Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Today in History....November 28

* 1520, Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan reached the Pacific Ocean after passing through the South American strait that now bears his name

* 1895, America's first race featuring gasoline-powered automobiles was held in Chicago, Illinois, with six vehicles competing: two electric cars, three German Benz automobiles, and one American-made Duryea automobile, the USA's first working gasoline-powered car. After 10 1/2 hours, despite an accidental two-mile detour, the Duryea crossed the finish line with no other car in sight, having achieved an average speed of 7.5mph during the race

* 1943, President Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet leader Josef Stalin began conferring in Tehran, Iran, during World War II

* 1964, the United States launched the space probe Mariner 4 on a course to Mars

* 1987, Tawana Brawley is found covered with feces and wrapped in garbage bags outside the Pavilion Condominiums in Wappingers Falls, New York. Brawley appeared to have undergone an extremely traumatic
experience: parts of her hair were cut off, her pants were slightly burned, and there was a racial slur scrawled on her body. Brawley told authorities that for four days she had been held against her will and repeatedly r ap ed by a gang of white men, one of whom she claimed had a police badge. Despite being proved a hoax, one of the key race hustlers in the case, Rev. Al Sharpton, is now a cable TV darling

* 1990, Margaret Thatcher resigned as prime minister of Britain during an audience with Queen Elizabeth II, who conferred the premiership on John Major

* 1994, serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, serving 15 consecutive life sentences for the brutal murders of 15 men, is beaten to death by a fellow inmate while performing cleaning duty in a bathroom at the Columbia Correctional Institute gymnasium in Portage, Wisconsin

* 2001, Enron Corp., once the world's largest energy trader, collapsed after would-be rescuer Dynegy Inc. backed out of an $8.4 billion deal to take it over

* 2002, in twin attacks in Kenya, three suicide bombers, practitioners of that "religion of peace" killed 14 people at an Israeli-owned hotel, while at least two missiles were fired at -- but missed -- an Israeli jetliner taking off from Mombasa airport

* 2006, at the opening of a NATO summit in Latvia, President Bush rejected suggestions Iraq had fallen into civil war and vowed not to pull U.S. troops out "until the mission is complete." The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to extend for a year the mandate of the 160,000-strong multinational force in Iraq

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