Years Ago

Today is Wednesday, March 2, the 61st day of 2011. There are 304 days left in the year.

Associated Press

On this date in:

1877: Republican Rutherford B. Hayes is declared the winner of the 1876 presidential election over Democrat Samuel J. Tilden, even though Tilden had won the popular vote.

1899: Mount Rainier National Park in Washington state is established.

1917: Puerto Ricans are granted U.S. citizenship as President Woodrow Wilson signs the Jones-Shafroth Act.

1939: Roman Catholic Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli is elected pope on his 63rd birthday; he takes the name Pius XII.

1943: The World War II Battle of the Bismarck Sea begins; U.S. and Australian warplanes inflict heavy damage on a Japanese convoy.

1989: Representatives from the 12 European Community nations agree to ban all production of CFC’s (chlorofluorocarbons) by the end of the 20th century.

2001: The United Nations tries in vain to persuade Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban to reverse its decision to destroy a pair of giant, ancient statues of Buddha and other Buddhist relics that the regime considered idolatrous.

Vindicator files

1986: General Motors officials are bullish on the future of the Buick-Oldsmobile-Cadillac Group’s Lordstown complex after a banner sales year for the plant’s Chevrolet Cavalier.

An option to buy the vacant Park Hotel on Courthouse Square in Warren is signed between longtime owner Charles Pugliese and Frank Tempesta, an agent for the Natale Co.

1971: Police and the FBI are seeking a middle-aged man who was recorded on a hidden camera robbing the Farmers National Bank in Salem. He escaped with $3,078.

More than 2,200 high school musicians compete at Boardman High School in the District V state solo and ensemble festival.

Gov. John J. Gilligan outlines the game plan for his Democratic administration in the State of the State Speech, but leaves the ball-carrying up to the Republican-dominated Legislature.

1961: The Austintown Board of Education lets contracts for construction of the Charles G. Watson Elementary School. General contractor, Nespeca Construction Co., $392,000; plumbing and heating, Bloomberg Plumbing, $109,464; and electrical, Hickle-Lea Electric, $41,768.

The Youngstown Hospital Association will receive $150,000 in federal funds toward the proposed expansion of the hospital‘s nursing school facilities.

1936: A man and a woman are killed and as many as five people are believed missing after a midday fire sweeps the Warren Hotel on Market Street in downtown Warren. Four others are known to be seriously injured.

East Palestine artist Ivan Hoon, whose painting “Old Covered Bridge” hangs in the office of the speaker of the House of Representatives, enters “Self Portrait” in the Mahoning Society of Painters exhibit at the Butler Art Institute.

Daniel O. McCauley, 60, widely known Youngstown funeral director for 33 years, dies at his home, 727 Himrod Ave., following a four month illness.