Today in History
Today is Wednesday, Nov. 14, the 318th day of 2018. There are 47 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History:
On Nov. 14, 1970, a chartered Southern Airways DC-9 crashed while trying to land in West Virginia, killing all 75 people on board, including the Marshall University football team and its coaching staff.
On this date:
In 1862, during the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln gave the go-ahead for Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside’s plan to capture the Confederate capital of Richmond; the resulting Battle of Fredericksburg proved a disaster for the Union.
In 1889, inspired by the Jules Verne novel “Around the World in Eighty Days,” New York World reporter Nellie Bly (Elizabeth Cochrane) set out to make the trip in less time than the fictional Phileas Fogg. (She completed the journey in 72 days.)
In 1910, Eugene B. Ely became the first aviator to take off from a ship as his Curtiss pusher rolled off a sloping platform on the deck of the scout cruiser USS Birmingham off Hampton Roads, Virginia.
In 1925, the first group exhibition of surrealistic paintings opened at the Galerie Pierre in Paris.
In 1940, during World War II, German planes destroyed most of the English town of Coventry.
In 1965, the U.S. Army’s first major military operation of the Vietnam War began with the start of the five-day Battle of Ia Drang. (The fighting between American troops and North Vietnamese forces ended on Nov. 18 with both sides claiming victory.)
In 1969, Apollo 12 blasted off for the moon.
In 1972, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above the 1,000 level for the first time, ending the day at 1,003.16.
In 1973, Britain’s Princess Anne married Captain Mark Phillips in Westminster Abbey. (They divorced in 1992, and Anne remarried.)
In 1986, the Securities and Exchange Commission imposed a $100 million penalty on inside-trader Ivan F. Boesky and barred him from working again in the securities industry.
In 1996, Cardinal Joseph Bernardin (BURN’-uh-deen), the senior Roman Catholic prelate in the United States and leader of Chicago’s 2.3 million Catholics, died at his home at age 68. Singer Michael Jackson married his plastic surgeon’s nurse, Debbie Rowe, in a ceremony in Sydney, Australia. (Rowe filed for divorce in 1999.)
In 1997, a jury in Fairfax, Virginia, decided that Pakistani national Aimal Khan Kasi (eye-MAHL’ kahn KAH’-see) should get the death penalty for gunning down two CIA employees outside agency headquarters. (Five years later on this date, Aimal Khan Kasi was executed.)
