years ago

Today is Sunday, April 15, the 106th day of 2012. There are 260 days left in the year.

Associated Press

On this date in:

1865: President Abraham Lincoln dies, nine hours after being shot the night before by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theater in Washington. Andrew Johnson becomes the nation’s 17th president.

1912: The British luxury liner RMS Titanic sinks in the North Atlantic off Newfoundland at 2:20 a.m. ship’s time, more than 21/2 hours after striking an iceberg; 1,514 people died, while less than half as many survived.

1912: Kim Il Sung, North Korea’s longtime Communist ruler, is born Kim Sung-ju in Mangyondae, near Pyongyang.

1947: Jackie Robinson, baseball’s first black major league player, makes his official debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers on opening day.

1959: Cuban leader Fidel Castro arrives in Washington to begin a goodwill tour of the United States.

2002: The Vatican announces Pope John Paul II is summoning American cardinals to Rome for talks about sex-abuse scandals in the U.S. church.

Vindicator files

1987: Sharon Steel Corp. Chairman Victor Posner is meeting with representatives of a major investor in an attempt to stave off bankruptcy.

A hearing officer for the State Board of Education denies a request by residents of Boardman precincts 39 and 41 to be transferred from the Youngstown City School District to the Boardman Local School District.

Frank Rendes, a Warren firefighter and student of the history of the Titanic just back from the Titanic Historical Society’s convention in Wilmington, Del., says the sinking of the ship 75 years ago represented the end of an era.

1972: A violent thunderstorm dumps 2 inches of rain on the tri-county area. Niles Mayor William Thorp declares a state of emergency in his city.

President Richard Nixon wraps up a 40-hour visit to Canada, signing a cooperative blueprint for cleaning up the chain of Great Lakes along the U.S.-Canadian border.

Slugger Richie Allen, a former Wampum, Pa., athlete, joins the Chicago White Sox, a team managed by an old neighbor, Chuck Tanner of New Castle, Pa.

1962: Clifford A. Hoyt, 86, and his wife, Hallie, 77, of Austintown are killed when their car collides head-on with a truck in the Allegheny Tunnel of the Pennsylvania Turnpike while driving from their winter home in St. Petersburg, Fla.

Rescinding their price increases under pressure from President John F. Kennedy means Youngstown area steel mills will be in for tough sledding, and will have less money for modernization.

1937: Youngstown area steel companies begin retracting financial aid for company unions, also known as employee representative plans, in accord with the Wagner Act that was upheld as constitutional by the Supreme Court.

Youngstown’s 19th annual Community Chest campaign will open with a goal of $275,000.

Wellington T. Leonard, chairman of the state liquor control board, says that if Youngstown and Mahoning County don’t crack down on illegal liquor operations, the board can withhold liquor license fees from the local governments.