HIGHLIGHTS IN HISTORY
Today’s highlight:
On Oct. 11, 1991, testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Anita Hill accused Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas of sexually harassing her; Thomas re-appeared before the panel to denounce the proceedings as a “high-tech lynching.”
On this date:
1809: Just over three years after the famous Lewis and Clark expedition ended, Meriwether Lewis was found dead in a Tennessee inn, an apparent suicide; he was 35.
1884: American first lady Eleanor Roosevelt was born in New York City.
1910: Theodore Roosevelt became the first former U.S. president to fly in an airplane during a visit to St. Louis.
1958: The lunar probe Pioneer 1 was launched; it failed to go as far out as planned, fell back to Earth, and burned up in the atmosphere.
1961: Actor-comedian
Leonard “Chico” Marx, 74, died in Hollywood, Calif.
1962: Pope John XXIII convened the first session of the Roman Catholic Church’s Second Vatican Council, also known as “Vatican 2.”
1968: Apollo 7, the first manned Apollo mission, was launched with astronauts Wally Schirra, Donn Fulton Eisele and R. Walter Cunningham aboard. The government of Panama was overthrown in a military coup.
1983: The last full-fledged hand-cranked telephone system in the United States went out of service as 440 telephone customers in Bryant Pond, Maine, were switched over to direct-dial service.
1986: President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev opened two days of talks concerning arms control and human rights in Reykjavik, Iceland.
1992: In the first of three presidential debates, three candidates faced off against each other in St. Louis: President George H.W. Bush, Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton and businessman Ross Perot.
2001: In his first prime-time news conference since taking office, President George W. Bush said “it may take a year or two” to track down Osama bin Laden and his terrorist network in Afghanistan, but he asserted that after a five-day aerial bombardment, “we’ve got them on the run.”
2002: Former President Jimmy Carter was named the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.
Ten years ago: President George W. Bush and foreign financial officials, meeting at the White House, displayed joint resolve in combating the unfolding financial crisis.
Five years ago: The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons won the Nobel Peace Prize for its efforts to stop chemical warfare. Tyrese Ruffin, the 2-year-old son of Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson, died at a South Dakota hospital two days after being admitted with severe head injuries; Joseph Patterson was convicted of second-degree murder in the child’s beating death and was sentenced to life in prison.
One year ago: The Boy Scouts of America announced that it would admit girls into the Cub Scouts starting in 2018 and establish a new program for older girls based on the Boy Scout curriculum, allowing them to aspire to the Eagle Scout rank.