Years Ago

Today is Saturday, April 23, the 113th day of 2011. There are 252 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1616: English poet and dramatist William Shakespeare, 52, dies on what has been traditionally regarded as the anniversary of his birth in 1564.

1789: President-elect George Washington moves into the first executive mansion, the Franklin House, in New York.

1791: The 15th president of the United States, James Buchanan, is born in Franklin County, Pa.

1896: The Vitascope system for projecting movies onto a screen is publicly demonstrated in New York City.

1910: Former President Theodore Roosevelt delivers his “Man in the Arena” speech at the Sorbonne in Paris.

1940: About 200 people die in the Rhythm Night Club fire in Natchez, Miss.

1954: Hank Aaron of the Milwaukee Braves hits the first of his record 755 major-league home runs, in a game against the St. Louis Cardinals. (The Braves win, 7-5.)

1961: Judy Garland performs her legendary concert at New York’s Carnegie Hall.

1968: Student protesters begin occupying buildings on the campus of Columbia University in New York; police put down the protests a week later.

1969: Sirhan Sirhan is sentenced to death for assassinating New York Sen. Robert F. Kennedy. (The sentence is later reduced to life imprisonment.)

1985: The Coca-Cola Co. announces it is changing the secret flavor formula for Coke (negative public reaction forced the company to resume selling the original version).

VINDICATOR FILES

1986: Youngstown Mayor Patrick J. Ungaro says state assistance will be needed to overcome a liability crisis that is threatening operation of city parks, pools and playgrounds.

The EPA names two Superfund clean-up sites in Ashtabula County, but will not address longstanding problems at the Deerfield Dump.

The Idora Park Ballroom schedules a half-dozen events through the Memorial Day weekend, after which it will be closed to the public.

1971: Five bus loads of marchers for National Peace Action Day in Washington leave from Central Square.

Norman E. Day, 67, a retired South High history teacher and longtime stamp editor of The Vindicator, dies in South Side Hospital.

Three robbers fire three shots at druggist Albert Shears at the Benita Drugstore before emptying the cash register and fleeing. There are no injuries.

1961: Applications for admission at Youngstown University for the fall semester are running about 15 percent ahead of those a year ago with 736 applications received.

The public works subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee will begin hearings on the proposed Lake Erie-Ohio River waterway and some observers believe the canal has its best chance of being built in a century.

1936: A half mile police chase during which one shot was fired results in the arrest of three young men suspected of breaking a window in a grocery store at 2422 Mahoning Avenue in a burglary attempt.

Former President Herbert Hoover is given the Republican nomination for president on the sixth ballot in a mock national convention by Westminster College students at New Wilmington, Pa.