Deb McDuffie has been an integral part of the Ritz Theatre & Museum ever since it's reopening in 1999, first as production manager, director of Ritz Voices, and producer of Ritz Amateur Night. More recently she functions as Artistic Director for the venue, where she still directs Ritz Voices and produced Puttin' on the Ritz, and also produces the Ritz Heritage Concert Series featuring community talent.

What is a holiday season without festive music.

The former Trump Plaza casino was imploded after falling into such disrepair that chunks of the building began peeling off and crashing to the ground. “I got chills,” Atlantic City Mayor Marty Small said. AdOpened in 1984, when Trump was a real estate developer in his pre-politics days, Trump Plaza was for a time the most successful casino in Atlantic City. AdBut things began to sour for Trump Plaza when Donald Trump opened the nearby Trump Taj Mahal in 1990, with crushing debt loads that led the company to pour most of its resources — and cash — into the shiny new hotel and casino. Trump Plaza was the last of four Atlantic City casinos to close in 2014, victims of an oversaturated casino market both in the New Jersey city and in the larger northeast.

2005: Singer-songwriter and record producer Luther Vandross, who sold more than 25 million albums and won eight Grammy Awards in his career, dies of a heart attack at the age of 54 in Edison, New Jersey. Among Vandross' Grammy wins were four Best Male R&B Vocal Performance awards and Song of the Year for the 2003 song "Dance with My Father." Some of his other best known songs include "Never Too Much," "Stop to Love," "There's Nothing Better Than Love," "Power of Love/Love Power," "The Best Things in Life Are Free" and "Endless Love." Hide Caption