Today in history

In 1618,

Sir Walter Raleigh, the English courtier, military adventurer and poet, was executed in London for treason.

In 1901,

President William McKinley’s assassin, Leon Czolgosz, was electrocuted.

In 1929,

Wall Street crashed on “Black Tuesday,” heralding 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 1956,

during the Suez Canal crisis, Israel invaded Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.

In 1967,

the counterculture rock musical “Hair” officially opened off-Broadway at Joseph Papp’s Public Theater 12 days after beginning previews.

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.