Years Ago

Today is Sunday, April 28, the 118th day of 2013. There are 247 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1788: Maryland becomes the seventh state to ratify the Constitution of the United States.

1789: Rebelling crew members of the British ship HMS Bounty led by Fletcher Christian set Capt. William Bligh and 18 sailors adrift in a launch in the South Pacific. (Bligh and most of the men with him manage to reach Timor in 47 days.)

1817: The United States and Britain sign the Rush-Bagot Treaty, which limits the number of naval vessels allowed in the Great Lakes.

1918: Gavrilo Princip, the assassin of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and the archduke’s wife, Sophie, dies in prison of tuberculosis.

1945: Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and his mistress, Clara Petacci, are executed by Italian partisans as they attempt to flee the country.

1952: Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower resigns as Supreme Allied commander in Europe; he is succeeded by Gen. Matthew B. Ridgway.

1967: Heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali refuses to be inducted into the Army, the same day Gen. William C. Westmoreland tells Congress the U.S. “would prevail in Vietnam.”

1980: President Jimmy Carter accepts the resignation of Secretary of State Cyrus R. Vance, who had opposed the failed rescue mission aimed at freeing American hostages in Iran. (Vance is succeeded by Edmund Muskie.)

1988: A flight attendant is killed and more than 60 persons injured when part of the roof of an Aloha Airlines Boeing 737 tears off during a flight from Hilo to Honolulu.

VINDICATOR FILES

1988: Mahoning County Sheriff Edward P. Nemeth says one of his lieutenants charged by federal authorities with soliciting a bribe from organized crime figures was working undercover to infiltrate the mob, but he has no paperwork on the probe.

Edward J. DeBartolo Corp. enters a joint venture with Dillard Department Stores of Little Rock, Ark., to purchase the 17-store Joseph Horne Co. of Pittsburgh.

Youngstown police conduct a sweep of the Police Department and City Hall looking for electronic eavesdropping devices, but no bugs were found.

1973: The Youngstown Education Association’s new president, Charles Jewell, sends a letter to Supt. Robert Pegues expressing a willingness to resume contract negotiations. Former president Matilda Wren declared an impasse after accusing Pegues of misleading employees.

Trumbull County Common Pleas Judge David M. Griffith orders Girard to permit a water tap-in for an almost-completed motel and restaurant on Belmont Avenue near Interstate 80.

The Youngstown Planning Commission rejects for the second time a zone change request to permit construction of a $2.5 million condominium abutting Mill Creek Park off Canfield Road.

1963: Milton G. McInnes, president of the Erie-Lackawanna Railroad, presents an optimistic view on the nation’s economy and the railroad industry in an address to 500 members and guests of the Erie-Lackawanna Railroad Veterans Association at Hotel Pick-Ohio.

Oleen S. Hall, a 19-year-old sophomore at Grove City College, will reign as “Miss Blue Tiger” of the 910th Troop Carrier Group at Youngstown Municipal Airport. Members of her court will be Phyllis D. Perry of Kent State University, Elaine M. Cooper of Youngstown University, Anne Daskalov of Mount Union College and Rebecca L. Way of Allegheny College.

Eva Plack of 568 North Road SE in Warren discovers that a painting she bought 35 years ago and had restored is not, as first thought, a painting of an Amish woman, but is a rare portrait of Elizabeth Seton, the first native American beatified by the Roman Catholic Church.

1938: Miriam Koch of Struthers, a junior at Capital University, is chosen queen of the university’s May Day celebration.

Directors of the Youngstown Chamber of Commerce criticize President Roosevelt’s federal recovery program as “economically unsound” and asks that business be encouraged to create jobs for the unemployed.

Four Youngstown College juniors vie for Prom Queen: Marion Parmenter, Helen Gifford, Rose Rosapepe and Katherine Jones.

Norman Smith, 19-year-old farm hand under indictment for the first degree murder of three people on a North Lima farm, enters a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity before Judge Erskine Maiden Jr.