Today In History

• 1226: Saint Francis of Assisi dies in Italy.
  The founder of the Franciscan order built his movement around imitating the life of Jesus, with a commitment to poverty, charity, and energetic preaching. The son of a wealthy cloth merchant, he gave up his inheritance to live among the poor, and he died near Assisi in his mid-40s. Pope Gregory IX declared him a saint just two years later, and he is today a patron saint of Italy and of animals and ecology.
• 1862: The Battle of Corinth begins in Mississippi.
  Confederate troops under Earl Van Dorn attacked the Union garrison commanded by William S. Rosecrans at Corinth, a key railroad junction in northeastern Mississippi. The two-day Civil War fight ended the next day in a decisive Union victory, with the Confederates driven off after heavy losses.
• 1863: Abraham Lincoln proclaims a national Thanksgiving Day.
  The president set the last Thursday of November as a day of thanks, issuing the proclamation in the middle of the Civil War. It capped a campaign of several decades by magazine editor Sarah Josepha Hale, who had pressed a series of presidents to create the holiday. Congress later fixed the date as the fourth Thursday in November, in 1941.
• 1866: Italy gains Venetia under the Treaty of Vienna.
  The treaty ended the fighting between Italy and Austria in the Seven Weeks’ War, in which Italy had sided with Prussia. With French emperor Napoleon III acting as mediator, Austria gave up Venetia, which passed through French hands to the young Kingdom of Italy. The region, including the city of Venice, was formally joined to Italy after a vote later that month.
• 1889: Pacifist journalist Carl von Ossietzky is born in Hamburg.
  The German writer and editor became one of the Weimar era’s leading antiwar voices and was prosecuted for exposing Germany’s secret rearmament. Arrested soon after the Nazis took power in 1933, he was being held in a concentration camp when he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 1935. He died in 1938, still in custody.
• 1918: Prince Maximilian of Baden becomes chancellor of Germany.
  Known for his humanitarian reputation, Prince Max was chosen because Emperor William II believed he was the man who could bring World War I to a close. He quickly opened armistice talks with U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. Five weeks later, on November 9, he announced the emperor’s abdication and handed the government to Social Democrat Friedrich Ebert.
• 1935: Italy invades Ethiopia.
  Acting on Benito Mussolini’s orders, troops commanded by Emilio De Bono crossed into Abyssinia, as Ethiopia was then known, from the Italian colony of Eritrea. The attack was part of Mussolini’s ambition to build a “new Roman Empire.” The League of Nations responded with sanctions that proved ineffective, and the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, fell in May 1936.
• 1936: Football pioneer John Heisman dies in New York.
  The American coach was regarded as one of the game’s great innovators and was an early champion of legalizing the forward pass. He led several college programs, most famously Georgia Tech. The Heisman Trophy, given each year to college football’s outstanding player, was named in his honor after his death.
• 1941: The Maltese Falcon premieres.
  John Huston directed the film, his first as a director, adapting Dashiell Hammett’s 1930 novel of the same name. Humphrey Bogart starred as private eye Sam Spade, alongside Mary Astor, Peter Lorre, and Sydney Greenstreet. Some critics rank it as the greatest detective movie ever made, and it is often cited as an early landmark of film noir.
• 1945: The May-Johnson bill on atomic energy is introduced in Congress.
  Named for sponsors Representative Andrew May and Senator Edwin Johnson, the bill aimed to keep atomic research secret and set strict security rules for the field. Many scientists objected to the degree of military control it allowed, and it never became law. The debate instead produced the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, which put nuclear development under a civilian commission.
• 1952: Britain conducts its first atomic weapons test.
  The test, code-named Hurricane, set off a device aboard the frigate HMS Plym, which was anchored in the Monte Bello Islands off the coast of Western Australia. The blast destroyed the ship and made Britain the world’s third nuclear power, after the United States and the Soviet Union.
• 1960: The Andy Griffith Show debuts on CBS.
  The comedy was a hit from the start. Andy Griffith played Sheriff Andy Taylor of the small town of Mayberry, North Carolina, with Don Knotts as his deputy Barney Fife and Ron Howard as his young son Opie. It ran for eight seasons, through 1968.
• 1961: The Dick Van Dyke Show premieres on CBS.
  Created by Carl Reiner, the series starred Dick Van Dyke as television comedy writer Rob Petrie and Mary Tyler Moore as his wife, Laura. It is remembered as a pioneering sitcom, splitting its stories between the couple’s home and Rob’s workplace. The show ran for five seasons, ending in 1966.
• 1969: Singer Gwen Stefani is born.
  The American singer and songwriter, born in Fullerton, California, rose to fame as the lead singer of the band No Doubt, which broke through with the 1995 album Tragic Kingdom. She went on to a successful solo career beginning in 2004 and later became a coach on the TV competition The Voice.
• 1974: Frank Robinson is hired as the American League’s first Black manager.
  The Cleveland Indians named the star outfielder as a player-manager, breaking the managerial color barrier in the American League and in the major leagues as a whole. He hit a home run in his first game in the role the following April. Robinson, the only player named Most Valuable Player in both leagues, was later elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
• 1990: Germany is reunified.
  East Germany formally joined West Germany, ending more than four decades of division that had been one of the defining features of the Cold War. It came less than a year after the Berlin Wall opened in November 1989. West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev had agreed that the unified country would remain in NATO. October 3 is now a national holiday, the Day of German Unity.
• 1995: O.J. Simpson is found not guilty of murder.
  A Los Angeles jury acquitted the former football star of killing his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman, who were stabbed to death in June 1994. The verdict came after a trial of more than eight months and only a few hours of deliberation, and it was watched live by an enormous television audience. A civil jury later found Simpson liable for the deaths in 1997.
• 2004: Actress Janet Leigh dies at 77.
  The American film star was best known for playing Marion Crane in Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960), whose shower scene became one of the most famous in movie history. The role earned her an Academy Award nomination. Her other films included Touch of Evil and The Manchurian Candidate, and she was the mother of actress Jamie Lee Curtis.
• 2023: Kevin McCarthy is voted out as speaker of the House.
  It was the first time in U.S. history that the House of Representatives removed its own speaker. The 216-210 vote followed a motion brought by fellow Republican Matt Gaetz, with eight Republicans joining Democrats to oust the California congressman. McCarthy had held the job only since January, and Mike Johnson of Louisiana was elected to replace him three weeks later.
• 2025: Sarah Mullally is named the 106th archbishop of Canterbury.
  She became the first woman chosen for the post in its history of more than 1,400 years at the head of the Church of England. Mullally, a former nurse who served as England’s chief nursing officer, had been bishop of London since 2018. She was selected to succeed Justin Welby, who had resigned.

Born on This Day

• 1867: Pierre Bonnard, French painter
  A member of the Nabis group, he was known for richly colored scenes of everyday domestic life.
• 1895: Sergey Yesenin, Russian poet
  His lyrical verse celebrated the Russian countryside and peasant life.
• 1928: Erik Bruhn, Danish ballet dancer
  Regarded as one of the finest classical male dancers of his era, he later directed the National Ballet of Canada.
• 1936: Steve Reich, American composer
  A pioneer of minimalist music, he is known for works such as Music for 18 Musicians.