1995 annual local news chronology

January 1995

• 1 -- Fire extensively damages a portion of Imperial Dry Cleaners in Sharon.
  
  
• 1 _ Buhl-Henderson Community Library in Sharon is renamed Shenango Valley Community Library to more accurately reflect its new status.
  
  
• 3 -- Arson was to blame for a fire that caused more than $1 million in damage to Imperial Dry Cleaners, a state police fire marshal rules; the store reopens for business.
  
  
• 3 -- Darlene S. Loughner, 27, of Hermitage, is killed in a two-car crash on Route 60; Shenango Township police say she was driving a stolen car.
  
  
• 4 -- In what Westminster College President Dr. Oscar Remick calls the first award of its kind in Pennsylvania, and possibly the first in the nation, Westminster presents honorary doctorates in peacemaking to the grand mufti of Egypt, Dr. Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi, and the Rev. Dr. Samuel Habib, president of the Protestant Churches of Egypt.
  
  
• 7 -- CLP Management Inc., a group of local businessmen who bought Conneaut Lake Park two years ago, files for protection from its creditors under the federal bankruptcy law.
  
  
• 9 -- Joseph M. Valley is relieved as president of Armco Inc.'s Sawhill Tubular Division and is replaced by David A. Higbee, an Armco executive who was Valley's boss.
  
  
• 11 -- Adda E. Fordyce, 85, of 38 S. Mercer St., Greenville, is fatally injured when a pickup truck hits her while she is walking in the borough.
  
  
• 12 -- After 44 years, Greenville-Reynolds Development Corp. gives up sponsorship of the Greenville-Reynolds Industrial Day.
  
  
• 17 -- Hundreds of Mercer County residents travel to Harrisburg to see Tom Ridge sworn in as governor.
  
  
• 18 -- The Trumbull County Board of Education consultant assigned to assess the financial and educational condition of Brookfield School District recommends that Brookfield ``seriously consider'' transferring the district to Hubbard.
  
  
• 19 -- With the 1994-95 school year half gone, teachers in Sharon, Reynolds and Grove City are still working without new contracts.
  
  
• 19 -- Mercer County commissioners contract with Mercer lawyer and Assistant District Attorney Robert G. Kochems to prosecute all child-abuse cases and hire retired state police trooper Charles Gaffney of Coolspring Township as a part-time child-abuse investigator.
  
  
• 26 -- Caparo Inc.'s purchase of Sharon Steel Corp.'s Farrell mill was a steal at $26 million, Chief Operating Officer Jim Riley says.
  
  
• 28 -- Sandra R. White, former assistant vice president of what is now First Western Bank F.S.B., pleads guilty to submitting false applications for $97,000 in loans and credit.
  
  
• 31 -- State police say a 24-hour operation ended with the arrest of four professional drug runners and the largest marijuana bust ever on the local section of Interstate 80.

February 1995

• 2 -- Bankruptcy Judge Warren W. Bentz allows six shareholders to lend CLP Management $36,000 to carry the owners of Conneaut Lake Park through February; meanwhile, about 130 families living on leased land in and around the park say they want to see the amusement park stay in operation.
  
  
• 2 -- Sunbelt Transformer Inc. of Temple, Texas, says it is buying the Mark Crane Co. building in Sharon in a deal estimated at $1,025,000.
  
  
• 7-- Brookfield's 7.5-mill, permanent operating levy passes, with 2,159 of the 3,212 voters saying yes to keeping their schools instead of consolidating them with Hubbard.
  
  
• 8 -- Four local people are killed in a three-car crash on Route 62, about a mile west of Mercer. The victims are Lawrence W. Keeley, 77, and his wife, Clarabelle E., 81, both of 1342 Bend Road, Jefferson Township; and John C. Wilson, 73, and his wife, Margaret L., 66, both of 450 N. Keel Ridge Road, Hermitage.
  
  
• 8 -- Charges are filed aginst four Grove City-area veterans clubs and six bartenders for allegedly selling alcohol without a license to an undercover trooper from the state police Bureau of Liquor Control Enforcement in Erie on Dec. 16, 1994.
  
  
• 10 -- William M. Reznor will step down as a Mercer County commissioner March 7 to assume a job in Gov. Tom Ridge's administration. Reznor will become the special assistant in the correction commissioner's office.
  
  
• 10 -- Caparo Steel Co. is awarded a $4 million loan from the state Commerce Department to help it buy 600 acres from Sharon Steel Corp.
  
  
• 13 -- Longtime Lakeview teacher and administrator Paulette Savolskis is named the new superintendent of Lakeview School District.
  
  
• 15 -- WHX Corp. is trying to back out of a deal to buy Coal Coating, says Herbert Minkel, a former Sharon Steel Corp. attorney who is continuing to advise the bankrupt company.
  
  
• 15 -- A paralyzing ice storm causes dozens of crashes in the area, including one in Poland Township that claims the life of a former Sharon woman.
  
  
• 16 -- Believing that they have a better chance operating amusement rides than running a hotel or night club, owners of CLP Management Inc. announce plans to sell the Hotel Conneaut, the Conneaut Lake Beach Club and the Flynn House.
  
  
• 16 -- Fire destroys the 100-year-old Plain Grove Presbyterian Church, around which the tiny village grew.
  
  
• 16 -- Margaret J. Carlson, 85, of 18 Orchard St., Stoneboro, dies in the hospital of Sharon Regional Health System -- the fifth victim of a three-car crash Feb. 8 in East Lackawannock Township.
  
  
• 17 -- Thomas D. Hinkson, former assistant vice president and loan manager of what is now First Western Bank, F.S.B., is sentenced to five months in a community-based prison and five months of home detention for falsifying bank loans in the names of relatives and friends.
  
  
• 18 -- Sharon Steel Corp. agrees to sell the company's 13 original Norman Rockwell paintings to Ray Schoonover for $390,000; he owns the Schoonover Co. of Ecorse, Mich., which is scrapping part of the Farrell mill still owned by Sharon Steel.
  
  
• 20 -- Armco Inc. says it has signed a letter of intent to sell its Wheatland plant of the Sawhill Tubular Division to Sharon Tube Co.
  
  
• 21 -- The GOP's ``Contract With America'' ought to be called the ``Contract On America,'' Washington Post columnist Dorothy Butler Gilliam says at a Black History Month forum in Sharon.
  
  
• 22 -- Earl D. King, pharmacist at the Downtown Apothecary and Elixir Shoppe in Greenville, is charged with felony drug distribution.
  
  
• 24 -- Two large garage bays and 35 cars are destroyed in a fire at Interstate Auto Auction in Jackson Township.
  
  
• 25 -- Damages are placed at ``well over $500,000'' in the Interstate Auto Auction fire.
  
  
• 25 -- A tip from an ``Unsolved Mysteries'' viewer in Canada leads authorities to a former Sharon man wanted since 1991 for allegedly running a real estate scam in Mercer and Butler counties that defrauded 34 victims of $1.2 million.
  
  
• 25 -- Fire presumably destroys a one-room Amish school in Wilmington Township.
  
  
• 25 -- A Liberty Township, Ohio, man is killed when his single-engine plane crashes into a field while approaching Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport in Vienna.

March 1995

• 2 -- Former Mercer County Commissioner John G. ``Jerry'' Johnson is picked to fill the vacany left by Commissioner William M. Reznor.
  
  
• 2 -- Members of Teamsters Local 377 go on strike at PI&I Express in Masury.
  
  
• 8 -- With the help of a federal mediator, PI&I Express and the Teamsters reach a tentative labor agreement.
  
  
• 9 -- A nine-alarm fire causes extensive damage to the Roy W. Wilt Auditorium at McKeever Environmental Learning Center in Lake Township.
  
  
• 10 -- Michael Bayer, a sixth-grader at St. Michael's School in Greenville, wins The Herald's seventh annual Spelling Bee.
  
  
• 10 -- Sharon Steel Corp.'s blast furnaces are demolished, with the resulting 15,000 tons of steel to be sold for scrap.
  
  
• 13-- Ray Schoonover, Ecorse, Mich., buys Monday Sharon Steel Corp.'s 13 original Norman rockwell paintings for $390,000.
  
  
• 14-- After years of planning and delays, a $13.4 million facelift gets underway this week to widen Route 18 in Hermitage and Shenango Township.
  
  
• 14-- Greenville Borough Council adopts a 17 percent sewer-rate increase enacted earlier by Greenville Sanitary Sewer Authority.
  
  
• 14-- Increasing frequency of guilty pleas by criminal defendants cuts number of jury trials in Mercer County Common Pleas Court by almost 70 percent in the last decade.
  
  
• 15-- About two dozen employees of Mercer County Regional Council of Governments get their first-ever contract when COG's executive committee votes to ratify a four-year agreement. The employees are members of Teamsters Local 261.
  
  
• 18-- Richard D. Osborne, 61, of 200 Buckley Road, Findley Township, dies when his motorcycle hits a utility pole at 12:40 p.m. on Route 58 in Harrisville.
  
  
• 19 -- Buhl Woods homeowners say that the streets in their Hermitage subdivision, developed by B&B Realty, are plagued with storm water drainage problems. City officials say they won't accept the streets for maintenance because they do not drain properly.
  
  
• 19-- Cheryl DeMaria and Loree Schmidt say they will remodel the Fruit Mansion, 452 E. State St., Sharon, to accommodate specialty shops.
  
  
• 23-- Joanne M. Welshimer, 58, of Mabel Drive, Shenango Township, dies in a car fire at 4:55 p.m. in the parking lot of Community Counseling Center of Mercer County.
  
  
• 24 -- Shenango Campus of Pennsylvania State University will invest up to $900,000 in a new library and bookstore in Sharon, Dr. Albert N. Skomra, campus executive officer, says. The library will be built in the former Hubert H. Humphrey Hall, Shenango Avenue and Reno Street
  
  
• 24 -- Sacred Heart Church's former grade school is damaged during the weekend by vandals who break off the head of a statue of Jesus and paint racial and Nazi graffiti on the building, says Monsignor Donald Scully, pastor of the Sharon church.
  
  
• 27-- Lisa M. Berchtold, who was wounded in a 1987 shooting rampage in Hermitage, dies after a two-vehicle accident on East Connelly Boulevard in Sharon.

April 1995

• 2 -- Mary Ann Horgos, 24, of 1010 Main St., Sharpsville, and her passenger, Vickie Lynn Dell, 19, of 410 W. 12th St., Reynolds, are killed when their car collides with a pickup truck at Colt Road and state Route 18 in Pymatuning Township.
  
  
• 4-- Judith Delgros, Greenville, appeals her 1993 murder conviction for the 1978 deaths of her son and husband in Ohio.
  
  
• 5-- Nicholas G. Koufou, 37, Oceanside, Calif., is charged with bribery for allegedly offering a local detective $103,000 to get cocaine charges dismissed.
  
  
• 10 -- Caparo Steel Co. pours the first steel made in Farrell since bankrupt Sharon Steel Corp. closed the plant 29 months ago and sold it to the Missouri-based company.
  
  
• 10 -- Norma Jean Snyder, 61, of 1818 Mercer Road, Jackson Township, dies after the van she was riding in is hit broadside by a car in Jackson Township.
  
  
• 10 -- Police identify Donald D. ``Kraut'' Treftz after his arrest April 6 by police and FBI agents in Deadwood, S.D. Treftz, who was sentenced to life in prison for a 1973 Mercer County murder conviction, had escaped in 1993 from the state prison in Huntingdon, Pa.
  
  
• 12 -- Hubbard Police Chief Raymond Moffitt says his department was unable to find the body of a premature baby placed by its mother in a dumpster last month.
  
  
• 17 -- Michael M. Webster, Mercer County Court of Common Pleas administrator, is nominated to a six-year term on the Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole by Gov. Tom Ridge.
  
  
• 17-- Dr. Kenneth Vuletic, superintendent of Sharpsville Area School District, citing health reasons, resigns effective June 30.
  
  
• 19 -- Grove City Area School Board accepts a contract with Grove City Area Education Association that will raise salaries for teachers by an average 4.8 percent a year in the five-year agreement.
  
  
• 20 -- Lacey Querio, a Sharon sixth-grader at Case Avenue Elementary School, learns that Parker Pen and handwriting text publisher Zaner-Bloser have judged her handwriting to be the best of all sixth-grade students among more than 30,000 contestants in the National Handwriting Contest.
  
  
• 22 -- Peggy Evans, of Barkeyville Road, Pine Township, says that her sister, 46-year-old Clara Smith, and 2-year-old grand nephew, Nathan Smith, died from injuries suffered in the April 19 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
  
  
• 24 -- Mercer Area School District approves pay increases that will raise administrators' average salaries by about 2.9 percent for each of the next three years
  
  
• 24 -- Jamestown teachers and Jamestown Area School Board announce they recently ``agreed in principle'' to a three-year contract that will grant 3 to 4 percent annual raises, Superintendent David Shaffer said.

May 1995

• 1 -- Mellon Bank says it will offer Saturday service at its offices on East State Street in Hermitage and in downtown Grove City.
  
  
• 2 -- Trumbull County voters pass levies to benefit the Trumbull County Joint Vocational School and the Warren-Trumbull County Library.
  
  
• 2 -- Businessman Vince Scoccia says eight volunteers have resurrected van service for Brookfield senior citzens.
  
  
• 3 -- Mercer County commissioners say Mercer County Living Center will be returned to county management July 1 by Direct Health Care Inc.
  
  
• 4 -- Sharon officials learn that the city won't be getting a $373,710 state grant to help build a proposed recreation center near Sharon High School.
  
  
• 7-- Albert N. Lowe, 97, of 3595 Lewis St., Hubbard Township, dies after being hit by a hit-skip driver at about 2:30 a.m. on Lincoln Avenue.
  
  
• 8 -- Fredonia Borough Council denies public water service to developer J.R. Powell, who is turning the former Fredonia-Delaware Elementary School into a personal care home.
  
  
• 9 -- Roger B. Smith, 48, of East Lackawannock Township, principal and administrator of Keystone Christian School, Hermitage, is charged with indecent assault for allegedly having ``indecent contact'' with an 8-year-old female student.
  
  
• 9-- Greenville Borough Council decides not to ask Cablevision Industries to block the cartoon program Beavis and Butt-head on its MTV channel.
  
  
• 10 -- Brookfield third-graders Melissa Simeon, Joelle Bucci and Jackie Knowles collect $185, much of it from their classmates at Stevenson Elementary School, and sent it to Oklahoma City Children's Hospital.
  
  
• 14-- Local trucking company owners say they will find alternate routes to avoid an 80-percent toll increase proposed by the Ohio Turnpike Commission.
  
  
• 15-- Ron Garrett, New Wilmington, appears on The Nashville Network, showing a nationwide television audience the covered bridge replica he built.
  
  
• 15 -- John Perfilio, Sharpsville, says the retailing by Wal-Mart of a fishing lure he designed is an example of a hobby paying for itself.
  
  
• 15 -- Dr. Derry L. Stufft is promoted from high school principal to superintendent by Sharpsville Area School Board.
  
  
• 16 -- Nkhumah Tarr, 19, of Mill Creek Township, dies in a motorcycle crash in New Vernon Township.
  
  
• 17 -- State Police Lt. Gregory N. Patterson, 47, of Hermitage, is charged with sexually harassing a Shenango Valley convenience store clerk.
  
  
• 18 -- Sharon patrolman Gerald T. Smith, 27, is charged for allegedly beating a handcuffed suspect's head against the floor during a booking.
  
  
• 21 -- Werner Co employees accept a five-year extension of the labor contract between United Steelworkers of America Local 3713 and the ladder and aluminum extrusions maker in Sugar Grove Township.
  
  
• 23 -- Sharon joins Mercer County's 911 system, two years after the emergency calling system began serving most other communities.
  
  
• 24 -- High winds uproot trees and cut off electricity throughout the county, damaging an estimated 80 buildings in Mercer.
  
  
• 24 -- Michael Webster, Grove City is confirmed by the state Senate to a six-year post on the Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole.
  
  
• 26 -- Shenango Valley Urban League directors appoint Felecia Pearson Smith of Sharon as the league's new president and chief executive officer, effective June 15.

June 1995

• 1 -- Hermitage residents attend a meeting to discuss recreational proposals suggested in a recently completed community survey.
  
  
• 1 -- Hubbard police meet with city residents to describe what police call the ``growing influence'' of gangs and drug activity in the community.
  
  
• 1 -- Shenango Valley pipe and tubemakers join in a lawsuit filed by 21 American companies asking the U.S. Trade Representative's office to investigate their claims of unfair trade practices by Korean manufacturers.
  
  
• 5 -- Manuel Moreno Sr., 65, formerly of Sharon, is ordered held without bail pending trial on five federal counts of defrauding investors of $1.2 million.
  
  
• 5 -- Sharon police begin walking beats in some city neighborhoods with the opening of a precinct on Quinby Street.
  
  
• 5 -- William F. Brown, 31, a native of Greenville who lives in Crawford County, is hired as Grove City police chief.
  
  
• 6 -- Sharon School District gets two proposals from a consulting firm recommending that the system add another elementary school and make other preparations for an expected increase in enrollments of younger students over the next decade.
  
  
• 7 -- Marine Cpl. Jason Snyder, 22, of Perry Township, is one of 24 Marines on the team that rescued fighter pilot Scott F. O'Grady in Bosnia.
  
  
• 7 -- Horizon Hospital System, Greenville, loses $4.5 million between July 1, 1993 through March 31 of this year, said Moody's Investors Service, a New York bond-rating agency.
  
  
• 8 -- Kenneth Hoffman, 34, of Grove City, was sentenced Thursday to 6 to 23 months in the county jail for stealing nearly $9,000 from Grove City Volunteer Fire Department.
  
  
• 9 -- Patterson-Erie Corp., Erie, announces plans to build 24 apartments in Greenville on the site of an abandoned Penn Central Railroad right of way.
  
  
• 11 -- Jennifer L. Boley, 14, of 1033 S. Park Drive, dies after being struck by lightning June 4 at Brookfield Township Park.
  
  
• 13 -- Judith Delgros, 44, formerly of Hempfield Township, loses an appeal in the 11th District Court of Appeals, Warren, Ohio. Mrs. Delgros was convicted of murdering her son and husband in Ohio 17 years ago.
  
  
• 14 -- Roger B. Smith, of East Lackawannock Township is held for trial after a hearing on charges arising from allegations by three girls, 8 and 9 years old, that they were sexually abused by the former principal and administrator of Keystone Christian School, Hermitage.
  
  
• 15 -- Hermitage and Sharpsville officials disagree over the future location of the Dr. Frederick Raisch Log Cabin.
  
  
• 15 -- Several Sharon business owners complain about a city-proposed renewal plan that would demolish the buildings housing their businesses.
  
  
• 16 -- Dr. Jerry H. Combee is relieved of his duties as president of Grove City College, although neither Combee nor members of the board of trustees will comment on the reason.
  
  
• 19 -- Harold Sloan, 68, of Tie Line Road, Pine Township, dies after falling from his tractor and being run over by a trailer filled with wood.
  
  
• 19 -- James Ellifritz, 52, of 69 S. Summit Road, West Salem Township, an employee of Waste Management of Greenville, is killed on Leech Road when he steps out of the truck into the path of a passing pickup truck.
  
  
• 21 -- Charles L. Altman and Christopher S. Raydo, both of Erie, are charged in the beating death 20thof Timothy Rape, Slippery Rock
  
  
• 22 -- Mercer County Historical Society reaffirms its December decision to move Dr. Frederick Raisch Log Cabin from Hermitage to Sharpsville.
  
  
• 22 -- Youngstown-Warren Air Reserve Station is removed from a closure list being reviewed by a defense base closure commission.