Today in history
Today is Tuesday, Oct. 10, the 283rd day of 2017. There are 82 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History
On Oct. 10, 1967, the Outer Space Treaty, prohibiting the placing of weapons of mass destruction on the moon or elsewhere in space, entered into force.
On this date
In A.D. 19, Roman general Germanicus Julius Caesar, 33, died in Antioch under mysterious circumstances, possibly from poisoning.
In 1845, the U.S. Naval Academy was established in Annapolis, Maryland.
In 1913, the Panama Canal was effectively completed as President Woodrow Wilson sent a signal from the White House by telegraph, setting off explosives that destroyed a section of the Gamboa dike.
In 1917, legendary jazz composer and pianist Thelonious Monk was born in Rocky Mount, North Carolina.
In 1935, the George Gershwin opera “Porgy and Bess,” featuring an all-black cast, opened on Broadway, beginning a run of 124 performances.
In 1938, Nazi Germany completed its annexation of Czechoslovakia’s Sudetenland.
In 1943, Chiang Kai-shek took the oath of office as president of China.
In 1957, President Dwight D. Eisenhower apologized to the finance minister of Ghana, Komla Agbeli Gbdemah, after the official was refused seating in a Howard Johnson’s restaurant near Dover, Delaware. The Milwaukee Braves won the World Series, defeating the New York Yankees in Game 7, 5-0. The TV series “Zorro,” starring Guy Williams as the masked hero, debuted on ABC.
In 1966, the Beach Boys’ single “Good Vibrations” by Brian Wilson and Mike Love was released by Capitol Records.
In 1973, Vice President Spiro T. Agnew, accused of accepting bribes, pleaded no contest to one count of federal income tax evasion, and resigned his office.
In 1985, U.S. fighter jets forced an Egyptian plane carrying the hijackers of the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro to land in Italy, where the gunmen were taken into custody. Actor-director Orson Welles died in Los Angeles at age 70; actor Yul Brynner died in New York at age 65.
In 1997, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and its coordinator, Jody Williams, were named winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.
Ten years ago: A 14-yearold suspended student opened fire in a Cleveland high school, wounding two teachers and two classmates before killing himself. The United Auto Workers tentatively agreed on a contract with Chrysler. (UAW members ratified the accord, but with significant dissent.) A Russian spacecraft blasted off for the international space station, carrying Malaysia’s first astronaut (Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor) and Peggy Whitson, an American who became the first woman to command the orbital outpost. German Gerhard Ertl won the 2007 Nobel Prize in chemistry on his 71st birthday.
Five years ago: President Barack Obama conceded he did poorly the previous week in his first debate with Republican rival Mitt Romney, telling ABC he’d “had a bad night”; Romney, meanwhile, barnstormed battleground state Ohio and released a new commercial pledging not to raise taxes.