Years Ago

Today is Thursday, Dec. 8, the 342nd day of 2011. There are 23 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1863: President Abraham Lincoln announces his plan for the Reconstruction of the South.

1886: The American Federation of Labor is founded in Columbus, Ohio.

1911: Actor Lee J. Cobb is born in New York City.

1941: The United States enters World War II as Congress declares war against Japan, a day after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

1949: The Chinese Nationalist government moves from the Chinese mainland to Formosa as the Communists press their attacks.

1961: The Beach Boys’ first single, “Surfin’,” is released.

1980: Rock star John Lennon is shot to death outside his New York City apartment building by an apparently deranged fan.

VINDICATOR FILES

1986: A truck carrying hazardous materials overturns on Interstate 80 near Meander Reservoir, bringing out a hazardous materials team. Four people, including the truck driver, are treated for exposure to the chemicals or fumes.

Author and columnist Sydney J. Harris, whose column appeared in 100 newspapers including The Vindicator, dies in a Chicago hospital of a heart attack.

1971: A bill is prepared to increase Mayor Jack C. Hunter’s salary in five steps from $20,000 to $26,139.

Judge Lloyd Brown of Cleveland Municipal Court is appointed to the Ohio Supreme Court by Gov. John J. Gilligan to succeed Robert Duncan, who resigned to become a member of the U.S. Military Court of Appeals. Brown is the second Negro named to the court; Duncan was the first.

Carl F. Glade, sales director of WKBN-AM radio, is elected president of the Boardman Civic Association.

1961: Burglars strike twice at the R.J. Reynolds tobacco Co. office at 1133 Glenwood Ave., returning to haul away $1,500 worth of cigarettes, pipes and lighters.

Bonnie Showman Sember, 30, an art instructor at Sharon Junior High, dies when her car skids at the Clark Street bridge and plummets into the Shenango River.

1936: Youngstown begins a new chapter in its transportation history as trambus service is inaugurated on the entire South Side.

The Rt. Rev. Msgr. John A. Ryan, leading Catholic economist in Washington, D.C., gives a lecture at the Hotel Ohio in Youngstown during which he says, “Higher wages and shorter working hours are the only means of absorbing the millions of unemployed at present.”