Print
E-mail
This Week In History: October 18-24
By The Associated Press
Sunday, October 18
1648 - Boston's shoemakers, barrelmakers and tubmakers set up the first American labor organization.
1672 - Poland surrenders the Ukraine to the Turks after an invasion.
1685 - King Louis XIV of France revokes the Edict of Nantes, which had established the legal toleration of France's Protestant population, the Huguenots.
1767 - The boundary between Maryland and Pennsylvania, the Mason-Dixon line, which divides America's south from the north, is agreed upon.
1867 - The United States takes formal possession of Alaska from Russia.
1892 - The first long-distance telephone line is opened between Chicago and New York.
1898 - The American flag is raised in Puerto Rico shortly before Spain formally relinquishes control of the island to the United States.
1944 - Soviet troops invade Czechoslovakia during World War II.
1964 - Pope Paul VI proclaims 22 new African saints. The saints, known as the Blessed Martyrs of Uganda, were a group of converts who were persecuted and martyred in 1885-87.
1968 - The U.S. Olympic Committee suspends two black athletes, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, for giving a black-power salute as a protest at a victory ceremony in Mexico City.
1969 - The federal government bans artificial sweeteners known as cyclamates because of evidence they caused cancer in laboratory rats.
1972 - A three-nation U.N. investigating committee made up of Yugoslavia, Somalia and Sri Lanka, accuses Israel of continued violations of Arab rights in the territories occupied since the 1967 war
1981 - Andreas Papandreou's Panhellenic Socialist Movement wins 48 percent in national elections, becoming Greece's first leftist government.
1989 - Gunmen assassinate Colombian presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galan, the frontrunner in polls, at a campaign rally outside Bogota. Four candidates are murdered in the months leading up to the 1990 election.
1991 - Ukraine, Georgia, Moldavia and Azerbaijan refuse to sign an economic union treaty with the Soviet constituent republics.
1993 - U.N. oil embargo takes effect against Haiti.
1994 - Boat people begin to return to Haiti after the reinstatement of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
1995 - The United States announces it will grant Fidel Castro a visa, permitting the Cuban president to address the United Nations.
1998 - A pipeline explosion in Nigeria apparently sparked by thieves siphoning off oil leads to an inferno that kills at least 250 people and destroys villages.
1999 - Former South African President Nelson Mandela begins his first visit to Israel, a gesture of final reconciliation with a nation that had backed South Africa's apartheid regime.
2000 - Fighting between Nigeria's Hausa and Yoruba tribes leaves 100 dead in Lagos. Thousands of people are killed in ethnic and religious conflicts in Africa's most populous nation in 2000.
2001 - Four Osama bin Laden disciples convicted in the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa are sentenced in New York City to life without parole.
2004 - India's most wanted bandit, Koose Muniswamy Veerappan, 60, a brutal smuggler who eluded police for three decades in dense jungles, is killed in a shootout with security forces.
2005 - U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld accuses China of understating the growth of its military budget, saying the country is raising global suspicion about its military intentions by failing to acknowledge the true size of recent increases in its defense spending.
2006 - Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont of Thailand says he will try to peacefully resolve the Muslim insurgency in the kingdom's southern provinces — a reversal of the previous government's iron-fisted strategy.
2007 - Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto returns to Karachi after eight years of exile. A suspected suicide bomber strikes near the truck carrying her, killing 108 people, but Bhutto escapes unhurt.
2008 - Canada declares a chemical widely used in food packaging a toxic substance, and says it will now move to ban plastic baby bottles containing bisphenol A.
Monday, October 19
1765 - The Stamp Act Congress, meeting in New York, draws up a declaration of rights and liberties.
1781 - British troops under Lord Cornwallis surrender at Yorktown, Virginia, ending the American Revolution war.
1812 - French forces under Napoleon Bonaparte begin their retreat from Moscow.
1813 - Napoleon's forces are defeated by a combined Austrian, Prussian, Russian, and Swedish army at Leipzig, Germany, marking the end of the French Empire east of the Rhine.
1827 - Turkish-Egyptian fleet is destroyed by a combined Anglo-French-Russian armada in the battle of Navarino.
1943 - The foreign ministers of the United States, the Soviet Union and Britain open a conference in Moscow to discuss broad principles of cooperation.
1944 - The U.S. Navy announces black women would be allowed into Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES).
1950 - United Nations forces enter Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea.
1951 - U.S. President Harry Truman formally ends the state of war with Germany.
1954 - An Anglo-Egyptian treaty providing for withdrawal of British armed forces from the Suez Canal Zone during the next 20 months is signed in Cairo with Egypt taking complete control of the Suez in seven years.
1960 - The U.S. imposes an embargo on exports to Cuba covering all commodities except medical supplies and certain food products.
1969 - U.S. Vice President Spiro Agnew refers to anti-Vietnam War protesters "an effete corps of impudent snobs."
1972 - U.S. and South Vietnamese officials meet in peace negotiations where the U.S. and North Vietnam will move toward a cease-fire agreement in Indochina and a political accord that would replace the current government in Saigon.
1977 - The supersonic Concorde airplane makes its first landing in New York after 19 months of delays caused by residents concerned about the aircraft's noise.
1983 - The commander of Grenada's armed force announces that Prime Minister Maurice Bishop, who was under house arrest, has been killed by soldiers after he tried to seize army headquarters.
1984 - A young Polish pro-Solidarity priest, the Rev. Jerzy Popieluszko, is abducted and murdered by Communist secret police.
1987 - The stock market crashes as the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunges 508 points, or 22.6 percent in value - its biggest-ever percentage drop in decades.
1990 - The Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. adopts a long-awaited plan to reform the nation's economy.
1991 - A clandestine assembly of ethnic Albanian legislators proclaim Kosovo to be an independent republic. The republic of Serbia annexed Kosovo in 1990.
1992 - African National Congress President Nelson Mandela acknowledges that prisoners in congress military camps had been tortured during the 1980s and early 1990s. The camps, located in other African countries, had been training sites during the congress's guerrilla war against the South African government.
1994 - A bomb on a crowded city bus kills 20 people in Tel Aviv, Israel.
1995 - A powerful bomb explodes at Sri Lanka's main oil storage tank in a Colombo suburb, causing mass evacuations as fires rage out of control.
1996 - Chechen separatists install their military commander Aslan Maskhadov as prime minister of a makeshift coalition government.
2000 - A suspected Tamil Tiger suicide bomber blows himself up in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The explosion occurs minutes before President Chandrika Kumaratunga swears in a new cabinet to cement her shaky coalition and end a weeklong political crisis.
2001 - U.S. special forces begin operations on the ground in Afghanistan, opening a significant new phase of the assault against the Taliban and terrorists.
2004 - Myanmar's secretive military regime forces out its prime minister, the long-powerful Gen. Khin Nyunt, and places him under house arrest on corruption charges.
2005 - Chile's Supreme Court strips former dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet of immunity from prosecution for corruption charges related to his multimillion-dollar bank accounts overseas.
2006 - Suicide bombings in the south and east of Afghanistan kill a British soldier, two children and a policeman, as President Hamid Karzai calls on NATO forces to use caution during military operations a day after 20 civilians are killed.
2008 - One of only two portraits of painter Francis Bacon by his friend and fellow British artist Lucian Freud is sold at auction for more than 5.4 million pounds ($9.4 million).
Tuesday, October 20
1728 - A huge fire ravages Copenhagen, Denmark, destroying most of the city.
1792 - U.S. President George Washington writes about religious differences as the cause of the world's troubles: "Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind those which are caused by a difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing and ought to be deprecated."
1805 - Austrians are defeated by French at Battle of Ulm.
1827 - The last great naval battle of the age of sail: British, French and Russian ships obliterate the Turkish fleet at Navarino, leading to the Turks withdrawing from Greece.
1867 - British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli writes about change in a time that many people were afraid of it, "change is inevitable in a progressive country, change is constant."
1883 - Peru cedes territory to Chile by Peace of Ancor.
1892 - The city of Chicago dedicates the World's Colombian Exposition.
1897 - King of Korea proclaims himself emperor, and Russia and Japan intervene.
1903 - A joint commission rules in favor of the U.S. in a boundary dispute between the District of Alaska and Canada.
1921 - Franco-Turkish agreement is signed at Ankara.
1944 - The Yugoslav cities of Belgrade and Dubrovnik are liberated during World War II; Gen. Douglas MacArthur, keeping his promise to the Philippine people that he would return to rescue them from Japanese occupation, steps ashore at Leyte.
1945 - Egypt, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon warn the U.S. that creation of a Jewish state could lead to war in Middle East; Arab League is formed.
1947 - The House Un-American Activities Committee opens hearings into alleged Communist influence and infiltration within the motion picture industry.
1968 - Jacqueline Kennedy and Aristotle Onassis are wed on his privately owned island of Skorpios in Ionian Sea.
1977 - Civilian government in Thailand is ousted in bloodless coup by military junta which installed the regime one year earlier.
1980 - Greece rejoins NATO's military wing.
1986 - Mozambique's President Samora Machel dies in plane crash in eastern South Africa.
1988 - Sri Lanka suspends military operations against Sinhalese militants, trying to topple the government, for one week.
1989 - Hungarian parliament disbands the Communist Party's armed guard, known as the Worker's Militia.
1990 - Kim Dae Jung, leader of South Korean political opposition, ends a 12-day hunger strike when government leaders say they are willing to compromise on some of his demands: end military surveillance, improve the economy and halt plans to replace the presidential system of government.
1991 - Earthquake strikes Himalayan foothills in India, killing at least 341 people and destroying tens of thousands of homes.
1993 - NATO defense ministers agree to offer former Warsaw Pact states and neutral European countries "partnerships for peace" as a first step toward qualifying for full membership in the alliance.
1995 - NATO Secretary-General Willy Claes resigns to face corruption charges in his native Belgium.
2000 - Local and international health workers tackle an outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in Gulu, Uganda. Officials report a slowing in the spread of the epidemic that has killed 47 people and infected as many as 75 more.
2003 - Italian officials find the bodies of 13 African immigrants who died at sea in a small boat en route from Libya to Italy. Survivors of the passage said a total of at least 63 people had died of hunger and cold, and dozens of the dead were thrown overboard.
2004 - Two Muslim girls who refuse to remove their head scarves in class are expelled from their schools in France, and two more risk the same fate as officials begin taking action against those who defy a new law banning conspicuous religious symbols from public schools.
2005 - A U.N. investigation concludes that high-ranking Syrian and Lebanese security officials were involved in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
2006 - Colombian President Alvaro Uribe withdraws his offer to negotiate a humanitarian prisoner exchange with leftist rebels after blaming the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia for a car bomb that wounded 23 people.
2007 - Radio Shabelle's Bashir Nor Gedi, who is critical of both the Somali government and the Islamic militants who have been trying to topple it, is killed outside his home in the Somali capital, the eighth journalist slain in the country this year.
2008 - Taliban gunmen kill Christian aid worker Gayle Williams, a British-South African national, in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Today is Wednesday, Oct. 21, the 294th day of 2009. There are 71 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
On Oct. 21, 1959, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, opened to the public in New York.
On this date:
In 1797, the U.S. Navy frigate Constitution, also known as "Old Ironsides," was christened in Boston's harbor.
In 1805, a British fleet commanded by Adm. Horatio Nelson defeated a French-Spanish fleet in the Battle of Trafalgar; Nelson, however, was killed.
In 1879, Thomas Edison perfected a workable electric light at his laboratory in Menlo Park, N.J.
In 1917, members of the 1st Division of the U.S. Army training in Luneville, France, became the first Americans to see action on the front lines of World War I.
In 1944, during World War II, U.S. troops captured the German city of Aachen.
In 1960, Democrat John F. Kennedy and Republican Richard M. Nixon clashed in their fourth and final presidential debate in New York.
In 1966, more than 140 people, mostly children, were killed when a coal waste landslide engulfed a school and several houses in Aberfan, Wales.
In 1967, the Israeli destroyer INS Eilat was sunk by Egyptian missile boats near Port Said; 47 Israeli crew members were lost.
In 1969, beat poet and author Jack Kerouac died in St. Petersburg, Fla., at age 47.
In 1971, President Richard Nixon nominated Lewis F. Powell and William H. Rehnquist to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Ten years ago: France's highest court upheld the conviction of Maurice Papon, the former Vichy official who'd fled France rather than face prison for his role in sending Jews to Nazi death camps; Papon was captured in Switzerland and deported the following day. (Papon ended up serving three years of a 10-year sentence; he died in 2007.)
Five years ago: An Associated Press poll found President George W. Bush and Sen. John Kerry locked in a statistical tie for the popular vote. Emerson College student Victoria Snelgrove, 21, died hours after being shot in the eye with a pepper-spray pellet fired by police trying to control a raucous crowd outside Fenway Park, where the Boston Red Sox had won the American League championship. The St. Louis Cardinals defeated the Houston Astros 5-2 to take Game 7 of the National League championship series.
One year ago: Dozens of members of the Mongol motorcycle gang were arrested by federal agents in six states on a variety of charges following a three-year investigation in which undercover agents infiltrated the group. Iraq's Cabinet decided to ask the United States for changes to the draft agreement that would keep American troops there for three more years. The former prime minister of Thailand, Thaksin Shinawatra, was convicted in absentia of corruption and sentenced to two years in prison.
Today is Thursday, Oct. 22, the 295th day of 2009. There are 70 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
On Oct. 22, 1962, President John F. Kennedy announced a quarantine of all offensive military equipment shipped to Cuba, following the discovery of Soviet-built missile bases on the island.
On this date:
In 1746, Princeton University was first chartered as the College of New Jersey.
In 1797, French balloonist Andre-Jacques Garnerin made the first parachute descent, landing safely from a height of about 3,000 feet over Paris.
In 1836, Sam Houston was inaugurated as the first constitutionally elected president of the Republic of Texas.
In 1883, the original Metropolitan Opera House in New York held its grand opening with a performance of Gounod's "Faust."
In 1928, Republican presidential nominee Herbert Hoover spoke of the "American system of rugged individualism" in a speech at New York's Madison Square Garden.
In 1934, bank robber Charles "Pretty Boy" Floyd was shot to death by federal agents at a farm in East Liverpool, Ohio.
In 1968, Apollo 7 returned safely from Earth orbit, splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean.
In 1979, the U.S. government allowed the deposed Shah of Iran to travel to New York for medical treatment — a decision that precipitated the Iran hostage crisis.
In 1981, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization was decertified by the federal government for its strike the previous August.
In 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed into law sweeping tax-overhaul legislation.
Ten years ago: Five of the seven Republican presidential hopefuls met in New Hampshire for their first debate of the 2000 nomination race, with front-runner George W. Bush notably absent. Former Vichy official Maurice Papon was expelled from Switzerland and sent back to France.
Five years ago: In a wrenching videotaped statement, kidnapped aid worker Margaret Hassan begged Britain to help save her by withdrawing its troops from Iraq, saying these "might be my last hours." (Hassan was apparently killed by her captors a month later.) ***(TOM, SEE WIKI ENTRY AND OXFORD FOR TODAY IN HISTORY IF POSSIBLE) ***
One year ago: Wall Street tumbled again as investors worried that the global economy was poised to weaken. The major indexes fell more than 4 percent, including the Dow Jones industrial average, which finished with a loss of 514 points. The fishing vessel Katmai sank in the Bering Sea off Alaska's Aleutian Islands, killing seven crewmen; four survived. India launched its first mission to the moon to redraw maps of the lunar surface. (India lost contact with its lunar satellite Chandrayaan-1 last August.) The Philadelphia Phillies won Game 1 of the World Series, defeating the Tampa Bay Rays 3-2.
Today is Friday, Oct. 23, the 296th day of 2009. There are 69 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
On Oct. 23, 1983, 241 U.S. service members, most of them Marines, were killed in a suicide truck-bombing at Beirut International Airport in Lebanon; a near-simultaneous attack on French forces killed 58 paratroopers.
On this date:
In 1707, the first Parliament of Great Britain, created by the Acts of Union between England and Scotland, held its first meeting.
In 1864, forces led by Union Gen. Samuel R. Curtis repelled Confederate Gen. Sterling Price's army in the Battle of Westport in Missouri.
In 1915, tens of thousands of women marched in New York City, demanding the right to vote.
In 1942, during World War II, Britain launched a major offensive against Axis forces at El Alamein in Egypt.
In 1946, the United Nations General Assembly convened in New York for the first time, at an auditorium in Flushing Meadow.
In 1956, a student-sparked revolt against Hungary's Communist rule began; as the revolution spread, Soviet forces started entering the country, and the uprising was put down within weeks.
In 1973, President Richard Nixon agreed to turn over White House tape recordings subpoenaed by the Watergate special prosecutor to Judge John J. Sirica.
In 1987, the U.S. Senate rejected, 58-42, the Supreme Court nomination of Robert H. Bork.
In 1989, 23 people were killed in an explosion at Phillips Petroleum Co.'s chemical complex in Pasadena, Texas. In a case that inflamed racial tensions in Boston, Charles Stuart claimed he and his pregnant wife, Carol, had been shot in their car by a black robber. (Carol Stuart and her prematurely delivered baby died; Charles Stuart later died, an apparent suicide, after he was implicated.)
In 1995, a jury in Houston convicted Yolanda Saldivar of murdering Tejano singing star Selena. (Saldivar is serving a life prison sentence.)
Ten years ago: Sixteen members of the Ku Klux Klan held a silent rally in New York City as thousands of counter-demonstrators jeered them. The New York Yankees won the first game of the World Series, beating the Atlanta Braves, 4-1. (The Yankees went on to sweep the series.)
Five years ago: Gunmen ambushed a group of U.S.-trained Iraqi soldiers on a road east of Baghdad; around 50 of the soldiers, who were unarmed, were killed execution-style. A 6.8-magnitude earthquake in northern Japan killed 40 people. The Boston Red Sox took Game 1 of the World Series, defeating the St. Louis Cardinals 11-9. Singer Ashlee Simpson was caught lip-synching during an appearance on NBC's "Saturday Night Live." Opera singer Robert Merrill died in New Rochelle, N.Y., at age 87.
One year ago: Badgered by lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan denied the nation's economic crisis was his fault but conceded the meltdown had revealed a flaw in a lifetime of economic thinking and left him in a "state of shocked disbelief." The Tampa Bay Rays evened the World Series at one game apiece by beating the Philadelphia Phillies, 4-2.
Today is Saturday, Oct. 24, the 297th day of 2009. There are 68 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
In Oct. 24, 1945, the United Nations officially came into existence as its charter took effect. (On this date in 1949, construction began on the U.N. headquarters in New York.)
On this date:
In 1537, Jane Seymour, the third wife of England's King Henry VIII, died 12 days after giving birth to Prince Edward, later King Edward VI.
In 1648, the Peace of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years War and effectively destroyed the Holy Roman Empire.
In 1861, the first transcontinental telegraph message was sent as Chief Justice Stephen J. Field of California transmitted a telegram to President Abraham Lincoln.
In 1901, widow Anna Edson Taylor became the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel.
In 1931, the George Washington Bridge, connecting New York and New Jersey, was officially dedicated (it opened to traffic the next day).
In 1939, Benny Goodman and his orchestra recorded their signature theme, "Let's Dance," for Columbia Records in New York. Nylon stockings were sold publicly for the first time, in Wilmington, Del.
In 1952, Republican presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower declared in Detroit, "I shall go to Korea" as he promised to end the conflict. (He made the visit over a month later.)
In 1980, the merchant freighter SS Poet departed Philadelphia bound for Port Said, Egypt, with a crew of 34 and a cargo of grain; it disappeared en route and has not been heard from since.
In 1989, former television evangelist Jim Bakker was sentenced by a judge in Charlotte, N.C., to 45 years in prison for fraud and conspiracy. (The sentence was later reduced to eight years; it was further reduced to four for good behavior.)
In 2002, authorities arrested Army veteran John Allen Muhammad and teenager Lee Boyd Malvo near Myersville, Md., in connection with the Washington-area sniper attacks.
Ten years ago: An Israeli court sentenced American teenager Samuel Sheinbein to 24 years in prison for killing an acquaintance in Maryland in 1997. Sen. John Chafee, R-R.I., died at Bethesda Naval Hospital at age 77. The New York Yankees took Game 2 of the World Series, defeating the Atlanta Braves, 7-2.
Five years ago: A plane owned by top NASCAR team Hendrick Motorsports crashed near Martinsville, Va., killing all ten people aboard. A Russian-U.S. crew aboard a Soyuz capsule returned to Earth from the international space station in a pinpoint landing in Kazakhstan. Cardinal James A. Hickey, former archbishop of Washington, D.C., died at age 84. The Boston Red Sox beat the St. Louis Cardinals 6-2 for a 2-0 World Series lead. Arizona's Emmitt Smith broke Walter Payton's NFL record for 100-yard games rushing with his 78th.
One year ago: Singer-actress Jennifer Hudson's mother and brother were found slain in their Chicago home; the body of her 7-year-old nephew was found three days later. (Hudson's estranged brother-in-law has been arrested in the killings.) A Russian Soyuz capsule touched down in Kazakhstan after delivering the first two men to follow their fathers into space, a Russian and an American, to the international space station.
1892 - The city of Chicago dedicates the World's Colombian Exposition.
1897 - King of Korea proclaims himself emperor, and Russia and Japan intervene.
1903 - A joint commission rules in favor of the U.S. in a boundary dispute between the District of Alaska and Canada.
1921 - Franco-Turkish agreement is signed at Ankara.
1944 - The Yugoslav cities of Belgrade and Dubrovnik are liberated during World War II; Gen. Douglas MacArthur, keeping his promise to the Philippine people that he would return to rescue them from Japanese occupation, steps ashore at Leyte.
1945 - Egypt, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon warn the U.S. that creation of a Jewish state could lead to war in Middle East; Arab League is formed.
1947 - The House Un-American Activities Committee opens hearings into alleged Communist influence and infiltration within the motion picture industry.
1968 - Jacqueline Kennedy and Aristotle Onassis are wed on his privately owned island of Skorpios in Ionian Sea.
1977 - Civilian government in Thailand is ousted in bloodless coup by military junta which installed the regime one year earlier.
1980 - Greece rejoins NATO's military wing.
1986 - Mozambique's President Samora Machel dies in plane crash in eastern South Africa.
1988 - Sri Lanka suspends military operations against Sinhalese militants, trying to topple the government, for one week.
1993 - NATO defense ministers agree to offer former Warsaw Pact states and neutral European countries "partnerships for peace" as a first step toward qualifying for full membership in the alliance.
1995 - NATO Secretary-General Willy Claes resigns to face corruption charges in his native Belgium.
2000 - Local and international health workers tackle an outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in Gulu, Uganda. Officials report a slowing in the spread of the epidemic that has killed 47 people and infected as many as 75 more.
2003 - Italian officials find the bodies of 13 African immigrants who died at sea in a small boat en route from Libya to Italy. Survivors of the passage said a total of at least 63 people had died of hunger and cold, and dozens of the dead were thrown overboard.
2004 - Two Muslim girls who refuse to remove their head scarves in class are expelled from their schools in France, and two more risk the same fate as officials begin taking action against those who defy a new law banning conspicuous religious symbols from public schools.
2005 - A U.N. investigation concludes that high-ranking Syrian and Lebanese security officials were involved in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
2006 - Colombian President Alvaro Uribe withdraws his offer to negotiate a humanitarian prisoner exchange with leftist rebels after blaming the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia for a car bomb that wounded 23 people.
2007 - Radio Shabelle's Bashir Nor Gedi, who is critical of both the Somali government and the Islamic militants who have been trying to topple it, is killed outside his home in the Somali capital, the eighth journalist slain in the country this year.
2008 - Taliban gunmen kill Christian aid worker Gayle Williams, a British-South African national, in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Wednesday, Oct. 21
In 1797, the U.S. Navy frigate Constitution, also known as "Old Ironsides," was christened in Boston's harbor.
In 1805, a British fleet commanded by Adm. Horatio Nelson defeated a French-Spanish fleet in the Battle of Trafalgar; Nelson, however, was killed.
In 1879, Thomas Edison perfected a workable electric light at his laboratory in Menlo Park, N.J.
In 1917, members of the 1st Division of the U.S. Army training in Luneville, France, became the first Americans to see action on the front lines of World War I.
In 1944, during World War II, U.S. troops captured the German city of Aachen.
In 1960, Democrat John F. Kennedy and Republican Richard M. Nixon clashed in their fourth and final presidential debate in New York.
In 1966, more than 140 people, mostly children, were killed when a coal waste landslide engulfed a school and several houses in Aberfan, Wales.
In 1967, the Israeli destroyer INS Eilat was sunk by Egyptian missile boats near Port Said; 47 Israeli crew members were lost.
In 1969, beat poet and author Jack Kerouac died in St. Petersburg, Fla., at age 47.
In 1971, President Richard Nixon nominated Lewis F. Powell and William H. Rehnquist to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Thursday, Oct. 22
In 1746, Princeton University was first chartered as the College of New Jersey.
In 1797, French balloonist Andre-Jacques Garnerin made the first parachute descent, landing safely from a height of about 3,000 feet over Paris.
In 1836, Sam Houston was inaugurated as the first constitutionally elected president of the Republic of Texas.
In 1883, the original Metropolitan Opera House in New York held its grand opening with a performance of Gounod's "Faust."
In 1928, Republican presidential nominee Herbert Hoover spoke of the "American system of rugged individualism" in a speech at New York's Madison Square Garden.
In 1934, bank robber Charles "Pretty Boy" Floyd was shot to death by federal agents at a farm in East Liverpool, Ohio.
In 1968, Apollo 7 returned safely from Earth orbit, splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean.
In 1979, the U.S. government allowed the deposed Shah of Iran to travel to New York for medical treatment — a decision that precipitated the Iran hostage crisis.
In 1981, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization was decertified by the federal government for its strike the previous August.
In 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed into law sweeping tax-overhaul legislation.
Friday, Oct. 23
In 1707, the first Parliament of Great Britain, created by the Acts of Union between England and Scotland, held its first meeting.
In 1864, forces led by Union Gen. Samuel R. Curtis repelled Confederate Gen. Sterling Price's army in the Battle of Westport in Missouri.
In 1915, tens of thousands of women marched in New York City, demanding the right to vote.
In 1942, during World War II, Britain launched a major offensive against Axis forces at El Alamein in Egypt.
In 1946, the United Nations General Assembly convened in New York for the first time, at an auditorium in Flushing Meadow.
In 1956, a student-sparked revolt against Hungary's Communist rule began; as the revolution spread, Soviet forces started entering the country, and the uprising was put down within weeks.
In 1973, President Richard Nixon agreed to turn over White House tape recordings subpoenaed by the Watergate special prosecutor to Judge John J. Sirica.
In 1987, the U.S. Senate rejected, 58-42, the Supreme Court nomination of Robert H. Bork.
In 1989, 23 people were killed in an explosion at Phillips Petroleum Co.'s chemical complex in Pasadena, Texas. In a case that inflamed racial tensions in Boston, Charles Stuart claimed he and his pregnant wife, Carol, had been shot in their car by a black robber. (Carol Stuart and her prematurely delivered baby died; Charles Stuart later died, an apparent suicide, after he was implicated.)
In 1995, a jury in Houston convicted Yolanda Saldivar of murdering Tejano singing star Selena. (Saldivar is serving a life prison sentence.)
Saturday, Oct. 24
In 1537, Jane Seymour, the third wife of England's King Henry VIII, died 12 days after giving birth to Prince Edward, later King Edward VI.
In 1648, the Peace of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years War and effectively destroyed the Holy Roman Empire.
In 1861, the first transcontinental telegraph message was sent as Chief Justice Stephen J. Field of California transmitted a telegram to President Abraham Lincoln.
In 1901, widow Anna Edson Taylor became the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel.
In 1931, the George Washington Bridge, connecting New York and New Jersey, was officially dedicated (it opened to traffic the next day).
In 1939, Benny Goodman and his orchestra recorded their signature theme, "Let's Dance," for Columbia Records in New York. Nylon stockings were sold publicly for the first time, in Wilmington, Del.
In 1952, Republican presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower declared in Detroit, "I shall go to Korea" as he promised to end the conflict. (He made the visit over a month later.)
In 1980, the merchant freighter SS Poet departed Philadelphia bound for Port Said, Egypt, with a crew of 34 and a cargo of grain; it disappeared en route and has not been heard from since.
In 1989, former television evangelist Jim Bakker was sentenced by a judge in Charlotte, N.C., to 45 years in prison for fraud and conspiracy. (The sentence was later reduced to eight years; it was further reduced to four for good behavior.)
In 2002, authorities arrested Army veteran John Allen Muhammad and teenager Lee Boyd Malvo near Myersville, Md., in connection with the Washington-area sniper attacks.
One year ago: Singer-actress Jennifer Hudson's mother and brother were found slain in their Chicago home; the body of her 7-year-old nephew was found three days later. (Hudson's estranged brother-in-law has been arrested in the killings.) A Russian Soyuz capsule touched down in Kazakhstan after delivering the first two men to follow their fathers into space, a Russian and an American, to the international space station.
1648 - Boston's shoemakers, barrelmakers and tubmakers set up the first American labor organization.
1672 - Poland surrenders the Ukraine to the Turks after an invasion.
1685 - King Louis XIV of France revokes the Edict of Nantes, which had established the legal toleration of France's Protestant population, the Huguenots.
1767 - The boundary between Maryland and Pennsylvania, the Mason-Dixon line, which divides America's south from the north, is agreed upon.
1867 - The United States takes formal possession of Alaska from Russia.
1892 - The first long-distance telephone line is opened between Chicago and New York.
1898 - The American flag is raised in Puerto Rico shortly before Spain formally relinquishes control of the island to the United States.
1944 - Soviet troops invade Czechoslovakia during World War II.
1964 - Pope Paul VI proclaims 22 new African saints. The saints, known as the Blessed Martyrs of Uganda, were a group of converts who were persecuted and martyred in 1885-87.
1968 - The U.S. Olympic Committee suspends two black athletes, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, for giving a black-power salute as a protest at a victory ceremony in Mexico City.
1969 - The federal government bans artificial sweeteners known as cyclamates because of evidence they caused cancer in laboratory rats.
1972 - A three-nation U.N. investigating committee made up of Yugoslavia, Somalia and Sri Lanka, accuses Israel of continued violations of Arab rights in the territories occupied since the 1967 war
1981 - Andreas Papandreou's Panhellenic Socialist Movement wins 48 percent in national elections, becoming Greece's first leftist government.
1989 - Gunmen assassinate Colombian presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galan, the frontrunner in polls, at a campaign rally outside Bogota. Four candidates are murdered in the months leading up to the 1990 election.
1991 - Ukraine, Georgia, Moldavia and Azerbaijan refuse to sign an economic union treaty with the Soviet constituent republics.
1993 - U.N. oil embargo takes effect against Haiti.
1994 - Boat people begin to return to Haiti after the reinstatement of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
1995 - The United States announces it will grant Fidel Castro a visa, permitting the Cuban president to address the United Nations.
1998 - A pipeline explosion in Nigeria apparently sparked by thieves siphoning off oil leads to an inferno that kills at least 250 people and destroys villages.
1999 - Former South African President Nelson Mandela begins his first visit to Israel, a gesture of final reconciliation with a nation that had backed South Africa's apartheid regime.
2000 - Fighting between Nigeria's Hausa and Yoruba tribes leaves 100 dead in Lagos. Thousands of people are killed in ethnic and religious conflicts in Africa's most populous nation in 2000.
2001 - Four Osama bin Laden disciples convicted in the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa are sentenced in New York City to life without parole.
2004 - India's most wanted bandit, Koose Muniswamy Veerappan, 60, a brutal smuggler who eluded police for three decades in dense jungles, is killed in a shootout with security forces.
2005 - U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld accuses China of understating the growth of its military budget, saying the country is raising global suspicion about its military intentions by failing to acknowledge the true size of recent increases in its defense spending.
2006 - Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont of Thailand says he will try to peacefully resolve the Muslim insurgency in the kingdom's southern provinces — a reversal of the previous government's iron-fisted strategy.
2007 - Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto returns to Karachi after eight years of exile. A suspected suicide bomber strikes near the truck carrying her, killing 108 people, but Bhutto escapes unhurt.
2008 - Canada declares a chemical widely used in food packaging a toxic substance, and says it will now move to ban plastic baby bottles containing bisphenol A.
Monday, October 19
1765 - The Stamp Act Congress, meeting in New York, draws up a declaration of rights and liberties.
1781 - British troops under Lord Cornwallis surrender at Yorktown, Virginia, ending the American Revolution war.
1812 - French forces under Napoleon Bonaparte begin their retreat from Moscow.
1813 - Napoleon's forces are defeated by a combined Austrian, Prussian, Russian, and Swedish army at Leipzig, Germany, marking the end of the French Empire east of the Rhine.
1827 - Turkish-Egyptian fleet is destroyed by a combined Anglo-French-Russian armada in the battle of Navarino.
1943 - The foreign ministers of the United States, the Soviet Union and Britain open a conference in Moscow to discuss broad principles of cooperation.
1944 - The U.S. Navy announces black women would be allowed into Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES).
1950 - United Nations forces enter Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea.
1951 - U.S. President Harry Truman formally ends the state of war with Germany.
1954 - An Anglo-Egyptian treaty providing for withdrawal of British armed forces from the Suez Canal Zone during the next 20 months is signed in Cairo with Egypt taking complete control of the Suez in seven years.
1960 - The U.S. imposes an embargo on exports to Cuba covering all commodities except medical supplies and certain food products.
1969 - U.S. Vice President Spiro Agnew refers to anti-Vietnam War protesters "an effete corps of impudent snobs."
1972 - U.S. and South Vietnamese officials meet in peace negotiations where the U.S. and North Vietnam will move toward a cease-fire agreement in Indochina and a political accord that would replace the current government in Saigon.
1977 - The supersonic Concorde airplane makes its first landing in New York after 19 months of delays caused by residents concerned about the aircraft's noise.
1983 - The commander of Grenada's armed force announces that Prime Minister Maurice Bishop, who was under house arrest, has been killed by soldiers after he tried to seize army headquarters.
1984 - A young Polish pro-Solidarity priest, the Rev. Jerzy Popieluszko, is abducted and murdered by Communist secret police.
1987 - The stock market crashes as the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunges 508 points, or 22.6 percent in value - its biggest-ever percentage drop in decades.
1990 - The Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. adopts a long-awaited plan to reform the nation's economy.
1991 - A clandestine assembly of ethnic Albanian legislators proclaim Kosovo to be an independent republic. The republic of Serbia annexed Kosovo in 1990.
1992 - African National Congress President Nelson Mandela acknowledges that prisoners in congress military camps had been tortured during the 1980s and early 1990s. The camps, located in other African countries, had been training sites during the congress's guerrilla war against the South African government.
1994 - A bomb on a crowded city bus kills 20 people in Tel Aviv, Israel.
1995 - A powerful bomb explodes at Sri Lanka's main oil storage tank in a Colombo suburb, causing mass evacuations as fires rage out of control.
1996 - Chechen separatists install their military commander Aslan Maskhadov as prime minister of a makeshift coalition government.
2000 - A suspected Tamil Tiger suicide bomber blows himself up in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The explosion occurs minutes before President Chandrika Kumaratunga swears in a new cabinet to cement her shaky coalition and end a weeklong political crisis.
2001 - U.S. special forces begin operations on the ground in Afghanistan, opening a significant new phase of the assault against the Taliban and terrorists.
2004 - Myanmar's secretive military regime forces out its prime minister, the long-powerful Gen. Khin Nyunt, and places him under house arrest on corruption charges.
2005 - Chile's Supreme Court strips former dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet of immunity from prosecution for corruption charges related to his multimillion-dollar bank accounts overseas.
2006 - Suicide bombings in the south and east of Afghanistan kill a British soldier, two children and a policeman, as President Hamid Karzai calls on NATO forces to use caution during military operations a day after 20 civilians are killed.
2008 - One of only two portraits of painter Francis Bacon by his friend and fellow British artist Lucian Freud is sold at auction for more than 5.4 million pounds ($9.4 million).
Tuesday, October 20
1728 - A huge fire ravages Copenhagen, Denmark, destroying most of the city.
1792 - U.S. President George Washington writes about religious differences as the cause of the world's troubles: "Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind those which are caused by a difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing and ought to be deprecated."
1805 - Austrians are defeated by French at Battle of Ulm.
1827 - The last great naval battle of the age of sail: British, French and Russian ships obliterate the Turkish fleet at Navarino, leading to the Turks withdrawing from Greece.
1867 - British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli writes about change in a time that many people were afraid of it, "change is inevitable in a progressive country, change is constant."
1883 - Peru cedes territory to Chile by Peace of Ancor.
1892 - The city of Chicago dedicates the World's Colombian Exposition.
1897 - King of Korea proclaims himself emperor, and Russia and Japan intervene.
1903 - A joint commission rules in favor of the U.S. in a boundary dispute between the District of Alaska and Canada.
1921 - Franco-Turkish agreement is signed at Ankara.
1944 - The Yugoslav cities of Belgrade and Dubrovnik are liberated during World War II; Gen. Douglas MacArthur, keeping his promise to the Philippine people that he would return to rescue them from Japanese occupation, steps ashore at Leyte.
1945 - Egypt, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon warn the U.S. that creation of a Jewish state could lead to war in Middle East; Arab League is formed.
1947 - The House Un-American Activities Committee opens hearings into alleged Communist influence and infiltration within the motion picture industry.
1968 - Jacqueline Kennedy and Aristotle Onassis are wed on his privately owned island of Skorpios in Ionian Sea.
1977 - Civilian government in Thailand is ousted in bloodless coup by military junta which installed the regime one year earlier.
1980 - Greece rejoins NATO's military wing.
1986 - Mozambique's President Samora Machel dies in plane crash in eastern South Africa.
1988 - Sri Lanka suspends military operations against Sinhalese militants, trying to topple the government, for one week.
1989 - Hungarian parliament disbands the Communist Party's armed guard, known as the Worker's Militia.
1990 - Kim Dae Jung, leader of South Korean political opposition, ends a 12-day hunger strike when government leaders say they are willing to compromise on some of his demands: end military surveillance, improve the economy and halt plans to replace the presidential system of government.
1991 - Earthquake strikes Himalayan foothills in India, killing at least 341 people and destroying tens of thousands of homes.
1993 - NATO defense ministers agree to offer former Warsaw Pact states and neutral European countries "partnerships for peace" as a first step toward qualifying for full membership in the alliance.
1995 - NATO Secretary-General Willy Claes resigns to face corruption charges in his native Belgium.
2000 - Local and international health workers tackle an outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in Gulu, Uganda. Officials report a slowing in the spread of the epidemic that has killed 47 people and infected as many as 75 more.
2003 - Italian officials find the bodies of 13 African immigrants who died at sea in a small boat en route from Libya to Italy. Survivors of the passage said a total of at least 63 people had died of hunger and cold, and dozens of the dead were thrown overboard.
2004 - Two Muslim girls who refuse to remove their head scarves in class are expelled from their schools in France, and two more risk the same fate as officials begin taking action against those who defy a new law banning conspicuous religious symbols from public schools.
2005 - A U.N. investigation concludes that high-ranking Syrian and Lebanese security officials were involved in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
2006 - Colombian President Alvaro Uribe withdraws his offer to negotiate a humanitarian prisoner exchange with leftist rebels after blaming the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia for a car bomb that wounded 23 people.
2007 - Radio Shabelle's Bashir Nor Gedi, who is critical of both the Somali government and the Islamic militants who have been trying to topple it, is killed outside his home in the Somali capital, the eighth journalist slain in the country this year.
2008 - Taliban gunmen kill Christian aid worker Gayle Williams, a British-South African national, in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Today is Wednesday, Oct. 21, the 294th day of 2009. There are 71 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
On Oct. 21, 1959, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, opened to the public in New York.
On this date:
In 1797, the U.S. Navy frigate Constitution, also known as "Old Ironsides," was christened in Boston's harbor.
In 1805, a British fleet commanded by Adm. Horatio Nelson defeated a French-Spanish fleet in the Battle of Trafalgar; Nelson, however, was killed.
In 1879, Thomas Edison perfected a workable electric light at his laboratory in Menlo Park, N.J.
In 1917, members of the 1st Division of the U.S. Army training in Luneville, France, became the first Americans to see action on the front lines of World War I.
In 1944, during World War II, U.S. troops captured the German city of Aachen.
In 1960, Democrat John F. Kennedy and Republican Richard M. Nixon clashed in their fourth and final presidential debate in New York.
In 1966, more than 140 people, mostly children, were killed when a coal waste landslide engulfed a school and several houses in Aberfan, Wales.
In 1967, the Israeli destroyer INS Eilat was sunk by Egyptian missile boats near Port Said; 47 Israeli crew members were lost.
In 1969, beat poet and author Jack Kerouac died in St. Petersburg, Fla., at age 47.
In 1971, President Richard Nixon nominated Lewis F. Powell and William H. Rehnquist to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Ten years ago: France's highest court upheld the conviction of Maurice Papon, the former Vichy official who'd fled France rather than face prison for his role in sending Jews to Nazi death camps; Papon was captured in Switzerland and deported the following day. (Papon ended up serving three years of a 10-year sentence; he died in 2007.)
Five years ago: An Associated Press poll found President George W. Bush and Sen. John Kerry locked in a statistical tie for the popular vote. Emerson College student Victoria Snelgrove, 21, died hours after being shot in the eye with a pepper-spray pellet fired by police trying to control a raucous crowd outside Fenway Park, where the Boston Red Sox had won the American League championship. The St. Louis Cardinals defeated the Houston Astros 5-2 to take Game 7 of the National League championship series.
One year ago: Dozens of members of the Mongol motorcycle gang were arrested by federal agents in six states on a variety of charges following a three-year investigation in which undercover agents infiltrated the group. Iraq's Cabinet decided to ask the United States for changes to the draft agreement that would keep American troops there for three more years. The former prime minister of Thailand, Thaksin Shinawatra, was convicted in absentia of corruption and sentenced to two years in prison.
Today is Thursday, Oct. 22, the 295th day of 2009. There are 70 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
On Oct. 22, 1962, President John F. Kennedy announced a quarantine of all offensive military equipment shipped to Cuba, following the discovery of Soviet-built missile bases on the island.
On this date:
In 1746, Princeton University was first chartered as the College of New Jersey.
In 1797, French balloonist Andre-Jacques Garnerin made the first parachute descent, landing safely from a height of about 3,000 feet over Paris.
In 1836, Sam Houston was inaugurated as the first constitutionally elected president of the Republic of Texas.
In 1883, the original Metropolitan Opera House in New York held its grand opening with a performance of Gounod's "Faust."
In 1928, Republican presidential nominee Herbert Hoover spoke of the "American system of rugged individualism" in a speech at New York's Madison Square Garden.
In 1934, bank robber Charles "Pretty Boy" Floyd was shot to death by federal agents at a farm in East Liverpool, Ohio.
In 1968, Apollo 7 returned safely from Earth orbit, splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean.
In 1979, the U.S. government allowed the deposed Shah of Iran to travel to New York for medical treatment — a decision that precipitated the Iran hostage crisis.
In 1981, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization was decertified by the federal government for its strike the previous August.
In 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed into law sweeping tax-overhaul legislation.
Ten years ago: Five of the seven Republican presidential hopefuls met in New Hampshire for their first debate of the 2000 nomination race, with front-runner George W. Bush notably absent. Former Vichy official Maurice Papon was expelled from Switzerland and sent back to France.
Five years ago: In a wrenching videotaped statement, kidnapped aid worker Margaret Hassan begged Britain to help save her by withdrawing its troops from Iraq, saying these "might be my last hours." (Hassan was apparently killed by her captors a month later.) ***(TOM, SEE WIKI ENTRY AND OXFORD FOR TODAY IN HISTORY IF POSSIBLE) ***
One year ago: Wall Street tumbled again as investors worried that the global economy was poised to weaken. The major indexes fell more than 4 percent, including the Dow Jones industrial average, which finished with a loss of 514 points. The fishing vessel Katmai sank in the Bering Sea off Alaska's Aleutian Islands, killing seven crewmen; four survived. India launched its first mission to the moon to redraw maps of the lunar surface. (India lost contact with its lunar satellite Chandrayaan-1 last August.) The Philadelphia Phillies won Game 1 of the World Series, defeating the Tampa Bay Rays 3-2.
Today is Friday, Oct. 23, the 296th day of 2009. There are 69 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
On Oct. 23, 1983, 241 U.S. service members, most of them Marines, were killed in a suicide truck-bombing at Beirut International Airport in Lebanon; a near-simultaneous attack on French forces killed 58 paratroopers.
On this date:
In 1707, the first Parliament of Great Britain, created by the Acts of Union between England and Scotland, held its first meeting.
In 1864, forces led by Union Gen. Samuel R. Curtis repelled Confederate Gen. Sterling Price's army in the Battle of Westport in Missouri.
In 1915, tens of thousands of women marched in New York City, demanding the right to vote.
In 1942, during World War II, Britain launched a major offensive against Axis forces at El Alamein in Egypt.
In 1946, the United Nations General Assembly convened in New York for the first time, at an auditorium in Flushing Meadow.
In 1956, a student-sparked revolt against Hungary's Communist rule began; as the revolution spread, Soviet forces started entering the country, and the uprising was put down within weeks.
In 1973, President Richard Nixon agreed to turn over White House tape recordings subpoenaed by the Watergate special prosecutor to Judge John J. Sirica.
In 1987, the U.S. Senate rejected, 58-42, the Supreme Court nomination of Robert H. Bork.
In 1989, 23 people were killed in an explosion at Phillips Petroleum Co.'s chemical complex in Pasadena, Texas. In a case that inflamed racial tensions in Boston, Charles Stuart claimed he and his pregnant wife, Carol, had been shot in their car by a black robber. (Carol Stuart and her prematurely delivered baby died; Charles Stuart later died, an apparent suicide, after he was implicated.)
In 1995, a jury in Houston convicted Yolanda Saldivar of murdering Tejano singing star Selena. (Saldivar is serving a life prison sentence.)
Ten years ago: Sixteen members of the Ku Klux Klan held a silent rally in New York City as thousands of counter-demonstrators jeered them. The New York Yankees won the first game of the World Series, beating the Atlanta Braves, 4-1. (The Yankees went on to sweep the series.)
Five years ago: Gunmen ambushed a group of U.S.-trained Iraqi soldiers on a road east of Baghdad; around 50 of the soldiers, who were unarmed, were killed execution-style. A 6.8-magnitude earthquake in northern Japan killed 40 people. The Boston Red Sox took Game 1 of the World Series, defeating the St. Louis Cardinals 11-9. Singer Ashlee Simpson was caught lip-synching during an appearance on NBC's "Saturday Night Live." Opera singer Robert Merrill died in New Rochelle, N.Y., at age 87.
One year ago: Badgered by lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan denied the nation's economic crisis was his fault but conceded the meltdown had revealed a flaw in a lifetime of economic thinking and left him in a "state of shocked disbelief." The Tampa Bay Rays evened the World Series at one game apiece by beating the Philadelphia Phillies, 4-2.
Today is Saturday, Oct. 24, the 297th day of 2009. There are 68 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
In Oct. 24, 1945, the United Nations officially came into existence as its charter took effect. (On this date in 1949, construction began on the U.N. headquarters in New York.)
On this date:
In 1537, Jane Seymour, the third wife of England's King Henry VIII, died 12 days after giving birth to Prince Edward, later King Edward VI.
In 1648, the Peace of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years War and effectively destroyed the Holy Roman Empire.
In 1861, the first transcontinental telegraph message was sent as Chief Justice Stephen J. Field of California transmitted a telegram to President Abraham Lincoln.
In 1901, widow Anna Edson Taylor became the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel.
In 1931, the George Washington Bridge, connecting New York and New Jersey, was officially dedicated (it opened to traffic the next day).
In 1939, Benny Goodman and his orchestra recorded their signature theme, "Let's Dance," for Columbia Records in New York. Nylon stockings were sold publicly for the first time, in Wilmington, Del.
In 1952, Republican presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower declared in Detroit, "I shall go to Korea" as he promised to end the conflict. (He made the visit over a month later.)
In 1980, the merchant freighter SS Poet departed Philadelphia bound for Port Said, Egypt, with a crew of 34 and a cargo of grain; it disappeared en route and has not been heard from since.
In 1989, former television evangelist Jim Bakker was sentenced by a judge in Charlotte, N.C., to 45 years in prison for fraud and conspiracy. (The sentence was later reduced to eight years; it was further reduced to four for good behavior.)
In 2002, authorities arrested Army veteran John Allen Muhammad and teenager Lee Boyd Malvo near Myersville, Md., in connection with the Washington-area sniper attacks.
Ten years ago: An Israeli court sentenced American teenager Samuel Sheinbein to 24 years in prison for killing an acquaintance in Maryland in 1997. Sen. John Chafee, R-R.I., died at Bethesda Naval Hospital at age 77. The New York Yankees took Game 2 of the World Series, defeating the Atlanta Braves, 7-2.
Five years ago: A plane owned by top NASCAR team Hendrick Motorsports crashed near Martinsville, Va., killing all ten people aboard. A Russian-U.S. crew aboard a Soyuz capsule returned to Earth from the international space station in a pinpoint landing in Kazakhstan. Cardinal James A. Hickey, former archbishop of Washington, D.C., died at age 84. The Boston Red Sox beat the St. Louis Cardinals 6-2 for a 2-0 World Series lead. Arizona's Emmitt Smith broke Walter Payton's NFL record for 100-yard games rushing with his 78th.
One year ago: Singer-actress Jennifer Hudson's mother and brother were found slain in their Chicago home; the body of her 7-year-old nephew was found three days later. (Hudson's estranged brother-in-law has been arrested in the killings.) A Russian Soyuz capsule touched down in Kazakhstan after delivering the first two men to follow their fathers into space, a Russian and an American, to the international space station.
1892 - The city of Chicago dedicates the World's Colombian Exposition.
1897 - King of Korea proclaims himself emperor, and Russia and Japan intervene.
1903 - A joint commission rules in favor of the U.S. in a boundary dispute between the District of Alaska and Canada.
1921 - Franco-Turkish agreement is signed at Ankara.
1944 - The Yugoslav cities of Belgrade and Dubrovnik are liberated during World War II; Gen. Douglas MacArthur, keeping his promise to the Philippine people that he would return to rescue them from Japanese occupation, steps ashore at Leyte.
1945 - Egypt, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon warn the U.S. that creation of a Jewish state could lead to war in Middle East; Arab League is formed.
1947 - The House Un-American Activities Committee opens hearings into alleged Communist influence and infiltration within the motion picture industry.
1968 - Jacqueline Kennedy and Aristotle Onassis are wed on his privately owned island of Skorpios in Ionian Sea.
1977 - Civilian government in Thailand is ousted in bloodless coup by military junta which installed the regime one year earlier.
1980 - Greece rejoins NATO's military wing.
1986 - Mozambique's President Samora Machel dies in plane crash in eastern South Africa.
1988 - Sri Lanka suspends military operations against Sinhalese militants, trying to topple the government, for one week.
1993 - NATO defense ministers agree to offer former Warsaw Pact states and neutral European countries "partnerships for peace" as a first step toward qualifying for full membership in the alliance.
1995 - NATO Secretary-General Willy Claes resigns to face corruption charges in his native Belgium.
2000 - Local and international health workers tackle an outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in Gulu, Uganda. Officials report a slowing in the spread of the epidemic that has killed 47 people and infected as many as 75 more.
2003 - Italian officials find the bodies of 13 African immigrants who died at sea in a small boat en route from Libya to Italy. Survivors of the passage said a total of at least 63 people had died of hunger and cold, and dozens of the dead were thrown overboard.
2004 - Two Muslim girls who refuse to remove their head scarves in class are expelled from their schools in France, and two more risk the same fate as officials begin taking action against those who defy a new law banning conspicuous religious symbols from public schools.
2005 - A U.N. investigation concludes that high-ranking Syrian and Lebanese security officials were involved in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
2006 - Colombian President Alvaro Uribe withdraws his offer to negotiate a humanitarian prisoner exchange with leftist rebels after blaming the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia for a car bomb that wounded 23 people.
2007 - Radio Shabelle's Bashir Nor Gedi, who is critical of both the Somali government and the Islamic militants who have been trying to topple it, is killed outside his home in the Somali capital, the eighth journalist slain in the country this year.
2008 - Taliban gunmen kill Christian aid worker Gayle Williams, a British-South African national, in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Wednesday, Oct. 21
In 1797, the U.S. Navy frigate Constitution, also known as "Old Ironsides," was christened in Boston's harbor.
In 1805, a British fleet commanded by Adm. Horatio Nelson defeated a French-Spanish fleet in the Battle of Trafalgar; Nelson, however, was killed.
In 1879, Thomas Edison perfected a workable electric light at his laboratory in Menlo Park, N.J.
In 1917, members of the 1st Division of the U.S. Army training in Luneville, France, became the first Americans to see action on the front lines of World War I.
In 1944, during World War II, U.S. troops captured the German city of Aachen.
In 1960, Democrat John F. Kennedy and Republican Richard M. Nixon clashed in their fourth and final presidential debate in New York.
In 1966, more than 140 people, mostly children, were killed when a coal waste landslide engulfed a school and several houses in Aberfan, Wales.
In 1967, the Israeli destroyer INS Eilat was sunk by Egyptian missile boats near Port Said; 47 Israeli crew members were lost.
In 1969, beat poet and author Jack Kerouac died in St. Petersburg, Fla., at age 47.
In 1971, President Richard Nixon nominated Lewis F. Powell and William H. Rehnquist to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Thursday, Oct. 22
In 1746, Princeton University was first chartered as the College of New Jersey.
In 1797, French balloonist Andre-Jacques Garnerin made the first parachute descent, landing safely from a height of about 3,000 feet over Paris.
In 1836, Sam Houston was inaugurated as the first constitutionally elected president of the Republic of Texas.
In 1883, the original Metropolitan Opera House in New York held its grand opening with a performance of Gounod's "Faust."
In 1928, Republican presidential nominee Herbert Hoover spoke of the "American system of rugged individualism" in a speech at New York's Madison Square Garden.
In 1934, bank robber Charles "Pretty Boy" Floyd was shot to death by federal agents at a farm in East Liverpool, Ohio.
In 1968, Apollo 7 returned safely from Earth orbit, splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean.
In 1979, the U.S. government allowed the deposed Shah of Iran to travel to New York for medical treatment — a decision that precipitated the Iran hostage crisis.
In 1981, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization was decertified by the federal government for its strike the previous August.
In 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed into law sweeping tax-overhaul legislation.
Friday, Oct. 23
In 1707, the first Parliament of Great Britain, created by the Acts of Union between England and Scotland, held its first meeting.
In 1864, forces led by Union Gen. Samuel R. Curtis repelled Confederate Gen. Sterling Price's army in the Battle of Westport in Missouri.
In 1915, tens of thousands of women marched in New York City, demanding the right to vote.
In 1942, during World War II, Britain launched a major offensive against Axis forces at El Alamein in Egypt.
In 1946, the United Nations General Assembly convened in New York for the first time, at an auditorium in Flushing Meadow.
In 1956, a student-sparked revolt against Hungary's Communist rule began; as the revolution spread, Soviet forces started entering the country, and the uprising was put down within weeks.
In 1973, President Richard Nixon agreed to turn over White House tape recordings subpoenaed by the Watergate special prosecutor to Judge John J. Sirica.
In 1987, the U.S. Senate rejected, 58-42, the Supreme Court nomination of Robert H. Bork.
In 1989, 23 people were killed in an explosion at Phillips Petroleum Co.'s chemical complex in Pasadena, Texas. In a case that inflamed racial tensions in Boston, Charles Stuart claimed he and his pregnant wife, Carol, had been shot in their car by a black robber. (Carol Stuart and her prematurely delivered baby died; Charles Stuart later died, an apparent suicide, after he was implicated.)
In 1995, a jury in Houston convicted Yolanda Saldivar of murdering Tejano singing star Selena. (Saldivar is serving a life prison sentence.)
Saturday, Oct. 24
In 1537, Jane Seymour, the third wife of England's King Henry VIII, died 12 days after giving birth to Prince Edward, later King Edward VI.
In 1648, the Peace of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years War and effectively destroyed the Holy Roman Empire.
In 1861, the first transcontinental telegraph message was sent as Chief Justice Stephen J. Field of California transmitted a telegram to President Abraham Lincoln.
In 1901, widow Anna Edson Taylor became the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel.
In 1931, the George Washington Bridge, connecting New York and New Jersey, was officially dedicated (it opened to traffic the next day).
In 1939, Benny Goodman and his orchestra recorded their signature theme, "Let's Dance," for Columbia Records in New York. Nylon stockings were sold publicly for the first time, in Wilmington, Del.
In 1952, Republican presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower declared in Detroit, "I shall go to Korea" as he promised to end the conflict. (He made the visit over a month later.)
In 1980, the merchant freighter SS Poet departed Philadelphia bound for Port Said, Egypt, with a crew of 34 and a cargo of grain; it disappeared en route and has not been heard from since.
In 1989, former television evangelist Jim Bakker was sentenced by a judge in Charlotte, N.C., to 45 years in prison for fraud and conspiracy. (The sentence was later reduced to eight years; it was further reduced to four for good behavior.)
In 2002, authorities arrested Army veteran John Allen Muhammad and teenager Lee Boyd Malvo near Myersville, Md., in connection with the Washington-area sniper attacks.
One year ago: Singer-actress Jennifer Hudson's mother and brother were found slain in their Chicago home; the body of her 7-year-old nephew was found three days later. (Hudson's estranged brother-in-law has been arrested in the killings.) A Russian Soyuz capsule touched down in Kazakhstan after delivering the first two men to follow their fathers into space, a Russian and an American, to the international space station.
 |
 |
|
| Gorgeous ‘Wild Things’ Roars To The Screen | Soviet Traces Remain In Moscow After USSR’s Demise |
Reader Comments
The following are comments from the readers. In no way do they represent the view of thebulletin.us.
You must register with a valid email to post comments. Only your Member ID will be posted with the comments.
Registered users sign in here: |
Become a Registered User |
