Today is Friday, Dec. 29, the 363rd day of 2006. There are two days left in the year. On this date in 1916 (according to the New Style calendar; Dec. 16th by the Old Style), Grigory Rasputin, the so-

Today is Friday, Dec. 29, the 363rd day of 2006. There are two days left in the year. On this date in 1916 (according to the New Style calendar; Dec. 16th by the Old Style), Grigory Rasputin, the so-called "Mad Monk" who had wielded great influence with Czar Nicholas II, is murdered by a group of Russian noblemen in St. Petersburg.
In 1808, the 17th president of the United States, Andrew Johnson, is born in Raleigh, N.C. In 1845, Texas is admitted as the 28th state. In 1851, the first American Young Men's Christian Association is organized, in Boston. In 1890, the Wounded Knee massacre takes place in South Dakota as some 300 Sioux Indians are killed by U.S. troops sent to disarm them. In 1934, Japan renounces the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930. In 1940, during World War II, Germany drops incendiary bombs on London, setting off what comes to be known as "The Second Great Fire of London." In 1975, a bomb explodes in the main terminal of New York's LaGuardia Airport, killing 11 people.
December 29, 1981: Earl Reich, director of the Ohio Department of Highway Safety, warns New Year's revelers that drinking and driving could cost a motorist as much as 3,500 and three days in jail if caught -- and that's assuming no accident is involved.
The Dollar Savings & amp; Trust Co. in Warren will leave it to Trumbull County Common Pleas Court to decide who is entitled to 12,300 in a bank account titled to the Expo Motor Speedway Association that was created by a member of the fair board who was operating the speedway for the board. Some individual board members claim authority over the account, while the board as a whole has voted to take control of the money.
Permanent job cuts take effect at the Packard Electric Division of General Motors in Warren, eliminating 211.
Harry Crockett, 56, a foreman in the press shop at RMI Inc. in Niles, is killed when pinned between a machine and a guardrail at the plant.
December 29, 1966: A widowed Youngstown woman, two of her seven children and another Youngstown girl are killed near Mansfield when their station wagon failed to stop at the end of an I-71 exit ramp and was crushed by a truck in Route 13. Dead are Mrs. Elsie Clark, 40; a son, Donald, 9, and a 9-year-old twin daughter, and Sandra Stuckey, 18.
Youngstown will not surrender its police and fire pension fund to the state until all avenues to circumvent the "confiscatory law" have been explored, Mayor Anthony B. Flask tells City Council.
Mahoning County commissioners approve a record general fund appropriation of 5.2 million, an increase of 160,000 over 1966.
December 29, 1956: Youngstown district cadets in U.S. military academies, home for the Christmas holidays, are feted at the Colonial House by U.S. Rep. Michael J. Kirwan and Edward G. Fournier, president of Century Truck & amp; Manufacturing Co.
John and Susan Summers, a young Hartford, Ind., couple, become Trum-bull County's 50th and 51st traffic fatalities of the year when their car is rammed by a coal truck in Route 90 near Fowler.
Two inches of snow in the Youngstown district bring a rash of accidents on icy streets. Youngstown police investigated 20 accidents in a four-hour period.
December 29, 1931: Three Campbell policemen are laid off after city council votes to eliminate their jobs in an economy move. Mayor Julius said the three will be eligible to be rehired in the future if finances permit.
Georgiana Tillotson is elected queen of Leavittsburg High School by students in the junior and senior high schools and reigns over the Windham-Leavittsburg basketball game.
The Youngstown Chamber of Commerce launches a battle to have the new downtown post office built of Georgia marble, similar to the Butler Art Gallery because the material is self-cleaning and, the chamber maintains, would be worth the additional cost of 40,000 over sandstone.