YEARS AGO FOR JUNE 2

Today is Sunday, June 2, the 153rd day of 2019. There are 212 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1886: President Grover Cleveland, 49, married Frances Folsom, 21, in the Blue Room of the White House. (To date, Cleveland is the only president to marry in the executive mansion.)

1897: Mark Twain is quoted by the New York Journal as saying from London that “the report of my death was an exaggeration.” (Twain was responding to a report in the New York Herald that he was “grievously ill” and “possibly dying.”)

1924: Congress passes, and President Calvin Coolidge signs, a measure guaranteeing full American citizenship for all Native Americans born within U.S. territorial limits.

1941: Baseball’s “Iron Horse,” Lou Gehrig, dies in New York of a degenerative disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis; he was 37.

1953: The coronation of Queen Elizabeth II takes place in London’s Westminster Abbey, 16 months after the death of her father, King George VI.

1961: Playwright and director George S. Kaufman, 71, dies in New York.

1966: U.S. space probe Surveyor 1 lands on the moon and begins transmitting detailed photographs of the lunar surface.

1976: Arizona Republic investigative reporter Don Bolles is mortally wounded by a bomb planted underneath his car; he would die 11 days later. (Prosecutors believed Bolles was targeted because he had written stories that upset a liquor wholesaler; three men were convicted of the killing.)

1979: Pope John Paul II arrives in his native Poland on the first visit by a pope to a Communist country.

1983: Half of the 46 people aboard an Air Canada DC-9 are killed after fire broke out on board, forcing the jetliner to make an emergency landing at Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport.

1986: For the first time, the public can watch the proceedings of the U.S. Senate on television as a six-week experiment begins.

1997: Timothy McVeigh is convicted of murder and conspiracy in the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City that killed 168 people. (McVeigh was executed in June 2001.)

2004: The syndicated TV game show “Jeopardy!” begins airing contestant Ken Jennings’ 74-game winning streak.

2009: Scott Roeder, an anti-abortion activist, is charged with first-degree murder in the shooting death of late-term abortion provider Dr. George Tiller in Wichita, Kan. (Roeder was later convicted and sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole for 50 years.)

Chicago police officer Anthony Abbate is convicted of committing aggravated battery against Karolina Obrycka, a bartender half his size, after she’d refused to serve him more drinks; Abbate received probation.

2014: Spain’s King Juan Carlos, who’d led the transition from dictatorship to democracy but faced damaging scandals amid a financial meltdown, announces he will abdicate in favor of his more popular son, Felipe.

2018: Bare-knuckle boxing matches take place in front of 2,000 rowdy fans at a hockey rink in Cheyenne, Wyo.; the event, promoted as the first legal, regulated and sanctioned bare-knuckle fight event in U.S. history, featured 10 bouts and was viewed by tens of thousands via pay-per-view.

VINDICATOR FILES

1994: Billy Lucarell of Girard, The Vindicator’s spelling champion, falls in the third round of the national bee in Washington, D.C., on the word “meticulous.”

Youngstown City Council approves a mutual aid agreement with Youngstown State University that will give university police the same authority as city police in the YSU area.

Kipton C. Kumler is named president and CEO of Commercial Intertech Corp.

1979: State, county and local officials launch a campaign to persuade two Japanese researchers that Northeast Ohio is the best place to build a test track for high-speed rail.

Paul E. McSherry is named Sharon’s new fire chief by Mayor Robert Price.

Ohio Lt. Gov. George V. Voinovich, whose father, an architect, supervised construction of the parish house at Holy Trinity Serbian Orthodox Church, will be among the guests at the church’s 50th anniversary celebration.

1969: Bishop James W. Malone of Youngstown will receive an honorary doctor of humane letters degree at the 47th spring commencement of Youngstown State University. Nearly 1,000 students, the largest graduating class in YSU history, will receive diplomas.

William Davis Jr., 52, Sebring Ford dealer, is killed when he lost control of his car at 95 mph during a time trial at the Ohio Drag City on Gibson Road.

Albert Green, 32, of Himrod Avenue, is shot in the face and killed when he attempted to break up a fight between two men during an argument at a South Side drinking spot.

1944: In a heated election in the Buckeye Lodge, John Legree is re-elected exalted ruler and George Washington, leading knight.

Navy Signalman 3rd Class Cecil Lawman, an East High School honor student and one of the most outstanding athletes to graduate from the school, drowns at sea when his Army transport was sunk by a German submarine.

The Rev. William A. Dunn, pastor of St. Ann Church, will be director of the Father Kane Camp near Lake Milton when it opens for the summer June 25.