Today In History...

In 1620 41 Pilgrims aboard the Mayflower, anchored just off Massachusetts,

sign a compact calling for "just and equal laws."

In 1778 Iroquois Indians in central New York kill some 40 people in the

Cherry Valley Massacre.

In 1831 Former slaver Nat Turner, who had led a violent insurrection, is

executed in Jerusalem, Virginia.

In 1889 Washington is admitted as the 42nd U.S. state.

In 1918 Fighting in World War I comes to an end with the signing of an

armistice between the Allies and Germany.

In 1921 President Harding dedicates the "Tomb of the Unknown Solider" in

Arlington National Cemetery.

In 1942 During World War II, Germany completes their occupation of France.

In 1965 Rhodesia proclaims independence from Britain.

In 1966 The final Gemini flight, Gemini XII is launched with James A. Lovell

and Edwin E. "Buzz" Aldrin, Jr.

In 1972 The U.S. Army turns over its Long Bihn base to the South Vietnamese

army symbolizing the end of direct U.S. military involvement in the

Vietnam War.

In 1980 The crew of Soyuz 35 returns to Earth aboard Soyuz 37.

In 1981 Stuntman Dan Goodwin scales the outside of the 100-story John

Hancock Center in Chicago in nearly six hours.

In 1982 75 people, most of them Israeli soldiers, are killed in a suicide

truck bombing of Israel's military headquarters in Tyre, Lebanon.

In 1983 President Reagan becomes the first U.S. chief executive to address

the Diet, Japan's national legislature.

In 1984 Reverend Martin Luther King Sr., dies in Atlanta at age 84.

In 1987 Van Gogh's "Irises" sells for a record $53.6 million at an auction.

In 1987 Following the rejection of two Supreme Court nominations, President

Reagan announces his choice of Judge M. Anthony Kennedy, who goes on

to receive confirmation.

In 1988 Police in Sacramento, CA, find the first of seven bodies buried on

the grounds of a boarding house. Landlady Dorothea Puente was later

charged in the deaths of nine people; she was convicted of three

murders and sentenced to life in prison.

In 1990 Stormie Jones, the world's first heart-liver transplant recipient,

dies at a Pittsburgh hospital at age 13.

In 1991 The U.S. stations its first diplomat in Cambodia in 16 years to help

the war-shocked nation arrange democratic elections.

In 1992 In a letter, Russian President Boris Yeltsin tells U.S. Senators

that Americans had been held in prison camps after World War II.

In 1992 The Church of England votes to ordain women as priests.

In 1993 A bronze statue honoring the more than 11,000 American women who had

served in the Vietnam War is dedicated in Washington, DC.

In 1996 23 Latin heads of state denounce U.S. moves to isolate Cuba, but

also press Fidel Castro to institute democratic changes.

In 1997 Gunmen in downtown Karachi, Pakistan, kill four American oil company

workers and their Pakistani driver.

In 1997 Eastman Kodak announces it was cutting 10,000 jobs because of fierce

competition from Japan's Fuji Photo Film Company.

In 2000 A cable car crammed with skiers and snowboarders catches fire while

being pulled through an Alpine tunnel in Austria, killing 155.

In 2000 Lennox Lewis wins a unanimous 12-round decision over David Tua in

Las Vegas to retain his WBC and IBF heavyweight titles.

In 2000 Republicans go to court, seeking an order to block manual recounts

from continuing in Florida's presidential election.

In 2001 The Pakistani newspaper Ausaf qoutes Osama bin Laden as saying he

would never allow himself to be captured.

In 2001 Two French radio reporters and a German magazine journalist are

killed when they came under Taliban fire in Afghanistan.

In 2016 Veterans Day