Nov 18 in History
1307 — Wilhelm Tell, a folk hero in Switzerland, splits an apple on his son Walter’s head with a bolt from his crossbow.
1421 — During the night of 18/19 November, a heavy storm near the North Sea coast causes the seawall of the Zuiderzee dike to break, flooding 72 villages and killing about 10,000 people in Zeeland and Holland (Netherlands). Most of the land remains flooded.
1803 — The Battle of Vertières, the last major battle in the Second War of Haitian Independence, ends in a victory for the Haitian rebels under Jean-Jacques Dessalines over Napoleon’s expeditionary forces. 1865 — Mark Twain’s first story “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” is published in the New York Saturday Press under the title “Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog”.
1904 — Gold is discovered in Rhodesia.
1905 — The Norwegian Parliament elects Prince Carl of Denmark as king of Norway. He reigns as Haakon VII until his death at 85 on September 21 1957.
1906 — Alec Issigonis, Greek-English car designer, is born in Smyrna, Ottoman Empire. He is famous for the groundbreaking development of the Mini, launched by the British Motor Corporation in 1959. 1918 — Latvia declares independence from Soviet Russia, which launches an offensive to regain its western provinces. Independence follows the signing of the Latvian-Soviet Peace treaty on August 11 1920. Latvia is invaded by Russia, Germany and again Russia during World War 2. It becomes part of the Soviet Union and regains independence on September 6 1991.
1921 — New York City considers varying work hours to avoid long traffic jams.
1959 — “Ben-Hur”, the biblical-era movie spectacle starring Charlton Heston, premieres in NYC.
1963 — Bell Telephone introduces the first commercial push-button telephone, installed first in Carnegie and Greensburg, Pennsylvania,
1976 — Spain’s parliament approves a bill to establish a democracy after 37 years of dictatorship.
1978 — In Jonestown, Guyana, 918 people, including 276 children, die in a few hours of mass murder and suicide at Jim Jones’s People Temple compound. California representative Leo J Ryan, investigating the cult, and four others (SF Examiner photographer Greg Robinson, NBC correspondent Don Harris, NBC cameraman Bob Brown and Temple defector Patricia Parks) are killed by Temple members at a nearby airport. Congressional aide Jackie Speier survives five bullets. Jones orders his followers to drink poison, mixed with Kool-Aid. The next morning 913 bodies are found, with families huddled together in an embrace. Jones is found with a gunshot to the head.