Years Ago

Today is Monday, Dec. 30, the 364th day of 2013. There is one day left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1813: British troops burn Buffalo, N.Y., during the War of 1812.

1853: The United States and Mexico sign a treaty under which the U.S. agrees to buy some 45,000 square miles of land from Mexico for $10 million in a deal known as the Gadsden Purchase.

1860: Ten days after South Carolina secedes from the Union, the state militia seizes the United States Arsenal in Charleston.

1922: Vladimir I. Lenin proclaims the establishment of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

1936: The United Auto Workers union stages its first “sit-down” strike at the General Motors Fisher Body Plant No. 1 in Flint, Mich. (The strike lasts until Feb. 11, 1937.)

1940: California’s first freeway, the Arroyo Seco Parkway connecting Los Angeles and Pasadena, is officially opened by Gov. Culbert L. Olson.

1948: The Cole Porter musical “Kiss Me, Kate” opens on Broadway.

1965: Ferdinand Marcos is inaugurated for his first term as president of the Philippines.

1972: The United States halts its heavy bombing of North Vietnam.

1993: Israel and the Vatican agree to recognize each other.

1994: A gunman walks into a pair of suburban Boston abortion clinics and opens fire, killing two employees. (John C. Salvi III is later convicted of murder; he dies in prison, an apparent suicide.)

2003: The Bush administration announces it is banning the sale of ephedra, and urges consumers to immediately stop using the herbal stimulant linked to 155 deaths and dozens of heart attacks and strokes.

VINDICATOR FILES

1988: The Youngstown Air Reserve Base is not on a list of 145 U.S. military installations that have been proposed for closing or reduced operations in an austerity program that is expected to save $693 million.

William Walp and his wife, Joan, of Niles-Carver Road, Weathersfield Township, claim the $6 million Ohio Super Lotto jackpot. Walp, 46, has been commuting 100 miles a day to a job at a J&L steel products plant in Lewisville which he says will end as soon as he receives the first of his annual checks of $240,000.

Youngstown State University’s offensive tackle, Jim Zdelar, a Rayen graduate, is named to the first team on the Associated Press Division I-AA All-American College Football Team. YSU’s Paul Soltis, an Austintown graduate, is named to the second team.

1973: The East Ohio Gas Co., struggling with the energy crisis that has cut natural gas supplies, will spend about $27 million in its capital improvements program, including $1.3 million in the Youngstown Division.

Trumbull County recorded 23 homicides in 1973, more than twice the toll of the preceding year. December was the bloodiest month in county history, with 11 fatal shootings and one fatal stabbing.

John W. Smythe Jr., a 1953 graduate of Girard High School, earns a doctorate in economics from the University of Nebraska. He is an assistant professor at Youngstown State University.

1963: Forty cars of an Erie-Lackawanna freight train derail near Cortland, scattering cars over a hillside.

Some Youngstown City Hall employees receive the first of an estimated 100 letters of dismissal from Mayor-elect Anthony B. Flask. There are an estimated 200 to 300 jobs that are not covered by civil service and are subject to be filled by the mayor.

An overheated oil stove is believed to be the cause of a $10,000 fire that destroyed the North Lima Nurseries building on Sharrott Road.

1938: Three bandits hold up 20 employees of the Railway Express Agency, 551 Mahoning Ave., escaping with $35,000 in cash shipments consigned to the Federal Reserve Bank at Cleveland.

Gov. Martin L. Davey calls on the Legislature meeting in special session to reach “a complete and final solution of the problem of public school financing.”

Pierre Luboshutz and Genia Nemenoff, famous duo-pianists, will appear at a recital at Stambaugh Auditorium under the auspices of the Monday Musical Club.