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Local

May 10, 1990: Sue Morton of Albert Lea was selected as the District 241 Citizen of the Year. The award was presented to Morton at the Albert Lea Family Y with members of the public on hand to help celebrate. Morton served area youth, seniors and the handicapped through her involvement with Community Action, the YMCA, MADD and other organizations.

May 8, 1990: Mayor Harlan Nelson proclaimed May 8 National Teacher Day in Albert Lea. The mayor was pictured in the Albert Lea Tribune signing the proclamation as Lakeview Elementary School teachers Lisa Haney, Pat Waters, Hazel Spiering and Pat Schultz looked on.

May 6, 1990: The obituary for Dr. Leon Steiner, a long-time area benefactor, appeared in the Albert Lea Tribune. Steiner practiced family medicine in the area from 1948 to 1986, when he retired. Steiner was active in the community throughout his career, serving on the Naeve Hospital Board of Trustees, as the county coroner and on the Albert Lea City Council for nearly 16 years.

 

National

2013: Kidnap-rape victims Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight, who went missing separately about a decade earlier while in their teens or early 20s, were rescued from a house just south of downtown Cleveland. (Their captor, Ariel Castro, hanged himself in prison in September 2013 at the beginning of a life sentence plus 1,000 years.)

1998: Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski was given four life sentences plus 30 years by a federal judge in Sacramento, California, under a plea agreement that spared him the death penalty.

1978: David R. Berkowitz pleaded guilty in a Brooklyn courtroom to murder, attempted murder and assault in connection with the “Son of Sam” shootings that claimed six lives and terrified New Yorkers. (Berkowitz was sentenced to six consecutive life prison terms.)

1975: President Gerald R. Ford formally declared an end to the “Vietnam era.” In Ho Chi Minh City — formerly Saigon — the Viet Cong celebrated its takeover.

1974: The House Judiciary Committee opened public hearings on whether to recommend the impeachment of President Richard Nixon. (The committee ended up adopting three articles of impeachment against the president, who resigned before the full House took up any of them.)

May 4, 1970: Ohio National Guardsmen opened fire during an anti-war protest at Kent State University, killing four students and wounding nine others.

May 5, 1961: Astronaut Alan B. Shepard Jr. became America’s first space traveler as he made a 15-minute suborbital flight aboard Mercury capsule Freedom 7.

1961: The first group of “Freedom Riders” left Washington, D.C. to challenge racial segregation on interstate buses and in bus terminals.

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

1937: The hydrogen-filled German airship Hindenburg caught fire and crashed while attempting to dock at Lakehurst, New Jersey; 35 of the 97 people on board were killed along with a crewman on the ground.

1932: Mobster Al Capone, convicted of income-tax evasion, entered the federal penitentiary in Atlanta. (Capone was later transferred to Alcatraz Island.)

1925: Schoolteacher John T. Scopes was charged in Tennessee with violating a state law that prohibited teaching the theory of evolution. (Scopes was found guilty, but his conviction was later set aside.)

May 6, 1915: Babe Ruth hit his first major-league home run as a player for the Boston Red Sox.

1914: President Woodrow Wilson, acting on a joint congressional resolution, signed a proclamation designating the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day.

1865: What’s believed to be America’s first train robbery took place as a band of criminals derailed a St. Louis-bound train near North Bend, Ohio; they proceeded to rob the passengers and loot safes on board before getting away.

May 7, 1789: America’s first inaugural ball was held in New York in honor of President George Washington, who had taken the oath of office a week earlier.