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- 0079 The city of Pompei is buried by an erupting Mt Vesuvius
- 0996 Emperor Otto III issues a deed to Gottschalk, Bishop of Freising, which is the oldest known document using the name Ostarrchi (Austria in Old High German).
- 1210 King John of England begins imprisoning Jews
- 1512 Michelangelo's paintings on ceiling of Sistine Chapel, is exhibited
- 1512 The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, painted by Michelangelo, is exhibited to the public for the first time.
- 1520 The Strait of Magellan, the passage immediately south of mainland South America, connecting the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans, is first navigated by Ferdinand Magellan during his global circumnavigation voyage.
- 1611 Shakespeare's romantic comedy "The Tempest" is presented
- 1612 (22 October O.S.) Time of Troubles in Russia: Moscow, Kitai-gorod, is captured by Russian troops under command of Dmitry Pozharsky
- 1623 Fire at Plymouth, Massachusetts destroys several buildings
- 1683 The British crown colony of New York is subdivided into 12 counties.
- 1755 Lisbon earthquake kills more than 50,000
- 1755 Lisbon earthquake: In Portugal, Lisbon is destroyed by a massive earthquake and tsunami, killing between sixty thousand and ninety thousand people.
- 1765 Stamp Act went into effect in the British colonies
- 1776 San Juan Capistrano Mission founded in California
- 1784 Maryland grants citizenship to Lafayette and his descendants
- 1790 Edmund Burke publishes Reflections on the Revolution in France, in which he predicts that the French Revolution will end in a disaster.
- 1800 John Adams is the first President to live in the White House
- 1800 US President John Adams becomes the first President of the United States to live in the Executive Mansion (later renamed the White House).
- 1802 Delegates meet at Chillicothe, Ohio to form a state constitutional convention.
- 1805 Napoleon Bonaparte invades Austria during the War of the Third Coalition.
- 1814 Congress of Vienna opens to re-draw the European political map after the defeat of France, in the Napoleonic Wars.
- 1848 In Boston, Massachusetts, the first medical school for women, The Boston Female Medical School (which later merged with the Boston University School of Medicine), opens.
- 1859 The current Cape Lookout, North Carolina, lighthouse was lit for the first time. Its first-order Fresnel lens can be seen for about 19 miles (30 kilometers), in good conditions.
- 1861 Gen George B McClellan made general in chief of Union armies
- 1863 Fortifications built on Angel Island (San Francisco Bay) by troops
- 1870 US Weather Bureau begins operations (24 locations)
- 1876 New Zealand's provincial government system is dissolved.
- 1884 The Gaelic Athletic Association is set up in Hayes's Hotel in Thurles, County Tipperary.
- 1884 The Harbour Grace Railway, the first railway on Newfoundland, is opened for traffic between St. Johns and Harbour Grace. The last spike was driven by Prince George, later to become King George V, who was at the time visiting Newfoundland as a midshipman aboard H.M.S. Cumberland.
- 1885 First train service established over CP between Montreal and Winnipeg via Ottawa, Sudbury and the Lakehead.
- 1886 Ananda College, a leading Buddhist school in Sri Lanka was established with 37 students.
- 1894 Nicholas II becomes the new Tsar of Russia after his father, Alexander III, dies.
- 1894 Vaccine for diphtheria announced by Dr Roux of Paris
- 1896 A picture showing the unclad (bare) breasts of a woman appears in National Geographic magazine for the first time.
- 1901 Sigma Phi Epsilon, the largest national men's collegiate fraternity is established at Richmond College, in Richmond, VA.
- 1911 Introduction of compulsory military training
- 1911 The first dropping of a bomb from an airplane in combat, during the Italo-Turkish War.
- 1914 The First Division of the AIF sails from Albany, Western Australia, for Egypt
- 1914 World War I: the first British Royal Navy defeat of the war with Germany, the Battle of Coronel, is fought off of the western coast of Chile, in the Pacific.
- 1915 Parris Island is officially designated a Marine Corps Recruit Depot.
- 1916 Paul Miliukov delivers in the State Duma the famous "stupidity or treason" speech, precipitating the downfall of the Boris Strmer government.
- 1918 97 die in NYC subway's worst accident
- 1918 Malbone Street Wreck: the worst rapid transit accident in US history occurs under the intersection of Malbone Street and Flatbush Avenue, Brooklyn, New York City, with at least 93 deaths.
- 1918 Sgt. Hugh Cairns (46th Cdn. Infantry Batt.) wins the Victoria Cross at Valenciennes, Belgium
- 1918 Western Ukraine gains its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
- 1920 American Fishing Schooner Esperanto defeats the Canadian Fishing Schooner Delawana in the First International Fishing Schooner Championship Races in Halifax.
- 1922 Ottoman Empire abolished
- 1922 The last sultan of the Ottoman Empire, Mehmed VI, abdicates.
- 1923 Visitor posting - Birth of Beverly Gene Derting
- 1928 Graf Zeppelin sets airship distance record of 6384 km
- 1928 The Law on the Adoption and Implementation of the Turkish Alphabet, replacing the version of the Arabic alphabet previously used, comes into force in Turkey.
- 1929 Lundy, part of the British Isles, issue their own stamps
- 1932 Wernher von Braun named head of German liquid-fuel rocket program
- 1936 Mussolini describes alliance between Italy and Germany as an "Axis"
- 1938 Seabiscuit defeats War Admiral in an upset victory during a match race deemed "the match of the century" in horse racing.
- 1939 The first animal conceived by artificial insemination (rabbit) displayed
- 1939 The first rabbit born after artificial insemination is exhibited to the world.
- 1939 Trans Canada Air Lines starts daily coast-to-coast flights
- 1941 American photographer Ansel Adams takes a picture of a moonrise over the town of Hernandez, New Mexico that would become one of the most famous images in the history of photography.
- 1943 Dim-out ban lifted in San Francisco Bay area
- 1943 World War II: In support of the landings on Bougainville, U.S. aircraft carrier forces attack the huge Japanese base at Rabaul.
- 1944 Final mass gassing at Auschwitz, 73 women are murdered. The remainder of the prisoners, approximately 2,300, are deported to Ravensbruck and Bergen-Belsen to meet the growing slave labor demand.
- 1944 World War II: Units of the British Army land at Walcheren in the Netherlands.
- 1945 Australia ratifies Charter of United Nations
- 1945 First issue of Ebony magazine published by John H Johnson
- 1945 The official North Korean newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, is first published under the name Chongro. Australia joins the United Nations.
- 1946 The New York Knicks played against the Toronto Huskies at the Maple Leaf Gardens, in the first Basketball Association of America game. The Knicks would win 68-66.
- 1946 West German state of Niedersachsen formed
- 1947 UN trusteeship for Nauru granted to Australia, NZ and UK
- 1948 Off southern Manchuria, 6,000 people are killed as a Chinese merchant ship explodes and sinks.
- 1950 Pope Pius XII claims Papal Infallibility when he formally defines the dogma of the Assumption of Mary.
- 1950 Pope Pius XII witnesses "The Miracle of the Sun" while at the Vatican.
- 1951 American soldiers are exposed to an atomic explosion for training purposes in Desert Rock, Nevada. Participation was not voluntary.
- 1951 Award of Republic of South Korea Presidential Citation to 77 Squadron, RAAF
- 1952 Operation Ivy The United States successfully detonates the first large hydrogen bomb, codenamed "Mike" ["M" for megaton], in the Eniwetok atoll, located in the Marshall Islands in the central Pacific Ocean. The explosion had a yield of 10 megatons.
- 1952 The first hydrogen device exploded at Eniwetok Atoll in the Pacific
- 1954 Algeria begins rebellion against French rule
- 1954 India takes over administration of 4 French Indian settlements
- 1954 The Front de Libration Nationale fires the first shots of the Algerian War of Independence.
- 1954 Visitor posting - Carol May Wright was born in Philadelphia, Pa, USA
- 1955 The Famous Flames, a band featuring James Brown, records "Please, Please, Please" at a radio station in Macon, Georgia.
- 1955 The bombing of United Airlines Flight 629 occurs.
- 1955 Time bomb aboard United DC-6 kills 44 above Longmont Colorado
- 1956 Delhi becomes a territory of the Indian union
- 1956 Formation of Indian state of Andhra Pradesh with its capital as Hyderabad, formerly known as Nizam state.
- 1956 Formation of Kerala state in India.
- 1956 Formation of the Indian state of Karnataka (1973), formerly known as Mysore State.
- 1956 Indian state of Madhya Pradesh formed
- 1956 Nagy government of Hungary withdraws from Warsaw Pact
- 1957 The Mackinac Bridge, the world's longest suspension bridge between anchorages at the time, opens to traffic connecting Michigan's upper and lower peninsulas.
- 1959 Goalie Jacques Plant wears a hockey mask fo rthe first time in a game
- 1960 Benelux treaty goes into effect
- 1960 While campaigning for President of the United States, John F. Kennedy announces his idea of the Peace Corps.
- 1962 Greece enters the European Common Market
- 1962 USSR launches Mars 1; radio contact lost before arrival at Mars
- 1963 Revolt against the Diem regime in South Vietnam
- 1963 The Arecibo Observatory in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, with the largest radio telescope ever constructed, officially opens.
- 1966 William Dana in X-15 reaches 93 km
- 1969 Beatles'""Abbey Road," album goes #1 and stays #1 for 11 weeks
- 1970 A fire at a dance hall in Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, France kills 144 young people.
- 1970 Discotheque in Grenoble France burns, all exits padlocked and 142 die
- 1971 Eisenhower dollar put into circulation
- 1973 The Indian state of Mysore was renamed as Karnataka to represent all the regions within Karunadu .
- 1973 Watergate Scandal: Leon Jaworski is appointed as the new Watergate Special Prosecutor.
- 1979 Federal government made $1.5 billion loan to Chrysler
- 1979 Tanker Burmah Agate off Galveston Bay, Texas, spills 10.7 m gallons of oil, in US's worst oil spill disaster
- 1981 Antigua and Barbuda gains independence from Britain (National Day)
- 1981 Antigua and Barbuda gain independence from the United Kingdom.
- 1982 Honda becomes the first Asian automobile company to produce cars in the United States with the opening of their factory in Marysville, Ohio. The Honda Accord is the first car produced there.
- 1989 Scandinavian Airlines System bans smoking on many flights
- 1990 Last of Margaret Thatcher's original cabinet resigns, Deputy PM Sir Geoffrey Howe
- 1990 Rhetoric escalates as Bush likens Saddam to Hitler
- 1990 Sandra Miller awarded $100 for Mike Tyson fondling her breasts
- 1991 Three faculty, and one staff member of the department of physics and astronomy, were killed, along with one administrator, when physics graduate student Gang Lu went on a shooting rampage at the University of Iowa.
- 1993 Australia grants permanent extension on visas given to Chinese present in the country at the time of the Tienanmen Square massacre in Beijing in June 1989
- 1993 Maastricht Treaty takes effect
- 1995 Commuter service commences over CP Rail between Vancouver and Mission, BC.
- 1997 Visitor posting - Kyra Ashley Sandra Jane Roscom born at St. Clare hospital, Lakewood WA - USA
- 2005 First part of the Gomery Report, which discusses allegations of political money manipulation, is released in Canada.
- 2009 The composer and pianist Elton John postpones three more concerts on The Red Piano Tour, this time in the United States, due to illness.
- 2009 11 people are killed after a Russian military cargo plane belonging to the Interior Ministry crashes in Yakutia.
- 2009 A ship carrying 100 tons of hydrochloric acid sinks in a section of the Yangtze River in China's central Hubei province after colliding with another vessel.
- 2009 Afghan Presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah pulls out of the run-off election versus Hamid Karzai due to concerns over the independence of Azizullah Lodin, the head of the Independent Election Commission
- 2009 At least 14 people are dead after Typhoon Mirinae hits the Philippines.
- 2009 At least two women are killed and six people trapped after a landslide in Los Gigantes, Tenerife.
- 2009 China's legislature sacks the country's education minister, Zhou Ji, amid a corruption scandal, replacing him with his deputy Yuan Guiren.
- 2009 Nigeria's main rebel group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, threatens to call off its ceasefire with the government if foreign oil companies do not leave their land.
- 2009 Police in Italy detain two more suspected mafia bosses, one day after the seizure of their brother in a raid near Naples.
- 2009 Several events are held to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the Gaelic Athletic Association.
- 2009 Six Uyghurs detained at Guantanamo Bay detention camp are released by the United States and resettled in Palau.
- 2009 South Sudan's leader, Salva Kiir, announces he will back the independence of the semi-autonomous region in a 2011 referendum.
- 2009 The West Atlas oil rig that has leaked oil and gas for 10 weeks into the Timor Sea catches fire after an attempt to plug the leak.
- 2009 U.S. Republican Party candidate Dede Scozzafava, who withdrew her bid for New York's 23rd Congressional District in the House of Representatives Friday, endorses the Democratic challenger.
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