21 WFMJ archives  / March  19, 1993 | Renee Kalp and Shannon O'Neil prepared a ping-pong ball for launch at the Youngstown State University Physics Olympics 31 years ago. The Sharon High students, along with an unpictured teammate, Patrick Miller, placed first in the competition.

March 20 

2000: Edward J. DeBartolo Jr. signs over control of the San Francisco 49ers football team to his sister, Denise DeBartolo York. 

Responding to U.S. Rep. James A. Traficant's request that former Mahoning County Sheriff Phil Chance be moved from a Michigan prison to one closer to home, the Bureau of Prisons says that policy requires an inmate to remain incarcerated for at least 18 months before transfer. 

Ralph Valentini, retired president of 80-year-old City Printing, is turning over control of the family business to his nephew, Joseph after the company invested more than $1 million in high-tech equipment. 

 

1985: A Mahoning County Common Pleas jury finds James Lee Hall, 33, of Cleveland, guilty of involuntary manslaughter, aggravated robbery, and aggravated burglary in the shooting death of architect Douglas Skica during a robbery in his parents' Boardman home. 

Forty years after two 500-pound Japanese bombs struck the aircraft carrier USS Franklin 50 miles off the Japanese coast, killing 830 seamen, two area men who survived the attack recall March 19, 1945. Kermit Klingerman and Frank Sepesy have lived five blocks from each other in Poland for 27 years. 

Ohio Gov. Richard Celeste signed legislation allowing the reopening of most of the state-chartered savings and loans that were ordered closed to avoid a run on their deposits. 

 

1975: Two people are injured, one seriously, when a "Saturday night special" handgun explodes in the kitchen at 566 Whipple Avenue.

Atty. Robert Manchester of Youngstown was the uncontested nominee for president of Rotary International in 1976.

A bandit carrying a blue snub-nosed pistol escapes with $13,000 from the Farrell suburban office of First National Bank of Mercer County. 

 

1950: About 100 Austintown Fitch High School students mount a strike to protest the board of education's failure to rehire football coach Matthew Fehn. 

Three Erie boys who took a bus and rail trip through Youngstown, Meadville, and Pittsburgh spent about $150 of the $9,200 in cash taken from one of their homes before being picked up by Pittsburgh police. It is unlikely they will face charges. 

The Warren Civil Service Commission exonerates Police Chief William Johnson of all charges filed against him by Safety-Service Director Walter Pestrak.