TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – OCT 26
1774 The first Continental Congress, which protested British measures and called for civil disobedience, concludes in Philadelphia.
1795 When General Paul Barras resigns his commission as head of France’s Army of the Interior to become head of the Directory, his second-in-command becomes the army’s commander—Napoleon Bonaparte.
1825 The Erie Canal, connecting Lake Erie to the Hudson River, opened.
1850 Robert McClure sights the fabled Northwest Passage for the first time (from Banks Island towards Melville Island)
1861 Pony Express (Missouri to California) ends after 19 months
1863 International conference begins in Geneva aimed at improving medical conditions on battlefields – beginning of the Red Cross
1868 White terrorists kill several blacks in St Bernard Parish La
1881 Three Earp brothers and Doc Holliday have a shootout with the Clantons and McLaurys at the O.K. Corral in Tombstone, Arizona Territory.
1905 Norway signs a treaty of separation with Sweden. Norway chooses Prince Charles of Denmark as the new king; he becomes King Haakon VII.
1918 Germany’s supreme commander, General Erich Ludendorff, resigns, protesting the terms to which the German Government has agreed in negotiating the armistice. This sets the stage for his later support for Hitler and the Nazis, who claim that Germany did not lose the war on the battlefield but were “stabbed in the back” by politicians.
1941 US savings bonds go on sale
1955 The Village Voice is first published, backed in part by Norman Mailer.
1955 Ngo Dinh Diem declares himself Premier of South Vietnam.
1959 The first photographs are seen on earth of the far side of the moon when the Lunik III, a Soviet satellite which are sent back to earth via radio signals.
1967 Mohammad Reza Pahlavi crowns himself Emperor of Iran and his wife Farah as empress.
1970 Gary Trudeau’s comic strip Doonesbury first appears.
1975 Anwar Sadat became the first Egyptian president to pay an official visit to the United States.
1979 The President of South Korea, Park Chung-hee, asssinated by Kim Jae-kyu, head of the country’s Central intelligence Agency; Choi Kyu-ha is named acting president.
1984 Surgeons gave a 14-day-old girl, referred to as ‘Baby Fae’, the heart of a young baboon, she did only survive for 20 days after the operation but this was still considered a breakthrough in heart transplants.
1988 Donald Trump bills Mike Tyson $2,000,000 for 4 month advisory service
1994 Israel and Jordan sign a peace treaty.
2001 The USA PATRIOT Act signed into law by Pres. George W. Bush, greatly expanding intelligence and legal agencies’ ability to utilize wiretaps, records searches and surveillance.
2002 Russian Spetsnaz storm the Moscow Theatre, where Chechen terrorists had taken the audience and performers hostage three days earlier; 50 terrorists and 150 hostages die in the assault.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
