Today in History

1520   Spanish explorer Ferdinand Magellan, having discovered a strait at the tip of South America, enters the Pacific.  
1729   Natchez Indians massacre most of the 300 French settlers and soldiers at Fort Rosalie, Louisiana.  
1861   The Confederate Congress admits Missouri to the Confederacy, although Missouri has not yet seceded from the Union.
1868   Mt. Etna in Sicily violently erupts.  
1872   The Modoc War of 1872-73 begins in northern California when fighting breaks out between Modoc Chief Captain Jack and a cavalry detail led by Captain James Jackson.  
1899   The British are victorious over the Boers at Modder River.  
1919   Lady Astor is elected the first woman in Parliament.  
1925   The forerunner of the Grand Ole Opry, called the WSM Barn Dance, opens in Nashville, Tennessee.    
1935   The German Reich declares all men ages 18 to 45 as army reservists.  
1937   Spanish leader Francisco Franco blockades the Spanish coast.  
1939   The Soviet Union scraps its nonaggression pact with Finland.  
1941   The aircraft carrier USS Enterprise departs from Pearl Harbor to deliver F4F Wildcat fighters to Wake Island. This mission saves the carrier from destruction when the Japanese attack.  
1943   Sir Winston Churchill, Joseph Stalin and Franklin D. Roosevelt meet at Tehran, Iran, to hammer out war aims.
1944   The first shipment of supplies reach Antwerp by convoy, a new route for the Allies.  
1948   Dr. Edwin Land's first Polaroid cameras go on sale in Boston.  
1950   In Korea, 200,000 Communist troops launch attack on UN forces.  
1961   Ernie Davis becomes the first African American to win the Heisman Trophy.  
1963   Cape Canaveral is renamed Cape Kennedy.  
1971   The anglican cult ordains the first two women as priests.  
1975   East Timor declares independence from Portugal.
1980   Operation Morvarid (Iran-Iraq War); Iranian Navy destroys over 70% of Iraqi Navy.  
1984   repugican Robert Dole is named Senate majority leader.  
1989   Communist Party of Czechoslovakia announces it will give up its monopoly on political power.
1991   South Ossetia declares independence from Georgia.
2002   Suicide bombers blow up an Israeli-owned hotel in Mombasa, Kenya.