Years Ago

Today is Sunday, Aug. 5, the 218th day of 2012. There are 148 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1864: During the Civil War, Union Adm. David G. Farragut leads his fleet to victory in the Battle of Mobile Bay, Ala.

1884: The cornerstone for the Statue of Liberty’s pedestal is laid on Bedloe’s Island in New York Harbor.

1912: The Progressive Party, also known as the “Bull Moose Party,” convenes in Chicago. (The party is formed by former President Theodore Roosevelt following a split in the Republican Party.)

1921: A baseball game is broadcast for the first time as KDKA radio announcer Harold Arlin describes the action between the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Philadelphia Phillies from Forbes Field. (The Pirates win, 8-5.)

1924: The comic strip “Little Orphan Annie” by Harold Gray makes its debut.

1936: Jesse Owens of the United States wins the 200-meter dash at the Berlin Olympics, collecting the third of his four gold medals.

1953: Operation Big Switch begins as prisoners taken during the Korean conflict are exchanged at Panmunjom.

1962: Actress Marilyn Monroe, 36, is found dead in her Los Angeles home; her death is ruled a probable suicide from “acute barbiturate poisoning.”

1963: The United States, Britain and the Soviet Union sign a treaty in Moscow banning nuclear tests in the atmosphere, in space and underwater.

1981: The federal government begins firing air traffic controllers who had gone out on strike.

VINDICATOR FILES

1987: A 29-year-old Youngstown man, Dwain Wallace, is shot and killed by a Pentagon security guard who said Wallace pulled a gun at an entrance to the Pentagon.

Cold Metal Products Co. doubles its size and revenues when it completes the acquisition of three specialty steel operations from the Stanley Works, the New Britain, Conn.-based tool maker.

Six weeks after President Reagan vetoed a bill passed by the House and Senate making the Fairness Doctrine broadcast policy law, the Federal Communications Commission unilaterally repeals the 38-year-old doctrine.

1972: The temperature drops to a record low of 44 degrees overnight at the Youngstown Municipal Airport.

Plans are being made for Democratic presidential nominee George McGovern to visit the General Motors Assembly Division plant at Lordstown.

The Most Rev. Anthony De Saram, Bishop of Galle, Ceylon, speaks at Sacred Heart Church in Youngstown as part of a mission appeal for his country.

1962: Two gunmen kidnap a Youngstown patrolman and the produce manager of an A&P Supermarket on Belmont Avenue as they were headed to make a night deposit and escape with money bags containing an estimated $17,500. The thieves surprised patrolman Paul O’Neill and Walter McElwan in the store parking lot.

William H. Veelman, 74, of New Castle, Pa., drowns in Pine Lake in Southern Mahoning County after failing from a rented fishing boat while trying to bag a fish he had on his line.

The Trumbull County Fair ends its week-long run at the Elm Road Fairgrounds with a record attendance estimated at 175,000 .

1937: Infantile paralysis claims its second Trumbull County victim within a week. Both boys died in Youngstown hospitals: Fred Vinarksi, 11, of Girard, and Paul Berlin, 14, of Niles.

Estimates place the take from illegal gambling in Youngstown at $3 million a year, with about $2 million of that spent on the “bug.”

Trumbull County Common Pleas Judge Lynn B. Griffith sentences four men who confessed guilt to bombings during the steel strike to the Ohio penitentiary for terms of 1 to 20 years. They are Arthur Scott, 40; Sidney Alkins, 27, Charles Byers, 32, and Joe Orawic, 22.

The Sharon Chamber of Commerce pledges to do its part to support development of a regional airport in Vienna Township, Trumbull County.

The Thomas Struthers Memorial Library, the largest branch of the Youngstown Public Library, opens in the K of P Building on Bridge Street in Struthers, culminating three years of work by Struthers civic leaders.