With jobs connected to the retirement of a refueling tanker ― and its impact on the mission of Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst ― on the minds of many people there, President Barack Obama visited the base on Monday, Dec. 15, 2014.
Obama’s visit to the base came as the Defense Department mulled the retirement of KC-10 refueling tankers, half of which were stationed at the joint base.
President Barack Obama addresses soldiers at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst on Monday, Dec. 15, 2014.
Here’s a look at events that happened in Central Jersey from five, 10, 25, 50 and 100 years ago this week.
Five years ago
Dec. 9, 2019: Gov. Phil Murphy tweeted, “I hereby declare that CENTRAL JERSEY DOES EXIST.” On Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2019, he tweeted the state law defines Central Jersey as the following counties: Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Monmouth, Somerset, Ocean and Union.
Dec. 10: It was reported New Jersey was moving quickly to extend driver’s licenses to immigrants without legal status and others who lacked paperwork. On Monday, Dec. 9, 2019, lawmakers heard testimony on a bill that could get final votes the next week.
Dec. 10: By a wider than 2-1 margin, voters approved a $35.4 million referendum to upgrade all Hillsborough Township schools, passing by a vote of 3,868 to 1,760.
Dec. 10: A police officer, two suspects and three bystanders were killed in a gunfight that stretched from a cemetery to a supermarket in Jersey City.
Edison’s Trevor Damonski, left, and South Brunswick’s Zachary Inzano face off during their game on Wednesday, Dec. 11, 2019.
Dec. 11: For the second time in less than a week, the Edison Township ice hockey team beat South Brunswick, 6-5, and with the win, improved to 4-0.
Dec. 13: Hackensack Meridian Health said it paid an undisclosed amount in ransom to stop a cyber-attack that had disrupted the hospital owner’s computer network since it began the week prior.
Dec. 13: Darlene Love would perform on Wednesday, Dec. 18, 2019, at the Hackensack Meridian Health Theatre at the Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank, it was reported.
10 years ago
Dec. 9, 2014: The Rutgers Board of Governors gave final approval to a resolution endorsing legislative changes to the Rutgers Act of 1956 that, if approved by the legislators and enacted by Gov. Chris Christie, would reduce the size of the university’s board of trustees.
Assistant professor Andrea Vaccaro, bottom right, along with students and faculty at Raritan Valley Community College, held a die-in protest about recent deaths at the hands of police on Thursday, Dec. 11, 2014.
Dec. 11: Like thousands on campuses across the country, a group of Raritan Valley Community College students and teachers in the North Branch section of Branchburg expressed outrage against unwarranted police violence by staging a “die-in.”
Dec. 13: Touring behind her new Christmas EP, LeAnn Rimes performed at the Bergen Performing Arts Center in Englewood.
Dec. 14: In men’s college basketball, the Rutgers Scarlet Knights beat Manhattan College, 63-55.
Dec. 15: It was reported official numbers compiled by the state Division of Elections showed just 35.8 percent of registered voters cast ballots in the November 2014 election, one of the lowest turnouts in the U.S., and the lowest on record for a year a U.S. Senate race topped the NJ ballot.
Dec. 15: During a poignant assembly that kicked off Sayreville War Memorial High School’s Week of Hope, students gave first-hand accounts of their experiences with hatred, violence and discrimination.
1999
Dec. 9, 1999: State Police Bomb Squad experts found candy and match sticks in a package they thought might have contained a bomb. On Friday, Dec. 10, 1999, police said the person the package was addressed to left it behind by mistake.
Dec. 9: David L. Smith, 31, who worked as an assistant computer technician at Rutgers University’s fund-raising arm in New Brunswick from Monday, Sept. 20, to Friday, Dec. 3, 1999, pleaded guilty to state and federal charges in the dissemination of the Melissa computer virus.
Dec. 11: Authorities said 75 detectives and officers from Somerset and five other counties arrested 24 fugitives in a sweep that began early in the morning on Tuesday, Dec. 7, 1999, it was reported.
Dec. 11: The motor vehicle inspection center in Somerville closed at the end of the day, a casualty of the state’s new emissions testing, which was to begin Monday, Dec. 13, 1999.
Kevin Searles, a computer technician for Hunterdon Central Regional High School, works on a bank of computers. With many scheduled snow days used up due to Hurricane Floyd, many districts were hoping that Y2K problems didn’t result in lost school time.
Dec. 13: It was reported Central Jersey children would not have to go to school between Christmas and New Year’s to make up for days lost in the aftermath of Hurricane Floyd.
Dec. 13: A state Superior Court judge in Bergen County upheld a 6-month-old law requiring a parent to be notified before a minor could have an abortion.
Dec. 14: “Peanuts” creator Charles M. Schulz announced he would retire on Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2000, the day after his final comic strip appeared.
Dec. 14: The New Jersey Devils beat the Los Angeles Kings, 7-1.
1974
Dec. 10, 1974: “Visit to a Small Planet,” which opened Friday, Dec. 6, 1974, at the Craig Theatre in Summit, would run Fridays and Saturdays through Saturday, Dec. 21, 1974, it was reported.
Dec. 12: It was reported the Bridgewater East High School football team had won the Rutgers Cup, symbolic of schoolboy football supremacy in Central Jersey.
Dec. 13: While several towns indicated that year’s Christmas lighting would be more conservative than in pre-energy crisis years, none said they would black-out altogether, or make the major cutbacks taken the previous year.
Santa at the Metuchen Christmas parade on Sunday, Dec. 15, 1974.
Dec. 15: With rain having postponed the annual event twice, the Metuchen Christmas parade to kick off the holiday shopping season marched down Main Street in the borough.
Dec. 15: Security staffs at Central Jersey stores were prepared for holiday season shoplifters, with some nabbing six shoplifters a day, and nearly all prosecuting without discrimination, it was reported.
1924
Dec. 10, 1924: The Queen City Wheelmen baseball team beat the Gladpack Five, 37-35.
Ernest Torrence and Anna Q. Nilsson in Herbert Brenon’s production, “The Side Show of Life.”
Dec. 10-11: The movie, “The Side Show of Life,” starring Ernest Torrence and Anna Q. Nilsson, was shown at Reade’s Strand Theatre in Perth Amboy.
Dec. 11: Jack Degnan, an employe of Fred Endress at his garage on Park Avenue in Plainfield, while mixing some asphalt paint in the workshop, got too close to a nearby flame and a slight explosion followed. Degman was slightly burned, and the foot of Edward Midgley, another workman, was burned.
Dec. 11: According to a statement filed with the Board of Freeholders at its meeting, the average daily cost per patient treated at St. Peter’s Hospital in New Brunswick between Saturday, Dec. 1, 1923, and Monday, Dec. 1, 1924, was $2.76.
Dec. 14: It was reported a postcard mailed from Jamesburg finally made it to its destination in Helmetta ― 16 years later.
Brad Wadlow is a staff writer for MyCentralJersey.com
This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: NJ history for Dec. 9-15