YEARS AGO FOR DEC. 18

Today is Tuesday, Dec. 18, the 352nd day of 2018. There are 13 days left in the year.

Associated Press

On this date in:

1787: New Jersey became the third state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.

1865: The 13th Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery, was declared in effect by Secretary of State William H. Seward.

1892: Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s ballet “The Nutcracker” publicly premiered in St. Petersburg, Russia.

1917: Congress passed the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibiting “the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors” and sent it to the states for ratification.

1957: The Shippingport Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvania, the first nuclear facility to generate electricity in the United States, went on line. (It was taken out of service in 1982.)

1998: the House debated articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton.

2000: The Electoral College cast its ballots, with President-elect George W. Bush receiving the expected 271; Al Gore, however, received 266, one fewer than expected, because of a District of Columbia Democrat who’d left her ballot blank to protest the district’s lack of representation in Congress.

VINDICATOR FILES

1993: Trumbull County Engineer James Fiorenzo adds six employees to his payroll, defying a request by county commissioners that department heads not hire new employees.

Mahoning County commissioners instruct the solid waste management district to cut its administrative costs by $118,000 – about 22 percent – as part of $1.3 million in cuts needed in the county’s overall budget.

Wal-Mart announces that it will donate $1,000 each year toward a scholarship for a Fitch High School student.

1978: Slated to appear at the second annual Sports Banquet at Sandalini’s Top of the Mall at Eastwood are Tommy Lasorda, L.A. Dodgers manager; Pittsburgh Pirates Chuck Tanner and Willie Stargell; Pittsburgh Steeler Rocky Bleier and O.J. Simpson of the San Francisco 49ers, Ron Jaworski of the Philadelphia Eagles and boxing great Billy Conn.

Carl A. Basic, metro editor of the Tribune Chronicle in Warren, is named press secretary for U.S. Rep. Lyle Williams, the recently elected congressman from the 19th District.

At least six youngsters ages 6 and 7 are injured when the Apostolic Faith Temple van in which they were riding collided with a truck and passenger car at Erie Street and Chalmers Avenue on the South Side.

1968: The three youngest children of Clyde and Lillian McVay of Trinity Church Road south of Lisbon die in a fire. Dead are Charles W., 4; John, 3, and Clyde Jr., 18 months.

Judge Robert M. Duncan of Columbus Municipal Court is named to the Ohio Supreme Court by Gov. James A. Rhodes. Duncan is the first black male to serve on the court.

An apparent low bid for $6 million is entered by James Soda Inc. of Niles for construction of six miles of Route 11, freeway in southern Mahoning County. It was $307,925 below state cost estimates.

1943: Jeremiah R. Wooley, 96, of Norwood Avenue, chairman of the board of Home Savings & Loan Co., a leading Youngstown resident and outstanding Welshman, dies in South Side Hospital.

Frankie Sinkwich, Youngstown gridder who won All-American fame at the University of Georgia, now a Detroit Lion, is named as a halfback on the New York Daily News All-National Pro League Team for 1943.

Brothers Nick and George Limberopoulos, two of the alleged leaders of the “Big House” lottery syndicate, Youngstown’s biggest bug outfit, are being held in jail – Nick in Chicago and George in the Mahoning County jail.