Years Ago

Today is Wednesday, Feb. 2, the 33rd day of 2011. There are 332 days left in the year. This is Groundhog Day.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1653: New Amsterdam — now New York City — is incorporated.

1876: The National League of Professional Base Ball Clubs is formed in New York.

1897: Fire destroys the Pennsylvania state capitol in Harrisburg. (A new statehouse is dedicated on the same site in 1906.)

1948: President Harry S. Truman sends a 10-point civil rights program to Congress, where the proposals run into fierce opposition from southern lawmakers.

1961: Hijackers of the Portuguese ocean liner the Santa Maria allow passengers and crew to disembark in Brazil, 11 days after seizing the ship.

1971: Idi Amin, having seized power in Uganda, proclaims himself president.

1990: In a dramatic concession to South Africa’s black majority, President F.W. de Klerk lifts a ban on the African National Congress and promises to free Nelson Mandela.

VINDICATOR FILES

1986: The Youngstown Water Department declares war on customers who skip out on water bills or who are chronically late in paying.

The Youngstown Board of Education considers salary increases of up to 5.71 percent for administrators and supervisory personnel.

The U.S. auto industry’s flirtation with plastics is “terrifying” domestic steelmakers who have been investing billions to make corrosion-resistant metal for cars, says a spokesman for the American Iron & Steel Institute.

1971: The groundhog can look for a chilly reception in Youngstown, where overnight temperatures dropped to -8 degrees.

Tom Pagna, offensive backfield coach for Ara Parseghian at Notre Dame, and Don Miller, one of the immortal “Four Horsemen” who is a U.S. Bankruptcy Court referee in Cleveland, share speaking duties at the Vestibule Club of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel’s 6th annual sports banquet.

1961: Temperatures at Youngstown Municipal Airport dropped to a record low overnight of -11.

Fire guts four downtown buildings in the village of Columbiana, destroying several businesses and driving occupants of second floor apartments into the cold. The loss is set at $210,000.

The Youngstown Transit Co. reports earnings of $9,074 in December for a 7.74 percent return on its capital value.

1936: City police capture two young bandits who had menaced a family of five at their Ford Avenue home. The robbers apparently expected Mr. and Mrs. Gersh Leibel to arrive home with the receipts from their store in Campbell.

Edward Galaida and a crew of WPA writers are at work in the basement of Youngstown City Hall assembling material for “The American Guide,” a writing project that employs 5,000 people across the nation. Among the little known facts uncovered: Youngstown preachers were once paid in bottles of liquor, Poland had 18 stills and Mill Creek Park was founded during a depression in 1893 and became a relief work project.

Dewey Crum of the Dunning Crum Ice and Coal Co. of Youngstown is re-elected president of the Ohio Ice Industries Association during a meeting in Toledo.