Today in history
1765 - The Stamp Act Congress, meeting in New York, draws up a declaration of rights and liberties.
1781 - British troops under Lord Cornwallis surrender at Yorktown, Virginia, ending the American Revolution war.
1943 - The foreign ministers of the United States, the Soviet Union and Britain open a conference in Moscow to discuss broad principles of cooperation.
1944 - The US Navy announces black women would be allowed into Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service.
1960 - The US imposes an embargo on exports to Cuba covering all commodities except medical supplies and certain food products.
1987 - The stock market crashes as the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunges 508 points, or 22.6 per cent in value - its biggest-ever percentage drop in decades.
1994 - A bomb on a crowded city bus kills 20 people in Tel Aviv, Israel.
1995 - A powerful bomb explodes at Sri Lanka’s main oil storage tank in a Colombo suburb, causing mass evacuations as fires rage out of control.
2004 - Myanmar’s secretive military regime forces out its prime minister, the long-powerful General Khin Nyunt, and places him under house arrest on corruption charges.
2011 - Hundreds of youths smash and loot stores in central Athens and clash with riot police during a massive anti-government rally against painful new austerity measures that won initial parliamentary approval; Queen Elizabeth II, accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh, makes her 16th trip to Australia.
2012 - A car bomb rips through Beirut, killing a top security official and seven others, shearing balconies off blocks of flats and sending bloodied residents into the streets in the most serious blast the Lebanese capital has seen infour years.
2014 - Tony Abbott flies to Jakarta seeking closer ties amid a warning from Indonesian president- elect Joko Widodo about Australia’s navy entering its waters while turning back asylum seeker boats.
2015 - Justin Trudeau and his Liberal Party win Canada’s parliamentary election, 47 yeas after his father held the office of prime minister; A UK parliamentary report warns Big Ben could fall silent if repairs costing between $60 and $80 million are not carried out.
Today’s Birthdays:
Auguste Lumiere, Frenchman credited with making the first movie (1862-1948); John Le Carre, British writer (1931-); John Lithgow, US actor (1945-); Jennifer Holliday, US singer (1960-); Evander Holyfield, US heavyweight boxing champion (1962-)