Today is Wednesday, Nov. 20, the 324th day of 2013. There are 41 days left in the year.
Today’s highlight:
On Nov. 20, 1947, Britain’s future queen, Princess Elizabeth, married Philip Mountbatten, Duke of Edinburgh, at Westminster Abbey.
On this date:
In 1620, Peregrine White was born aboard the Mayflower in Massachusetts Bay; he was the first child born of English parents in present-day New England.
In 1789, New Jersey became the first state to ratify the Bill of Rights.
In 1910, revolution broke out in Mexico, led by Francisco I. Madero.
In 1925, Robert F. Kennedy was born in Brookline, Mass.
In 1929, the radio program “The Rise of the Goldbergs” debuted on the NBC Blue Network.
In 1945, 22 out of 24 indicted Nazi officials went on trial (one in absentia) before an international war crimes tribunal in Nuremberg, Germany.
In 1959, the United Nations issued its Declaration of the Rights of the Child.
In 1962, President John F. Kennedy held a news conference in which he announced the end of the naval quarantine of Cuba imposed during the missile crisis, and the signing of an executive order prohibiting discrimination in federal housing facilities.
In 1967, the U.S. Census Bureau’s Population Clock at the Commerce Department ticked past 200 million.
In 1969, the Nixon administration announced a halt to residential use of the pesticide DDT as part of a total phaseout. A group of American Indian activists began a 19-month occupation of Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay.
In 1975, after nearly four decades of absolute rule, Spain’s General Francisco Franco died, two weeks before his 83rd birthday.
In 1982, in one of college football’s oddest finales, the University of California used five laterals to score a disputed winning touchdown on the last play of a game against Stanford, 25-20.
In 1992, fire seriously damaged Windsor Castle, the favorite weekend home of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II.
In 2000, Lawyers for Al Gore and George W. Bush battled before the Florida Supreme Court over whether the presidential election recount should be allowed to continue.
Ten years ago: Michael Jackson was booked on suspicion of child molestation in Santa Barbara, Calif. (Jackson was later acquitted at trial.) Record producer Phil Spector was charged with murder in the shooting death of an actress, Lana Clarkson, at his home in Alhambra, Calif., in February 2003. (Spector’s first trial ended with a hung jury in 2007; he was convicted of second-degree murder in 2009 and sentenced to 19 years to life in prison.) Suicide bombers blew up trucks in Istanbul, Turkey, at the British consulate and at a London-based bank, killing 32 people. Tens of thousands of demonstrators in London burned an effigy of President Bush to show their anger over the Iraq war. In Miami, trade ministers from across the Americas gave final approval to a framework for the world’s largest free trade bloc as police clashed with hundreds of demonstrators.
Five years ago: Sen. Ted Stevens, the chamber’s longest-serving Republican, delivered his swan song address following his failed re-election bid; he was saluted by his colleagues as a staunch friend and teacher. The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to impose new sanctions aimed at reducing the arms flowing into Somalia and the lawlessness and piracy that were flourishing there. Betty James, co-founder of the company that made the Slinky, died in Philadelphia at age 90.
One year ago: Former boxing champion Hector “Macho” Camacho was shot while sitting in a car in his hometown of Bayamon, Puerto Rico. (Camacho died three days later after doctors removed him from life support.) Elmo puppeteer Kevin Clash resigned from “Sesame Street” amid allegations he sexually abused underage boys. Jack Taylor, a guard for the Grinnell College basketball team, shattered the NCAA scoring record with a 138-point performance as the Division III school beat Faith Baptist Bible, 179-104.
Associated Press
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