YEARS AGO

years ago

Today is Shrove Tuesday (preceding Ash Wednesday), Feb. 9, the 40th day of 2016. There are 326 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1773: The ninth president of the United States, William Henry Harrison, is born in Charles City County, Va.

1861: Jefferson Davis is elected provisional president of the Confederate States of America at a congress in Montgomery, Ala.

1870: The U.S. Weather Bureau is established.

1942: The U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff has its first formal meeting to coordinate military strategy during World War II.

1943: The World War II battle of Guadalcanal in the southwest Pacific ends with an Allied victory over Japanese forces.

1950: In a speech in Wheeling, W.Va., Sen. Joseph McCarthy, R-Wis., charges the State Department is riddled with Communists.

1964: The Beatles make their first live American television appearance on “The Ed Sullivan Show,” broadcast from New York City by CBS.

1971: A magnitude-6.6 earthquake in California’s San Fernando Valley claims 65 lives.

The crew of Apollo 14 returns to Earth after man’s third landing on the moon.

1986: During its latest visit to the solar system, Halley’s Comet comes closest to the sun (its next return will be in 2061).

2002: Britain’s Princess Margaret, sister of Queen Elizabeth II, dies in London at age 71.

2006: President George W. Bush defends U.S. surveillance efforts, saying spy work helped thwart terrorists plotting to use shoe bombs to hijack an airliner and crash it into the tallest skyscraper on the West Coast.

2011: Thousands of workers go on strike across Egypt, adding a new dimension to the uprising as public rage turns to the vast wealth President Hosni Mubarak’s family reportedly amassed while close to half the country struggles near the poverty line.

2015: President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, meeting at the White House, rally behind efforts to reach a long-shot diplomatic resolution in Ukraine.

VINDICATOR FILES

1991: Medical workers at the Mahoning County jail ask county commissioners to spare them the budget-cutting knife because they already are understaffed, and further cutbacks would result in the county’s falling below federal jail standards.

Four anti-abortion demonstrators arrested in Youngstown in November file a class-action lawsuit complaining of unhealthful, unsanitary and inhumane conditions in the Youngstown City Jail.

Youngstown Litter Control and Recycling crews will begin picking up paper, glass, plastic and cans from 150 houses in the Parkside neighborhood, inaugurating the city’s first curbside recycling program.

Jim Goske scores 23 points in Boardman’s victory over Ursuline, 62-52, giving Goske 1,003 career points, behind only Al Burns, 1,013; Fred Davis, 1,054, and Greg Dunn, 1,385 in Spartan history.

1976: U.S. Sen. Robert Taft Jr. opens his campaign for re-election with stops in four Ohio cities, including Youngstown. At the Youngstown Municipal Airport, Taft says he “will continue to support programs that help those who need help but will continue to fight programs that do nothing but fatten those who govern.”

Girard High School seniors are selling black and red “Tell the World you’re from Indian country” license plates.

Dr. Robert B. Walker, a psychologist, is appointed coordinator of emergency and intake at the Child and Adult Mental Health Center in Youngstown.

1966: Bishop James W. Malone of Youngstown will join an ecumenical service at Temple Emanu-El. Rabbi Harold Schecter calls it a “historic occasion.”

“Rusty,” a collie-German shepherd owned by Walter A . Laskowski Jr., 14, of Euclid Boulevard, Youngstown, wins first prize in a dog-food contest. Rusty’s master gets a new station wagon, a new convertible, a mink coat and $5,000 in cash.

The Lowellville Board of Education discusses reinstituting kindergarten if a levy is passed.

1941: Beginning this week, one 45-minute class period per week will be set aside for religious education in Youngstown’s public schools. Protestant, Catholic and Jewish classes will be taught.

The Home Show coming to Stambaugh Auditorium will afford thousands of Mahoning Valley residents their first glimpse of actual television.

The 1940 census figures show Youngstown’s population dropped from 170,002 to 167,624 in the past decade.