21 WFMJ Archives  /  February 8, 1998 | The Mahoning Valley celebrated Youngstown State University's fourth national championship under Coach Jim Tressel with a parade 28 years ago.  Katelyn Kurilla, 6, wearing a penguin headband, waves from atop her dad, Tom, of Boardman.  The Penguins beat McNeese State, 10-9, Dec. 20, 1997, to win the national Division 1-AA title. 

February 7

2001: Pennsylvania State Police charge Shane R. Sloan with the strangulation murder of his mother, Susan L. Fleeger, 48, at their Grove City home.

More than 40 people have applied for the job of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court magistrate, which became vacant with the death of Bernard J. Wilkes III.

Warren Fire Chief Jay Mulligan says he disagrees with a study recommending that the department discontinue its dispatch center so it can reopen two fire stations. 

 

1986: Damage is estimated at $400,000 in a fire that gutted the Poland Concrete Products office in Hillsville, Pa. 

A state-appointed committee reports that traditional organized crime families continue to control gambling, loan sharking, and narcotics in Cleveland, Akron, Canton, and the Mahoning Valley. The report also says that motorcycle gangs have developed into well-organized and disciplined criminal enterprises.

Higher education in America "has to be a social conscience, not just a machine to turn out equipment for the economic structure," the Rev. Richard W. Solberg, a Lutheran educational scholar and former vice president of Thiel College, says during an address marking Founders Day at Thiel. 

 

1976: A gunman claiming to have just a year to live kills one patron at the Oriole Bar on Wilson Avenue, wounds another, and abducts a third. Dead is Judith White, 29.

The Cadillac Eldorado convertible is going out of production, marking the end of the American soft-top. Cadillac will make 14,000 for the 1976 model year with a sticker price of $11,000 to $13,000. Dealers are adding a $1,000 to $2,000 premium at the point of sale. 

Mahoning County is seeking a permanent injunction to bar Youngstown from increasing its water rate surcharge for suburban customers from 25 percent to 40 percent. 

 

1951: All natural gas supplies to Mahoning Valley industries, except the minimum amount necessary for maintenance, are halted so that East Ohio Gas can supply residential customers during zero temperature days. Some 700 companies are affected. 

A Pennsylvania commuter train traveling at twice the speed limit plummets off a trestle near Woodridge, N.J., killing 82 people and injuring 500.

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