This Day in History

Today is Tuesday, Nov. 30, the 334th day of 2010. There are 31 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1782: The United States and Britain sign preliminary peace articles in Paris, ending the Revolutionary War.

1803: Spain completes the process of ceding Louisiana to France, which had sold it to the United States.

1874: British statesman Sir Winston Churchill is born at Blenheim Palace.

1900: Irish writer Oscar Wilde dies in Paris at age 46.

1936: London’s famed Crystal Palace, constructed for the Great Exhibition of 1851, is destroyed in a fire.

1939: The Winter War begins as Soviet troops invade Finland. (The conflict ends the following March with a Soviet victory.)

1960: The last DeSoto is built by Chrysler, which has decided to retire the brand after 32 years.

1962: U Thant of Burma, who had been acting secretary-general of the United Nations following the death of Dag Hammarskjold the year before, is elected to a four-year term.

1966: The former British colony of Barbados becomes independent.

1981: The United States and the Soviet Union open negotiations in Geneva aimed at reducing nuclear weapons in Europe.

2000: Al Gore’s lawyers battle for his political survival in the Florida and U.S. Supreme Courts; meanwhile, GOP lawmakers in Tallahassee move to award the presidency to George W. Bush in case the courts did not by appointing their own slate of electors.

VINDICATOR FILES

1985: U.S. Rep. James A. Traficant Jr. offers to intervene in the strike by meat cutters and delicatessen workers at the Youngstown-area Valu King stores that is resulting in the permanent closing of a number of stores by the Tamarkin Co.

Church Hill United Methodist Church in Liberty will build a new $511,000 sanctuary at 189 Churchill-Hubbard Road.

Cleveland Browns Quarterback Bernie Kosar is honorary chairman of the Tod Children’s Hospital “Light Up a Life” campaign and provides five autographed footballs that will be given away.

1970: Youngstown Fire Chief George Panno begins an investigation into a “set pattern” of nine mysterious fires that broke out in vacant houses over the weekend.

Students at East High School will stay home for one day and teachers will make visits to each of the students homes, in response to requests by the Concerned Parents Group at East High, which is seeking improvements in the school.

Frank B. Jones, 82, former Youngstown city council president and the oldest living grand monarch of North America in the Grotto Association, dies in South Side Hospital.

Air Force Capt. Thomas A. Brewer, Logan Way, Hubbard, and his 93rd Bomb Wing team from Castle Air Base, Calif., win the coveted Fairchild Trophy in the 1970 Strategic Air Command competition at McCoy Air Base, Fla.

1960: International tennis star Karol Fageros, 26, of New York City is in South Side Hospital after being injured when the bus carrying her barnstorming basketball team collides with a truck on the snow-slicked Ohio Turnpike near the route 7 interchange.

Joseph “Fats” Aiello is reported accidentally shot by his own gun in an East Side gambling den. Aiello, who is in St. Elizabeth Hospital, tells police his pistol was in his belt and discharged when he leaned up against a bar.

Julian White will come from the YWCA of Taipei, Formosa, to take a new position of assistant executive director of the Youngstown YWCA.

1935: A third slab-heating furnace for the 79-inch continuous hot strip mill at Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. will be built at a cost of $300,000.

Members of the Mahoning County Medical Society recommend Dr. H.E. Patrick, Dr. Colin M. Reed and Dr. P.H. Fusco for city physician under Mayor-elect Lionel Evans.

Police Chief Leroy Goodwin resigns to take his old position as head of the identification division of the police department and is backed by outgoing Mayor Mark E. Moore to remain as acting chief until further notice.