Today in History: November 26, 1898 On Saturday, November 26, 1898, the passenger steamship Portland set sail from Boston Harbor, carrying approximately 192 passengers and crew members bound for Portland, Maine. As the Portland was heading away from the coast, a storm system from the Great Lakes and another from the south collided to form an explosive monster-storm that became […]

Today in History: November 25, 1963 Three days after his assassination, president John F. Kennedy was laid to rest with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. President Lyndon Johnson’s first proclamation as the new president was to declare November 25th as a national day of mourning for the slain president. Most assumed that JFK would be buried […]

Today in History: November 22, 1718 Edward “Blackbeard” Teach was a notorious pirate of English birth who began his illustrious career around 1713. He became a crew member on a Caribbean sloop under the command of a pirate named Benjamin Hornigold. In 1717, Hornigold was offered general amnesty by Queen Anne and ended his days as a pirate. Teach, who […]

Today in History: November 21, 1980 Millions of faithful Dallas viewers had been waiting since the last episode of the previous season on March 21st to find out who had shot J.R. Ewing, the character everyone loved to hate. On this day in 1980, the truth was revealed. The season finale when J.R was shot is still one of the […]

Today in History: November 20, 1947 England had its first post-World War II Royal celebration when Princess Elizabeth, daughter of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, married  her second cousin once removed, Philip the Duke of Edinburgh, at Westminster Abbey in London on this day in 1947. Winston Churchill described the Royal Wedding as “a splash of color on the […]

Today in History: November 19, 1965 Today is a very special day for those of us who like our first meal of the day to offer us the convenience of eating with one hand while the other is frantically writing a term paper that was assigned a month ago – the birthday of the Kellogg’s Pop-Tart! The evolution of the […]

Today in History: November 18, 1978 On this day history, 1978, over 900 Americans died in a South American cult commune on the order of Reverend Jim Jones. Many of his followers willingly drank a poisoned concoction that led to their deaths, others were forced to do so at gunpoint. The children of the cult were the first to die; […]

Today in History: November 15, 1985 A dark-haired, blue-eyed two-week-old baby girl known to the world as “Baby Fae” (later revealed as Stephanie Fae Beauclair) underwent a first-of-its-kind heart transplant and died on this day in 1985. What made this transplant unique at this time? The tiny infant received a baboon heart in an attempt to correct hypoplastic heart syndrome, […]

Today in History: November 14, 1970 Marshall University had chartered a plane to bring its football team, the Thundering Herd, home after a game with East Carolina University on November 14, 1970. The plane hit a row of trees and careened into a hillside less than two miles from their destination – the Tri-State Airport in Kenova, West Virginia. All […]

Today in History: November 13, 1953 On this day in 1953, Robin Hood was declared a Communist, at least by the Indiana Textbook Commission. Mrs. Thomas J. White, Republican member of the committee, insisted that all references to the book “Robin Hood” be purged from textbooks used in state schools. She felt this was necessary because there was a Communist […]

Today in History: November 12, 2004 After a two-year ordeal that dominated the headlines and engrossed the entire nation, a jury found Scott Peterson guilty of murder 23 months after his heavily pregnant wife Laci Peterson suddenly vanished from her home in Modesto, California on Christmas Eve. Peterson stated that Laci had gone for a walk with their dog while […]

Today in History: November 11, 1988 During the early 1980s, ex-nurse’s aide Dorothea Puente ran a boarding house for the elderly in Sacramento, California. She was a schizophrenic who had numerous run-ins with the law. She served time for forging checks, and also was incarcerated for drugging and then robbing random people she had met in bars. She opened her […]

Today in History: November 8, 1960 On November 8, 1960, John Fitzgerald Kennedy became the youngest man to be elected as United States President, beating Republican Vice President Richard Nixon by one of the narrowest margins in history. One of the factors that may have tipped the scales ever so slightly in the election was Kennedy’s shrewd willingness to address […]

Today in History: November 7, 1916 A full four years before the United States Constitution granted women the right to vote, Jeannette Rankin was elected to a seat in Congress in 1916, becoming the first woman in U.S. history to hold such an office. Even though women had yet to achieve suffrage across the nation, there was no legislation forbidding […]

Today in History: November 6, 1860 The election of Abraham Lincoln to the United States presidency is the spark that ignited the Civil War in April of 1861. Lincoln was the first Republican to become President, a feat made even more impressive considering the party had only been in existence for a decade.  He was the first President to be […]

Today in History: November 5, 1605 On this day in history, Guy Fawkes and his fellow conspirators planned to blow up Parliament during the State Opening on November 5, 1605 when King James I was present. As a Catholic, he and his co-conspirators meant to do this in protest for how badly Catholics were treated in England at the time. […]

Today in History: November 4, 1922 British archaeologist Howard Carter, running out of both time and money for his excavation project, finally unearthed a step leading to King Tutankhamen’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings on November 4, 1922. He quickly ordered the stairs to be cleared of any sand and debris, and by noon the next day a […]

Today in History: November 1, 1512 On All Saint’s Day, November 1st, Pope Julius celebrated Mass in the Sistine Chapel for the first time in four years. Those in attendance were dumbfounded by the magnificent frescoes telling nine stories from the book of Genesis. The most memorable of these is a painting called “The Creation of Adam,” where God and […]