Today is Friday, Dec. 30, the 364th day of 2005. There is one day left in the year. On this date in

Today is Friday, Dec. 30, the 364th day of 2005. There is one day left in the year. On this date in 1903, about 600 people die when fire breaks out at the recently opened Iroquois Theater in Chicago.
In 1852, future U.S. president Rutherford B. Hayes marries Lucy Ware Webb in Cincinnati. In 1853, the United States brings some 45,000 square miles of land from Mexico in a deal known as the Gadsden Purchase. In 1911, Sun Yat-sen is elected the first president of the Republic of China. In 1922, Vladimir I. Lenin proclaims the establishment of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. In 1936, the United Auto Workers union stages its first "sit-down" strike, at the Fisher Body Plant No. 1 in Flint, Mich. In 1940, California's first freeway, the Arroyo Seco Parkway connecting Los Angeles and Pasadena, is officially opened. In 1944, King George II of Greece proclaims a regency to rule his country, virtually renouncing the throne. In 1948, the Cole Porter musical "Kiss Me, Kate" opens on Broadway. In 1972, the United States halts its heavy bombing of North Vietnam. In 1994, a gunman walks into a pair of suburban Boston abortion clinics and opens fire, killing two employees and wounding five other people (John C. Salvi III is later convicted of murder; he commits suicide in prison).
December 30, 1980: An explosion and fire guts a nightclub in the Ridgeview Plaza in Warren. Arson investigator James Elko found two five gallon cans that had been filled with gasoline or kerosene in the club, Phase 3, which had been the Plaza Cinema.
Two of three Mahoning County commissioners and other elected county officials will receive pay raises that were approved by the Ohio Legislature Dec. 19. The increases will cost the county $162,000 over four years. By 1984, commissioners will make $32,490; the prosecutor, $37,000 and the sheriff, $33,250.
Thomas J. Kiousis Jr., 42, of Lakewood is named executive director of the Mahoning County Chapter of the American Red Cross.
December 30, 1965: Mahoning County commissioner approves a $5 million operating fund for the county for 1966, an all-time high figure, which provides for a 5 percent wage increase for all county employees.
Republic Steel Corp.'s Truscon plants in Youngstown and Warren receive an order for $5.9 million worth of aircraft landing mats. Truscon turned out thousands of the landing mats during World War II.
John B. Morgan Jr., executive vice president of the Associated Hospital Service, is elected president of the Youngstown Area Chamber of Commerce.
December 30, 1955: Three visiting children die when fire sweeps through the home of Paul Jurko in the Trumbull County village of Yankee Lake. Dead are James Alexander, 5; Doria Mae Mesmer, 7, and Sheila June Johnson, 9.
One Westinghouse employee is dragged from his car and beaten at the Sharon plant and two pickets are arrested as tensions mount in the two-month old strike.
The National Safety Council estimates the traffic death toll for 1955 at 38,500, the highest in 14 years.
December 30, 1930: After Mahoning County Common Pleas Judge David Jenkins issues a restraining order against a merger of Bethlehem Steel Corp. and Youngstown Sheet & amp; Tube Co., steel industry observers say any possibility of a merger in the near future appears dead.
Five boys, ages 14 to 17, are overcome by fumes and die in a coal mine in Pittsburgh's South Hills after they entered the abandoned mine to get fuel for their families. A dog, constant companion to one of the boys, led the boy's father to the scene of the tragedy.
Mill Creek Park authorities order Lake Glacier scraped to prepare to allow ice skating. Skating is already permitted at Lincoln, South Side and Crandall ponds, where good crowds are reported.