Today in history

Today is Wednesday, Nov. 29, the 333rd day of 2017. There are 32 days left in the year.

Today’s highlight

On Nov. 29, 1947, the U.N. General Assembly passed a resolution calling for the partitioning of Palestine between Arabs and Jews; 33 members, including the United States, voted in favor of the resolution, 13 voted against while 10 abstained. (The plan, rejected by the Arabs, was never implemented.)

On this date

In 1530, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey ( WOOL’-zee), onetime adviser to England’s King Henry VIII, died.

In 1890, the first ArmyNavy football game was played at West Point, New York; Navy defeated Army, 24- 0. The Imperial Diet, forerunner of Japan’s current national legislature, opened its first session.

In 1924, Italian composer Giacomo Puccini died in Brussels before he could complete his opera “Turandot.” (It was finished by Franco Alfano.)

In 1956, the musical comedy “Bells Are Ringing,” starring Judy Holliday, opened on Broadway.

In 1961, Enos the chimp was launched from Cape Canaveral aboard the MercuryAtlas 5 spacecraft, which orbited earth twice before returning.

In 1967, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara announced he was leaving the Johnson administration to become president of the World Bank.

In 1972, the coin- operated video arcade game Pong, created by Atari, made its debut at Andy Capp’s Tavern in Sunnyvale, California.

In 1981, actress Natalie Wood drowned in a boating accident off Santa Catalina Island, California, at age 43.

In 1986, actor Cary Grant died in Davenport, Iowa, at age 82.

In 1987, a Korean Air 707 jetliner en route from Abu Dhabi to Bangkok was destroyed by a bomb planted by North Korean agents with the loss of all 115 people aboard.

In 1991, 17 people were killed in a 164-vehicle pileup during a dust storm on Interstate 5 near Coalinga, California. Actor Ralph Bellamy died in Santa Monica, California, at age 87.

In 2001, George Harrison, the “quiet Beatle,” died in Los Angeles following a battle with cancer; he was 58.

Ten years ago: A court in Sudan convicted British teacher Gillian Gibbons of insulting Islam for letting her pupils name a teddy bear “Muhammad” and sentenced her to 15 days in prison. (Gibbons was pardoned after spending more than a week in custody; she then left the country.) Pakistan’s president, Pervez Musharraf (pur-VEHZ’ mooSHAH’-ruhv), embarked on a new, five-year term as a civilian president, a day after ceding the powerful post of army chief. Former congressman Henry Hyde, R-Ill., died in Chicago at age 83. Former General Motors chief executive Roger B. Smith died in Detroit at age 82.

Five years ago: The United Nations voted overwhelmingly to recognize a Palestinian state, a vote that came exactly 65 years after the General Assembly adopted a plan to divide Palestine into separate states for Jews and Arabs. (The vote was 138 in favor; nine members, including the United States, voted against and 41 abstained.) President Barack Obama had lunch with defeated Republican nominee Mitt Romney in the White House’s private dining room; the White House says they discussed America’s leadership in the world.