Years Ago

Today is Wednesday, March 30, the 89th day of 2011. There are 276 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1867: U.S. Secretary of State William H. Seward reaches agreement with Russia to purchase the territory of Alaska for $7.2 million.

1945: The Soviet Union invades Austria during World War II.

1964: John Glenn withdraws from the Ohio race for the U.S. Senate because of injuries suffered in a fall.

1981: President Ronald Reagan is shot and seriously injured outside a Washington, D.C., hotel by John W. Hinckley Jr. Also wounded are White House press secretary James Brady; Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy and District of Columbia police officer Thomas Delahanty.

1986: Actor James Cagney dies at his farm in Stanfordville, N.Y., at age 86.

VINDICATOR FILES

1986: Cy Paumier, a city planner, says the Strouss-Kaufmann store in Youngstown lasted 10 years longer than it should have, considering the deterioration of the central business district.

More than a year after the US EPA began a clean up of toxic chemicals at the city-owned Albert Street Industrial Park, 244 barrels of PCB-contaminated soil remain at the site.

1971: Ron Sebest, North High School student, wins first prize in the 4th annual driver excellence contest sponsored by Amvets, based on a written exam and driving an obstacle course.

Youngstown City Council is considering appropriating $16,000 to replace a large window in the Youngstown Airport restaurant that was blown out almost two years ago by the blast from a jet airliner.

Film Pioneer Jack L. Warner will produce a movie version of the Broadway hit, “1776”, his first movie production in nearly seven years.

1961: Walter Bender, chairman of the board of General Fireproofing Co., Walter E. Watson, retired Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. executive, and L.A. Beeghly, president of Standard Slag Co., will head the drive for the Youngstown Hospital Association’s $1 million building drive.

More than 600 eastern Ohioans and western Pennsylvanians are invited to a meeting at the Hotel Pick-Ohio to round up support fro the Lake Erie-Ohio River waterway.

1936: J.C. Argetsinger, chairman of the Youngstown Chamber of Commerce, tells the U.S. Board of Army engineers that railroads opposed to a Lake Erie-Ohio River Canal are “fighting ghosts.”

Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. sales in 1935 shot up 37 percent over those of 1934 and showed a net profit of $1.6 million. Payroll exceeded $29 million, with an average employment of 17,200.