Today in history

In 1216, King John of England died after consuming what was described as an excessive number of peaches and too much beer.

In 1781, Gen. Lord Cornwallis surrendered the British garrison of 7,000 at Yorktown, Va., after a three-week siege in 1781. He had been sent to seize the harbour for the British fleet but found himself bottled up by the French. The capture of Yorktown virtually ended the American War of Independence and the British hurried to make peace.

In 1957, Maurice (Rocket) Richard of the Montreal Canadiens became the first NHL player to score 500 career goals. He did it in 863 games. Richard retired in 1960 with a then-record 544 goals.

In 1960, the United States imposed an embargo on exports to Cuba covering all commodities except medical supplies and certain food products. The embargo followed a reduction of U.S. imports of sugar, Cuba’s main source of income, and was meant to punish the new government of Fidel Castro, which had expropriated large American land holdings under its Agrarian Reform Law. Successive punitive embargoes against Cuba have received international criticism.

In 2008, Mr. Blackwell, the acerbic designer whose annual worstdressed list skewered the fashion felonies of celebrities from Zsa Zsa Gabor to Britney Spears, died at age 86. Born Richard Sylvan Selzer in 1922, he was a littleknown dress designer when he issued his first tongue-in-cheek criticism of Hollywood fashion disasters for 1960.