Today is Saturday, Nov. 21, the 325th day of 2015

Today is Saturday, Nov. 21, the 325th day of 2015. There are 40 days left in the year.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

On this date in:

1789: North Carolina becomes the 12th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.

1864: A letter is signed by President Abraham Lincoln expressing condolences to Lydia Bixby, a widow in Boston whose five sons supposedly died while fighting in the Civil War. (As it turned out, only two of Mrs. Bixby’s sons had been killed in battle.)

1922: Rebecca L. Felton of Georgia is sworn in as the first woman to serve in the U.S. Senate.

1934: The Cole Porter musical “Anything Goes,” starring Ethel Merman as Reno Sweeney, opens on Broadway.

1942: The Alaska Highway, also known as the Alcan Highway, was formally opened at Soldier’s Summit in the Yukon Territory.

1969: The Senate votes down the Supreme Court nomination of Clement F. Haynsworth, 55-45, the first such rejection since 1930.

1973: President Richard Nixon’s attorney, J. Fred Buzhardt, reveals the existence of an 181/2-minute gap in one of the White House tape recordings related to Watergate.

1980: Eighty-seven people die in a fire at the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada.

1985: U.S. Navy intelligence analyst Jonathan Jay Pollard is arrested, accused of spying for Israel. (Pollard later pleaded guilty to espionage and was sentenced to life in prison; his release on parole is scheduled to take place today, Nov. 21, 2015.)

An estimated 83 million TV viewers tune in to the CBS prime-time soap opera “Dallas” to find out “who shot J.R.” (The shooter turned out to be J.R. Ewing’s sister-in-law, Kristin Shepard.)

1995: The Dow Jones industrial average closes above the 5,000 mark for the first time.

2005: General Motors announces it will close 12 facilities and lay off 30,000 workers in North America.

2014: After a three-day onslaught that dumps a historic 7 feet of snow on the Buffalo, New York, area and killed at least 12 people, the sun comes out.

VINDICATOR FILES

1990: A group of 45 Democrats, including U.S. Rep. James A. Traficant, D-17th of Poland, files suit seeking an injunction barring President Bush from sending troops to Iraq without congressional approval.

A handful of parents and former vocational school students warn the Warren Board of Education that merging the city’s vocational education program with the Trumbull County Joint Vocational School would doom future attempts to pass levies.

1975: A predicted sharp increase in the basic steel industry will be a major help to Ohio Edison Co., John White, the new president of the power company, says in Youngstown while on a “get acquainted” tour of Ohio Edison’s territory.

Additional natural gas purchases by the Columbia Gas System, a major distributor in Ohio, allows the company to announce an easing of gas curtailments to large industrial and commercial customers in the state.

Richard E. Mills, owner of City Centre One and president of Fullerton Transfer & Storage Co., files a $2 million suit against Teamsters who have been picketing his Midlothian Boulevard company for almost six months. Mills says Teamsters Local 377 has been trying to force Fullerton to unionize with illegal tactics.

1965: Staff Sgt. Robert George Wright of Edgar Street is killed in combat in Vietnam when his 1st Calvary unit was ambushed. He is believed to be the first Youngstowner killed in Vietnam.

Jennings R. Lambeth, vice president-sales for Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co., believes steel business is picking up and by the first of the year thousands of idle workers should be back on the job.

The Youngstown Area Council on Economic Opportunity plans a six-month series of remedial classes for 200 Youngstown public and parochial students.

1940: Only 70 police “courtesy tickets” have been fixed since Mayor William Spagnola issued orders in October that city officials stop fixing parking tickets.

Mrs. Adolph E. Burkhardt of Woodworth is declared grand champion in the fourth annual crochet contest, which drew 350,000 contestants. She received $250 in cash and is honored at a banquet in New York.

Four letter men – Zellers, Gleckler, Hollinger and Kyser – form the nucleus of Coach Alfred Beach’s Columbiana Tri-County Championship team, in Columbiana. Last year, the team won 22 games and lost 2.