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2009: The year in review

Top 10 stories from the last year

This year had challenges, glimpses of better days

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By Jim DeBrosse, Staff Writer Updated 1:18 PM Saturday, December 26, 2009

Goodbye, NCR. Hello, Caterpillar and casinos.

2009 was full of surprises for the Miami Valley, from long-sought voter approval of casino gambling to the shocking defeat of a two-term Dayton mayor, from Caterpillar’s announcement of up to 600 new jobs here to the saddening departure of Dayton’s oldest and best-known international company.

Here’s our list of top 10 stories of the year, ranked in reverse order and based on community impact, reader interest and that uncanny expertise delegated to all journalists known as news judgment.

10. Flyers win  in tournament

Invited to be part of March Madness, the University of Dayton (27-6) notches its first NCAA tourney victory since 1990 with sophomore Chris Wright scoring a career-high 27 points and pulling down 10 rebounds to lead 11th-seeded UD to a 68-60 upset over sixth-seeded West Virginia. The team’s good news continues this season as well, with a 9-2 record so far.

9. Five die in dramatic car crash

In the early morning hours of New Year’s Day, a Grand Prix sedan transporting five family members from a party reaches an estimated 90 mph on North Findlay Street, hits the railroad crossing and goes airborne before smashing into a pole. Trisha Roush, 33; Shawn Roush, 32; Dustin McDonald, 22; Nichole Hill, 29; and 11-month-old Hayden Hill died instantly, according to police. Alcohol was blamed in the crash.

8. UD buys NCR World Headquarters

The final month of the year brought good news that the University of Dayton had purchased for $18 million the world headquarters being vacated by NCR. UD has plans to consolidate inside the 455,000-square-foot structure the scattered pieces of the University of Dayton Research Institute and establish a new state hub for aerospace research. A few weeks before, the hub got a major boost with a $49.5 million grant from the U.S. Air Force to develop advanced jet fuels and combustion technology.

7. Mother killed,  son abducted

Investigators say Charlie Myers, armed with a shotgun, drove on Jan. 2 from Columbus to the Harrison Twp. home of 29-year-old Jenny Nelson in the Nelson family’s 1999 Honda Accord, stolen from an Ohio State University parking garage two weeks before. Myers kicked open the front door while Nelson was cooking dinner, tied her to a chair, then took the boy upstairs and sexually assaulted him, according to prosecutors. Nelson broke free from her restraints, grabbed a knife and stabbed Myers in the side. Myers then shot Nelson twice with his shotgun, according to prosecutors.

Myers fled in a car with the boy and left him that night at a rest stop near the Madison-Clark county line. The boy, who had no shoes and wasn’t wearing a coat, told a woman there that a man had shot his mother. Deputies later found Nelson dead in her home. Myers, who is deaf, is in jail facing murder and kidnapping charges.

6. Caterpillar to bring jobs here

Finally, in December, some welcome news on the job front. Caterpillar Logistics Services agrees to construct a $68.6 million distribution center at Commerce Park on Hoke Road in Clayton, bringing 500 to 600 new jobs paying $11.75 an hour plus benefits and an annual payroll of $12 million to 14 million. A week later, Cintas Corp. announces it will add 100 jobs at its Dayton operation.

5. DHL Express leaves Wilmington

DHL Express reduces U.S. operations with plans to strike a deal with fellow package-delivery company UPS, eliminating thousands of jobs at DHL’s operation in Wilmington. DHL wants to hire UPS and replace ABX Air and ASTAR Air Cargo in transporting packages by year’s end. That would move work away from DHL’s airport hub in Wilmington, about 30 miles southeast of Dayton, and result in the loss of about 7,400 jobs there.

4. Swine Flu threatens

Thousands of area residents line up this fall and winter for shots against the H1N1 influenza virus, or swine flu, as health officials struggle to obtain adequate supplies of the vaccine. Although the virus so far falls short of fears that it might cause a deadly epidemic, the flu claims the lives of at least 40 Ohioans, including a 5-year-old Springboro boy and a 39-year-old Preble County Sheriff’s captain.

3. Casinos approved by Ohio voters

Gov. Ted Strickland does a 180 on his opposition to expanding gambling and pushes a plan to put 17,500 slot machines at the seven horse racetracks around the state as a way to revive Ohio’s ailing horse industry and generate $900 million for schools. But the slots plan collapses in September when the Ohio Supreme Court rules that it must be subjected to a voter referendum. Meanwhile, voters pass Issue 3, which allows developers to put casinos in Toledo, Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati. Columbus power brokers cry about how they still don’t want a casino in Franklin County. But in Southwest Ohio, including the Dayton area, support for casinos is strong in the hope they will bring badly-needed jobs.

2. Leitzell defeats McLin for mayor

She had the name recognition and the political pedigree. He was the political neophyte, with little funding and no government experience. But with the economy in its worst shape in decades, and the recent loss of Dayton business icon NCR to Georgia, two-time Dayton Mayor Rhine McLin took a hit from voters, losing the election to newcomer Gary Leitzell by fewer than 900 votes.

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How are numbers 9 & 10 even on this list?

And while we're at it, why would Kwanzaa be on this list? I've never met anyone that actually celebrated it, and probably about 4% of the country actually celebrates it. Why would anyone waste time whining about it (like the idiot below)?

huh?
7:11 PM, 12/27/2009

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Looks like a couple DDN comment folks forgot to take their pills.

Chris
1:33 AM, 12/27/2009

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Flyers win in tournament? This is a top 10 story???

huh?
2:38 PM, 12/26/2009

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Kwanzaa isn't a top 10 story? Bigot/racist crackers! You removed the story because the whites provided the truth that it's a black bigot/felon created holiday hatched out of the foul bowel pie hole of UCB(San Fran.)in 1966. We Kwanzaa hacks wanted to counter the commentors of truth about Kwanzaa with our personal attacks, innuendo, latent bias, full non-truth and making statements out of context. Lies work well. We exist on lies. We live lies. We use our race lies to shut down opposition.

Obama Kwanzaa
2:20 PM, 12/26/2009

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I think the failure of the Regionla Dispatch Center on its first day operation ranks in the top ten stories of 2009. The DDN editorial board all but called for the resignation of lms sheriff phil plummer. His mishandling of this incident and the laying off employees may well prove the ddn editorial board was accurate about his lack of leadership.

City Resident
12:55 PM, 12/26/2009

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