TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON: NOV 16
534 Second and final revision of the Codex Justinianus published
1532 Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro captures Inca Emperor Atahualpa after a surprise ambush at Cajamarca in the Peruvian Andes
1676 1st colonial prison organized, Nantucket, Massachusetts
1798 British seamen board the U.S. frigate Baltimore and impress a number of crewmen as alleged deserters, a practice that contributed to the War of 1812.
1821 Trader William Becknell reaches Santa Fe, N.M., on the route that will become known as the Santa Fe Trail.
1846 General Zachary Taylor takes Saltillo, Mexico.
1864 Union General William T. Sherman departs Atlanta and begins his “March to the Sea.”
1871 The National Rifle Association of America (NRA) was first chartered in the State of New York.
1902 A cartoon appears 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.
1907 The Indian and Oklahoma territories are unified to make Oklahoma, which becomes the 46th state.
1925 American Association for the Advancement of Atheism formed in NY
1940 Warsaw ghetto sealed- According to the decree, all Jews in the city had to move to the ghetto, which was closed off by a 10 feet wall and had soldiers and police guarding it from the outside 24 hours a day.
1945 Eighty-eight German scientists, holding Nazi secrets, arrive in the United States.
1948 Operation Magic Carpet begins with 1st plane from Yemen carrying Jews to Israel
1953 The United States joins in the condemnation of Israel for its raid on Jordan.
1955 The Big Four talks, taking place in Geneva on German reunification, end in failure.
1960 After the integration of two all-white schools, 2,000 whites riot in the streets of New Orleans.
1966 Dr. Samuel H. Sheppard was acquitted in his second trial of charges he had murdered his pregnant wife, Marilyn, in 1954.
1969 The U.S. Army announced that several had been charged with massacre and the subsequent cover-up in the My Lai massacre in Vietnam on March 16, 1968.
1973 President Nixon signed the bill authorizing the construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline.
1982 The space shuttle Columbia completes its first operational flight.
1988 Estonians declare sovereignty from USSR
1989 Salvadoran Army death squad kills six Jesuit priests and two others at Jose Simeon Canas University.
1992 Eric Lawes, while using a metal detector to search for a friend’s lost hammer near Hoxne, Suffolk, England, discovers the Hoxne Hoard, the largest hoard of Roman silver and gold ever found in Britain, and the largest collection of 4th and 5th century coins found anywhere within the bounds of the former Roman Empire
1998 In Burlington, Wisconsin, five high school students, aged 15 to 16, were arrested in an alleged plot to kill a carefully selected group of teachers and students.
2000 Bill Clinton became the first serving U.S. president to visit Communist Vietnam.
2004 President George W. Bush nominated Condoleezza Rice to replace Colin Powell as secretary of state.
REFERENCES: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeoplehistory.com, timeandate.com, factmonster.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
