YEARS AGO

years ago

Today is Thursday, March 10, the 70th day of 2016. There are 296 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1785: Thomas Jefferson is appointed America’s minister to France, succeeding Benjamin Franklin.

1864: President Abraham Lincoln assigns Ulysses S. Grant, who had just received his commission as lieutenant-general, to the command of the Armies of the United States.

1876: Alexander Graham Bell’s assistant, Thomas Watson, hears Bell say over his experimental telephone: “Mr. Watson – come here – I want to see you” from the next room of Bell’s Boston laboratory.

1880: The Salvation Army arrives in the United States from England.

1933: A magnitude-6.4 earthquake centered off Long Beach, Calif., results in 120 deaths.

1949: Nazi wartime broadcaster Mildred E. Gillars, also known as “Axis Sally,” is convicted in Washington, D.C., of treason. (She served 12 years in prison.)

1969: James Earl Ray pleads guilty in Memphis, Tenn., to assassinating civil-rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. (Ray later repudiated that plea, maintaining his innocence until his death.)

1980: “Scarsdale Diet” author Dr. Herman Tarnower is shot to death at his home in Purchase, N.Y. (Tarnower’s former lover, Jean Harris, was convicted of his murder; she served nearly 12 years in prison before being released in January 1993.)

1993: Dr. David Gunn is shot to death outside a Pensacola, Fla., abortion clinic. (Shooter Michael Griffin is serving a life sentence.)

2015: Breaking her silence in the face of a growing controversy over her use of a private email address and server, Hillary Rodham Clinton concedes that she should have used government email as secretary of state but insisted she had not violated any federal laws or Obama administration rules.

VINDICATOR FILES

1991:Some 25 Mahoning County and Youngstown officials have put license plates on their government cars that are meant to be used only on government-owned vehicles used in covert police operations.

Unlike fellow workers with much more seniority in the Mahoning County Clerk of Courts office, former Campbell Mayor James J. Vargo has survived a round of layoffs.

The old stone railroad arch that used to carry Conrail trains over Pa. Route 58 on the north end of Jamestown, Pa., slated for demolition by PennDOT has been given at least a temporary reprieve by a judge for the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission.

1976: Mahoning County commissioners hike the welfare department’s 1976 budget by $3 million, to nearly $13 million.

Mahoning County Recorder Horace G. Tetlow is elected acting chairman of the Mahoning County Democratic Central Committee to serve through the June 8 primary.

Ralph F. Gardunno, 38, of Youngstown is found guilty in Portage County Common Pleas Court of murder in the death of Karl Netolicky of Lake Milton and wounding of James Krug of Austintown in Atwater Township.

1966: Laraine Santangelo, a senior at Youngstown State University, is named Miss Youngstown and will represent the area at the Miss Ohio Pageant in Lima.

Youngstown City Council considers legislation to outlaw pinball machines as nuisances detrimental to public morals.

The Youngstown District Amateur Golf Association names Steve Pipoly as the area’s Golfer of the Year.

1941:Twice as many Youngstowners are filing income-tax returns in 1941 as in 1940, and revenue from the area is likely to increase by 40 percent, says Jerome Santangelo, IRS division chief.

The Mahoning Valley is digging out from under 9 inches of snow, the heaviest in the area in more than a year.

A shortage of farm labor in Trumbull County is apparent and is likely to get worse due to the draft and defense work.

Henry H. Hoppe, Warren attorney and leader of a group working for approval of the Berlin dam, testifies before the House public buildings and grounds committee.