YEARS AGO FOR APRIL 17

Today is Monday, April 17, the 107th day of 2017. There are 258 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1492: A contract is signed by Christopher Columbus and a representative of Spain’s King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, giving Columbus a commission to seek a westward ocean passage to Asia.

1924: The motion picture studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer is founded, the result of a merger of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures and the Louis B. Mayer Co.

1937: Cartoon character Daffy Duck debuts in the Warner Bros. animated short “Porky’s Duck Hunt,” directed by Tex Avery.

1961: Some 1,500 CIA-trained Cuban exiles launch the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in an attempt to topple Fidel Castro, whose forces would crush the incursion by the third day.

1972: The Boston Marathon allows women to compete for the first time.

2007: A day after the Virginia Tech massacre, President George W. Bush visits the campus, where he tells students and teachers at a somber convocation that the nation is praying for them.

VINDICATOR FILES

1992: U.S. Rep. James Traficant Jr. of Poland, D-17th, plans to submit a bill to Congress designating Mahoning and Trumbull counties as part of the poverty-stricken Appalachian region, entitling the counties to more federal funds. The two counties later were approved for membership in the region.

A gentle German Shepherd-Rottweiler mix is recovering 44 BB pellets and a 22-caliber bullet at the Trumbull County Animal Welfare League shelter. The dog, who has been named “Sabrina,” was found near death on Creed Street in Hubbard Township.

Austintown Township trustees are researching whether “home rule” would provide a new and better way of governing the township.

1977: U.S. Sen. H. John Heinz III, speaking at the groundbreaking for Sharon’s new $2.7 million city hall, says he is “extremely skeptical of President Carter’s plan to increase the gasoline tax by 25 to 50 cents as a conservation measure.

Conrail is virtually rebuilding its Youngstown-Ashtabula Line in expectation of unusually heavy rail traffic in 1977.

Jeff Holmes, 17, a junior at Hubbard High School, is elected governor of Ohio Key clubs at the state convention in Cleveland.

The Rev. Diane Kenney, former acting chaplain at Mills College in Stockton, Calif., is named Protestant chaplain at Youngstown State University.

1967: Franz Bibo, former conductor of the New York City Symphony Orchestra and the Oberlin College Orchestra, is the new director of the Youngstown Philharmonic Orchestra, selected from more than 100 candidates.

A program to inform high-school youths on ways to increase their skills and educations is planned by Phi Delta Kappa, a national teachers society. The planning committee includes Miss Gloria Tribble, Mrs. Harold Davis, Miss Tomacine Satterwhite, Mrs. Mable Costa and Miss Mary Orton.

1942: John Scalzilli, former Youngstowner, finishes his third season with the “Met” orchestra in Cleveland. When he played in Youngstown, he invented the fifth string for the bass fiddle.

Youngstown housewives can expect to get their ration books in early May allowing them to buy a half-pound of sugar weekly for each person in their household.

An assembly plant for machine tools vitally needed in the war effort will be opened in Mineral Ridge by the Federal Machine & Welder Co. of Warren.