Today in history

On Oct. 15, 1844, philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche was born in Rocken in present-day Germany.

In 1860 11-year-old Grace Bedell of Westfield, N.Y., wrote a letter to presidential candidate Abraham Lincoln, suggesting he could improve his appearance by growing a beard.

In 1881 comic novelist and playwright Sir P.G. Wodehouse was born Pelham Grenville Wodehouse in Guildford, England.

In 1908 economist John Kenneth Galbraith was born in Iona Station, Ontario.

In 1914 the Clayton Antitrust Act was passed.

In 1917 Mata Hari, a Dutch dancer who had spied for the Germans, was executed by a French firing squad outside Paris.

In 1924 former Chrysler Chairman Lee Iacocca was born Lido Anthony Iacocca in Allentown, Pa.

In 1928 the German dirigible Graf Zeppelin landed in Lakehurst, N.J., its first commercial flight across the Atlantic.

In 1939 New York Municipal Airport, later renamed LaGuardia Airport, was dedicated.

In 1945 the former premier of Vichy France, Pierre Laval, was executed.

In 1946 Nazi war criminal Hermann Goering poisoned himself hours before he was to have been executed.

In 1951 the television sitcom “I Love Lucy,” starring Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, premiered on CBS.