Today is Sunday, Oct. 29, the 302nd day of 2017. There are 63 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History:
On Oct. 29, 2012, Superstorm Sandy slammed ashore in New Jersey and slowly marched inland, devastating coastal communities and causing widespread power outages; the storm and its aftermath were blamed for at least 182 deaths in the U.S.
On this date:
In 1618, Sir Walter Raleigh, the English courtier, military adventurer and poet, was executed in London for treason.
In 1787, the opera "Don Giovanni" by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart had its world premiere in Prague.
In 1901, President William McKinley's assassin, Leon Czolgosz (CHAWL'-gahsh), was electrocuted.
In 1929, Wall Street crashed on "Black Tuesday," heralding the start of America's Great Depression.
In 1940, a blindfolded Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson drew the first number - 158 - from a glass bowl in America's first peacetime military draft.
In 1947, former first lady Frances Cleveland Preston died in Baltimore at age 83.
In 1956, during the Suez Canal crisis, Israel invaded Egypt's Sinai Peninsula. "The Huntley-Brinkley Report" premiered as NBC's nightly television newscast.
In 1957, former MGM studio boss Louis B. Mayer died in Los Angeles.
In 1967, the counterculture rock musical "Hair" officially opened off-Broadway at Joseph Papp's Public Theater 12 days after beginning previews. Expo 67 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, closed after six months.
In 1979, on the 50th anniversary of the great stock market crash, anti-nuclear protesters tried but failed to shut down the New York Stock Exchange.
In 1987, following the confirmation defeat of Robert H. Bork to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, President Ronald Reagan announced his choice of Douglas H. Ginsburg, a nomination that fell apart over revelations of Ginsburg's previous marijuana use. Jazz great Woody Herman died in Los Angeles at age 74.
In 1994, Francisco Martin Duran fired more than two dozen shots from a semiautomatic rifle at the White House. (Duran was later convicted of trying to assassinate President Bill Clinton and was sentenced to 40 years in prison.)