2001 – Enron Corp. filed for Chapter 11 reorganization. The filing came five days after Dynegy walked away from a $8.4 billion buyout. It was the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history.
1620 – English language newspaper “Namloos” begins publishing in Amsterdam
1682 – Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury flees to Amsterdam following the failure of his plots to prevent a Catholic succession should King Charles II die
1755 – The second Eddystone Lighthouse is destroyed by fire.
1763 – Touro shul of Newport RI dedicated (oldest existing US synagogue)
1777 – British General Howe plots attack on Washington’s army for Dec 4
1804 – At Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, Napoleon Bonaparte crowns himself Emperor of the French, the first French Emperor in a thousand years.
1816 – The first savings bank in the U.S., the Philadelphia Savings Fund Society, opened for business.
1822 – In San Salvador, a congress proposes incorporation into US
1823 – Monroe Doctrine: US President James Monroe delivers a speech establishing American neutrality in future European conflicts.
1845 – Manifest Destiny: US President James K. Polk announces to Congress that the United States should aggressively expand into the West.
1851 – Newly-elected French President Charles Louis Bonaparte overthrows the Second Republic.
1859 – Militant abolitionist leader John Brown is hanged for his October 16th raid on Harper’s Ferry.
1899 – Philippine-American War: The Battle of Tirad Pass, termed “”The Filipino Thermopylae””, is fought.
1900 – Exiled South African President of Transvaal Paul Kruger arrives in Germany, though the Kaiser refuses to meet him
1901 – Gillette patented the KC Gillette Razor. It was first razor to feature a permanent handle and disposable double-edge razor blades.
1908 – Child Emperor Pu Yi ascends the Chinese throne at the age of two
1917 – During World War I, hostilities were suspended on the eastern front.
1920 – Following more than a month of Turkish-Armenian War, the Turkish dictated peace treaty is concluded -Treaty of Alexandropol
1927 – The Ford Motor Company unveiled the Model A automobile. It was the successor to the Model T.
1930 – Great Depression: US President Herbert Hoover goes before the United States Congress and asks for a US$150 million public works program to help generate jobs and stimulate the economy.
1938 – The first ‘Kindertransport’ carrying Jewish refugee children from Nazi Germany arrives in Britain
1942 – Manhattan Project: A self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction was demonstrated by Dr. Enrico Fermi and his staff at the University of Chicago.
1947 – Jerusalem Riots of 1947: Riots break out in Jerusalem in response to the approval of the 1947 UN Partition Plan.
1950 – “I Robot” collection of sci-fi short stories by Isaac Asimov published by Gnome Press in the US
1954 – The U.S. Senate voted to condemn Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy for what it called “conduct that tends to bring the Senate into dishonor and disrepute.” The censure was related to McCarthy’s controversial investigation of suspected communists in the U.S. government, military and civilian society.
1956 – The Granma yacht reaches the shores of Cuba’s Oriente province and Fidel Castro, Che Guevara and 80 other members of the 26th of July Movement disembark to initiate the Cuban Revolution
1957 – The Shippingport plant “went critical” (the nuclear fission reaction became self-sustaining) and began generating electricity throughout the Pittsburgh area sixteen days later.
1959 – Malpasset dam collapses destroying French Riviera town of Frejus
1961 – Cuban leader Fidel Castro declared in a nationally broadcast speech that he was a Marxist-Leninist and that he was going to lead Cuba to communism.
1968 – US President Richard Nixon names Henry Kissinger security advisor
1970 – The Environmental Protection Agency began operations.
1971 – Trucial States Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Dubai, Fujairah, Sharjah and Umm Al Quwain form the United Arab Emirates and declare independence from the United Kingdom
1976 – Fidel Castro becomes President of Cuba replacing Osvaldo Dortics Torrado.
1979 – Crowds attack US embassy in Tripoli, Libya
1980 – The Central Committee of Poland’s Communist Party announced major Politburo changes. The changes were aimed at coping with labor unrest.
1982 – Doctors at the University of Utah implanted a permanent artificial heart in the chest of retired dentist Barney Clark. He lived 112 days with the device. The operation was the first of its kind.
1988 – Benazir Bhutto is sworn in as Prime Minister of Pakistan, becoming the first woman to head the government of an Islam-dominated state
1989 – V.P. Singh was sworn in as prime minister of India.
1990 – Chancellor Hekmut Kohl’s coalition won the first free all-German elections since 1932.
1992 – Germany’s lower house of parliament voted in favor of the Maastricht Treaty on European unity.
1993 – Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar is shot and killed in Medelln.
1994 – The U.S. government agreed not to seek a recall of allegedly fire-prone General Motors pickup trucks. A deal was made with GM under which the company would spend more than $51 million on safety and research.
1995 – NASA launched a U.S.-European observatory on a $1 billion dollar mission intended to study the sun.
1997 – U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno declined to seek an independent counsel investigation of telephone fund-raising by President Clinton and Vice President Gore. She had concluded that they had not violated election laws.
1999 – The British government transferred political power over the province of Northern Ireland to the Northern Ireland Executive.
2001 – Enron Corp. filed for Chapter 11 reorganization. The filing came five days after Dynegy walked away from a $8.4 billion buyout. It was the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history.
2002 – New climate-controlled vault to conserve and display the Sarajevo Haggadah illuminated manuscript (c. 1350) dedicated in Sarajevo’s National Museum
2005 – Van Tuong Nguyen is executed in Singapore for drug trafficking.
2010 – NASA announced the discovery of a new arsenic-based life form.
2014 – Hong Kong pro-democracy activists clash with police as they try to surround the government’s headquarters in some of the worst violence since the protests began
2015 – Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik attack a social services centre in San Bernardino, California killing 14 and wounding 17
2017 – Egyptian lawyer Nabih al-Wahsh sentenced to 3 years in prison for saying women wearing ripped jeans should be raped
2018 – Israeli police recommend Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife be charged with fraud and bribery
2020 – US Attorney General William Barr says there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election, despite claims by President Donald Trump
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
