STORY:
U.S Territory Enters Year 2000

Guam leads the United States into the next century

(Everything2000) In true U.S. style, Guam set off fireworks held family feasts and raucous beach parties to ring in the year 2000. Guam is one of the first U.S. territories to enter the millennium and what an American party.

Wake Island, an U.S. military installation in the Pacific, was technically the first part of American soil to enter 2000. That event took place at 7a.m. EST. All the attention though went to Guam and to the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas where the biggest Millennium parties were taking place. There was dancing on the beach, cheers from crowds and a firework ceremony in the tourist area of Tumon Bay.

Quiet celebrations took place at family beach barbecues and in Catholic churches around the island. More than 75-percent of the island's residents are Catholic. Many gathered at churches to pray and sing as the clock rang midnight.

Guam is a testing ground for Y2K. Since it is the first territory to hit the year 2000 a staging area was set up by the U.S. Department of the Interior to keep track of any problems. Dozens of emergency management officials spent the New Year in a civil defense compound where they normally coordinate the territory's response to natural disasters like typhoons. So far, no Y2K glitches in Guam.

Guam also claimed the first birth on American soil. A boy named Pete John G. Urdanetta San Nicholas was born at Guam Memorial Hospital in the village Inarajan at 12:15 a.m. He weighed in at 7-pounds-7-ounces.

Source: Associated Press

DATE: 12/31/99

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