Years Ago

September 21, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

Today is Tuesday, Sept. 21, the 264th day of 2010. There are 101 days left in the year.

Associated Press

On this date in:

1893: One of America’s first horseless carriages is taken for a short test drive in Springfield, Mass. by Frank Duryea, who had designed the gasoline-powered vehicle with his brother, Charles.

1897: The New York Sun runs its famous editorial that declared, “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.”

1931: Britain goes off the gold standard.

1937: “The Hobbit,” by J.R.R. Tolkien, is first published.

1938: A hurricane strikes parts of New York and New England, causing widespread damage and claiming some 700 lives.

1948: Milton Berle makes his debut as permanent host of “The Texaco Star Theater” on NBC-TV.

1970: “NFL Monday Night Football” debuts on ABC-TV as the Cleveland Browns defeat the visiting New York Jets, 31-21.

National Football League players begin a 57-day strike, their first regular-season walkout ever.

1987: NFL players call a strike, mainly over the issue of free agency. (The 24-day walkout prompted football owners to hire replacement players.)

1989: Hurricane Hugo, packing sustained winds up to 135 mph, crashes into Charleston, S.C.

Twenty-one students in Alton, Texas, die when their school bus, involved in a collision with a soft-drink delivery truck, careens into a water-filled pit.

Vindicator files

1985: Farrell City Council is told the city has no more money to pay overtime in the Fire Department.

An internal investigation into reports of illicit sexual activities in the Mahoning County Jail leads to an indictment charging one deputy with promoting prostitution and to the resignation of two other deputies.

The Michigan Hanger Co. celebrates is 20th anniversary by announcing plans to buy an out-of-state operation, similar to its plant in Hubbard, which will create 25 to 30 new jobs.

1970: The Mahoning Valley Regional Mass Transit Authority launches a week-long campaign to increase riding on its buses and inform the public of the advantages of mass transportation.

Mike Saleh who owns the often-robbed Jerusalem Market at 518 Glenwood Ave., fires two shots at three robbers who were escaping with $200. He believes he wounded one in the shoulder.

Jefferson D. Holbrook of West Middlesex, Pa., a 16-year-old escapee from the Ohio Youth Commission is shot to death by a Niles policeman while the youth was fleeing from a stolen wrecked car on the near East Side.

1960: The voter registration rush continues in Mahoning County, with totals reaching 137,064.

Elizabeth Ford of Hubbard is elected 1960 Homecoming Queen of Youngstown University.

American Radiator & Standard Sanitary Co. must sell its Youngstown Kitchens Division, which has plants in Warren and Salem, under a consent judgment the Justice Department says.

1935: A day after Youngs–town police seize a slot machine from the lunch room of the Hotel Vanier and arrest the owner of the hotel, Mahoning County Sheriff Ralph Elser and his men join city police and confiscate 99 slot machines from the E. Commerce Street headquarters of the Knull Machine Co., and arrest two men.

Nearly 1,300 people file applications for an unspecified number of city jobs for which hiring will be done under civil service. The first examinations will be given to applicants for truck driver positions.

The Board of Elections votes to rent two voting machines from the Automatic Voting Machine Co. of Jamestown, N.Y., which will be used as an experiment in two Youngstown precincts in the November election.