YEARS AGO FOR MAY 7

Today is Tuesday, May 7, the 127th day of 2019. There are 238 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1789: America’s first inaugural ball takes place in New York in honor of President George Washington, who took the oath of office a week earlier.

1915: A German U-boat torpedoes and sinks the British liner RMS Lusitania off the southern coast of Ireland, killing 1,198 people, including 128 Americans.

1939: Germany and Italy announce a military and political alliance known as the Rome-Berlin Axis.

1945: Germany signs an unconditional surrender at Allied headquarters in Rheims, France, ending its role in World War II.

1954: The 55-day Battle of Dien Bien Phu in Vietnam ends with Vietnamese insurgents overrunning French forces.

1975: President Gerald R. Ford declares an end to the “Vietnam era.” In Ho Chi Minh City – formerly Saigon – the Viet Cong celebrates its takeover.

1984: A $180 million out-of-court settlement is reached in the Agent Orange class-action suit brought by Vietnam veterans.

1992: The latest addition to America’s space shuttle fleet, Endeavour, goes on its first flight.

2014: Russian President Vladimir Putin softens his tone in a confrontation with the West, declaring that he has pulled his troops away from the Ukrainian border.

VINDICATOR FILES

1994: Understanding the birth of the Communist state, the 1917 Russian Revolution, and its effect on what’s happening in Russia in 1994 is the focus of a two-day conference at Youngstown State University.

Lock Beachum, D-2nd Ward, requests a resolution that would require Youngstown’s participation in any discussion about regionalizing Mahoning Valley drinking-water sources.

A new program aims at getting minority high-school students interested in college in the Shenango Valley.

1979: The Donofrio Homes, a rehabilitation program and halfway house for alcoholics and problem drinkers, is dedicated at 510 Parmalee Ave. It is named Judge for Joseph Donofrio of the 7th District Court of Appeals, who first supported programs for alcoholics as a municipal court judge.

Rich Hussar of Salem, a sophomore at YSU, is the top-rated weightlifter in the 165-pound class and has his eye on the Olympics. But he says time is running out to fully recover from a shoulder injury he suffered after winning the 1978 National Teenage Title.

The Butler Institute of American Art lends two George Wesley Bellows paintings to a traveling exhibition of Bellows’ work organized by the Columbus Museum of Fine Arts.

1969: Youngstown public schools and Youngstown residents win their greatest victory as the 12-mill school operating levy passes by about 7,000 votes to ensure the future for public education for the district’s 27,000 youngsters.

Democratic Mayor Anthony B. Flask will face Republican Jack C. Hunter in November. Flask got 18,080 votes to lead a four-man race; Hunter, unopposed, got 6,835 votes.

Marine Pfc. Edward A. Horn, 20, Poland Village Boulevard, twice wounded in Vietnam since August, is killed by enemy rifle fire while on patrol near Quang Tri Province.

1944: Stanislaus Orlemanski, Polish-American priest with family ties to Youngstown, completes a 12-day trip to Russia during which he met twice with Premier Joseph Stalin. He says that Stalin is “very friendly disposed toward the Roman Catholic Church.”

Ruth Shepherd, 14-year-old from Poland and county champion in 1943, wins The Vindicator’s 1944 district spelling bee when she spelled down 90 other school champions. Her last two words were silhouette and tambourine.

Seventeen warblers are seen during a 3-hour hike of Mill Creek Park by the Youngstown Chapter of the American Nature Club.