YEARS AGO

Today is Sunday, March 8, the 67th day of 2015. There are 298 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1702: England’s Queen Anne accedes to the throne upon the death of King William III.

1854: U.S. Commodore Matthew C. Perry makes his second landing in Japan; within a month, he concludes a treaty with the Japanese.

1862: During the Civil War, the ironclad CSS Virginia rams and sinks the USS Cumberland and heavily damages the USS Congress, both frigates, off Newport News, Va.

1874: The 13th president of the United States, Millard Fillmore, dies in Buffalo, N.Y., at age 74.

1917: Russia’s “February Revolution” (referring to the Old Style calendar) begins in Petrograd; the result is the abdication of the Russian monarchy in favor of a provisional government.

The U.S. Senate votes to limit filibusters by adopting the cloture rule.

1930: The 27th president of the United States, William Howard Taft, dies in Washington at age 72.

1944: Two days after an initial strike, U.S. heavy bombers resume raiding Berlin during World War II.

1965: The United States lands its first combat troops in South Vietnam as 3,500 Marines arrive to defend the U.S. air base at Da Nang.

1971: Joe Frazier defeats Muhammad Ali by decision in what was billed as “Fight of the Century” at Madison Square Garden in New York.

Silent film comedian Harold Lloyd dies in Beverly Hills, Calif., at age 77.

1975: The first International Women’s Day is celebrated.

Academy Award-winning movie director George Stevens (Film: “Giant”) dies in Lancaster, Calif., at age 70.

1979: Technology firm Philips demonstrates a prototype compact disc player during a press conference in Eindhoven, the Netherlands.

1983: In a speech to the National Association of Evangelicals convention in Orlando, Fla., President Ronald Reagan refers to the Soviet Union as an “evil empire.”

1999: Baseball Hall-of-Famer Joe DiMaggio dies in Hollywood, Fla., at age 84.

2005: President George W. Bush says authoritarian rule in the Middle East has begun to ease, and he insists anew that Syria has to end its nearly three-decade occupation of Lebanon.

Hundreds of thousands jam a central Beirut square, chanting support for Syria in a thundering show of strength by the militant group Hezbollah.

Chechen rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov is killed in northern Chechnya during a raid by Russian forces.

2010: President Barack Obama makes a spirited, shirt-sleeved appeal for passage of health care legislation during a visit to Arcadia University in Pennsylvania.

A magnitude 6 earthquake strikes eastern Turkey, killing at least 41 people.

2014: Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, a Boeing 777 with 239 people on board, vanishes during a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, setting off a massive search for its whereabouts. (To date, the fate of the jetliner and its occupants has yet to be determined.)

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1990: Edward Swiger Jr. is sentenced to life in prison with parole eligibility in 30 years for the 1988 beating death of Roger Pratt to prevent him from testifying against him about crimes committed when they were roommates at Thiel College in Greenville, Pa., in 1987.

The Diocese of Youngs-town will close Holy Name School, which has served the West Side of Youngstown since 1920.

Congressman James A. Traficant Jr. is becoming a darling of national news shows and C-Span because, “He says blunt things bluntly,” according to Norman Ornstein, a political analyst with the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C. “Lee Iacocca found that that works,” adds Ornstein.

1975: Trading in securities of Ajax Magnethermic Corp., big Warren manufacturer of electroheating facilities, is halted temporarily as a big western European firm is reported to be preparing a multimillion-dollar bid for control of the firm.

An arsonist ignites kerosene and kerosene-soaked rags throughout a vacant house at 331 Bradley Lane, causing $25,000 damage in the city’s third arson in as many days.

J. Ronald Pittman, executive director of the Youngstown Area Development Corp., is invited by President Gerald Ford to participate in a “think tank” session on minority business development with top government officials at the While House.

1965: Thelma Wildpret, E. Midlothian Boulevard, primary supervisor in the Youngstown public school system, is named president-elect of the Ohio Council of the International Reading Association.

Heritage Manor, the new Jewish home, built at a cost of $650,000 on a 20-acre site on Gypsy Lane, is ready to open. Adjacent to the Jewish Community Center, it will accommodate 40 people.

1940: Two armed men kidnap and rob Jacob M. Eshler of Berlin Township of $22 after Eshler refused to open the safe of the Farm Service Co., Canfield, where he had been working late.

The huge Central Square Garage is moved 3 feet, an eighth of an inch at a time, away from Commerce Street by the Eichleay Engineering Corp. The 10,000 ton brick building is being moved to allow street widening.

Oral examination will be given to 163 applicants for jobs in the Youngstown Police Department. About 100 applicants for jobs in the fire department already have been examined.