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November
in History
November 1, 1776
- Mission San Juan Capistrano was founded in California. Each year, the
swallows of Capistrano leave their nests there around St. John's Day
(October 23) and return the following year near St. Joseph's Day (March
19).
November 1, 1848
- The first medical school for women opened in Boston. The Boston Female
Medical School was founded by Samuel Gregory with just twelve students. In
1874, the school merged with the Boston University School of Medicine,
becoming one of the first co-ed medical schools.
November 1, 1936
- The Rome-Berlin Axis was proclaimed by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini
following a visit to Berlin by Italian foreign secretary Ciano.
November 1, 1950
- President Harry S. Truman was the target of an unsuccessful
assassination attempt by two members of a Puerto Rican nationalist
movement.
November 1, 1963
- South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu
were killed in a military coup.
*
November 1, 1993
- The new European Union came into existence as a result of the Maastricht
Treaty.
November 1, 1995
- The first all-race local government elections took place in South
Africa, marking the end of the apartheid system.
November 1, 79
- The city of Pompeii was buried by eruption of Mt. Vesuvius.
November 1, 1765
- The Stamp Act went into effect in the British colonies worldwide,
prompting great resistance from American colonists.
November 2, 1570
- A tidal wave in the North Sea destroyed the sea walls from Holland to
Jutland. More than 1,000 people were killed.
November 2, 1772
- The first Committees of Correspondence were formed in Massachusetts
under Samuel Adams.
November 2, 1783
- General George Washington issued his "Farewell Address to the Army" near
Princeton NJ.
November 2, 1930
- Haile Selassie was crowned Emperor of Ethiopia.
*
November 2, 1947
- The first and only flight of Howard Hughes' "Spruce Goose" flying boat
occurred in Long Beach Harbor, California. It flew about a mile at an
altitude of 70 feet. Costing $25 million, the 200 ton plywood eight-engine
Hercules was the world's largest airplane, designed, built and flown by
Hughes. It later became a tourist attraction alongside the Queen Mary ship
at Long Beach and has since been moved to Oregon.
November 2, 1962
- During the Cuban Missile Crisis, President John F. Kennedy announced on
TV, "the Soviet bases in Cuba are being dismantled; their missiles and
related equipment being crated, and the fixed installations at these sites
are being destroyed."
November 3, 1534
- King Henry VIII became head of the English church following the passage
of the Act of Supremacy by Parliament.
November 3, 1839
- The first Opium War between China and Britain began after British
frigates blew up several Chinese junks.
November 3, 1903
- Panama declared itself independent of Colombia following a revolt
engineered by the U.S.
*
November 3, 1948
- Dewey Defeats Truman banner headline appeared on the front page
of the Chicago Tribune. Harry Truman actually defeated Republican
candidate Thomas E. Dewey for the presidency.
November 3, 1957
- The Soviet Union launched the world's first inhabited space capsule,
Sputnik II, which carried a dog named Laika.
November 3, 1983
- South Africans voted to allow Indians and "Coloreds" limited power in
the government, but continued to exclude blacks.
November 4, 1842
- Abraham Lincoln married Mary Todd in Springfield, Illinois.
November 4, 1862
- Richard Gatling patented his first rapid-fire machine gun which used
revolving barrels rotating around a central mechanism to load, fire, and
extract the cartridges.
November 4, 1890
- The first electrified underground railway system was officially opened
in London.
*
November 4, 1922
- King Tut's tomb was discovered at Luxor, Egypt, by English archaeologist
Howard Carter after several years of searching. The child-king Tutankhamen
became pharaoh at age nine and died around 1352 B.C. at age 19. The tomb
was found mostly intact, containing numerous priceless items now exhibited
in Egypt's National Museum in Cairo.
November 4, 1942
- British troops defeated the Germans under General Rommel at El Alamein
after a twelve day battle.
November 4, 1956
- Soviet troops moved in to crush an uprising in Hungary.
November 4, 1979
- About 500 young Iranian militants stormed the U.S. Embassy in Teheran
and took 90 hostages, including 52 Americans that they held captive for
444 days.
November 4, 1995
- Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated as he left a peace
rally in Tel Aviv.
November 5, 1733
- The first issue of the New York Weekly Journal was published by
John Peter Zenger, a colonial American printer and journalist. A year
later, he was arrested on charges of libeling New York's royal governor.
November 5, 1814
- Having decided to abandon the Niagara frontier, the American army blows
up Fort Erie
November 5, 1911
- Aviator C.P. Snow completed the first transcontinental flight across
America, landing at Pasadena, California. He had taken off from Sheepshead
Bay, New York, on September 17 and flew a distance of 3,417 miles.
November 6, 1911
- Maine became a 'dry' state. State liquor laws had been gradually
strengthened, and brewing, drinking, and selling were outlawed in the
State Constitution in 1885. From 1905 to 1911 Maine created a Liquor
Enforcement Commission with deputies empowered to arrest transgressing
citizens.
November 6, 1429
- Henry VI was crowned king of England at age eight. He had acceded to the
throne at the age of nine months following the death of Charles VI.
November 6, 1860
- Abraham Lincoln was elected as the 16th U.S. President and the first
Republican. He received 180 of 303 possible electoral votes and 40 percent
of the popular vote.
November 6, 1962
- The U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution condemning South Africa
for its apartheid policies and recommended economic sanctions.
November 7, 1485
- King Henry VII, the first of the Tudors, was crowned.
November 7, 1665
- The London Gazette was first published.
November 7, 1805
- Meriwether Lewis and George Rogers Clark reached the Pacific coast.
November 7, 1811
- Rebellious Indians in a conspiracy organized in defiance of the United
States government by Tecumseh, the Shawnee chief, were defeated in the
Battle of the Wabash (or Tippecanoe) by William Henry Harrison, governor
of Indiana Territory.
November 7, 1814
- Andrew Jackson attacked and captured Pensacola, defeating the Spanish
and driving out a British force.
November 7, 1837
- A pro-slavery mob attacked and killed American abolitionist Elijah
Lovejoy at his printing works in Alton, Illinois.
November 7, 1885
- Canada's first transcontinental railway, the Canadian Pacific, was
completed in British Columbia.
November 7, 1917
- Russian Bolsheviks overthrew the provisional government of Alexander
Kerensky in Petrograd. The Council of People's Commissars was then
established as the new government of Russia, with Nikolai Lenin as
chairman, Leon Trotsky as foreign commissar and Joseph Stalin as commissar
of nationalities. This event was celebrated each year in the former USSR
with parades, massive military displays and public appearances by top
Soviet leaders.
November 7, 1944
- President Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected to an unprecedented fourth
term, defeating Thomas E. Dewey. Roosevelt died less than a year later on
April 12, 1945.
November 7, 1962
- Richard Nixon told news reporters in Los Angeles "...just think how much
you're going to be missing. You won't have Nixon to kick around any more,
because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference." Nixon's statement
came the day after he lost the election for California governor to
incumbent Edmund G. Brown
November 7, 1989
- The East German government resigned after pro-democracy protests.
November 7, 1989
- L. Douglas Wilder became the first African American governor in U.S.
history, elected governor of Virginia.
November 8, 1519
- Cortes conquered Mexico. After landing on the Yucatan Peninsula in
April, Cortes and his troops had marched into the interior of Mexico to
the Aztec capital and captured Aztec Emperor Montezuma.
November 8, 1777
- The British forces evacuated Fort Ticonderoga.
November 8, 1793 - The Louvre was opened to the public by the
Revolutionary government, although only part of the collection could be
viewed.
November 8, 1837
-
Mount Holyoke Seminary, a college exclusively for women, opened in South
Hadley, Massachusetts.
*
November 8, 1895
- X-rays (electromagnetic rays) were discovered by Wilhelm Roentgen at the
University of Wuerzburg in Germany.
November 8, 1923
- Hitler's Beer Hall Putsch took place in the Buergerbraukeller in Munich.
Hitler, Goering and armed Nazis attempted, but ultimately failed, to
forcibly seize power and overthrow democracy.
November 8, 1939
- An assassination attempt on Hitler failed at the Buergerbraukeller in
Munich. A bomb exploded soon after Hitler had exited following a speech
commemorating the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch. Seven others were killed.
November 8, 1942
- Operation Torch, the Allied landings in North Africa, began as 400,000
soldiers under the command of Gen. Eisenhower landed at Morocco and
Algeria.
November 9, 1872
- The Great Boston Fire started in a dry-goods warehouse then spread
rapidly in windy weather, destroying nearly 800 buildings consuming 65
acres of the city. Damage was estimated at more than $75 million. The
fire's bright red glare could be seen in the sky for nearly 100 miles.
November 9, 1859
- Flogging in the British army was abolished.
November 9, 1918
- German Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated his throne in the closing days of
World War I and fled to Holland. In Germany, Philip Scheidemann, a
Socialist leader, then proclaimed a Republic and became its first
Chancellor
November 9-10, 1938
- Kristallnacht (the night of broken glass) occurred in Germany as Nazi
mobs burned synagogues and vandalized Jewish shops and homes.
November 9, 1965
- At 5:16 p.m., the Great Blackout of the Northeast began as a tripped
circuit breaker at a power plant on the Niagara River caused a chain
reaction sending power surges knocking out interconnected power companies
down the East Coast. The blackout affected over 30 million persons,
one-sixth of the entire U.S. population. Electricity also failed in
Ontario and Quebec.
*
November 9, 1989
- The Berlin Wall was opened after standing for 28 years as a symbol of
the Cold War. The 27.9 mile wall had been constructed in 1961.
November 10, 1775
- The Continental Congress authorized the creation of the 'Continental
Marines', now known as the US Marines. Originally part of the Navy, it
became a separate unit on July 11, 1789.
November 10, 1871
- Explorer Henry M. Stanley found missionary David Livingstone at Ujiji,
Africa. Stanley began his search the previous March for Livingstone who
had been missing for two years. Upon locating him, he simply asked, "Dr.
Livingstone, I presume?"
November 10, 1928
- Hirohito was crowned Emperor of Japan. He was Imperial Japan's Emperor
during World War II. Following Japan's defeat, he was allowed to stay and
remained Emperor until his death in 1989.
November 10, 1942
- Following Montgomery's victory at El Alamein, British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill stated, "This is not the end. It is not even the
beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."
November 11, 1620
- 41 Pilgrims aboard the "Mayflower," anchored off Massachusetts, signed a
compact calling for a "body politick" or governing body.
November 11, 1918
- At 5 a.m., in Marshal Foch's railway car in the Forest of Compiegne, the
Armistice between the Allied and Central Powers was signed, ending World
War I effective at 11 a.m. In many places in Europe, a moment of silence
in memory of the fallen soldiers is observed at the 11th hour of the 11th
day of the 11th month. Formerly called Armistice Day, now celebrated as
Veterans Day.
November 11, 1938
- Irving Berlin's God Bless America was first performed. He had
written the song especially for radio entertainer Kate Smith who sang it
during her regular radio broadcast. It soon became a patriotic favorite of
Americans and was one of Smith's most requested songs.
November 11, 1972
- The U.S. turned over its military base at Long Binh to the South
Vietnamese, symbolizing the end of direct American military participation
in the Vietnam War.
November 11, 1973
- Egypt and Israel signed a cease-fire agreement sponsored by the U.S.
*
November 11, 1987
-
Boris Yeltsin was removed as Moscow Communist Party chief for criticizing
the slow pace of Soviet reform.
November 11, 1992
- The Church of England voted to allow women to become priests.
November 12, 1867
- A major eruption of Mount Vesuvius in Italy began, lasting several
months.
November 12, 1923
-
Adolf Hitler
was arrested in Germany after the failed Beer Hall Putsch.
November 12, 1948
- Japanese General Hideki Tojo and six others were sentenced to death by
an Allied war crimes tribunal.
November 12, 1974
- The UN General Assembly suspended South Africa over its policy of
apartheid.
*
November 12, 1982
- Yuri Andropov was elected First Secretary of the Soviet Communist party
following the death of Leonid Brezhnev.
November 13, 1789
- Benjamin Franklin wrote a letter to a friend in which he said, ''In this
world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.''
November 13, 1835
- Texans officially proclaimed independence from Mexico, calling it the
Lone Star Republic, until its admission to the Union in 1845.
November 13, 1851
- The London-to-Paris telegraph began operation.
November 13, 1927
- The Holland Tunnel was opened to traffic. The tunnel runs under the
Hudson River between New York City and Jersey City and was the first
underwater tunnel built in the U.S. It is comprised of two tubes, each
large enough for two lanes of traffic.
November 13, 1942
- The
five Sullivan Brothers from Waterloo, Iowa, were lost in the sinking of
the cruiser USS Juneau by a Japanese torpedo off Guadalcanal during
World War II in the Pacific. Following their deaths, the U.S. Navy changed
regulations to prohibit close relatives from serving on the same ship.
November 13, 1945
- General Charles De Gaulle was appointed president of the French
provisional government.
November 13, 1956
- The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that racial segregation on public buses was
unconstitutional.
November 13, 1967
- Carl Stokes became the first African American mayor in the U.S., elected
mayor of Cleveland, Ohio.
November 13, 1995
- Israel began pulling its troops out of the West Bank city of Jenin,
ending 28 years of occupation.
November 14, 1666
- The first experimental blood transfusion took place in England,
utilizing two dogs.
November 14, 1770
- Scottish explorer James Bruce discovered the source of the Blue Nile on
Lake Tana in northwest Ethiopia.
November 14, 1832
- The first streetcar in America went into operation on the streets of
NYC. It was a large horse-drawn vehicle running on rails, and was able to
carry 30 passengers.
November 14, 1889
- Newspaper reporter Nellie Bly set out from New York to beat the record
of Jules Verne's imaginary hero Phileas Fogg, who traveled around the
world in 80 days. Bly (pen name for Elizabeth Cochrane) returned 72 days
later to a tumultuous welcome in New York.
*
November 14, 1908
- Albert Einstein first presented his quantum theory of light.
November 14, 1910
- Lieutenant Eugene Ely, US Navy, became the first man to take off in an
airplane from the deck of a ship, launching his Curtiss from the USS
Birmingham at Hampton Roads.
November 14, 1994
- The first paying passengers traveled on the new rail service through the
Channel Tunnel linking England and France.
November 15, 1805
- Meriwether Lewis, William Clark and their party reached the mouth of the
Columbia River, completing their cross-country trek to the Pacific.
November 15, 1806
- Explorer Zebulon Pike discovered the Colorado mountain that bears his
name: Pike's Peak.
November 15, 1864
- During the U.S. Civil War, Union troops under General William T. Sherman
burned Atlanta.
November 15, 1881
- The Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions of the United States
and Canada was formed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Five years later the
organization was renamed the American Federation of Labor (AFL).
November 15, 1943
- During the Holocaust, Heinrich Himmler ordered Gypsies and part-Gypsies
to be sent to concentration camps. The number of Gypsies killed by Nazis
is estimated up to 500,000.
November 15, 1969
- The largest antiwar rally in U.S. History occurred as 250,000 persons
gathered in Washington, DC, to protest the Vietnam War.
November 15, 1980
- Pope John Paul II visited West Germany, the first papal visit to Germany
in 200 years.
November 16, 1776
- The Battle of Fort Washington, Manhattan NY. The American defeat at Fort
Washington finally cleared the rebels out of New York, and nearly lost
Washington the war.
November 16, 1798
- British seamen boarded the US frigate Baltimore and impressed a number
of crewmen as alleged deserters, a practice that contributed to the War of
1812.
November 16, 1813
- The British announced a blockade of Long Island Sound, leaving only the
New England coast open to shipping.
November 16, 1821
- Trader William Becknell reached Santa Fe NM on the route that became
known as the Santa Fe Trail.
November 16, 1864
- Union General William T. Sherman departed Atlanta and began his "March
to the Sea."
*
November 16, 1902
- A cartoon appeared in the Washington Star, prompting the Teddy Bear
Craze, after President Teddy Roosevelt refused to kill a captive bear tied
up for him to shoot during a hunting trip to Mississippi.
November 16, 1933
- President Franklin D. Roosevelt announced the U.S. and Soviet Union had
resumed diplomatic relations, suspended since 1919.
November 16, 1989
- South African President F.W. de Klerk announced the abandonment of the
Separate Amenities Act, thus opening the country's beaches to all races.
November 16, 1995
- The United Nations charged Bosnian Serb leader, Radovan Karadzic, and
his military commander, Ratko Mladic, with genocide.
November 17, 1558
- Queen Elizabeth I ascended the throne of England at the age of 25,
reining until 1603 when she was 69. Under her leadership, England became a
world power, defeating the Spanish Armada, and witnessed a golden age of
literature featuring works by William Shakespeare, Edmund Spenser and
others.
November 17, 1734
- New York Weekly Journal publisher John Peter Zenger was arrested
and charged with libeling the colonial governor of New York. In his trial,
held in August of 1735, truth was successfully used as a defense against
libel, an important early step toward freedom of the press in America.
November 17, 1800
- The U.S. Congress met for the first time in the new capital at
Washington, DC President John Adams then became the first occupant of the
Executive Mansion, later renamed the White House.
November 17, 1869
- The Suez Canal was formally opened after more than 10 years of
construction.
November 17, 1954
- General Gamal Abdel Nasser became Egyptian head of state after forcing
out General Mohammed Naguib.
November 17, 1989
- Thousands of protesters marched through the streets of Prague demanding
an end to Communist rule in Czechoslovakia. Riot police and army
paratroopers then moved in to crush the revolt.
November 17, 1993
- The United Nations opened its first war crimes tribunal since the
Nuremberg and Tokyo trials following World War II. Judges from 11 nations
were sworn in to examine recent mass murders in Yugoslavia characterized
as ethnic cleansing.
November 17, 1993
- NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement was approved by the U.S.
House of Representatives by a vote of 234 to 200.
Text of the Agreement
November 18, 1477
- William Caxton printed the first book in the English language, The
Dictes and Sayengis of the Phylosophers.
November 18, 1883
- A Connecticut school teacher, Charles F. Dowd, proposed a uniform time
zone plan for the U.S. consisting of four zones.
November 18, 1993
- South Africa adopted a new constitution after more than 300 years of
white majority rule. The constitution provided basic civil rights to
blacks and was approved by representatives of the ruling party, as well as
members of 20 other political parties.
November 19, 1493
- Puerto Rico was discovered by Columbus during his second voyage to the
New World.
November 19, 1620
- The Pilgrims reached landfall at Cape Cod, a few days before they sailed
to Plymouth.
November 19, 1703
- The "Man in the Iron Mask," a prisoner of Louis XIV in the Bastille
prison in Paris, died. The prisoner may have been Count Matthioli, who had
double-crossed Louis XIV, or may have even been the brother of Louis XIV.
His true identity has been the cause of much intrigue, and was celebrated
in literary works such as Alexandre Dumas' The Viscount Bragelonne.
November 19, 1861
- Julia Ward Howe wrote her poem "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" while
visiting Union troops near Washington.
November 19, 1863
- President Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address during
ceremonies dedicating 17 acres of the Gettysburg Battlefield as a national
cemetery. Famed orator Edward Everett of Massachusetts preceded Lincoln
and spoke for two hours. Lincoln then delivered his address in less than
two minutes. Although many in attendance were at first unimpressed,
Lincoln's words have come to symbolize the definition of democracy itself.
Everett admitted to Lincoln, "I wish that I could flatter myself that I
had come as near to the central idea of the occasion in two hours as you
did in two minutes."
November 19, 1868
- New Jersey suffragists attempted to vote in the presidential election to
test the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which states, "no State
shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or
immunities of citizens of the United States." 172 suffragists, including
four African American women, were turned away. Instead they cast their
votes in a women's ballot box overseen by 84-year-old Quaker Margaret
Pryer.
November 19, 1939
- Construction of the first presidential library began as President
Franklin D. Roosevelt laid the cornerstone next to his home in Hyde Park,
New York. Roosevelt donated the land, but public donations funded the
library building which was dedicated on June 30, 1941.
November 19, 1942
- The Soviet Army began a massive counter-offensive against the Germans at
Stalingrad during World War II.
November 19, 1969
- The first news reports emerged that American troops in Vietnam had
massacred civilians in My Lai village back in March of 1968.
November 19, 1977
- Egyptian President Anwar Sadat became the first Arab leader to visit
Israel.
November 19-20, 1990
- The Cold War came to an end during a summit in Paris as leaders of NATO
and the Warsaw Pact signed a Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe,
vastly reducing their military arsenals.
*
November 19, 1996
- Pope John Paul II and Cuban leader Fidel Castro held their historic
first meeting in the Vatican.
November 19, 1998
- The U.S. House of Representatives began an impeachment inquiry of
President Bill Clinton, only the third presidential impeachment inquiry in
U.S. History - the other two being of President Andrew Johnson in 1868 and
President Richard Nixon in 1974.
November 20, 1620
- Peregrine White was born aboard the Mayflower in Massachusetts Bay - the
first child born of English parents in present-day New England.
November 20, 1789
- New Jersey became the first state to ratify the Bill of Rights.
November 20, 1917
- The first use of tanks in battle occurred at Cambrai, France, during
World War I. Over 300 tanks commanded by British General Sir Douglas Haig
went into battle against the Germans.
November 20, 1943
- The Battle of Tarawa began in the Pacific War as American troops
attacked the Japanese on the heavily fortified Gilbert Islands. It took
eight days for the 5th Amphibious Corps, 2nd Marine Division and the 27th
Infantry Division to take Tarawa and Makin Islands. Over 1,000 Americans
were killed with 2,311 wounded. The Japanese lost 4,700.
November 20, 1945
- The Nuremberg War Crime Trials began in which 24 former leaders of Nazi
Germany were charged with conspiracy to wage wars of aggression, crimes
against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity.
November 20, 1947
- England's Princess Elizabeth married Philip Mountbatten in a ceremony
broadcast worldwide from Westminster Abbey. Elizabeth was the first child
of King George VI and became Queen Elizabeth II upon the death of her
father in 1952.
Queen's Official Web Site
November 20, 1962
- The Cuban Missile Crisis concluded as President John F. Kennedy
announced he had lifted the U.S. Naval blockade of Cuba stating, "the
evidence to date indicates that all known offensive missile sites in Cuba
have been dismantled."
November 20, 1980
- In China, Jiang Qing, the widow of Mao Zedong, went on trial with nine
others on charges of treason.
November 21, 1620
- Leaders of the Mayflower expedition framed the "Mayflower Compact,"
designed to bolster unity among the settlers. Plymouth Rock.
November 21, 1783
- The first free balloon flight took place in Paris as Jean Francois
Pilatre de Rozier and Marquis Francois Laurent d'Arlandes ascended in a
Montgolfier hot air balloon. Their flight lasted about 25 minutes and
carried them nearly six miles at a height of about 300 feet over Paris.
Benjamin Franklin was one of the spectators.
November 21, 1920
- The IRA (Irish Republican Army) shot and killed 14 British soldiers in
Dublin in what became known as "Bloody Sunday."
November 21, 1992
- The Anglican Church of Australia voted to allow women to become priests.
The largest of the dioceses voted against the bill, however, it still
received the required two-thirds approval.
November 22, 1497
- Portuguese navigator Vasco Da Gama, leading a fleet of four ships,
became the first to sail round the Cape of Good Hope, while searching for
a sea route to India.
*
November 22, 1935
- Trans-Pacific airmail service began as the China Clipper, a Pan American
flying boat, took off from San Francisco, reaching the Philippines 59
hours later. The following year, commercial passenger service began.
*
November 22, 1943
- The
Cairo Conference
occurred as President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill, and Chinese Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek, met to
discuss the war in the Pacific against Japan.
*
November 22, 1963
- At 12:30 p.m., on Elm Street in downtown Texas, President John F.
Kennedy's motorcade slowly approached a triple underpass. Shots rang out.
The President was struck in the back, then in the head. He was rushed to
Parkland Memorial Hospital where fifteen doctors tried to save him. At 1
p.m., John Fitzgerald Kennedy, 35th President of the United States, was
pronounced dead. On board Air Force One, at 2:38 p.m., Lyndon B. Johnson
was sworn in as the 36th President.
November 22, 1975
- Juan Carlos was sworn in as King of Spain, following the death of
General Franscisco Franco who had ruled as dictator since 1939.
November 22, 1990
- British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher announced she would resign
after 11 years in office, the longest term of any British Prime Minister
in the 20th century.
November 24, 1859
- Charles Darwin's book On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural
Selection was first published, theorizing that all the living
creatures descended from a common ancestor.
November 24, 1863
- The Battle of Chattanooga took place during the U.S. Civil War as
General Grant's soldiers scaled heavily fortified Lookout Mountain and
overran Confederate General Braxton Bragg's army.
November 24, 1874
- Joseph Glidden patented his invention of barbed wire.
November 24, 1969
- The U.S. Army announced that Lt. William L. Calley had been charged with
premeditated murder in the massacre of civilians in the Vietnamese village
of My Lai in March of 1968. Calley was ordered to stand trial by court
martial and was later convicted and sentenced to life in prison. However,
his sentence was later commuted to three years of house arrest by
President Richard Nixon.
November 24, 1989
- In Czechoslovakia, mass demonstrations resulted in the resignation of
the entire presidium and secretariat of the Czechoslovak Communist Party.
November 24, 1992
- The U.S. military departed the Philippines after nearly a century of
military presence. In 1991, the Philippine Senate had voted to reject a
renewal of the lease for the American military base.
November 25
– Thanksgiving Holiday
November 25, 1783
- The British evacuated New York, their last military position in the
United States during the Revolutionary War.
November 25, 1936
- Germany and Japan signed the Anti-Comintern Pact, an agreement to
collaborate in opposing the spread of Communism.
November 25, 1963
- Three days after his assassination, John F. Kennedy was buried with full
military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.
November 25, 1974
- Britain outlawed the IRA (Irish Republican Army) following the deaths of
21 persons in a pub bombing in Birmingham.
November 25, 1992
- The parliament in Czechoslovakia voted to divide the country into
separate Czech and Slovak republics.
November 26, 1789
- The first American holiday occurred, proclaimed by President George
Washington to be Thanksgiving Day, a day of prayer and public thanksgiving
in gratitude for the successful establishment of the new American
democracy.
November 26, 1832
- The first horse-drawn streetcar carried passengers in New York City
along Fourth Avenue between Prince Street and 14th Street. The fare was 12
and a half cents.
*
November 26, 1922
- In Egypt, Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon first went inside the tomb of
King Tutankhamen.
November 26, 1940
- During the Holocaust, Nazis began walling off the Jewish Ghetto in
Warsaw, sealing in 400,000 inhabitants while denying them adequate food,
sanitation and housing.
November 26, 1979
- After an absence of 21 years, the International Olympic Committee voted
to re-admit China
November 26, 1998
- In Dublin, Tony Blair became the first British Prime Minister to appear
before the Irish Parliament, which had been created 80 years earlier in
defiance of the British government.
November 27, 1779
- The Pennsylvania state government converted the College of Philadelphia
into the University of the State of Pennsylvania, thus creating both
America's first state school and America's first official university.
November 27, 1826
- Jebediah Smith's expedition reached San Diego, becoming the first
Americans to cross the southwestern part of the continent.
November 27, 1901
- The Army War College was authorized by the US Department of War.
November 28, 1520
- Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan passed through the strait (of
Magellan) located at the southern tip of South America, thus crossing from
the Atlantic Ocean into the ocean he named the Pacific.
November 28, 1660
- The Royal Society was chartered in London.
November 28, 1868
- Mt. Etna in Sicily erupted violently.
November 28, 1872
- The Modoc War of 1872-73 began in northern California when fighting
broke out between Modoc Chief Captain Jack and a cavalry detail led by
Captain James Jackson.
November 28, 1934
- FBI agents killed bank robber George "Baby Face" Nelson near Barrington,
Illinois.
November 28, 1942
- Fire erupted inside the Coconut Grove nightclub in Boston killing nearly
500 persons who became trapped inside.
*
November 28, 1943
- The
Teheran Conference
began, attended by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin. Among the major topics
discussed, a second front in Western Europe, resulting in D-day, the
invasion of Normandy's beaches on June 6, 1944.
November 29, 1787
- Louis XVI signed an edict of tolerance, granting civil status to
Protestants.
November 29, 1864
- U.S. army troops led by Colonel John Chivington attacked and killed at
least 400 Cheyenne and Arapahoe Indians at Sand Creek, Colorado after they
had already surrendered.
November 29, 1890
- The first Imperial Diet was opened in Japan, consisting of a House of
Peers and a House of Representatives.
November 29, 1900
- Oscar Wilde died in a Paris hotel room. Wry to the end, his last words
were a remark on the room's wallpaper: "One of us had to go."
November 29, 1929
- American explorer Richard Byrd and Bernt Balchen completed the first
airplane flight to the South Pole.
November 29, 1947
- Palestine was partitioned into Jewish and Arab land by the UN General
Assembly, resulting in the establishment of the Jewish state of Israel the
following year.
November 29, 1989
- Forty one years of Communist rule came to an end in Czechoslovakia
following a twelve day revolution sparked by the beating of protesters.
The Czech parliament voted unanimously to repeal constitutional clauses
granting the Communist Party sole power. This brought a wave of reform
headed by playwright Vaclav Havel, who later became president in the first
free elections since World War II.
November 30, 1782
- A provisional peace treaty was signed between Great Britain and the
United States heralding the end of America's War of Independence. The
final treaty was signed in Paris on September 3, 1783. It declared the
U.S. "...to be free, sovereign and independent states..." and that the
British Crown "...relinquishes all claims to the government, propriety and
territorial rights of the same, and every part thereof."
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