October 161701 - The Collegiate School was founded in Killingworth, CT. The school moved to New Haven in 1745 and changed its name to Yale College. 1793 - During the French Revolution, Queen Marie Antoinette was beheaded after being convicted of treason. 1829 - In Boston, MA, the first modern hotel in America opened. The Tremont Hotel had 170 rooms that rented for $2 a day and included four meals. 1847 - "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Bronte was first published in London. 1859 - Abolitionist John Brown led a raid on Harper's Ferry, VA (now located in West Virginia). 1869 - A hotel in Boston became the first in the U.S. to install indoor plumbing. 1916 - Margaret Sanger opened the first birth control clinic in New York City, NY. 1923 - Walt Disney contracted with M.J. Winkler to distribute the Alice Comedies. This event is recognized as the start of the Disney Company. Disney movies, music and books 1928 - Marvin Pipkin received a patent for the frosted electric light bulb. 1939 - "Right To Happiness" debuted on the NBC-Blue network. 1939 - "The Man Who Came to Dinner" opened on Broadway. 1941 - The Nazis advanced to within 60 miles of Moscow. Romanians entered Odessa, USSR, and began exterminating 150,000 Jews. 1942 - The ballet "Rodeo" premiered in New York City. 1943 - Chicago's new subway system was officially opened with a ribbon cutting ceremony. 1944 - "The Robe," by Lloyd Douglas, was published for the first time. 1945 - "His Honor the Barber" debuted on NBC Radio. 1955 - Mrs. Jules Lederer replaced Ruth Crowley in newspapers using the name Ann Landers. 1962 - U.S. President Kennedy was informed that there were missile bases in Cuba, beginning the Cuban missile crisis. 1964 - China detonated its first atomic bomb becoming the world's fifth nuclear power. 1967 - NATO headquarters opened in Brussels. 1970 - Anwar Sadat was elected president of Egypt to succeed Gamal Abdel Nassar. 1973 - Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho were named winners of the Nobel Peace Prize. The Vietnamese official declined the award. 1978 - Poland's Karol Josef Wojtyla was elected Pope John Paul II. 1982 - China announced that it had successfully fired a ballistic missile from a submarine. 1987 - Rescuers freed Jessica McClure from the abandoned well that she had fallen into in Midland, TX. She was trapped for 58 hours. 1989 - U.S. President George H.W. Bush signed the Gramm-Rudman budget reduction law that ordered federal programs be cut by $16.1 billion. 1990 - Comedian Steve Martin and his wife Victoria Tennant visited U.S. soldiers in Saudi Arabia. 1993 - The U.N. Security Council approved the deployment of U.S. warships to enforce a blockade on Haiti to increase pressure on the controlling military leaders. 1994 - German Chancellor Helmut Kohl was re-elected to a fourth term. 1995 - The "Million Man March" took place in Washington, DC. 1997 - Charles M. Schulz and his wife Jeannie announced that they would give $1 million toward the construction of a D-Day memorial to be placed in Virginia. 2000 - It was announced that Chevron Corp. would be buying Texaco Inc. for $35 billion. The combined company was called Chevron Texaco Corp. and became the 4th largest oil company in the world. 2002 - It was reported that North Korea had told the U.S. that it had a secret nuclear weapons program in violation of an 1994 agreement with the U.S. 2002 - The Arthur Andersen accounting firm was sentenced to five years probation and fined $500,000 for obstructing a federeal investigation of the energy company Enron. 2008 - The iTunes Music Store reached 200 billion television episodes sold. |