TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – NOV 3
644 Umar ibn al-Khattab, second Muslim caliph, is killed by a Persian slave in Medina
1507 Leonardo da Vinci is commissioned to paint Lisa Gherardini (“Mona Lisa”).
1529 The first Parliament for five years opens in England and the Commons put forward bills against abuses amongst the clergy and in the church courts.
1534 English parliament passes Act of Supremacy: Henry VIII and subsequent monarchs become Head of Church of England
1631 The Reverend John Eliot arrived in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He was the first Protestant minister to dedicate himself to the conversion of Native Americans to Christianity.
1783 Washington orders the Continental Army disbanded
1813 American troops destroy the Indian village of Tallushatchee in the Mississippi Valley.
1883 The U.S. Supreme Court declares American Indians to be “dependent aliens.”
1885 Tacoma vigilantes drive out Chinese, burn their homes & businesses
1918 The German fleet at Kiel mutinies. This is the first act leading to Germany’s capitulation in World War I.
1921 Milk drivers on strike dump thousands of gallons of milk onto New York City’s streets to protest the drink’s varying prices on the market.
1952 Clarence Birdseye marketed the first frozen peas.
1957 Dogs in space … The Soviet Union sent the first animal, a dog named Laika, into space aboard the Sputnik II. Laika died in orbit.
1964 For the first time, residents of Washington, D.C., are allowed to vote in the U.S. presidential election.
1969 U.S. President Richard Nixon, speaking on TV and radio, asks the “silent majority” of the American people to support his policies and the continuing war effort in Vietnam.
1979 63 Americans taken hostage at US Embassy (Teheran, Iran)
1979 Ku Klux Klansmen and neo-Nazis kill five and wound seven members of the Communist Workers Party during a “Death to the Klan” rally in Greensboro, NC; the incident becomes known as the Greensboro Massacre
1984 3,000 die in 3 day anti-Sikh riot in India
1986 The Ash-Shiraa, pro-Syrian Lebanese magazine, first broke the story of U.S. arms sales to Iran to secure the release of seven American hostages. The story turned into the Iran-Contra affair.
1988 Talk-show host Geraldo Rivera’s nose is broken as Roy Innis brawls with skinheads at TV taping
1994 Susan Smith of Union, SC, was arrested for drowning her two sons. Nine days earlier Smith had claimed that the children had been abducted by a black carjacker.
1997 U.S. imposes economic sanctions against Sudan in response to human rights abuses and support of Islamic extremist groups.
2003 In Kabul, Afghanistan, a post-Taliban draft constitution was unveiled.
2014 In New York City, One World Trade Center opened for business.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
