1. General Motors gets access to the cash needed to keep the company in operation. President George

1. General Motors gets access to the cash needed to keep the company in operation. President George W. Bush approves $9.4 billion in loans this month after weeks of uncertainty.

2. GM, in June, commits to building its new compact car, the Cruze, in Lordstown, starting in 2010.

3. Local businesses deal with credit crunch, and local investors watch their net worth drop as stock markets crash and credit markets freeze. The Dow takes its first big drop of 777 points Sept. 29 and keeps heading down over the coming weeks.

4. With sales of the Chevrolet Cobalt soaring, GM adds a third shift in Lordstown in August. It adds 1,400 jobs to staff the shift and replace workers who took a buyout. Then in November and December, with cars sales reeling amid a recession, GM says it is eliminating the third shift, slowing down the assembly line and laying off 2,000 workers.

5. Gas prices rise to $4 a gallon in July but drop to less than $1.70 by December.

6. V&M Star says in November that it is considering a site straddling Youngstown and Girard for a new steel mill. The plant would employ hundreds.

7. Home Savings in August is placed under strict regulatory supervision because of losses it incurred from bad loans.

8. Housing sales and car sales drop as recession takes hold.

9. Local grocer Henry Nemenz is embroiled in a dispute with a labor union. In September, he closed his IGA store in Hubbard after sales dropped amid informational union picketing. Picketing then spreads to other Nemenz stores.

10. Delphi Packard Electric says in July that it is closing its Cortland plant, which it opened in 2000 at a cost of $42 million. It is the latest in a series of local cuts made since Delphi Corp. filed for bankruptcy in 2005.