Today in history

In 1863 President Abraham Lincoln declared the last Thursday in November Thanksgiving Day.

In 1944, during World War II, U.S. troops cracked the Siegfried Line north of Aachen, Germany.

In 1960 “The Andy Griffith Show” premiered on CBS.

In 1961 “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” also starring Mary Tyler Moore, made its debut on CBS.

In 1962 astronaut Wally Schirra blasted off from Cape Canaveral aboard the Sigma 7 on a nine-hour flight.

In 1967 folk singer Woody Guthrie died; he was 55.

In 1974 Frank Robinson became major-league baseball’s first black manager as he was named to lead the Cleveland Indians.

In 1987 U.S. and Canadian negotiators agreed on a framework for an accord to eliminate all tariffs between the world’s two largest trading partners.

In 1990 West Germany and East Germany ended 45 years of postwar division, declaring the creation of a new unified country.

In 1995 the jury in the O.J. Simpson murder trial announced its verdicts, finding the former football star not guilty of the 1994 slayings of his former wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and Ronald Goldman.

In 2002 five people were shot to death in the Washington area within a 14-hour period, beginning the hunt for the “Beltway Sniper.”

In 2008 O.J. Simpson was found guilty of robbing two sports-memorabilia dealers at gunpoint in a Las Vegas hotel room. (Simpson was later sentenced to nine to 33 years in prison; he was granted parole in July 2017 and released from prison on Oct. 1.)

In 2012 the Weather Channel announced it would start naming winter storms.

In 2013 driver Miriam Carey was shot to death after leading police on a chase from the White House to the U.S. Capitol. Carey’s 1-year-old daughter was in the vehicle. Also in 2013 at least 350 people from Africa drowned after a migrant boat caught fire and capsized off the Italian island of Lampedusa.

In 2014 Turkish lawmakers approved allowing ground troops into Iraq and Syria to battle Islamic State militants.