Today in history

Today is Friday, October 9, the 282nd day of 2015. There are 83 days left in the year. On this date in the SCV: In 1988, despite a tremendous increase in the number of households, the Santa Clarita Valley experienced a decline in the number of residential burglaries for the fiscal year ending June 30. Although home burglaries had dropped each year, auto thefts had continued to rise, jumping from 400 in fiscal year 198687 to 546 in 1987-88, according to SCV Sheriff’s Station records. The battle being fought most successfully, however, was against residential burglary. During 1987-88, the most recent year-long period with completedcom statistics, 419 residential burglaries occurred in the SCV. Today’s Highlight in History: On October 9, 1940, rock-and-roll legend John Lennon was born in Liverpool, England. ( On this date in 1975, his son, Sean, was born in New York.) Ten years ago: Dozens of foreign tourists fled devastated lakeside Mayan towns as Guatemalan officials said they would abandon communities buried by landslides caused by Hurricane Stan and declare them mass graveyards. A driverless Volkswagen Touareg, designed by Stanford University, won a $ 2 million race across the rugged Nevada desert, beating four other robot-guided vehicles that completed a Pentagon- sponsored contest aimed at making warfare safer for humans. Actor-comedian Louis Nye died in Los Angeles at age 92. Five years ago: Chile’s 33 trapped miners cheered and embraced each other as a drill punched into their underground chamber where they had been stuck for an agonizing 66 days. The International Monetary Fund wrapped up two days of talks in Washington without resolving deep differences over currency movements. A crush of fans circled a flower-graced mosaic in Central Park’s Strawberry Fields and sang lyrics from “Imagine” to honor John Lennon on his 70th birthday. One year ago: Six U.S. military

planes arrived in the Ebola hot zone with more Marines as West African leaders pleaded for the world’s help in dealing with what Sierra Leone President Ernest Bai Koroma described as “a tragedy unforeseen in modern times.” French novelist Patrick Modiano was named the recipient of the Nobel Prize in literature. Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Carolyn Kizer, 89, died in Sonoma, California. On this date: In 1514, Mary Tudor, the 18-year-old sister of Henry VIII, became Queen consort of France upon her marriage to 52year-old King Louis XII, who died less than three months later. In 1776, a group of Spanish missionaries settled in presentday San Francisco. In 1888, the public was first admitted to the Washington Monument.