Today in history
1845 - The United States Naval Academy opens in Annapolis, Maryland.
1886 - The tuxedo dinner jacket makes its American debut at the autumn ball in Tuxedo Park, New York.
1911 - Revolutionaries in Wuhan begin a revolt that spreads through southern China and leads to the overthrow of the 2000-year-old Manchu dynasty.
1913 - Atlantic and Pacific oceans are united when the Gamboa Dam in the Panama Canal is blown up.
1917 - Brazil declares war on Germany in retaliation for the torpedoing of Brazilian ships.
1961 - The whole population of the South Atlantic island Tristan da Cunha is evacuated to Britain after a volcano erupted.
1963 - High dam collapses near Belluno, Italy, and resulting flood kills an estimated 1800 people.
1964 - The Tokyo Olympic Games, the first held in Asia, begin.
1970 - Fiji becomes independent after nearly a century of British rule.
1973 - US Vice President Spiro Agnew resigns after his conviction for income tax evasion.
1975 - The New Zealand Government establishes the Waitangi Tribunal to hear Maori claims of breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi.
1985 - US jet fighters force an Egyptian airliner carrying hijackers of cruise ship Achille Lauro to land in Italy, where the hijackers are arrested.
1992 - A court in Karachi, Pakistan acquits Asif Ali Zardari, the husband of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, on charges of masterminding the murder of 29 rival political supporters.
1996 - Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers search house-to-house for anyone suspected of collaborating with the former regime, unleashing a wave of fear among ethnic minorities.
2000 - Sirimavo Bandaranaike, who 40 years earlier became the world’s first female prime minister, dies of a heart attack in Colombo, Sri Lanka, after voting in parliamentary elections. She was 84.
2004 - Afghans pack polling stations for a historic presidential election that is blemished when all 15 candidates opposing Us-backed interim President Hamid Karzai withdrew, charging the government and the United Nations with fraud and incompetence.
2012 - Schools shut their doors and Pakistanis across the country hold vigils for a 14-year-old girl who was shot by a Taliban gunman after advocating education for girls and criticising the militant group. Today’s Birthdays:
Giuseppe Verdi, Italian composer (1813-1901); Fridtjof Nansen, Norwegian explorer (1861-1930); Harold Pinter, US writer/director (1930-2008).