Years ago

Today is Sunday, May 22, the 142nd day of 2011. There are 223 days left in the year.

Associated Press

On this date in:

1861: In what’s generally regarded as the first Union combat fatality of the Civil War, Pvt. Thornsbury Bailey Brown is shot and killed by a Confederate soldier at Fetterman Bridge in present-day West Virginia.

1939: The foreign ministers of Germany and Italy, Joachim von Ribbentrop and Galeazzo Ciano, sign a “Pact of Steel” committing the two countries to a military alliance.

1960: An earthquake of magnitude 9.5, the strongest on record, strikes southern Chile, claiming some 1,655 lives.

1968: The nuclear-powered submarine USS Scorpion, with 99 men aboard, sinks in the Atlantic Ocean.

1969: The lunar module of Apollo 10, with Thomas P. Stafford and Eugene Cernan aboard, flies to within 9 miles of the moon’s surface in a dress rehearsal for the first lunar landing.

1972: President Richard Nixon begins a visit to the Soviet Union, during which he and Kremlin leaders signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

Vindicator files

1986: AmeriTrust Co. opens a new bank branch at Renaissance Square on Federal Plaza. Company officials say they were encouraged to expand to the city by a long-time client, the Cafaro Co.

Winners in the school Bundle Day poster contest sponsored by Goodwill Industries are Michael Campana, Sherie and Stacie Simerlink, Jennifer Abram, Lindsay Vadjunec and Michelle Campana.

San Diego left-hander Dave Dravecky sets a personal record with 11 strike-outs in a four-hit dazzler against Philadelphia. The 7-2 victory was Dravecky’s second complete game of the season.

1971: By a 6-0 vote, city council gives Mayor Jack C. Hunter the authority to proclaim an emergency and order children under the age of 17 off the streets beginning at 8 p.m. Meanwhile, a vacant house at Garfield and Hillman streets, in an area of recent unrest, is damaged by an arson fire.

Douglas Shasby, district commercial manager of Ohio Bell Telephone Co., is named chairman of the 1971-72 Community Chest Drive.

William M. Cafaro, chairman of the board of William M. Cafaro Co. and a prominent Youngstown developer, is named to the board of the Youngstown Educational Foundation.

1961: A young Salem couple is found dead in a parked car in a lovers’ lane area off the Millville Hill section of Route 14. Coroner William Kolozsi issues a preliminary ruling of carbon monoxide poisoning.

Large crowds turn out for the ninth open house at the 757th Troop Carrier Squadron based at the Youngstown Airport, touring, among other attractions, the Flying Boxcars flown by the squadron.

Randall Park, now under the control of Edward J. DeBartolo of Youngstown, opens the thoroughbred racing season in Cleveland, the earliest opening ever for the track. DeBartolo also controls ThistleDown and Cranwood tracks.

1936: Truscon Steel Co. could furnish steel poles at a cost of $12 to $25, compared to $15 that the Youngstown Municipal Railway Co. would pay for wooden poles in building its trackless trolley system in the city.

Mose Hall, a former Youngstown city employee, is circulating petitions aimed at repealing the city’s charter.

Steel production in Youngstown is at 76 percent with the resumption of Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co.’s Bessemer plant and the idling of an open hearth at Brier Hill.