Post by farmgal on Nov 15, 2012 19:11:48 GMT -5
November 16 is the 320th day of the year, in the Gregorian calendar.
There are 45 days remaining until the end of the year.
Countdown until Obama should be leaving Office
www.obamaclock.org/
Days until coming elections:
www.daysuntil.com/Election-Day/index.html
U.S. Debt Clock: www.usdebtclock.org/
1414 The Council of Constance was convened. This conclave, which lasted until 22 April 1418, ended the Great Schism within the church by deposing three rival popes. The council also brought to trial and executed two Bohemian reformers: John Huss (1415) and his close friend Jerome of Prague (1416) and anathematized the teachings of the English reformer John Wycliffe (ca. 1329–1384).
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Constance
1532 Pizarro seizes Incan emperor Atahualpa. Shortly before the arrival (1532) of Francisco Pizarro, Atahualpa invaded the domains of Huscar, whom he defeated and imprisoned, and made himself Inca. On Nov. 16, 1532, Pizarro met Atahualpa at Cajamarca. Invited into the city, Atahualpa was seized and imprisoned. He offered a room full of gold as ransom and at the same time secretly ordered the death of Huscar. He was tried for his brother's murder and for plotting against the Spanish and was executed.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atahualpa
1620 The first corn (maize) found in the U.S. by British settlers was discovered in Provincetown, Mass., by sixteen desperately hungry Pilgrims led by Myles Standish, William Bradford, Stephen Hopkins, and Edward Tilley at a place they named Corn Hill. The food came from a previously harvested cache belonging to a local Indian tribe. This corn provided a much needed supply of food which saw the Pilgrims through their first Winter in the New World. A commemorative plaque placed on Corn Hill quotes in part "And sure it was God's good providence that we found this corn for else we know no how we should have done." The date 16 Nov is according to the Old Style Calendar.
1776 American Revolutionary War: Hessian mercenaries capture Fort Washington from the Patriots.
1776 American Revolution: The United Provinces (Low Countries) recognize the independence of the United States.
1786 The first U.S.-made "jenny" and "stock-card" machines were supported by the Massachusetts state legislature. The legislature voted a grant of £200 for the completion of what are believed to be first U.S.-made spinning, carding, and roping machines. In his workshop at Bridgewater, Mass, senator Hugh Orr employed brothers Robert and Alexander Barr, machinists bringing knowledge about such machines from Scotland. The senate subsequently awarded the Barrs six tickets in the state land lottery of the time (in which there were no blanks), as a reward for their "ingenuity " and " public spirit." The machines, known as "The State Models" were advertised so that the early American textile-machinery manufacturers could benefit.
1821 American Old West: Missouri trader William Becknell arrives in Santa Fe, New Mexico over a route that became known as the Santa Fe Trail.
Pure luck made Becknell the first businessman to revive the American trade with Santa Fe. Fearing American domination of the region, the Spanish had closed their Southwest holdings to foreigners following the Pike expedition more than a decade earlier. They threw the few traders who violated the policy into prison and confiscated their goods. However, Becknell and other merchants continued to trade with the Indians on the American-controlled eastern slope of the southern Rockies. While on such an expedition in the fall of 1821, Becknell encountered a troop of Mexican soldiers. They informed Becknell that they had recently won their independence in a war with Spain, and the region was again open to American traders. Becknell immediately sped to Santa Fe, where he found a lucrative market for his goods, and his saddlebags were heavy with Mexican silver when he returned to his base in Franklin, Missouri.
The next summer Becknell traveled to Santa Fe again, this time with three wagonloads of goods. Instead of following the old route that passed over a dangerous high pass, however, Becknell blazed a shorter and easier cutoff across the Cimarron Desert. Thus, while much of the route he followed had been used by Mexican traders for decades, Becknell's role in reopening the trail and laying out the short-cut earned him the title of "Father of the Santa Fe Trail." It became one of the most important and lucrative of the Old West trading routes; merchants and other travelers continued to follow the trail blazed by Becknell until the arrival of trains in the late 1870s.
1841 The first patent for a U.S. life preserver of cork was issued to Napoleon E. Guerin of New York City (No. 2,359) for his "Improvement in Buoyant Dresses or Life-Preservers." It was of the form of a jacket or waistcoat. The jacket was described as being made from a doubled layer of material, with sufficient room for the introduction of from 18 to 20 quarts of rasped or grated cork. After the insertion of the rasped or grated cork between the layers, those parts of the garment left open would be sewn closed. The difference in quantity of cork was chosen according to the size of the person for whom the life preserver is to be made.
1863 American Civil War: Battle of Campbell's Station near Knoxville, Tennessee. Confederate troops unsuccessfully attack Union forces.
1864 Union Gen William T Sherman begins march to the sea during Civil War. Sherman's march to the sea brought the Civil War home to Southern civilians. Few became casualties, but many lost property and felt demoralized. In Virginia, desertions in Robert E. Lee's army increased. Sherman's psychological warfare of destruction had a major effect on the outcome of the war. It also made Sherman a brute to many Southerners and a hero to Union supporters.
1875 The first U.S. patent for a dental mallet, or "Electro-magnetic Dental Pluggers" was issued to William G.A. Bonwill of Philadelphia, Pa. (No. 170,045). His tooth-filling device was used to drive gold into a tooth cavity. He derived the idea from observing the sounder of a telegraph key (while at the Continental Hotel in Philadelphia, 27 Feb 1867). The automatic tool was designed to be "manipulated as readily as the usual hand-tools." An electromagnet functions to drive a mallet, while also breaking the circuit to allow the spring-loaded mallet to return, at which point the circuit is closed, and the cycle repeated under the control of the operator.
1881 The pastors who left the Missouri Synod as a result of the Predestination Controversy held their first organizational meeting in Blue Island, Illinois.
cyclopedia.lcms.org/display.asp?t1=P&word=PREDESTINARIANCONTROVERSY
1889 Oahu Railway begins public service in Hawaii
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oahu_Railway_and_Land_Company
1901 The first American racer to exceed the speed of a mile a minute (60 mph) was that of A.C. Bostwick on the Ocean Parkway racetrack in Brooklyn, New York. During a race sponsored by the Long Island Automobile Club, Bostwick achieved an average speed of 63.83 mph along a one-mile straightaway on the course, thus completing the mile in 56.4 seconds. European car manufacturers and drivers dominated early motor racing, a phenomenon reflected in the first seven speed records. However, in 1902, just under a year after Bostwick's historic run, William K. Vanderbilt, Jr., a businessman and racing enthusiast, became the first American to enter the land speed record books when he ran a mile in 47.32 seconds, or at an average speed of 76.086 mph. The Mors automobile that Vanderbilt drove was also the first vehicle with an internal combustion engine to enter the speed record books. [Another source says - Henry Fournier drove a mile in 51 4/5 seconds, becoming the first auto racer to drive more than a mile-a-minute in competition - in Brooklyn, New York.]
1907 Indian Territory and Oklahoma Territory become Oklahoma and are admitted as the 46th U.S. state. Oklahoma, with a name derived from the Choctaw Indian words okla, meaning "people," and humma, meaning "red," has a history of human occupation dating back 15,000 years. The first Europeans to visit the region were Spanish explorers in the 16th century, and in the 18th century the Spanish and French struggled for control of the territory. The United States acquired Oklahoma from France in 1803 as part of the Louisiana Purchase.
After the War of 1812, the U.S. government decided to remove Indian tribes from the settled eastern lands of the United States and move them west to the unsettled lands of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. In 1828, Congress reserved Oklahoma for Indians and in 1834 formally ceded it to five southeastern tribes as Indian Territory. Many Cherokees refused to abandon their homes east of the Mississippi, and so the U.S. Army moved them west in a forced march known as the "Trail of Tears." The uprooted tribes joined Plains Indians that had long occupied the area, and Indian nations with fixed boundaries and separate governments were established in the region.
During the American Civil War, most tribes in Indian Territory supported the South. With the defeat of the Confederacy in 1865, the territory was placed under U.S. military rule. White cattlemen and settlers began to covet the virgin ranges of Oklahoma, and after the arrival of the railroad in the 1870s, illegal white incursion into Indian Territory flourished. Most of these "Boomers" were expelled, but pressure continued until the federal government agreed in 1889 to open two million acres in central Oklahoma for white settlement. At noon on April 22, 1889, a pistol shot signaled the opening of the new land, and tens of thousands of people rushed to stake claims. Those who had already made illegal entry to beat the starting gun were called "Sooners," hence Oklahoma's state nickname. The following year, the region was divided into Indian Territory and Oklahoma Territory.
In 1907, Congress decided to admit Indian Territory and Oklahoma Territory into the Union as a single state, with all Indians in the state becoming U.S. citizens. Representatives of the two territories drafted a constitution, and on September 17, 1907, it was approved by voters of the two territories. On November 16, Oklahoma was welcomed into the United States by President Theodore Roosevelt.
Oklahoma initially prospered as an agricultural state, but the drought years of the 1930s made the state part of the Dust Bowl. During the Depression, poor tenant farmers known as "Okies" were forced to travel west seeking better opportunities. In the 1940s, prosperity returned to Oklahoma, and oil production brought a major economic boom in the 1970s.
1914 The Federal Reserve Bank of the United States officially opens.
1914 New Fatherland League launched in Germany. On this day in 1914 in Germany, a small group of intellectuals led by the physician Georg Nicolai launch Bund Neues Vaterland, the New Fatherland League.
One of the league's most active supporters was Nicolai's friend, the great physicist Albert Einstein. Together, Einstein and Nicolai had written a pacifist answer to the famous pro-war manifesto of October 1914, which had been signed by 93 leading German intellectuals from various fields, including the physicist Max Planck, the painter Max Lieberman and the poet Gerhart Hauptmann. When their counter-manifesto failed to attract much support, Nicolai and Einstein concentrated their efforts into the New Fatherland League.
First and foremost, the league argued, World War I, which had begun the previous August, should end promptly in favor of "a just peace without annexations." Secondly, an international organization should be established in order to prevent future wars. According to Dr. Franziska Baumgartner-Tramer, who attended some of the league's meetings, Einstein spoke "with great pessimism about the future of human relations....I managed to get to him on one occasion, when I was depressed by the news of one German victory after another and the resultant intolerable arrogance and gloating of the people of Berlin. 'What will happen, Herr Professor?' I asked anxiously. Einstein looked at me, raised his right fist, and replied 'This will govern!'"
In July 1915, the New Fatherland League supported another declaration, signed by 91 prominent German intellectuals, opposing territorial annexations and calling for a compromise peace. This proved too much for German authorities, who raided the league's offices and prohibited its members from publishing any other documents or from even associating with each other. In the post-war years, however, the league resurfaced, and in 1922 it was renamed the German League for Human Rights, after a similar French organization dedicated to fostering German-French understanding.
Meanwhile, frustrated by the League of Nations' failure to enforce disarmament and prevent further international conflicts in the decades following World War I, Albert Einstein became one of the world's most powerful voices in support of pacifism. He was also committed to Zionism, the political movement aimed at creating a Jewish homeland in Palestine. When the state of Israel was created after World War II, its prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, offered Einstein the post of president. The great man declined, but remained deeply involved with Israel and with Jewish affairs until the end of his life.
1918 In NY City, the United Lutheran Church was organized by a merger of three general Lutheran bodies in the U.S. and Canada. (In 1962, the ULC became one of the branches of Lutheranism which formed the Lutheran Church in America.)
1920 Postage meter first used in US in lieu of postage stamps. A Post Office Department official introduced Arthur Pitney and Walter Bowes to each other because it appeared that their individual products would work together Mr. Bowes's machine and Mr. Pitney's meter. Bowes's stepson, Walter Wheeler, Jr., joined the design team and helped develop the final design of the 1920 model. The company's model M postage meter was authorized on September 1, 1920, and placed into commercial use on November 16, 1920.
1926 NY Rangers first game, beat Montreal Maroons 1-0
1932 The Palace in New York City, the most famous vaudeville theatre in America, closed its doors. The focal point of vaudeville - its home base was the Palace theater in the heart of New York's theater district, at Broadway and 47th Street. It was every actor's ambition to play the Palace in New York. Monday afternoon was the first show and the house would be filled with performers from all around town. They'd come in for the matinee. And all the Broadway talent scouts and agents would come down to see the show, because how you went over determined what your future bookings would be. The Palace opened in 1913 and with the advent of radio and talking pictures in 1927 was forced to close its doors, as a vaudeville house, in 1932.
1933 FDR announced the U.S. and Soviet Union had resumed diplomatic relations. The United States greeted the democratic Russian Revolution of February 1917 with great enthusiasm, which cooled considerably with the advent of the Bolsheviks in October 1917. The United States, along with many other countries, refused to recognize the new regime, arguing that it was not a democratically elected or representative government. The policy of non-recognition ended in November 1933, when the United States, under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, established full diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union, the last major power to do so.
1937 Bob Crosby and his orchestra recorded "South Rampart Street Parade" Bob Crosby is best remembered for the Dixieland band that bore his name during the 1930s and early 1940s. The Bob Crosby Orchestra, along with its combo side group, the Bob Cats, was considered one of the greatest jazz bands of all time. The orchestra was actually led by sax player Gil Rodin, however. Crosby himself was simply the front man, chosen for his personality, looks, and famous last name.
1940 World War II: In response to Germany's leveling of Coventry, England two days before, the Royal Air Force bombs Hamburg.
1940 Holocaust: In occupied Poland, the Nazis close off the Warsaw Ghetto from the outside world.
1942 Work began on an experimental atomic pile to investigate the world's first artificial nuclear chain reaction. In a makeshift lab underneath the University's football stands at Stagg Field, physicists and staffers, worked around the clock to built a lattice of 57 layers of uranium metal and uranium oxide embedded in graphite blocks. A wooden structure supported the graphite pile. The research would be an important contribution to the Manhattan Project, a secret wartime project to develop nuclear weapons, which initiated the modern nuclear age. Little more than two weeks later, on 2 Dec 1942, the first self-sustained nuclear chain reaction was achieved by Enrico Fermi and his team.
1943 World War II: American bombers strike a hydro-electric power facility and heavy water factory in German-controlled Vemork, Norway.
1944 Dueren, Germany is destroyed by Allied bombers.
The triangle in the glass tube contains
the world's first sample of americium,
produced in the 60- inch cyclotron in 19441945 Two newly discovered elements were announced: americium (atomic number 95) and curium (atomic number 96). Americium, named after the Americas, can be produced from intense neutron irradiation of pure plutonium. Problems involved in the extraction of americium include the recovery of the expensive starting material and the removal of hazardous fission products that are formed simultaneously in amounts comparable to the amounts of the element itself. It was discovered by Seaborg, James, Morgan and Ghiorso in Chicago, U.S.A. It is used as a portable source for gamma radiography, and in smoke detectors. Curium, a byproduct of americium, was named in honour of Pierre and Marie Curie.
1945 Cold War: Operation Paperclip: The United States Army secretly admits 88 German scientists and engineers to help in the development of rocket technology. Most of these men had served under the Nazi regime and critics in the United States questioned the morality of placing them in the service of America. Nevertheless, the U.S. government, desperate to acquire the scientific know-how that had produced the terrifying and destructive V-1 and V-2 rockets for Germany during WWII, and fearful that the Russians were also utilizing captured German scientists for the same end, welcomed the men with open arms. Realizing that the importation of scientists who had so recently worked for the Nazi regime so hated by Americans was a delicate public relations situation, the U.S. military cloaked the operation in secrecy. In announcing the plan, a military spokesman merely indicated that some German scientists who had worked on rocket development had "volunteered" to come to the United States and work for a "very moderate salary." The voluntary nature of the scheme was somewhat undercut by the admission that the scientists were in "protective custody." Upon their arrival in the United States on November 16, newsmen and photographers were not allowed to interview or photograph the newcomers. A few days later, a source in Sweden claimed that the scientists were members of the Nazi team at Peenemeunde where the V-weapons had been produced. The U.S. government continued to remain somewhat vague about the situation, stating only that "certain outstanding German scientists and technicians" were being imported in order to "take full advantage of these significant developments, which are deemed vital to our national security."The situation pointed out one of the many ironies connected with the Cold War. The United States and the Soviet Union, once allies against Germany and the Nazi regime during World War II, were now in a fierce contest to acquire the best and brightest scientists who had helped arm the German forces in order to construct weapons systems to threaten each other.
1945 UNESCO is founded.
1946 The Evangelical United Brethren Church was constituted at Johnstown, PA by a merger of the United Brethren in Christ and the Evangelical Church. The new denomination originated in the work of two German Reformed pastors, Philip W. Otterbein and Martin Boehm, who had ministered among Pennsylvania Germans two centuries earlier.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evangelical_United_Brethren_Church
1952 "Our Goodly Heritage" debuted over CBS television. This Sunday morning Bible study program, hosted by William Rush Baer of New York University, aired a little over five years.
1955 "Sixteen Tons" became the fastest-selling record in history. "Sixteen Tons" was written in 1947 by the Country & Western guitarist and songwriter Merle Travis. It is based on his coal miner father, whose favorite saying, "Another day older and deeper in debt," became part of the chorus. At the time, this was the fastest-selling single in Capitol's history, jumping to #1 in just 3 weeks.
1955 First speed-boat to exceed 200 mph (322 kph) (D.M. Campbell)
1957 "Jailhouse Rock" by Elvis Presley topped the charts. "Jailhouse Rock" was featured in the Elvis movie of the same name. It is considered one of the best of his 31 movies. Elvis joined the army shortly after this was released.This was #1 on the US pop charts for 7 weeks. It also reached #1 on the Country and R&B charts.
1958 Six inches of snow fell on Tucson, Arizona. 6.4 inches of snow across the metro area caused auto accidents, stranded people, dropped power lines, knocked out telephone service, closed highways and paralyzed air travel. Three boy scouts were stranded in snow near Madera Canyon in the Santa Rita Mountains south of Tucson. Their bodies were not found for two weeks. The heavy snow also closed the highway to Mt. Lemmon, marooning about 35 weekend vacationers.
1959 The Rodgers and Hammerstein musical "Sound of Music" opens on Broadway. The Sound of Music, with music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, and a book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, opened on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on November 16, 1959, and starred Mary Martin as Maria and Theodore Bikel as Captain Georg von Trapp. The original Broadway cast album sold three million copies and ran for 1,443 performances.
1959 - The most severe November cold wave in U.S. history was in progress. A weather observing station located 14 miles northeast of Lincoln MT reported a reading of 53 degrees below zero, which established an all-time record low temperature for the nation for the month of November. Their high that day was one degree above zero. (David Ludlum) (The Weather Channel)
1959 "Mr. Blue" by the Fleetwoods topped the charts. "Come Softly To Me" was an instant hit for the distinctive trio and the haunting and catchy song (on which the vocal was recorded a cappella) shot to the top of the US charts and made the UK Top 10 despite a hit cover version by Frankie Vaughan and the Kaye Sisters. Their third release, "Mr. Blue", a Dwayne Blackwell song originally written for the Platters, was also a US number 1 (in the UK two cover versions took the honours) and made Troxell one of the leaders in the teen-idol stakes.
1961 President John F. Kennedy decides to increase military aid to South Vietnam without committing U.S. combat troops.
Kennedy was concerned at the advances being made by the communist Viet Cong, but did not want to become involved in a land war in Vietnam. He hoped that the military aid would be sufficient to strengthen the Saigon government and its armed forces against the Viet Cong. Ultimately it was not, and Kennedy ended up sending additional support in the form of U.S. military advisors and American helicopter units. By the time of his assassination in 1963, there were 16,000 U.S. soldiers in South Vietnam.
1963 "Deep Purple" by Nino Tempo & April Stevens topped the charts. "Deep Purple" was recorded in a mere 15 minutes at the end of a session, explaining the almost improvised nature of the vocals (with Stevens taking long spoken passages) and homespun harmonica, ingredients which gave the record much of its charm. It reached number one in November 1963, and won a Grammy award as best rock & roll record of the year.
1964 Judy Garland and her daughter, Liza Minnelli, appeared together at the London Palladium. On November 16, 1964, Judy Garland stepped onto the stage of the famed London Palladium for a concert that became historic on two counts -- it marked the first time Garland would share the stage with her daughter Liza Minnelli, and would prove to be Garland's final performance at the venue. The program was shown on U.S. TV; and the LP, "Live at the London Palladium" became a classic on Capitol Records.
1966 Dr Sam Sheppard freed after 9 years in jail, by a jury.
1970 Anne Murray received a gold record for "Snowbird." Murray recorded "Snowbird" after watching its composer, Gene Maclellan, perform it on Canadian TV. Murray's first hit. She started recording when the producer of a show that turned her down as a singer gave her a shot 2 years later. She became a very popular Pop/Country crossover artist.
1973 President Nixon authorizes construction of the Alaskan pipeline. Nixon stated: "This legislation, which I am signing today, will at last enable us to construct the pipeline necessary for vital access to the rich oil deposits located on the North Slope of Alaska. When completed in 1977, the pipeline will initially carry 600,000 barrels of oil per day, and eventually 2 million barrels of oil per day on its way to the continental United States."
1973 Skylab 3, carrying a crew of three astronauts, was launched from Cape Canaveral, on an 84-day mission that remained the longest American space flight for over two decades. The Skylab III crew, Gerald P. Carr, William R. Pogue and Edward C. Gibson, maintained their physical condition by walking treadmills and riding an on-board stationary bicycle. Among the thousands of experiments conducted during this flight, the astronauts took four space walks, including one on Christmas Day to observe the comet Kohoutek. After 1214 orbits, the crew returned to Earth, splashing down on February 8, 1974.
This is the message
with color added
to highlight
its separate parts.
The actual binary transmission
carried no color information.1974 First intentional interstellar radio message sent. The Arecibo message is a radio message that was beamed into space at a ceremony to mark the remodeling of the Arecibo radio telescope in 1974. It was aimed at the globular star cluster M13 some 25,000 light years away because it was a large and close collection of stars that was available in the sky at the time and place of the ceremony. The message consisted of 1679 binary digits. The number 1679 was chosen because it is a semiprime (the product of two prime numbers) and therefore can only be broken down into 23 rows and 73 columns, or 73 rows and 23 columns.
The message consists of seven parts that encode the following:
1. The numbers one (1) through ten (10)
2. The atomic numbers of the elements hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and phosphorus, which make up deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)
3. The formulas for the sugars and bases in the nucleotides of DNA
4. The number of nucleotides in DNA, and a graphic of the double helix structure of DNA
5. A graphic figure of a human, the dimension (physical height) of an average man, and the human population of Earth
6. A graphic of the Solar System
7. A graphic of the Arecibo radio telescope and the dimension (the physical diameter) of the transmitting antenna dish
Because it will take 25,000 years for the message to reach its intended destination of stars (and an additional 25,000 years for any reply), the Arecibo message was more a demonstration of human technological achievement than a real attempt to enter into a conversation with extraterrestrials.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message
1974 John Lennon's #1 solo "Whatever Gets You Through the Night." Elton John sang backup on this. The following year Lennon returned the favor on Elton's #1 cover of "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds." Lennon played guitar on that track and was credited as "Dr. Winston O'Boogie." "Whatever Gets You Through the Night" hit the top of the US charts, but it fell fast. It spent just 3 weeks in the Top-10 before dropping from 2-16 in November 1974.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whatever_Gets_You_Through_the_Night
1976 Rick Barry (San Francisco), ends then longest NBA free throw streak of 60.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Barry
1977 Stephen Spielberg's "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" was released. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) is a science fiction movie about UFOs, written and directed by Steven Spielberg. It stars Richard Dreyfuss, Francois Truffaut, Bob Balaban, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, and Cary Guffey. The movie has visual effects by Douglas Trumbull and a score composed by John Williams.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_Encounters_of_the_Third_Kind
1979 Paul McCartney releases "Wonderful Christmas." Paul's first solo single since 1971 was a festive release, and was actually recorded in the summer, in July 1979, when Paul laid down over twenty solo recordings some of which ended up on "McCartney II." "Wonderful Christmas" was not Paul's first Christmas composition as he had written two Christmas songs for the Beatles fan-club records. The B-side was recorded in 1976 and features a mystery violinist. A mystery because Paul had ordered a violin which was delivered as he was rehearsing the song, and thought it would be a good idea for the man delivering it to participate.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonderful_Christmastime
1982 Agreement reached ending 57 day football strike
1984 Houston blocks 20 Denver shots tying NBA regulation game record
1985 "We Built This City" by Starship topped the charts. When this hit #1, Grace Slick was the oldest woman to sing the lead vocal (shared with Mickey Thomas) on a #1 single. The title had been previously held by Tina Turner for "What's Love Got To Do With It," and was later claimed by Cher for "Believe." The City in this song refers to San Francisco. Starship wrote it based on an incident in 1977 when the band (then Jefferson Airplane) was not allowed to play a free concert in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Built_This_City
1986 Gerber Products announced intentions to produce baby food in plastic jars, instead of glass -- a first for the industry.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerber_Products_Company
1987 High winds and heavy snow created blizzard conditions across parts of eastern Colorado. Wind gusts reached 68 mph at Pueblo, and snowfall totals ranged up to 37 inches at Echo Lake. In Wyoming, the temperature dipped to 14 degrees below zero at Laramie. Strong thunderstorms in Louisiana drenched Alexandria with 16.65 inches of rain in thirty hours, with an unofficial total of 21.21 inches north of Olla. Flash flooding in Louisiana caused five to six million dollars damage. (15th-16th) (Storm Data) (The National Weather Summary)
1988 A powerful low pressure system in the north central U.S. produced high winds across the Great Lakes Region, with wind gusts to 60 mph reported at Chicago IL. Heavy snow blanketed much of Minnesota, with eleven inches reported at International Falls. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
1989 Snow and gusty winds invaded the north central U.S. Winds gusting to 40 mph produced wind chill readings as cold as 25 degrees below zero, and blizzard conditions were reported in Nebraska during the late morning hours. High winds around a powerful low pressure system produced squalls in the Great Lakes Region. Winds gusted to 63 mph at Whitefish Point MI, and snowfall totals in Michigan ranged up to 19 inches at Hart, north of Muskegon. (15th-16th) (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
1996 "Head Over Feet" by Alanis Morissette topped the charts. While "You Oughta Know" was a hit, it was the bevy of hit singles that followed that sent Jagged Little Pill to its meteoric rise to the top. Following "Hand in My Pocket", the third single, "Ironic", went on to become Morissette's biggest hit. (However, critics noted that many of the situations described by Morissette did not actually qualify as being ironic.) "You Learn" and "Head Over Feet", the fourth and fifth singles, respectively, kept Jagged Little Pill on the Billboard Top 20 charts for over a year.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_over_Feet
1999 Construction begins on a giant bonfire at Texas A&M University on this day in 1999, the continuation of a tradition that began 90 years earlier. Two days later, the bonfire collapsed, killing 12 students and injuring another 27.
For nearly a century, students in College Station, Texas, created a massive bonfire—self-proclaimed to be "the world's largest"--prior to their school's annual football game against their archrival, the University of Texas. The beloved pre-game tradition had been canceled only once, in 1963 following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Over the years, the bonfire grew so big that its construction became an elaborate project requiring days of work by teams of student volunteers. On two previous occasions, the bonfire had partially collapsed; neither episode had been disastrous.
The 1999 bonfire was supposed to require more than 7,000 logs and the labor of up to 70 workers at a time. Just after dawn on November 18, students were working near the top of the 59-foot-high pile (4 feet higher than authorized) when, in the words of Jenny Callaway, a student who was on the stack, "It just snapped." Without warning, scores of students became caught in the huge log pile. Other students, including Caleb Hill who suffered only broken bones in his 50-foot fall, were lucky enough to fall away from the pile.
"People were running around calling people's names and crying," sophomore Michael Guerra said. "Other people were just like zombies. They couldn't believe what had happened." Cranes were immediately brought in to remove the logs and free the students but the process was painstaking, as any wrong movement could cause further collapse. The last survivor was pulled from the pile about six hours later.
The bonfire was cancelled for only the second time ever and an investigation began into the causes of the collapse. It was later determined that the first stack of logs did not have sufficient containment strength. The wiring used to tie the logs together was not strong enough for the job; the steel cables employed in prior years had not been used. The construction effort in general was also blamed, for creating "a complex and dangerous structure without adequate physical or engineering control.
Texas A&M's official bonfires were suspended indefinitely following this tragedy but unofficial bonfires have been built since 2002.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_A%26M_Aggies_football#Bonfire
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aggie_Bonfire
2000 Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers adopted 7 new domains. The Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers adopted 7 new domains: .aero for airports, .biz for businesses, .coop for business cooperatives, .info for general use, .museum for accredited museums, .name for individuals, and .pro for professionals.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Corporation_for_Assigned_Names_and_Numbers
2000 Bill Clinton becomes the first U.S. President to visit Vietnam since the end of the Vietnam War.
2004 Mach 9.6 attained in an unpiloted X-43A jet. A NASA unpiloted X-43A jet, part of its Hyper-X program, reached a record speed of 6,500 mph, Mach 9.6. It used the new scramjet engine. A scramjet differs from conventional jet technology by not using rotor blades to compress the air inside the engine. Instead, the scramjet, sometimes called an "air-breathing" engine, burns hydrogen fuel in a stream of fast-moving, compressed air created by the forward motion of the aircraft.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-43A
2006 An F-3 tornado strikes Riegelwood, NC causing eight deaths and twenty injuries
www.stormstudy.com/riegelwood/xcam-riegelwood.html
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riegelwood,_North_Carolina
daysuntil.com/Election-Day/index.html
www.todayinsci.com/11/11_16.htm
www.amug.org/~jpaul/nov16.html
www.weatherforyou.com/cgi-bin/weather_history/today2S.pl
www.lutheranhistory.org/history/tih1116.htm
www.hymntime.com/tch/index.htm
www.lcms.org/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_16
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_16_(Eastern_Orthodox_liturgics)
There are 45 days remaining until the end of the year.
Countdown until Obama should be leaving Office
www.obamaclock.org/
Days until coming elections:
www.daysuntil.com/Election-Day/index.html
U.S. Debt Clock: www.usdebtclock.org/
1414 The Council of Constance was convened. This conclave, which lasted until 22 April 1418, ended the Great Schism within the church by deposing three rival popes. The council also brought to trial and executed two Bohemian reformers: John Huss (1415) and his close friend Jerome of Prague (1416) and anathematized the teachings of the English reformer John Wycliffe (ca. 1329–1384).
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Constance
1532 Pizarro seizes Incan emperor Atahualpa. Shortly before the arrival (1532) of Francisco Pizarro, Atahualpa invaded the domains of Huscar, whom he defeated and imprisoned, and made himself Inca. On Nov. 16, 1532, Pizarro met Atahualpa at Cajamarca. Invited into the city, Atahualpa was seized and imprisoned. He offered a room full of gold as ransom and at the same time secretly ordered the death of Huscar. He was tried for his brother's murder and for plotting against the Spanish and was executed.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atahualpa
1620 The first corn (maize) found in the U.S. by British settlers was discovered in Provincetown, Mass., by sixteen desperately hungry Pilgrims led by Myles Standish, William Bradford, Stephen Hopkins, and Edward Tilley at a place they named Corn Hill. The food came from a previously harvested cache belonging to a local Indian tribe. This corn provided a much needed supply of food which saw the Pilgrims through their first Winter in the New World. A commemorative plaque placed on Corn Hill quotes in part "And sure it was God's good providence that we found this corn for else we know no how we should have done." The date 16 Nov is according to the Old Style Calendar.
1776 American Revolutionary War: Hessian mercenaries capture Fort Washington from the Patriots.
1776 American Revolution: The United Provinces (Low Countries) recognize the independence of the United States.
1786 The first U.S.-made "jenny" and "stock-card" machines were supported by the Massachusetts state legislature. The legislature voted a grant of £200 for the completion of what are believed to be first U.S.-made spinning, carding, and roping machines. In his workshop at Bridgewater, Mass, senator Hugh Orr employed brothers Robert and Alexander Barr, machinists bringing knowledge about such machines from Scotland. The senate subsequently awarded the Barrs six tickets in the state land lottery of the time (in which there were no blanks), as a reward for their "ingenuity " and " public spirit." The machines, known as "The State Models" were advertised so that the early American textile-machinery manufacturers could benefit.
1821 American Old West: Missouri trader William Becknell arrives in Santa Fe, New Mexico over a route that became known as the Santa Fe Trail.
Pure luck made Becknell the first businessman to revive the American trade with Santa Fe. Fearing American domination of the region, the Spanish had closed their Southwest holdings to foreigners following the Pike expedition more than a decade earlier. They threw the few traders who violated the policy into prison and confiscated their goods. However, Becknell and other merchants continued to trade with the Indians on the American-controlled eastern slope of the southern Rockies. While on such an expedition in the fall of 1821, Becknell encountered a troop of Mexican soldiers. They informed Becknell that they had recently won their independence in a war with Spain, and the region was again open to American traders. Becknell immediately sped to Santa Fe, where he found a lucrative market for his goods, and his saddlebags were heavy with Mexican silver when he returned to his base in Franklin, Missouri.
The next summer Becknell traveled to Santa Fe again, this time with three wagonloads of goods. Instead of following the old route that passed over a dangerous high pass, however, Becknell blazed a shorter and easier cutoff across the Cimarron Desert. Thus, while much of the route he followed had been used by Mexican traders for decades, Becknell's role in reopening the trail and laying out the short-cut earned him the title of "Father of the Santa Fe Trail." It became one of the most important and lucrative of the Old West trading routes; merchants and other travelers continued to follow the trail blazed by Becknell until the arrival of trains in the late 1870s.
1841 The first patent for a U.S. life preserver of cork was issued to Napoleon E. Guerin of New York City (No. 2,359) for his "Improvement in Buoyant Dresses or Life-Preservers." It was of the form of a jacket or waistcoat. The jacket was described as being made from a doubled layer of material, with sufficient room for the introduction of from 18 to 20 quarts of rasped or grated cork. After the insertion of the rasped or grated cork between the layers, those parts of the garment left open would be sewn closed. The difference in quantity of cork was chosen according to the size of the person for whom the life preserver is to be made.
1863 American Civil War: Battle of Campbell's Station near Knoxville, Tennessee. Confederate troops unsuccessfully attack Union forces.
1864 Union Gen William T Sherman begins march to the sea during Civil War. Sherman's march to the sea brought the Civil War home to Southern civilians. Few became casualties, but many lost property and felt demoralized. In Virginia, desertions in Robert E. Lee's army increased. Sherman's psychological warfare of destruction had a major effect on the outcome of the war. It also made Sherman a brute to many Southerners and a hero to Union supporters.
1875 The first U.S. patent for a dental mallet, or "Electro-magnetic Dental Pluggers" was issued to William G.A. Bonwill of Philadelphia, Pa. (No. 170,045). His tooth-filling device was used to drive gold into a tooth cavity. He derived the idea from observing the sounder of a telegraph key (while at the Continental Hotel in Philadelphia, 27 Feb 1867). The automatic tool was designed to be "manipulated as readily as the usual hand-tools." An electromagnet functions to drive a mallet, while also breaking the circuit to allow the spring-loaded mallet to return, at which point the circuit is closed, and the cycle repeated under the control of the operator.
1881 The pastors who left the Missouri Synod as a result of the Predestination Controversy held their first organizational meeting in Blue Island, Illinois.
cyclopedia.lcms.org/display.asp?t1=P&word=PREDESTINARIANCONTROVERSY
1889 Oahu Railway begins public service in Hawaii
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oahu_Railway_and_Land_Company
1901 The first American racer to exceed the speed of a mile a minute (60 mph) was that of A.C. Bostwick on the Ocean Parkway racetrack in Brooklyn, New York. During a race sponsored by the Long Island Automobile Club, Bostwick achieved an average speed of 63.83 mph along a one-mile straightaway on the course, thus completing the mile in 56.4 seconds. European car manufacturers and drivers dominated early motor racing, a phenomenon reflected in the first seven speed records. However, in 1902, just under a year after Bostwick's historic run, William K. Vanderbilt, Jr., a businessman and racing enthusiast, became the first American to enter the land speed record books when he ran a mile in 47.32 seconds, or at an average speed of 76.086 mph. The Mors automobile that Vanderbilt drove was also the first vehicle with an internal combustion engine to enter the speed record books. [Another source says - Henry Fournier drove a mile in 51 4/5 seconds, becoming the first auto racer to drive more than a mile-a-minute in competition - in Brooklyn, New York.]
1907 Indian Territory and Oklahoma Territory become Oklahoma and are admitted as the 46th U.S. state. Oklahoma, with a name derived from the Choctaw Indian words okla, meaning "people," and humma, meaning "red," has a history of human occupation dating back 15,000 years. The first Europeans to visit the region were Spanish explorers in the 16th century, and in the 18th century the Spanish and French struggled for control of the territory. The United States acquired Oklahoma from France in 1803 as part of the Louisiana Purchase.
After the War of 1812, the U.S. government decided to remove Indian tribes from the settled eastern lands of the United States and move them west to the unsettled lands of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. In 1828, Congress reserved Oklahoma for Indians and in 1834 formally ceded it to five southeastern tribes as Indian Territory. Many Cherokees refused to abandon their homes east of the Mississippi, and so the U.S. Army moved them west in a forced march known as the "Trail of Tears." The uprooted tribes joined Plains Indians that had long occupied the area, and Indian nations with fixed boundaries and separate governments were established in the region.
During the American Civil War, most tribes in Indian Territory supported the South. With the defeat of the Confederacy in 1865, the territory was placed under U.S. military rule. White cattlemen and settlers began to covet the virgin ranges of Oklahoma, and after the arrival of the railroad in the 1870s, illegal white incursion into Indian Territory flourished. Most of these "Boomers" were expelled, but pressure continued until the federal government agreed in 1889 to open two million acres in central Oklahoma for white settlement. At noon on April 22, 1889, a pistol shot signaled the opening of the new land, and tens of thousands of people rushed to stake claims. Those who had already made illegal entry to beat the starting gun were called "Sooners," hence Oklahoma's state nickname. The following year, the region was divided into Indian Territory and Oklahoma Territory.
In 1907, Congress decided to admit Indian Territory and Oklahoma Territory into the Union as a single state, with all Indians in the state becoming U.S. citizens. Representatives of the two territories drafted a constitution, and on September 17, 1907, it was approved by voters of the two territories. On November 16, Oklahoma was welcomed into the United States by President Theodore Roosevelt.
Oklahoma initially prospered as an agricultural state, but the drought years of the 1930s made the state part of the Dust Bowl. During the Depression, poor tenant farmers known as "Okies" were forced to travel west seeking better opportunities. In the 1940s, prosperity returned to Oklahoma, and oil production brought a major economic boom in the 1970s.
1914 The Federal Reserve Bank of the United States officially opens.
1914 New Fatherland League launched in Germany. On this day in 1914 in Germany, a small group of intellectuals led by the physician Georg Nicolai launch Bund Neues Vaterland, the New Fatherland League.
One of the league's most active supporters was Nicolai's friend, the great physicist Albert Einstein. Together, Einstein and Nicolai had written a pacifist answer to the famous pro-war manifesto of October 1914, which had been signed by 93 leading German intellectuals from various fields, including the physicist Max Planck, the painter Max Lieberman and the poet Gerhart Hauptmann. When their counter-manifesto failed to attract much support, Nicolai and Einstein concentrated their efforts into the New Fatherland League.
First and foremost, the league argued, World War I, which had begun the previous August, should end promptly in favor of "a just peace without annexations." Secondly, an international organization should be established in order to prevent future wars. According to Dr. Franziska Baumgartner-Tramer, who attended some of the league's meetings, Einstein spoke "with great pessimism about the future of human relations....I managed to get to him on one occasion, when I was depressed by the news of one German victory after another and the resultant intolerable arrogance and gloating of the people of Berlin. 'What will happen, Herr Professor?' I asked anxiously. Einstein looked at me, raised his right fist, and replied 'This will govern!'"
In July 1915, the New Fatherland League supported another declaration, signed by 91 prominent German intellectuals, opposing territorial annexations and calling for a compromise peace. This proved too much for German authorities, who raided the league's offices and prohibited its members from publishing any other documents or from even associating with each other. In the post-war years, however, the league resurfaced, and in 1922 it was renamed the German League for Human Rights, after a similar French organization dedicated to fostering German-French understanding.
Meanwhile, frustrated by the League of Nations' failure to enforce disarmament and prevent further international conflicts in the decades following World War I, Albert Einstein became one of the world's most powerful voices in support of pacifism. He was also committed to Zionism, the political movement aimed at creating a Jewish homeland in Palestine. When the state of Israel was created after World War II, its prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, offered Einstein the post of president. The great man declined, but remained deeply involved with Israel and with Jewish affairs until the end of his life.
1918 In NY City, the United Lutheran Church was organized by a merger of three general Lutheran bodies in the U.S. and Canada. (In 1962, the ULC became one of the branches of Lutheranism which formed the Lutheran Church in America.)
1920 Postage meter first used in US in lieu of postage stamps. A Post Office Department official introduced Arthur Pitney and Walter Bowes to each other because it appeared that their individual products would work together Mr. Bowes's machine and Mr. Pitney's meter. Bowes's stepson, Walter Wheeler, Jr., joined the design team and helped develop the final design of the 1920 model. The company's model M postage meter was authorized on September 1, 1920, and placed into commercial use on November 16, 1920.
1926 NY Rangers first game, beat Montreal Maroons 1-0
1932 The Palace in New York City, the most famous vaudeville theatre in America, closed its doors. The focal point of vaudeville - its home base was the Palace theater in the heart of New York's theater district, at Broadway and 47th Street. It was every actor's ambition to play the Palace in New York. Monday afternoon was the first show and the house would be filled with performers from all around town. They'd come in for the matinee. And all the Broadway talent scouts and agents would come down to see the show, because how you went over determined what your future bookings would be. The Palace opened in 1913 and with the advent of radio and talking pictures in 1927 was forced to close its doors, as a vaudeville house, in 1932.
1933 FDR announced the U.S. and Soviet Union had resumed diplomatic relations. The United States greeted the democratic Russian Revolution of February 1917 with great enthusiasm, which cooled considerably with the advent of the Bolsheviks in October 1917. The United States, along with many other countries, refused to recognize the new regime, arguing that it was not a democratically elected or representative government. The policy of non-recognition ended in November 1933, when the United States, under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, established full diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union, the last major power to do so.
1937 Bob Crosby and his orchestra recorded "South Rampart Street Parade" Bob Crosby is best remembered for the Dixieland band that bore his name during the 1930s and early 1940s. The Bob Crosby Orchestra, along with its combo side group, the Bob Cats, was considered one of the greatest jazz bands of all time. The orchestra was actually led by sax player Gil Rodin, however. Crosby himself was simply the front man, chosen for his personality, looks, and famous last name.
1940 World War II: In response to Germany's leveling of Coventry, England two days before, the Royal Air Force bombs Hamburg.
1940 Holocaust: In occupied Poland, the Nazis close off the Warsaw Ghetto from the outside world.
1942 Work began on an experimental atomic pile to investigate the world's first artificial nuclear chain reaction. In a makeshift lab underneath the University's football stands at Stagg Field, physicists and staffers, worked around the clock to built a lattice of 57 layers of uranium metal and uranium oxide embedded in graphite blocks. A wooden structure supported the graphite pile. The research would be an important contribution to the Manhattan Project, a secret wartime project to develop nuclear weapons, which initiated the modern nuclear age. Little more than two weeks later, on 2 Dec 1942, the first self-sustained nuclear chain reaction was achieved by Enrico Fermi and his team.
1943 World War II: American bombers strike a hydro-electric power facility and heavy water factory in German-controlled Vemork, Norway.
1944 Dueren, Germany is destroyed by Allied bombers.
The triangle in the glass tube contains
the world's first sample of americium,
produced in the 60- inch cyclotron in 1944
1945 Cold War: Operation Paperclip: The United States Army secretly admits 88 German scientists and engineers to help in the development of rocket technology. Most of these men had served under the Nazi regime and critics in the United States questioned the morality of placing them in the service of America. Nevertheless, the U.S. government, desperate to acquire the scientific know-how that had produced the terrifying and destructive V-1 and V-2 rockets for Germany during WWII, and fearful that the Russians were also utilizing captured German scientists for the same end, welcomed the men with open arms. Realizing that the importation of scientists who had so recently worked for the Nazi regime so hated by Americans was a delicate public relations situation, the U.S. military cloaked the operation in secrecy. In announcing the plan, a military spokesman merely indicated that some German scientists who had worked on rocket development had "volunteered" to come to the United States and work for a "very moderate salary." The voluntary nature of the scheme was somewhat undercut by the admission that the scientists were in "protective custody." Upon their arrival in the United States on November 16, newsmen and photographers were not allowed to interview or photograph the newcomers. A few days later, a source in Sweden claimed that the scientists were members of the Nazi team at Peenemeunde where the V-weapons had been produced. The U.S. government continued to remain somewhat vague about the situation, stating only that "certain outstanding German scientists and technicians" were being imported in order to "take full advantage of these significant developments, which are deemed vital to our national security."The situation pointed out one of the many ironies connected with the Cold War. The United States and the Soviet Union, once allies against Germany and the Nazi regime during World War II, were now in a fierce contest to acquire the best and brightest scientists who had helped arm the German forces in order to construct weapons systems to threaten each other.
1945 UNESCO is founded.
1946 The Evangelical United Brethren Church was constituted at Johnstown, PA by a merger of the United Brethren in Christ and the Evangelical Church. The new denomination originated in the work of two German Reformed pastors, Philip W. Otterbein and Martin Boehm, who had ministered among Pennsylvania Germans two centuries earlier.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evangelical_United_Brethren_Church
1952 "Our Goodly Heritage" debuted over CBS television. This Sunday morning Bible study program, hosted by William Rush Baer of New York University, aired a little over five years.
1955 "Sixteen Tons" became the fastest-selling record in history. "Sixteen Tons" was written in 1947 by the Country & Western guitarist and songwriter Merle Travis. It is based on his coal miner father, whose favorite saying, "Another day older and deeper in debt," became part of the chorus. At the time, this was the fastest-selling single in Capitol's history, jumping to #1 in just 3 weeks.
1955 First speed-boat to exceed 200 mph (322 kph) (D.M. Campbell)
1957 "Jailhouse Rock" by Elvis Presley topped the charts. "Jailhouse Rock" was featured in the Elvis movie of the same name. It is considered one of the best of his 31 movies. Elvis joined the army shortly after this was released.This was #1 on the US pop charts for 7 weeks. It also reached #1 on the Country and R&B charts.
1958 Six inches of snow fell on Tucson, Arizona. 6.4 inches of snow across the metro area caused auto accidents, stranded people, dropped power lines, knocked out telephone service, closed highways and paralyzed air travel. Three boy scouts were stranded in snow near Madera Canyon in the Santa Rita Mountains south of Tucson. Their bodies were not found for two weeks. The heavy snow also closed the highway to Mt. Lemmon, marooning about 35 weekend vacationers.
1959 The Rodgers and Hammerstein musical "Sound of Music" opens on Broadway. The Sound of Music, with music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, and a book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, opened on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on November 16, 1959, and starred Mary Martin as Maria and Theodore Bikel as Captain Georg von Trapp. The original Broadway cast album sold three million copies and ran for 1,443 performances.
1959 - The most severe November cold wave in U.S. history was in progress. A weather observing station located 14 miles northeast of Lincoln MT reported a reading of 53 degrees below zero, which established an all-time record low temperature for the nation for the month of November. Their high that day was one degree above zero. (David Ludlum) (The Weather Channel)
1959 "Mr. Blue" by the Fleetwoods topped the charts. "Come Softly To Me" was an instant hit for the distinctive trio and the haunting and catchy song (on which the vocal was recorded a cappella) shot to the top of the US charts and made the UK Top 10 despite a hit cover version by Frankie Vaughan and the Kaye Sisters. Their third release, "Mr. Blue", a Dwayne Blackwell song originally written for the Platters, was also a US number 1 (in the UK two cover versions took the honours) and made Troxell one of the leaders in the teen-idol stakes.
1961 President John F. Kennedy decides to increase military aid to South Vietnam without committing U.S. combat troops.
Kennedy was concerned at the advances being made by the communist Viet Cong, but did not want to become involved in a land war in Vietnam. He hoped that the military aid would be sufficient to strengthen the Saigon government and its armed forces against the Viet Cong. Ultimately it was not, and Kennedy ended up sending additional support in the form of U.S. military advisors and American helicopter units. By the time of his assassination in 1963, there were 16,000 U.S. soldiers in South Vietnam.
1963 "Deep Purple" by Nino Tempo & April Stevens topped the charts. "Deep Purple" was recorded in a mere 15 minutes at the end of a session, explaining the almost improvised nature of the vocals (with Stevens taking long spoken passages) and homespun harmonica, ingredients which gave the record much of its charm. It reached number one in November 1963, and won a Grammy award as best rock & roll record of the year.
1964 Judy Garland and her daughter, Liza Minnelli, appeared together at the London Palladium. On November 16, 1964, Judy Garland stepped onto the stage of the famed London Palladium for a concert that became historic on two counts -- it marked the first time Garland would share the stage with her daughter Liza Minnelli, and would prove to be Garland's final performance at the venue. The program was shown on U.S. TV; and the LP, "Live at the London Palladium" became a classic on Capitol Records.
1966 Dr Sam Sheppard freed after 9 years in jail, by a jury.
1970 Anne Murray received a gold record for "Snowbird." Murray recorded "Snowbird" after watching its composer, Gene Maclellan, perform it on Canadian TV. Murray's first hit. She started recording when the producer of a show that turned her down as a singer gave her a shot 2 years later. She became a very popular Pop/Country crossover artist.
1973 President Nixon authorizes construction of the Alaskan pipeline. Nixon stated: "This legislation, which I am signing today, will at last enable us to construct the pipeline necessary for vital access to the rich oil deposits located on the North Slope of Alaska. When completed in 1977, the pipeline will initially carry 600,000 barrels of oil per day, and eventually 2 million barrels of oil per day on its way to the continental United States."
1973 Skylab 3, carrying a crew of three astronauts, was launched from Cape Canaveral, on an 84-day mission that remained the longest American space flight for over two decades. The Skylab III crew, Gerald P. Carr, William R. Pogue and Edward C. Gibson, maintained their physical condition by walking treadmills and riding an on-board stationary bicycle. Among the thousands of experiments conducted during this flight, the astronauts took four space walks, including one on Christmas Day to observe the comet Kohoutek. After 1214 orbits, the crew returned to Earth, splashing down on February 8, 1974.
This is the message
with color added
to highlight
its separate parts.
The actual binary transmission
carried no color information.
The message consists of seven parts that encode the following:
1. The numbers one (1) through ten (10)
2. The atomic numbers of the elements hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and phosphorus, which make up deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)
3. The formulas for the sugars and bases in the nucleotides of DNA
4. The number of nucleotides in DNA, and a graphic of the double helix structure of DNA
5. A graphic figure of a human, the dimension (physical height) of an average man, and the human population of Earth
6. A graphic of the Solar System
7. A graphic of the Arecibo radio telescope and the dimension (the physical diameter) of the transmitting antenna dish
Because it will take 25,000 years for the message to reach its intended destination of stars (and an additional 25,000 years for any reply), the Arecibo message was more a demonstration of human technological achievement than a real attempt to enter into a conversation with extraterrestrials.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message
1974 John Lennon's #1 solo "Whatever Gets You Through the Night." Elton John sang backup on this. The following year Lennon returned the favor on Elton's #1 cover of "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds." Lennon played guitar on that track and was credited as "Dr. Winston O'Boogie." "Whatever Gets You Through the Night" hit the top of the US charts, but it fell fast. It spent just 3 weeks in the Top-10 before dropping from 2-16 in November 1974.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whatever_Gets_You_Through_the_Night
1976 Rick Barry (San Francisco), ends then longest NBA free throw streak of 60.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Barry
1977 Stephen Spielberg's "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" was released. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) is a science fiction movie about UFOs, written and directed by Steven Spielberg. It stars Richard Dreyfuss, Francois Truffaut, Bob Balaban, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, and Cary Guffey. The movie has visual effects by Douglas Trumbull and a score composed by John Williams.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_Encounters_of_the_Third_Kind
1979 Paul McCartney releases "Wonderful Christmas." Paul's first solo single since 1971 was a festive release, and was actually recorded in the summer, in July 1979, when Paul laid down over twenty solo recordings some of which ended up on "McCartney II." "Wonderful Christmas" was not Paul's first Christmas composition as he had written two Christmas songs for the Beatles fan-club records. The B-side was recorded in 1976 and features a mystery violinist. A mystery because Paul had ordered a violin which was delivered as he was rehearsing the song, and thought it would be a good idea for the man delivering it to participate.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonderful_Christmastime
1982 Agreement reached ending 57 day football strike
1984 Houston blocks 20 Denver shots tying NBA regulation game record
1985 "We Built This City" by Starship topped the charts. When this hit #1, Grace Slick was the oldest woman to sing the lead vocal (shared with Mickey Thomas) on a #1 single. The title had been previously held by Tina Turner for "What's Love Got To Do With It," and was later claimed by Cher for "Believe." The City in this song refers to San Francisco. Starship wrote it based on an incident in 1977 when the band (then Jefferson Airplane) was not allowed to play a free concert in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Built_This_City
1986 Gerber Products announced intentions to produce baby food in plastic jars, instead of glass -- a first for the industry.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerber_Products_Company
1987 High winds and heavy snow created blizzard conditions across parts of eastern Colorado. Wind gusts reached 68 mph at Pueblo, and snowfall totals ranged up to 37 inches at Echo Lake. In Wyoming, the temperature dipped to 14 degrees below zero at Laramie. Strong thunderstorms in Louisiana drenched Alexandria with 16.65 inches of rain in thirty hours, with an unofficial total of 21.21 inches north of Olla. Flash flooding in Louisiana caused five to six million dollars damage. (15th-16th) (Storm Data) (The National Weather Summary)
1988 A powerful low pressure system in the north central U.S. produced high winds across the Great Lakes Region, with wind gusts to 60 mph reported at Chicago IL. Heavy snow blanketed much of Minnesota, with eleven inches reported at International Falls. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
1989 Snow and gusty winds invaded the north central U.S. Winds gusting to 40 mph produced wind chill readings as cold as 25 degrees below zero, and blizzard conditions were reported in Nebraska during the late morning hours. High winds around a powerful low pressure system produced squalls in the Great Lakes Region. Winds gusted to 63 mph at Whitefish Point MI, and snowfall totals in Michigan ranged up to 19 inches at Hart, north of Muskegon. (15th-16th) (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
1996 "Head Over Feet" by Alanis Morissette topped the charts. While "You Oughta Know" was a hit, it was the bevy of hit singles that followed that sent Jagged Little Pill to its meteoric rise to the top. Following "Hand in My Pocket", the third single, "Ironic", went on to become Morissette's biggest hit. (However, critics noted that many of the situations described by Morissette did not actually qualify as being ironic.) "You Learn" and "Head Over Feet", the fourth and fifth singles, respectively, kept Jagged Little Pill on the Billboard Top 20 charts for over a year.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_over_Feet
1999 Construction begins on a giant bonfire at Texas A&M University on this day in 1999, the continuation of a tradition that began 90 years earlier. Two days later, the bonfire collapsed, killing 12 students and injuring another 27.
For nearly a century, students in College Station, Texas, created a massive bonfire—self-proclaimed to be "the world's largest"--prior to their school's annual football game against their archrival, the University of Texas. The beloved pre-game tradition had been canceled only once, in 1963 following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Over the years, the bonfire grew so big that its construction became an elaborate project requiring days of work by teams of student volunteers. On two previous occasions, the bonfire had partially collapsed; neither episode had been disastrous.
The 1999 bonfire was supposed to require more than 7,000 logs and the labor of up to 70 workers at a time. Just after dawn on November 18, students were working near the top of the 59-foot-high pile (4 feet higher than authorized) when, in the words of Jenny Callaway, a student who was on the stack, "It just snapped." Without warning, scores of students became caught in the huge log pile. Other students, including Caleb Hill who suffered only broken bones in his 50-foot fall, were lucky enough to fall away from the pile.
"People were running around calling people's names and crying," sophomore Michael Guerra said. "Other people were just like zombies. They couldn't believe what had happened." Cranes were immediately brought in to remove the logs and free the students but the process was painstaking, as any wrong movement could cause further collapse. The last survivor was pulled from the pile about six hours later.
The bonfire was cancelled for only the second time ever and an investigation began into the causes of the collapse. It was later determined that the first stack of logs did not have sufficient containment strength. The wiring used to tie the logs together was not strong enough for the job; the steel cables employed in prior years had not been used. The construction effort in general was also blamed, for creating "a complex and dangerous structure without adequate physical or engineering control.
Texas A&M's official bonfires were suspended indefinitely following this tragedy but unofficial bonfires have been built since 2002.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_A%26M_Aggies_football#Bonfire
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aggie_Bonfire
2000 Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers adopted 7 new domains. The Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers adopted 7 new domains: .aero for airports, .biz for businesses, .coop for business cooperatives, .info for general use, .museum for accredited museums, .name for individuals, and .pro for professionals.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Corporation_for_Assigned_Names_and_Numbers
2000 Bill Clinton becomes the first U.S. President to visit Vietnam since the end of the Vietnam War.
2004 Mach 9.6 attained in an unpiloted X-43A jet. A NASA unpiloted X-43A jet, part of its Hyper-X program, reached a record speed of 6,500 mph, Mach 9.6. It used the new scramjet engine. A scramjet differs from conventional jet technology by not using rotor blades to compress the air inside the engine. Instead, the scramjet, sometimes called an "air-breathing" engine, burns hydrogen fuel in a stream of fast-moving, compressed air created by the forward motion of the aircraft.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-43A
2006 An F-3 tornado strikes Riegelwood, NC causing eight deaths and twenty injuries
www.stormstudy.com/riegelwood/xcam-riegelwood.html
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riegelwood,_North_Carolina
daysuntil.com/Election-Day/index.html
www.todayinsci.com/11/11_16.htm
www.amug.org/~jpaul/nov16.html
www.weatherforyou.com/cgi-bin/weather_history/today2S.pl
www.lutheranhistory.org/history/tih1116.htm
www.hymntime.com/tch/index.htm
www.lcms.org/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_16
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_16_(Eastern_Orthodox_liturgics)