October 8th
 

1871 ~ The Great Chicago Fire destroyed about 17,450 buildings, killed about 250 people and left another 90,000 homeless.

1920 ~ Birthday of Frank Herbert, Science Fiction writer.

1949 ~ Birthday of Sigourney Weaver, Actress.

1952 ~ The UK suffered its worst peacetime rail accident.

1961 ~ In London, the Post Office Tower opened.

1969 ~ Birthday of Julia Ann, Porn Actress.

1982 ~ Solidarity, and all other labor organizations in Poland, were banned.

1992 ~ Death of Willy Brandt, German politician.

2003 ~ Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected governor of California.

2004 ~ Martha Stewart went to jail.

October 9th
 

1804 ~ Hobart, Tasmania, was founded.

1835 ~ Birthday of Camille Saint-Saëns, Composer.

1859 ~ Birthday of Alfred Dreyfus, French military officer.

1940 ~ Birthday of John Lennon, Musician & Songwriter.

1942 ~ The Statute of Westminster Adoption Act formalized Australian autonomy.

1948 ~ Birthday of Jackson Browne (Doctor My Eyes, The Pretender, Running On Empty).

1961 ~ Ray Charles' "Hit the Road Jack" reached #1.

1967 ~ Guerrilla leader Che Guevara was executed in Bolivia.

1970 ~ Birthday of Savannah, Porn Actress.

1974 ~ Death of Oskar Schindler, businessman.

October 10th
 

1845 ~ In Annapolis, Maryland, the Naval School (later renamed the United States Naval Academy) opened with 50 midshipmen students and seven professors.

1938 ~ The Sudetenland was ceded to Nazi Germany by the terms of the Munich Agreement.

1966 ~ Simon and Garfunkel released the album Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme.

1970 ~ A crisis hit Canada when Quebec Vice-Premier Pierre Laporte became the second statesman kidnapped by members of the FLQ terrorist group.

1973 ~ Vice President Spiro T. Agnew pleaded no contest to one count of federal income tax evasion and resigned.

1975 ~ Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor remarried.

1980 ~ UK PM Margaret Thatcher gave a defiant speech at the Tory party conference "… I have only one thing to say: You turn if you want to. The lady's not for turning!"

1985 ~ Death of Orson Welles, Director and Actor.

1985 ~ Death of Yul Brynner, Russian-born actor.

1985 ~ U.S. Navy F-14s intercepted the plane carrying the “Achille Lauro” cruise ship hijackers and forced it to land at a NATO base in Sicily where they were arrested.

October 11th
 

1844 ~ Birthday of Henry Heinz, food manufacturer.

1899 ~ In South Africa, a war between the UK and the Boers of the Transvaal and Orange Free State began.

1958 ~ Pioneer 1 was launched; it failed to go as far as planned, fell back to Earth and burned up in the atmosphere.

1961 ~ Death of Chico Marx, comedian.

1962 ~ Pope John XXIII convened the Second Vatican Council.

1968 ~ Launch of Apollo 7, the first manned Apollo mission.

1975 ~ The debut of Saturday Night Live.

1976 ~ China's "Gang of Four" was arrested.

1991 ~ Death of Redd Foxx, Comedian & actor.

2001 ~ The Polaroid Corporation filed for federal bankruptcy protection.

October 12th
 

1870 ~ Death of Gen. Robert E. Lee, Leader.

1872 ~ Birthday of Ralph Vaughan Williams, English composer.

1968 ~ Summer Olympics open in Mexico City.

1970 ~ Birthday of Julian, Porn actor.

1977 ~ Four Palestinians hijacked a Lufthansa Airlines flight to Somalia and demanded release of 11 members of the Red Army Faction.

1984 ~ UK PM Margaret Thatcher narrowly escaped an IRA bomb attack.

1986 ~ Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev failed to agree on Star Wars at a disarmament summit in Reykjavik.

1999 ~ Death of Wilt Chamberlain, American basketball player.

2000 ~ Terrorists attacked the USS Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden.

2002 ~ A terrorist bomb at a Bali nightclub killed 202 people, mainly Australians.

October 13th
 

54 ~ Death of Claudius, Roman Emperor.

1307 ~ All Knights Templar in France were simultaneously arrested by agents of the French king, to be later tortured into admitting heresy.

1773 ~ Charles Messier discovered the Whirlpool Galaxy.

1812 ~ Death of Sir Isaac Brock, British general (killed in the Battle of Queenston Heights).

1925 ~ Birthday of Margaret Thatcher, UK PM.

1943 ~ Italy changes alliances from the Axis to the Allies.

1982 ~ Birthday of Ian Thorpe, Australian swimmer.

1988 ~ The UK government lost the Spycatcher battle

1990 ~ Death of Lê Ðức Thọ, Vietnamese general & politician, awarded one half of the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize.

1992 ~ The UK government announced plans to close one third of the coal mines.

October 14th
 

1066 ~ Battle of Hastings: The Norman army of William the Conqueror defeated the Saxon army and kill King Harold II of England.

1944 ~ Given the choice between a public treason trial followed by death by firing squad or suicide with honor, German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel chose the latter.

1947 ~ Chuck Yeager flew a Bell X-1 faster than the speed of sound, the first man to do so in level flight.

1964 ~ Civil Rights movement leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

1966 ~ Birthday of Savanna Samson, Porn Actress.

1977 ~ Death of Bing Crosby, Actor & Singer.

1983 ~ Birthday of Vanessa Lane, Porn Actress.

1990 ~ Death of Leonard Bernstein, Composer & Conductor.

1991 ~ Aung San Suu Kyi was named winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

1994 ~ PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin shared the Nobel Peace Prize.

1947 ~ Chuck Yeager flew a Bell X-1 faster than the speed of sound, the first man to do so in level flight.

Dropped from a bomber, riding a rocket with wings. Level flight, himph!

Lightning, Spitfire and Me262 all did it before, albeit in a shallow dive, without the aid of a B-29.

Bah, humbug.

If the rate of descent is unimportant, then Herr Baumgartner, who is attempting to achieve unpowered supersonic speed, certainly deserves honorable mention.

There is a question whether Herr Baumgartner actually reached the speed of sound, despite exceeding 1300kph. What an amazing thing it would be to fall at mach 1, riding the sonic fold.

October 15th
 

70 BC ~ Birthday of Virgil, Roman poet.

1844 ~ Birthday of Friedrich Nietzsche, Philosopher.

1964 ~ Birthday of P. G. Wodehouse, British novelist.

1908 ~ Birthday of John Kenneth Galbraith, Economist.

1917 ~ Mata Hari was executed by firing squad for spying for Germany.

1964 ~ Nikita Khrushchev “retired” as head of USSR.

1990 ~ Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

1991 ~ The Senate confirmed the nomination of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court.

1993 ~ Nelson Mandela and F.W. de Klerk were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

2003 ~ China launched its first manned spacecraft into orbit, becoming the third country to do so.

Perhaps not, but it does make for Strange Days.

Thanks dm383!

October 16th
 

1854 ~ Birthday of Oscar Wilde, Irish writer.

1859 ~ In one of the developments towards the American Civil War, John Brown led a raid of the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia.

1916 ~ Planned Parenthood founded by Margaret Sanger.

1925 ~ Birthday of Angela Lansbury, actress.

1959 ~ Death of George Marshall, United States Secretary of State, Nobel laureate.

1964 ~ China detonated its first nuclear weapon.

1978 ~ Karol Józef Wojtyła became Pope John Paul II. He was the first non Italian to be elevated to the position since 1522.

1981 ~ Death of Moshe Dayan, Israeli general.

1984 ~ Desmond Tutu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

1984 ~ Birthday of Melissa Lauren, French Porn Actress. Bon appétit! [/QUOTE]

October 17th
 

1915 ~ Birthday of Arthur Miller, Playwright.

1931 ~ Al Capone convicted of income tax evasion.

1933 ~ Birthday of Jeanine Deckers, known in English as The Singing Nun

1935 ~ Death of Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Spanish neuroscientist.

1956 ~ Queen Elizabeth opened the first commercial nuclear power station, at Calder Hall.

1968 ~ Olympic protest against racial discrimination.

1972 ~ Birthday of Eminem, rap music performer.

1973 ~ Arab oil-producing nations announced they would cut back oil exports to Western nations and Japan; the result was a total embargo that lasted until March 1974.

1979 ~ Mother Teresa of India was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her work on behalf of the destitute in Calcutta.

1989 ~ The Loma Prieta earthquake hit the San Francisco Bay Area.

October 18th
 

1851 ~ Moby-Dick, a novel by Herman Melville, was first published as The Whale.

1871 ~ Death of Charles Babbage, mathematician and inventor of computing machines.

1919 ~ Birthday of Pierre Trudeau, fifteenth PM of Canada.

1922 ~ The British Broadcasting Company was founded.

1939 ~ Birthday of Lee Harvey Oswald, Assassin.

1954 ~ The Regency Division of Industrial Development Engineering Associates announced the first Transistor radio.

1962 ~ Dr. Watson of the United States, and Drs. Crick and Wilkins of the UK, were named winners of the Nobel Prize for Medicine and Physiology for their work in determining the double-helix molecular structure of DNA.

1976 ~ Birthday of Azlea Antistia, Porn Actress.

1989 ~ Erich Honecker was forced to step down as leader of East Germany after 18 years in power.

2006 ~ Death of Anna Russell, English music satirist.

October 19th
 

1745 ~ Death of Jonathan Swift, Author.

1781 ~ Lord Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown, effectively ending the American War of Independence.

1812 ~ French forces under Napoleon Bonaparte began a retreat from Moscow.

1931 ~ Birthday of John Le Carré, Author.

1937 ~ Death of Ernest Rutherford, New Zealand physicist, father of nuclear physics.

1950 ~ Death of Edna St. Vincent Millay, Poet.

1954 ~ Metal fatigue was identified as the cause of Comet crashes.

1969 ~ U.S. Vice President Spiro T. Agnew referred to anti-Vietnam War protesters “an effete corps of impudent snobs.”

1987 ~ The DJI fell by 22% (Black Monday).

2005 ~ The trial of Saddam Hussein began.

October 20th
 

1740 ~ Maria Theresa took the throne of Austria.

1803 ~ The U.S. Senate ratified the Louisiana Purchase.

1882 ~ Birthday of Bela Lugosi, Actor.

1893 ~ Birthday of Jomo Kenyatta[/URL], President of Kenya.

1983 ~ Grenada's Prime Minister, Maurice Bishop, was assassinated.

1973 ~ In the “Saturday Night Massacre”, President Nixon abolished the office of special Watergate prosecutor, accepted the resignation of the Attorney General, and fired Deputy Attorney General William B. Ruckelshaus.

1973 ~ The Sydney Opera House opened.

1984 ~ Death of Paul Dirac, awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics 1933.

1992 ~ The Toronto Blue Jays won the first World Series game outside the U.S.

2011 ~ Death of Muammar Gaddafi, Dictator.

October 21st
 

1772 ~ Birthday of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Poet. (for Oldfart)

1805 ~ A British fleet led by Admiral Lord Nelson defeated a combined French and Spanish fleet in the Battle of Trafalgar off the coast of Spain.

1805 ~ Death of Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson.

1833 ~ Birthday of Alfred Nobel, Swedish inventor and benefactor of the Nobel Prize.

1854 ~ Florence Nightingale and a staff of 38 nurses were sent to the Crimean War.

1879 ~ Thomas Edison invented a workable electric light.

1929 ~ Birthday of Ursula K. Le Guin, Science Fiction Author.

1944 ~ The first kamikaze attack: HMAS Australia was hit by a Japanese plane carrying a 200 kg bomb.

1945 ~ Women are allowed to vote in France for the first time.

1949 ~ Birthday of Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel.

October 22nd
 

1746 ~ Princeton University in New Jersey received its charter.

1836 ~ Sam Houston was inaugurated as the first President of the Republic of Texas.

1844 ~ Birthday of Sarah Bernhardt, Actress.

1906 ~ Death of Paul Cezanne, Painter.

1920 ~ Birthday of Timothy Leary, writer, psychedelic drug advocate.

1943 ~ Birthday of Catherine Deneuve, Actress.

1943 ~ The RAF air raid on Kassel, a city of 236,000 people, killed 10,000, and left 150,000 homeless.

1962 ~ US President Kennedy announced that American spy planes had discovered Soviet nuclear weapons in Cuba, and that he had ordered a naval "quarantine" of the island nation.

1973 ~ Death of Pablo Casals, Cellist & Conductor.

1990 ~ The region around the Aral Sea assessed as the world’s worst ecological disaster.

October 23rd
 

4004 BC ~ The start of the universe, according to the Ussher-Lightfoot Calendar.

1892 ~ Birthday of Gummo Marx, actor, comedian (Marx Brothers).

1940 ~ Birthday of Pelé, soccer player Extraordinaire.

1942 ~ In Egypt, British forces begin a major offensive against Axis forces by initiating the Second Battle of El Alamein.

1956 ~ Hungarians took to the streets in to demand an end to Soviet rule. Thousands died.

1974 ~ Birthday of Jasmin St. Claire, Porn Actress.

1983 ~ U.S. & French barracks in Beirut hit by truck bombs, killing 241 U.S. servicemen and 58 French.

2001 ~ Apple introduced the iPod.

2002 ~ Chechen terrorists seize the House of Culture theater in Moscow and take approximately 700 theater-goers hostage.

2004 ~ Death of Robert Merrill, Baritone.

October 24th
 

1632 ~ Birthday of Anton van Leeuwenhoek, the “Father of Microbiology".

1799 ~ Death of Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf, Composer.

1929 ~ Death of George Cadbury, Chocolate Manufacturer & Philanthropist.

1929 ~ "Black Thursday" crash of the New York Stock Exchange.

1945 ~ Founding of the United Nations Organisation.

1960 ~ An R-16 ballistic missile exploded on the launch pad at the Soviet Union's Baikonur Cosmodrome space facility, killing more than 100.

1992 ~ In the first real "World" Series, the Toronto Blue Jays became the first non-US team to win the World Series.

2003 ~ The Concorde completed its last commercial flight.

2006 ~ Death of William Watt, Islamic studies scholar & historian.

2008 ~ "Bloody Friday" stock market crash on the world's stock exchanges.

October 25th
 

1415 ~ England defeated France at the Battle of Agincourt.

1825 ~ Birthday of Johann Strauss II, Composer.

1838 ~ Birthday of Georges Bizet, Composer.

1854 ~ Battle of Balaklava during the Crimean War. You can listen and follow along to Lord Tennyson as he reads his poem, “The Charge of the Light Brigade”.

1881 ~ Birthday of Pablo Picasso, Painter & Sculptor.

1924 ~ First appearance of "Little Orphan Annie”.

1943 ~ Battle of Leyte Gulf, the largest naval battle in history, and the last battleship to battleship firefight.

1971 ~ The UN General Assembly seated the People's Republic of China and expelled the Republic of China.

1983 ~ U.S. troops invade Grenada.

1983 ~ Birthday of Taylor Vixen, Porn actress.

October 26th
 

899 ~ Death of Alfred the Great, king of Wessex.

1685 ~ Birthday of Domenico Scarlatti, Composer.

1881 ~ The Gunfight at the O.K. Corral took place at Tombstone, Arizona.

1918 ~ Erich von Ludendorff was dismissed by Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany for refusing to cooperate in peace negotiations.

1947 ~ The Maharaja of Kashmir agreed to allow his kingdom to join India.

1947 ~ Birthday of Hillary Rodham Clinton, 67th United States Secretary of State.

1972 ~ Death of Igor Sikorsky, helicopter pioneer.

1994 ~ Announcement of Andrew Wiles’ correct proof of Fermat's Last Theorem.

1994 ~ Israel and Jordan made peace.

2001 ~ The USA Patriot Act passed into law.

October 27th
 

1466 ~ Birthday of Erasmus of Rotterdam, Dutch writer and philosopher.

1728 ~ Birthday of James Cook, British Captain and explorer.

1787 ~ The first of the Federalist Papers, a series of essays calling for ratification of the U.S. Constitution, was published.

1811 ~ Birthday of Isaac Singer, inventor of the sewing machine.

1904 ~ New York’s first rapid transit subway opened.

1914 ~ Birthday of Dylan Thomas, British poet and writer.

1968 ~ Death of Lise Meitner, German physicist.

1968 ~ Major anti-war riot in London.

1991 ~ Turkmenistan achieved independence from the Soviet Union.

2005 ~ Riots begin in Paris after the deaths of two Muslim teenagers.

Elias Howe won a case against patent infringement in 1854 and was awarded the right to claim royalties from the manufacturers using ideas covered by his patent, including Singer. Sewing machines go back to the 1790s, the French military had machine sewed uniforms in the 1840s.

Ha! Mere phantasms! A mere Johnny-come-lately, Mr. Howe must have found a compliant judge to have scored a win so late in the day. Isaac is the man!

October 28th
 

1492 ~ Christopher Columbus landed in Cuba.

1886 ~ The Statue of Liberty was dedicated.

1903 ~ Birthday of Evelyn Waugh, Novelist.

1914 ~ Birthday of Dr. Jonas Salk, developer of the first effective polio vaccine.

1955 ~ Birthday of Bill Gates, co-founder and Chairman of Microsoft.

1962 ~ Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev informed the U.S. that he had ordered the dismantling of Soviet missile bases in Cuba.

1971 ~ The UK launched its first and only satellite, Prospero, atop a Black Arrow rocket.

1980 ~ Ronald Reagan asked voters during a debate with Jimmy Carter in Cleveland ''are you better off than you were four years ago?''.

1980 ~ Birthday of Kanzi, most literate non-human Earthling.

2009 ~ The first, and only launch of Ares I-X of NASA's later-cancelled Constellation program.

I wonder what a Kanzi flaked flint knife would be worth?

Mind you, he's probably only at the olduvaian stage.

October 29th
 

1911 ~ Death of Joseph Pulitzer, newspaper publisher and journalist.

1923 ~ The dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.

1929 ~ New York Stock Exchange stock prices collapsed amid panic selling.

1947 ~ Birthday of Richard Dreyfuss, American actor.

1948 ~ Birthday of Kate Jackson, American actress.

1957 ~ Death of Louis B. Mayer, film producer. The second “M” in “MGM”.

1966 ~ The National Organization For Women was founded.

1969 ~ The first computer-to-computer link was established on ARPANET.

1975 ~ General Franco’s dictatorship of Spain came to an end.

2004 ~ In a videotaped statement, Osama bin Laden directly admitted for the first time that he'd ordered the Sept. 11 attacks.

October 30th
 

1831 ~ Nat Turner was arrested for leading the bloodiest slave revolt in U.S. history.

1839 ~ Birthday of Alfred Sisley, one of the creators of French Impressionism.

1885 ~ Birthday of Ezra Pound, Poet.

1961 ~ The Soviet Union detonated the 58 megaton hydrogen bomb "Tsar Bomba".

1945 ~ Jackie Robinson signs with the Brooklyn Dodgers to break the baseball color barrier.

1974 ~ Muhammad Ali beat George Foreman to regain the World Heavyweight Boxing championship.

1987 ~ Death of Joseph Campbell, Comparative Mythologist.

2003 ~ Wicked opened on Broadway. It is currently here in Baltimore, playing at the Hippodrome. Tonight's performance was cancelled for Sandy.

2005 ~ The reconsecration of the Dresden Frauenkirche, which was destroyed in the firebombing of Dresden during World War II.

2007 ~ Death of Washoe, chimpanzee trained in American Sign Language.

2005 ~ The reconsecration of the Dresden Frauenkirche, which was destroyed in the firebombing of Dresden during World War II.

What a beautiful church! So much was lost during the war and while the reconsecration is seven years old now, it's really good to see some of what was lost brought back to life.

October 31st
 

1517 ~ Protestant Reformation got under way: Martin Luther posted his 95 theses on the door of the Wittenberg Castle Church. For a unique insight to this happening, click here.

1795 ~ Birthday of John Keats, Poet.

1892 ~ Arthur Conan Doyle published "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes".

1930 ~ Birthday of Michael Collins, the 3rd astronaut of Apollo 11.

1956 ~ Suez Crisis: The UK and France began bombing Egypt to force the reopening of the Suez Canal.

1973 ~ Birthday of Beverly Lynne, Porn Actress.

1984 ~ Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated by two Sikh security guards (riots soon broke out in New Delhi and nearly 2,000 innocent Sikhs were killed).

1988 ~ Death of John Houseman, Romanian-born actor and director.

1993 ~ Death of Federico Fellini, Italian director.

November 1st
 

1775 ~ The Continental Congress passed a resolution creating the Continental Marines, later renamed the United States Marine Corps.

1871 ~ Henry Morton Stanley located missing explorer and missionary, Dr. David Livingstone in Ujiji, near Lake Tanganyika saying "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"

1919 ~ Birthday of Mikhail Kalashnikov, Soviet inventor, AK-47.

1925 ~ Birthday of Richard Burton, Actor.

1951 ~ Direct-dial coast-to-coast telephone service began in the United States.

1975 ~ The SS Edmund Fitzgerald sank during a storm on Lake Superior. Gordon Lightfoot's "Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" is a song about the tragedy.

1982 ~ The Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington D.C. opened to public.

1983 ~ Birthday of Sammie Rhodes, Porn Actress.

1995 ~ Execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa, writer and human rights activist.

2007 ~ Death of Norman Mailer, American author.

November 2nd
 

1739 ~ Birthday of Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf, Composer.

1815 ~ Birthday of George Boole, Mathematician & Philosopher.

1930 ~ Haile Selassie was crowned emperor of Ethiopia.

1936 ~ The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation[/URL] was established.

1950 ~ Death of George Bernard Shaw, Playwright.

1976 ~ Former Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter defeated incumbent Gerald R. Ford.

1964 ~ In a family coup, King Saud of Saudi Arabia was deposed, and replaced by his half-brother Faisal.

1981 ~ Birthday of Avy Scott, Porn Star.

1983 ~ President Reagan signed a bill establishing a federal holiday in honor of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

1988 ~ The Morris worm was launched from MIT.

November 3rd
 

1801 ~ Birthday of Vincenzo Bellini, Italian opera composer.

1838 ~ The Times of India, the world's largest circulated English language daily broadsheet newspaper was founded.

1903 ~ Panama proclaimed itself independent from Colombia.

1936 ~ Incumbent President Franklin D. Roosevelt was re-elected in a landslide over Republican Alfred M. ''Alf'' Landon.

1954 ~ Death of Henri Matisse, French artist.

1957 ~ Sputnik program: The Soviet Union launched Sputnik 2. On board is the first animal to enter space - a dog named Laika.

1964 ~ Incumbent President Lyndon Johnson defeated challenger Barry Goldwater with over 60 percent of the popular vote.

1978 ~ Birthday of Julia Taylor, European Porn Star.

1986 ~ Iran-Contra Affair : The Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa reported that the United States had been selling weapons to Iran in secret in order to secure the release of seven American hostages held by pro-Iranian groups in Lebanon.

1992 ~ U.S. presidential election: Challenger Bill Clinton defeated incumbent Republican George H.W. Bush & independent candidate Ross Perot.

1993 ~ Death of Leon Theremin, Russian inventor.

November 4th
 

1847 ~ Death of Felix Mendelssohn, German composer.

1869 ~ The first issue of scientific journal Nature was published.

1924 ~ Death of Gabriel Fauré, French composer.

1948 ~ T.S. Eliot won the Nobel Prize in Literature.

1956 ~ Soviet troops invaded Hungary to crush the Hungarian revolution that started on October 23. Thousands were killed, more were wounded, and nearly a quarter million left the country.

1979 ~ Students storm the US embassy in Tehran and took 90 hostages.

1979 ~ Birthday of Audrey Hollander, Porn Actress

1995 ~ The Israeli Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, was assassinated at a peace rally in Tel Aviv.

2008 ~ Death of Michael Crichton, Author.

2008 ~ Senator Obama was elected President.

November 5th
 

1605 ~ A plot to blow up the English Houses of Parliament was foiled when Guy Fawkes was discovered in a cellar below the building.

1872 ~ Suffragist Susan B. Anthony voted for the first time. She was fined $100 for the privilege.

1892 ~ Birthday of J. B. S. Haldane, Geneticist.

1911 ~ Birthday of Roy Rogers, American actor.

1930 ~ Sinclair Lewis was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

1942 ~ The Second Battle of El Alamein was won by the British in El Alamein, Egypt.

1977 ~ Birthday of Brittney Skye, Porn actress.

1979 ~ Ayatollah Khomeini declares the USA to be "the great Satan".

1989 ~ Death of Vladimir Horowitz, Pianist.

1999 ~ Federal Judge Thomas Jackson declared Microsoft Corp. a monopoly, saying the software giant's aggressive actions were ''stifling innovation'' and hurting consumers.

November 6th
 

1789 ~ Pope Pius VI appointed Father John Carroll as the first Roman Catholic bishop in the United States.

1854 ~ Birthday of John Philip Sousa, composer of the official march of the U.S., The Stars and Stripes Forever

1861 ~ Jefferson Davis was elected president of the Confederate States of America.

1869 ~ Rutgers University defeated Princeton University, 6-4, in the first official intercollegiate American football game.

1893 ~ Death of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Composer.

1913 ~ Mahatma Gandhi was arrested while leading a march of Indian miners in South Africa.

1962 ~ The UN General Assembly passed a resolution condemning South Africa's racist apartheid policies[/URL] and called for all member states to cease military and economic relations with the nation.

1975 ~ Birthday of Anastasia Blue, former Porn Actress.

1999 ~ Australians voted to keep the British queen as their head of state.

2000 ~ Death of L. Sprague De Camp, Science Fiction writer.

November 7th
 

1665 ~ The London Gazette, the oldest surviving English language journal, was first published.

1867 ~ Birthday of Marie Curie, awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics 1903, and the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1911.

1886 ~ Birthday of Aron Nimzowitsch, chess grandmaster.

1913 ~ Birthday of Albert Camus, writer, awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature 1957.

1917 ~ Bolshevik leaders Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky lead revolutionaries in overthrowing the Provisional Government of Alexander Kerensky.

1934 ~ Premiere of Rachmaninoff's "Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini" at Baltimore, Maryland.

1940 ~ The middle section of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapsed in a windstorm.

1980 ~ Death of Steve McQueen, Actor.

1981 ~ Birthday of Lily Thai, Porn Actress.

1989 ~ Protests force the resignation of East Germany’s Communist government.

This sort of blows a main story element of "Somewhere in Time", doesn't it?