Sunday, October 1819, 1997
Today's events
Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak opens the Peace Canal,
bringing in Nile waters to the Sinai.
U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey is scheduled to visit Bogota, Colombia.
The 33rd World Bridge Championships open in Tunisia.
In Taiwan, stripper-turned-politician Hsu Shao-tan holds her wedding outdoors and in the nude.
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On the horizon
On Monday, October 20, European Commission President Jacques Santer is expected to meet with Hong Kong Chief Executive Tung Chee Hwa in Brussels.
On Tuesday, October 21, Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali is scheduled to visit France at the invitation of French President Jacques Chirac.
On Wednesday, October 22, Paris celebrates the 200th anniversary of the world's first parachute jump.
On Thursday, October 23, local elections are to be held in Algeria.
On Friday, October 24, the Tokyo Motor Show opens in Japan.
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On this day
In 1781, Lord Cornwallis surrendered to General Washington at
Yorktown in Virginia, signaling the end of the American War of Independence.
In 1813, Napoleon was defeated by the Allies at the Battle of
the Nations at Leipzig.
In 1872, the Holtermann Nugget, a slab of slate weighing
235.14 kg, was found in New South Wales, Australia. It contained 82.11 kg of gold, the largest mass of gold ever found.
In 1901, Alberto Santos-Dumont, a Brazilian aviator, flew an
airship around the Eiffel Tower. The trip took 30 minutes and he was awarded the Deutsche Prize.
In 1915, Italy and Russia declared war on Bulgaria.
In 1935, the League of Nations imposed sanctions against Italy following its invasion of Ethiopia.
In 1943, the Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers began, aimed at improving allied relations with the Soviet Union.
In 1954, Britain and Egypt signed a new Suez Canal pact, calling for withdrawal of British troops from the canal zone within 20 months.
In 1960, the U.S. State Department embargoed the shipment to Cuba of all goods except medicine and foodstuffs.
In 1970, British Petroleum made the first major oil find in the British sector of the North Sea.
In 1978, Rhodesian troops attacked suspected guerrilla camps
in neighboring Zambia, killing 300 people.
In 1982, the Northern Ireland Office announced the closure of the De Lorean car plant in Belfast, after John De Lorean's arrest on drug charges in the U.S.
In 1983, the U.S. Senate passed a bill making Martin Luther King's birthday a public holiday.
In 1986, President Samora Machel of Mozambique and 30 of his
staff were killed in a plane crash near the South African
border.
In 1987, "Black Monday" occurred when Wall Street stocks
plunged a record 508 points or 22.6 per cent. The loss topped
the one-day declines of October 28 and 29 in 1929 which heralded the Great Depression.
In 1989, the murder convictions against Britain's "Guildford Four," jailed since 1975 for IRA attacks on public
houses at Guildford and Woolwich in 1974, were quashed.
In 1990, Soviet President Gorbachev won parliamentary approval for a plan to switch from old-style communist central planning to a market economy.
In 1994, a suspected Muslim suicide bomber blew up a bus in
the heart of Tel Aviv, killing 22 people and wounding more than 40.
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Newslink
The eyes of the sporting world, or at least the U.S., are on baseball's World Series right now. Rawlings is a company that knows a little about the game, having sold baseball equipment for 109 years straight. Visit the Rawlings baseball page for a little history lesson and a look at the instruments of the game.
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Holidays and more
Journalist Jack Anderson is 75.
Former CBS announcer Bern Bennett is 76.
Basketball player Brad Daugherty is 32.
Actor Michael Gambon is 57.
Social activist, feminist Patricia Ireland is 52.
Author John LeCarre is 66.
Actor John Lithgow is 52.
Artist Peter Max is 60.
Actress LaWanda Page is 77.
Actor Simon Ward is 56.
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Sources: Associated Press,
Chase's Calendar of Events 1997, J.P. Morgan
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