NOW & THEN
NOVEMBER 21
1218: Bull of Pope Honorius III affirmed the independence of the Church of Scotland.
1783: Francois de Rozier and Marquis d’Arlandes lifted off from Bois de Boulogne in the Mongolfier brothers’ hot air balloon and flew for 25 minutes in man’s first free- flight.
1806: Napoleon Bonaparte issued Berlin Decrees, declaring French blockade of Britain.
1843: Vulcanised rubber patented in Britain by Thomas Hancock.
1855: Sweden joined Britain, France and Turkey in an alliance against Russia.
1875: The first “human cannonball”, Emilio Orwa, was shot from a Paris fairground.
1877: Thomas Edison announced the invention of the phonograph in the United States.
1918: German High Seas Fleet handed over to the British Fleet for internment at Scapa Flow in Orkney.
1922: Ramsay Macdonald was elected leader of the Labour Party.
1936: First television gardening programme broadcast by BBC – In Your Garden.
1956: United Nations General Assembly censured Soviet Union for its action in Hungary.
1958: Construction of the Forth Road Bridge began.
1967: In an attempt to stop the spread of foot- and- mouth disease in Britain, 134,000 animals were slaughtered.
1971: Six Edinburgh schoolchildren and a teacher from Ainslie Park School died in a blizzard while trying to walk from the top of the Cairn Gorm chairlift to Corrour Bothy.
1974: IRA bombs in Birmingham killed 21 and injured 120 when two pubs packed with young drinkers were blown up.
1986: Government began the first campaign to fight Aids.
1989: Protesting ambulance crews withdrew their service from all non- urgent cases throughout Britain.
1989: A Ferrari 250 GTO was sold for a record £ 10 million.
1991: Boutros Boutros Ghali, Egyptian deputy prime minister, was elected as first African secretary general of the United Nations.
1995: The presidents of Serbia, Bosnia and Croatia accepted a United States- brokered peace deal aimed at ending the war in Bosnia.
2002: Nato invited Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia to become members.
2004: The island of Dominica was hit by the most destructive earthquake in its history. The northern half of the island received the most damage, especially the town of Portsmouth.
2004: The Paris Club agreed to write off 80 per cent ( up to $ 100 billion) of Iraq’s external debt.
2006: Lebanese minister and MP Pierre Gemayel was assassinated in suburban Beirut. 2008: Pop star Madonna and husband Guy Ritchie were granted a divorce.
2009: A mine exploded in Heilongjiang province, China, killing over 100 people.
2013: A supermarket roof collapsed in the Latvian capital Riga, killing over 50 people.