IT HAPPENED ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

— In 1871, one of history’s greatest searches ended when American newsman Henry Morton Stanley found British explorer Dr. David Livingstone at Ujiji in central Africa. Stanley’s famous question, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume?” were the first words Livingstone had heard from a white man in five years. Stanley had been commissioned by the New York Herald to find Livingstone, who had been feared dead for four years. — In 1932, Foster Hewitt made his first Hockey Night in Canada broadcast. Boston and Toronto tied 1-1. — In 1940, the Trans-Atlantic Ferry Service began operations, transporting planes, men, and supplies from Canada via Goose Bay and Gander, Nfld. to Britain. — In 1953, Canada’s military base in Soest, Germany was opened. — In 1960, the deepest oil or gas well in Canada at the time was completed at Fording Mountain, B.C. — In 1969, Sesame Street made its debut on National Educational Television (later PBS). — In 1975, the iron-ore carrier Edmund Fitzgerald sank in a storm on Lake Superior with the loss of 29 crewmen.The 222-metre-long ship battled 7.5 metre waves and record 125 km/h winds before sinking. The tragedy was commemorated in The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald, by Gordon Lightfoot. — In 1979, a Canadian Pacific freight train carrying deadly combustible chemicals derailed in the heart of Mississauga, Ont. Deadly chlorine gas leaked from a punctured tanker and within 24 hours, 220,000 people, most of the city’s population, had been evacuated. No lives were lost in the largest single movement of people in Canada in peacetime. — In 1986, Francis Michael “King” Clancy, vicepresident of the Toronto Maple Leafs, former NHL player, first referee-in-chief of the NHL and former coach, died in Toronto at the age of 83. — In 1989, workers began punching a hole in the Berlin Wall, one day after East Germany abolished its border restrictions. — In 1994, Alan Eagleson, once the most prominent man in professional hockey, was charged with 40 counts of cheating his clients. He was later disbarred and served six months in jail for fraud.