This Day in History for Saturday, November 7, 2009
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Events
Events: 1637: Anne Hutchinson, the first female religious leader in the American colonies, was banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for heresy. She preached that faith alone was sufficient for salvation, and therefore that individuals had no need for the church or church law.
Events: 1665: The "London Gazette," the oldest surviving journal, was first published.
Events: 1811: Tecumseh's (Shawnee chief) band of followers were defeated in the Battle of the Wabash (or Tippecanoe) by William Henry Harrison, governor of the Indiana Territory.
Events: 1837: In Alton, Illinois, abolitionist printer Elijah P. Lovejoy, founder of "The Saint Louis Observer" anti-slavery newspaper, was shot to death by a mob while trying to protect his printing shop.
Events: 1846: Zachary Taylor, one of the heroes of the Mexican War, was elected President of the United States of America.
Events: 1874: amp;quot;Harper's Weekly" featured a Thomas Nast drawing of an elephant in a cartoon as the symbol of the Republican Party.
Events: 1876: Rutherford B. Hayes was elected 19th President of the United States of America.
Events: 1893: Colorado granted women the right to vote.
Events: 1895: Canada's transcontinental railway was completed.
Events: 1916: Republican Jeannette Rankin of Montana became the first woman elected to Congress.
Events: 1917: Vladimir Lenin returned from exile and led the Bolshevik Revolution with Leon Trotsky, staging a coup d'etat of the provisional government in Russia.
Events: 1929: New York's Museum of Modern Art opened to the public.
Events: 1940: The middle section of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge between Seattle and Tacoma, the third-largest suspension bridge in the world, collapsed -- just four months after opening.
Events: 1944: Franklin D. Roosevelt won an unprecedented fourth term as President of the United States of America, defeating Thomas E. Dewey.
Events: 1950: The Hawaii Territory ratified a state constitution, though it did not join the Union until 1959.
Events: 1954: amp;quot;Face the Nation" had its TV premiere.
Events: 1962: Republican Richard M. Nixon lost the race to be California's governor and held what he called his "last press conference," saying, "You won't have Nixon to kick around anymore."
Events: 1972: Richard M. Nixon won the Presidency of the United States of America with a landslide victory over Democrat George McGovern.
Events: 1973: Congress overrode President Richard Nixon's veto of the War Powers Act, which limits a chief executive's power to wage war without congressional approval.
Events: 1988: amp;quot;Sugar" Ray Leonard knocked out Canadian Donny Londe, completing his collection of world titles at five different weights.
Events: 1989: L. Douglas Wilder won the election for governor in Virginia, making him the first black governor in U.S. history. In New York, former Manhattan borough president David Dinkins, a Democrat, is elected New York City's first African-American mayor.
Events: 2000: Republican George W. Bush president won over incumbent Democratic Vice President Al Gore in the U.S. presidential election, but the results were not finalized for more than a month because of a dispute over votes in Florida.
Events: 2000: Hillary Rodham Clinton became the first First Lady to win public office, defeating Republican Rick Lazio for a U.S. Senate seat from New York.
Holidays
-- Russia: National Day/Day of Accord and Reconciliation.
-- Feast day of St. Herculanus of Perugia, St. Engelbert, St. Willibrord, and St. Florentius of Strasbourg.
Births
-- Madame Marie Curie (Marja Sklodowski), German Nobel Prize-winning physicist.
-- Leon Trotsky, Russian Communist leader.
-- Albert Camus, French Nobel Prize-winning writer.
-- Billy Graham, American evangelist and TV host.
-- Hiroshi Yamauchi, Japanese computer game executive, credited with transforming Nintendo from a small hanafuda card-making company, to the multi-billion dollar video game company it is today.
-- Joni Mitchell (born Roberta Joan Anderson), Canadian musician and songwriter.
-- Judy Tenuta, comedian born in Oak Park, Illinois.
Deaths
-- Eleanor Roosevelt, American first lady and the wife of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. She was considered one of the most powerful women of her time.
-- Gene Tunney, American world heavyweight boxing champion.
-- Steve McQueen, American television and film actor.
-- Queen Ingrid of Denmark.
-- Rudolf Augstein, German publisher; founder and part-owner of "Der Spiegel" magazine.