Today in History

1492		Christopher Columbus lands on the island of Santo Domingo in search of gold.
1776		Phi Beta Kappa, the first scholastic fraternity, is founded at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg.
1812		The majority of Napoleon Bonaparte’s Grand Armeé staggers into Vilna, Lithuania, ending the failed Russian campaign.
1861		Union General George G. Meade leads a foraging expedition to Gunnell’s farm near Dranesville, Virginia.
1862		President Abraham Lincoln orders the hanging of 39 of the 303 convicted Indians who participated in the Sioux Uprising in Minnesota. They are to be hanged on December 26.
1863		The monitor Weehawken sinks in Charleston Harbor.
1876		Jack McCall is convicted for the murder of Wild Bill Hickok and sentenced to hang.
1877		Thomas A. Edison makes the first sound recording when he recites "Mary had a Little Lamb" into his phonograph machine.
1906		Lieutenant Thomas E. Selfridge flies a powered, man-carrying kite that carries him 168 feet in the air for seven minutes at Baddeck, Nova Scotia.
1917		The Bolsheviks imprison Czar Nicholas II and his family in Tobolsk.
1921		Ireland’s 26 southern counties become independent from Britain forming the Irish Free State.
1922		Benito Mussolini threatens Italian newspapers with censorship if they keep reporting "false" information.
1934		American Ambassador Davis says Japan is a grave security threat in the Pacific.
1938		France and Germany sign a treaty of friendship.
1939		Britain agrees to send arms to Finland, which is fighting off a Soviet invasion.
1941		President Franklin D. Roosevelt issues a personal appeal to Emperor Hirohito to use his influence to avoid war.
1945		The United States extends a $3 billion loan to Great Britain to help compensate for the termination of the Lend-Lease agreement.
1947		Florida’s Everglades National Park is established.
1948		The "Pumpkin Spy Papers" are found on the Maryland farm of Whittaker Chambers. They become evidence that State Department employee Alger Hiss is spying for the Soviet Union.
1957		Vanguard TV3 explodes on the launchpad, thwarting the first US attempt to launch a satellite into Earth’s orbit.
1967		Adrian Kantrowitz performs first human heart transplant in the US.
1969		Hells Angels, hired to provide security at a Rolling Stones concert at the Altamont Speedway in California, beat to death concert-goer Meredith Hunter.
1971		Pakistan severs diplomatic relations with India after New Delhi recognizes the state of Bangladesh.
1973		US House of Representatives confirms Gerald Ford as Vice-President of the United States, 387–35.
1975		A Provisional IRA unit takes a couple hostage in Balcombe Street, London, and a 6-day siege begins.
1976		Democrat Tip O’Neill is elected speaker of the House of Representatives. He will serve the longest consecutive term as speaker.
1992		The Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, India, is destroyed during a riot that started as a political protest.
2006		NASA reveals photographs from Mars Global Surveyor that suggest the presence of water on the red planet.