Today inhistory

Today is Wednesday, Nov. 25, the 330th day of 2020. There are 36 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Nov. 25, 2002, President George W. Bush signed legislation creating the Department of Homeland Security, and appointed Tom Ridge to be its head.

On this date:

In 1783, the British evacuated New York during the Revolutionary War.

In 1915, a new version of the Ku Klux Klan, targeting blacks, Jews, Catholics and immigrants, was founded by WilliamJoseph Simmons.

In 1947, movie studio executives meeting in New York agreed to blacklist the “Hollywood Ten” who’d been cited for contempt of Congress the day before.

In 1963, the body of President John F. Kennedy was laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery; his widow, Jacqueline, lighted an “eternal flame” at the gravesite.

In 1986, the Iran- Contra affair erupted as President Ronald Reagan and Attorney General Edwin Meese revealed that profits from secret arms sales to Iran had been diverted to Nicaraguan rebels.

In 1999, Elian Gonzalez, a 5-year-old Cuban boy, was rescued by a pair of sport fishermen off the coast of Florida, setting off an international custody battle.

In 2001, as the war in Afghanistan entered its eighth week, CIA officer Johnny “Mike” Spann was killed during a prison uprising in Mazar-e-Sharif, becoming America’s first combat casualty of the conflict.

In 2009, Toyota said it would replace the gas pedals on 4 million vehicles in the United States because the pedals could get stuck in the floor mats and cause sudden acceleration.

In 2014, attorneys for Michael Brown’s family vowed to push for federal charges against the Ferguson, Missouri, police officer who killed the Black 18-year- old, a day after a grand jury declined to indict Darren Wilson. (The Justice Department later declined to prosecute Wilson.) President Barack Obama sharply rebuked protesters for racially charged violence in Ferguson, saying there was no excuse for burning buildings, torching cars and destroying other property.

In 2016, Fidel Castro, who led his rebels to victorious revolution in 1959, embraced Soviet-style communism and defied the power of 10 U.S. presidents during his half-century of rule in Cuba, died at age 90.