YEARS AGO

Today is Thursday, Aug. 4, the 217th day of 2016. There are 149 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1790: The U.S. Coast Guard has its beginnings as President George Washington signs a measure authorizing a group of revenue cutters to enforce tariff and trade laws and prevent smuggling.

1892: Andrew and Abby Borden are axed to death in their home in Fall River, Mass. Lizzie Borden, Andrew’s daughter from a previous marriage, is accused of the killings, but is acquitted at trial.

1914: Britain declares war on Germany for invading Belgium; the U.S. proclaims its neutrality in the mushrooming world conflict.

1944: Diarist Anne Frank, 15, is arrested with her sister, parents and four others by the Gestapo after hiding for two years inside a building in Amsterdam. (Anne and her sister, Margot, die at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.)

1964: The bodies of missing civil-rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James Chaney are found buried in an earthen dam in Mississippi.

1977: President Jimmy Carter signs a measure establishing the Department of Energy.

1987: The Federal Communications Commission votes to abolish the Fairness Doctrine, which required radio and television stations to present balanced coverage of controversial issues.

1991: The Greek luxury liner Oceanos sinks in heavy seas off South Africa’s southeast coast; the 402 passengers and 179 crew members all survive, largely through the efforts of ship’s entertainers who oversaw rescue operations.

VINDICATOR FILES

1991: Dennis Vitt, chairman of the Mahoning County Republican, says he is “very serious” about recruiting baseball player Dave Dravecky to run for Mahoning County commissioner.

Mahoning County Commissioner Thomas J. Carney says the current system of county government no longer works, and three commissioners are not sufficient for running a county.

Mercer County, Pa., officials are spending $225,900 for a major exterior restoration project on the 80-year-old county courthouse.

1976: A tractor-trailer rig loaded with chemicals and machinery strikes an auto containing a Minnesota woman and her six children and plunges off an Interstate 80 bridge into Lake Milton. The truck driver swims to safety. The truck driver, the woman and her children were released after treatment at South Side Hospital.

William E. “Rip” Repasky begins his duties as chief clerk to the Mahoning County commissioners, succeeding Stephen R. Benish, who retired.

Ron DeJulio, a recent graduate of Mount Union college and a former All-Steel Valley defensive back for Hubbard High School, accepts an assistant coaching position at Madison High School in Mansfield.

1966: Directors of Taylor-Winfield Co., local machinery and equipment manufacturer, approves completion of a $1.8 million expansion plan that calls for some new construction and extensive rearranging of the plant’s facilities.

Eleven young people from Central Christian Church, led by their associate pastor, the Rev. Bruce Cooley, and chaperones Betty Chubbs and Darl Dolan, return from a 22-day trip in two coaches to Mexico.

David E. Linebaugh of Struthers is named director of the Mahoning County Red Cross Youth Program.

1941: Pilgrim Congregational and First Unitarian congregations appoint committees to formulate a possible merger of the two churches.

Thomas Herbert, the Ohio attorney general, rules that under teacher tenure, teachers with life contracts can’t be fired for marrying in violation of local school board rules or be forced to retire before age 70.

Sixty-two airplanes carrying about 150 people, including 20 from Youngstown, visit Taylor Aviation Corp. in Alliance.