Years Ago

Today is Tuesday, Aug. 14, the 227th day of 2012. There are 139 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1848: The Oregon Territory is created.

1908: A race riot erupts in Springfield, Ill., as a white mob begins setting black-owned homes and businesses on fire; at least two blacks and five whites are killed in the violence.

1935: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Social Security Act into law.

1945: President Harry S. Truman announces that Japan has surrendered unconditionally, ending World War II.

1948: The Summer Olympics in London ends; they are the first Olympic games held since 1936.

1951: Newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst, 88, dies in Beverly Hills, Calif.

1962: Robbers hold up a U.S. mail truck in Plymouth, Mass., making off with more than $1.5 million; the loot has never been recovered.

1973: U.S. bombing of Cambodia comes to a halt.

1992: The White House announces that the Pentagon would begin emergency airlifts of food to Somalia to alleviate mass deaths by starvation.

VINDICATOR FILES

1987: Farrell City Treasurer James Kaikis sends a letter to city employees notifying them that overtime worked after Sept. 1 may not be paid until 1988 because of the city’s cash flow problems.

U.S. Rep. James A. Traficant Jr. will ask Columbiana County Democratic Party Chairman Don Gosney to form a committee to explore the feasibility of Traficant running for president in 1988.

Mahoning County Republican Party Chairman Dr. William Binning says he will remain neutral in the battle between U.S. Rep. Bob McEwen, R-Hillsboro, and Cleveland Mayor George Voinovich who are vying for the Republican nomination to challenge U.S. Sen. Howard Metzenbaum.

1972: Seven businesses in three downtown New Castle buildings are ruined by an early morning fire that swept through most of a business block on E. Washington Street between N. Mercer Street and Apple Way

The worst weekend traffic toll in many years is registered in the Youngstown area as 12 people are killed in three accidents, including one in which seven died, including five members of the Harold C. Gray family of Lisbon.

Mrs. Ann Livingston, 97, whose husband founded the Charles Livingston Co. in Youngstown, dies at Heritage Manor.

1962: Dan Maggianetti, chief of the Youngstown police intelligence squad, sends a letter to the mayor’s office, the Ohio Board of Liquor Control, the governor and Ohio Bell Telephone asking that telephone service be removed from Tisone’s Tavern, a Wilson Avenue gambling spot.

The Mahoning County Budget Commission takes under advisement the Youngstown Library’s request of $1,187,000 for 1963, of which $425,300 comes from a special levy approved at the polls in November 1961.

1937: Kenneth Delahunty, former basketball star at Westminster College, receives his masters degree at Penn State College and accepts the position of teacher and basketball coach at Hickory High School near Sharon.

Two men die in the collision of a motorcycle and an automobile at Arlington Street and North Avenue. Dead are Eugene Mattson, 25, and Jack Moran, 20, both of Girard.

A crowd of nearly 10,000 jam Evans Field for a two-hour safety show staged by the Ohio State Safety Council and The Vindicator encouraging traffic safety.