On this date
In 1605, the “Gunpowder Plot” failed as Guy Fawkes was seized before he could blow up the English Parliament.
In 1781, the Continental Congress elected John Hanson of Maryland its chairman, giving him the title of “President of the United States in Congress Assembled.”
In 1974, Democrat Ella T. Grasso was elected governor of Connecticut, becoming the first woman to win a gubernatorial office without succeeding her husband.
In 1990, Rabbi Meir Kahane, the Brooklyn-born Israeli extremist, was shot to death at a New York hotel. (Egyptian native El Sayyed Nosair was convicted of the killing.)
In 1992, Malice Green, a black motorist, died after he was struck in the head 14 times with a flashlight by a Detroit police officer, Larry Nevers. (Nevers and his partner, Walter Budzyn, were found guilty of second-degree murder, but the convictions were overturned; they were later convicted of involuntary manslaughter.)
In 1994, former President Ronald Reagan disclosed he had Alzheimer’s disease.
In 2006, Saddam Hussein was convicted and sentenced by the Iraqi High Tribunal to hang for crimes against humanity.
Ten years ago: A shooting rampage at the Fort Hood Army post in Texas left 13 people dead; Maj. Nidal Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, was later convicted of murder and sentenced to death.
Five years ago: A day after big Republican election gains, President Barack Obama and incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell pledged to try to turn divided government into a force for good rather than gridlock.
One year ago: The U.S. re-imposed sanctions on Iran that had been lifted under its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.