Years Ago

Today is Thursday, April 28, the 118th day of 2011. There are 247 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1758: The fifth president of the United States, James Monroe, is born in Westmoreland County, Va.

1788: Maryland becomes the seventh state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.

1789: The mutiny on HMS Bounty takes place as the crew of the British ship sets Capt. William Bligh and 18 sailors adrift in a launch in the South Pacific. (Bligh and most of the men with him manage to reach Timor in 47 days.)

1817: The United States and Britain sign the Rush-Bagot Treaty, which limits the number of naval vessels allowed in the Great Lakes.

1918: Gavrilo Princip, the assassin of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and the archduke’s wife, Sophie, dies in prison of tuberculosis.

1945: Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and his mistress, Clara Petacci, are executed by Italian partisans as they attempt to flee the country.

1952: War with Japan officially ends as a treaty signed in San Francisco the year before takes effect.

Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower resigns as Supreme Allied commander in Europe; he is succeeded by Gen. Matthew B. Ridgway.

1967: Heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali refuses to be inducted into the Army, the same day Gen. William C. Westmoreland tells Congress the U.S. “would prevail in Vietnam.”

1974: A federal jury in New York acquits former Attorney General John Mitchell and former Commerce Secretary Maurice H. Stans of charges in connection with a secret $200,000 contribution to President Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign from financier Robert Vesco.

VINDICATOR FILES

1986: Al Alli, shop chairman of the United Autoworkers Local 1112, says the labor-management climate at the General Motors Lordstown plant has changed for the better in the 1980s and the vehicles produced there are getting high marks on quality audits.

Local leaders will spend a day teaching classes at Youngstown high schools. Among the teachers for a day are state Sen. Harry Meshel, Atty. Don L. Hanni Jr., Jack Hunter, vice president of Mahoning National Bank, and school board President Anthony Julian.

1971: Three tornadoes follow erratic routes through south-central Kentucky, killing 10 people and injuring 100.

Agents of the U.S. Treasury Department are investigating the theft of dynamite from the Standard Slag Co.’s lime and stone plant on Courtney Road in Smith Township.

Stanley Kosenski, 84, of Plymouth Avenue, Girard, is in critical condition in North Side Hospital with burns suffered when he threw gasoline on a trash fire in his backyard and was caught in a backfire.

1961: The Youngstown Area Chamber of Commerce recommends an engineering study be done to determine the cost of the proposed Warren Avenue bridge over Mill Creek Park.

Pope John Paul XXIII honors 41 Youngstown diocesan priests, elevating five monsignori to the rank of protonotary apostolic and 36 priests to title of monsignor.

1936: A goal of $250,000 is set in the Youngstown Community Chest campaign and leaders vow they’ll meet the mark.

Mayor Lionel Evans names 30 permanent appointments to city positions. Fifteen present employees get letters of dismissal, including seven who had placed first on civil service exams.

About 120 pupils, all under 11, are marched to safety by a principal and three teachers from the Third Street School in East Liverpool which was destroyed by fire of undetermined origin.