Today inhistory

Today is Saturday, Oct. 31, the 305th day of 2020. There are 61 days left in the year. This is Halloween.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Oct. 31, 1941, work was completed on the Mount Rushmore National Memorial in South Dakota, begun in 1927.

On this date:

In 1795, English poet John Keats was born in London.

In 1860, Juliette Gordon Low, founder of the Girl Scouts of the USA, was born in Savannah, Ga.

In 1926, magician Harry Houdini died in Detroit of peritonitis resulting from a ruptured appendix.

In 1941, the Navy destroyer USS Reuben Jameswas torpedoed by a German U-boat off Iceland with the loss of some 100 lives, even though the United States had not yet enteredWorldWar II.

In 1961, the body of Josef Stalin was removed from Lenin’s Tomb as part of the Soviet Union’s “de-Stalinization” drive.

In 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson ordered a halt to all U.S. bombing of North Vietnam, saying he hoped for fruitful peace negotiations.

In 1984, Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated by two Sikh (seek) security guards.

In 1994, a Chicago-bound American Eagle ATR-72 crashed in northern Indiana, killing all 68 people aboard.

In 1998, a genetic study was released suggesting President Thomas Jefferson did in fact father at least one child by his slave Sally Hemings.

In 1999, EgyptAir Flight 990, bound from New York to Cairo, crashed off the Massachusetts coast, killing all 217 people aboard.

In 2001, New York hospital worker Kathy T. Nguyen (nwen) died of inhalation anthrax, the fourth person to perish in a spreading wave of bioterrorism.

In 2005, President George W. Bush nominated Judge Samuel Alito (ahlEE’-toh) to the Supreme Court. Civil rights icon Rosa Parks was honored during a memorial service in Washington, D.C.

Ten years ago: A former teenage al- Qaida fighter, Omar Khadr, was sentenced by a military judge at Guantanamo to eightmore years in custody under the terms of a plea agreement.