Today in history

On Jan. 10, 1776, Thomas Paine published his influential pamphlet “Common Sense.”

In 1850 architect John Wellborn Root, one of the foremost figures of the Chicago school of architecture with landmark creations such as the Rookery and the Monadnock Building, was born in Lumpkin, Ga.

In 1861 Florida became the third state to secede from the Union.

In 1870 John D. Rockefeller incorporated Standard Oil.

In 1917 William “Buffalo Bill” Cody, the frontier scout and showman, died in Denver; he was 70.

In 1920 the League of Nations was established as the Treaty of Versailles went into effect.

In 1938 Hall of Fame first baseman Willie McCovey was born in Mobile, Ala.

In 1946 the first manmade contact with the moon was made as radar signals were bounced off the lunar surface. Also in 1946 the first General Assembly of the United Nations convened in London.

In 1957 Harold Macmillan became prime minister of Britain, following the resignation of Anthony Eden.

In 1967 Republican Edward Brooke, of Massachusetts, the first AfricanAmerican elected to the U.S. Senate by popular vote, took his seat.

In 1978 the Soviet Union launched two cosmonauts aboard a Soyuz capsule for a rendezvous with the Salyut 6 space laboratory.

In 1980 former AFL-CIO president George Meany died in Washington; he was 85.

In 1989 Cuba began withdrawing its troops from

Angola, more than 13 years after its first contingents arrived.

In 1990 Chinese Premier Li Peng lifted Beijing’s 7month-old martial law and said that by crushing prodemocracy protests the army had saved China from “the abyss of misery.”

In 1997 Dallas police ended their investigation of Dallas Cowboys stars Erik Williams and Michael Irvin, saying a woman’s claim that Williams had raped her while Irvin held a gun to her head was false.

In 2002 Marines began flying hundreds of al-Qaida prisoners in Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Also in 2002 the White House disclosed that Enron Corp. had sought the administration’s help shortly before collapsing with the life savings of many workers.