Today is Sunday, May 18, the 138th day of 2003. There are 227 days left in the year. On this date in

Today is Sunday, May 18, the 138th day of 2003. There are 227 days left in the year. On this date in 1980, the Mount St. Helens volcano in Washington state explodes, leaving 57 people dead or missing.
In 1896, the Supreme Court endorses separate-but-equal racial segregation with its Plessy v. Ferguson decision, a ruling that is overturned 58 years later. In 1897, a public reading of Bram Stoker's new novel, "Dracula, or, The Un-dead," is staged in London. In 1926, evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson vanishes while visiting a beach in Venice, Calif.; she reappears a month later, claiming to have been kidnapped. In 1933, the Tennessee Valley Authority is created. In 1944, during World War II, Allied forces finally occupy Monte Cassino in Italy after a four-month struggle that claims some 20,000 lives. In 1953, 50 years ago, Jacqueline Cochran becomes the first woman to break the sound barrier as she pilots a North American F-86 Canadair over Rogers Dry Lake, Calif.
May 18, 1978: Buoyed by increasing support, the Ecumenical Coalition of the Mahoning Valley launches a massive telephone blitz to broaden community participation in the Save Our Valley campaign, asking residents to open SOV savings account at local financial institutions.
A $19.4 billion tax cut tentatively approved by Congress will likely be used to cut personal income taxes, but not the Social Security payroll deductions. The budget anticipates a $50 billion deficit but the House refused to raise the ceiling on the national debt, blocking the government from borrowing the money to cover the entire projected deficit.
Sharon Mayor Robert T. Price announces that Sharon will become self-insured in hospitalization, prescription, life and eyeglass care insurance beginning in June.
May 18, 1963: Clerk Doris Chernick foils a brazen gunman's attempt to rob the Loblaw store in the Elm Road Plaza by dropping to the floor and calling for help on the store's public address system. The hold-up man fled.
A whipping post sentence currently being challenged in Delaware's Supreme Court is imposed by for a second time by Superior Court Judge Stewart Lynch in Wilmington. He sentences a 40-year-old man convicted of stealing $4 in a robbery to 20 lashes and 25 years in jail.
May 18, 1953: Charles G. Nichols, president and general manager of the G.M. McKelvey Co., is named by the Mutual Security Administration to a five-man team of U.S. marketing experts who will visit Austria to conduct seminars on retailing and merchandising.
Mrs. Edith Andrews Logan, 89, widow of Maj. John A. Logan Jr., dies at the home of her daughter, Lady Maxwell-Scott of Abbotsford, Newport, R.I. She was the daughter of Chauncey Andrews, one of the city's early industrialists, who won fame and fortune in railroads, iron and coal during the early expansion of the city.
May 18, 1928: Employment in Youngstown was higher in April than in any month since June 1927, the bureau of business research at Ohio State University reports. Employment in April was 5 percent greater than in March, but still 4 percent less than April 1927.
A jury in the court of Judge J.H.C. Lyon returns a verdict of $25,000 for Mrs. Lillian Flavell against the Cleveland & amp; Mahoning Valley Coach Lines for the death of her husband, Harry, in August 1926 near Auburn Corners.