Well, I'm going to stick around Rhode Island today. I've been to Newport which I consider to be a tourist trap of sorts but it is still popular and lots of people visit it so I will list some things about this seaport. It has a lot of mansions from Colonial Times along Bellevue Avenue that are pretty neat to visit.

The photos are: 1) the Newport shoreline, 2) the Newport Bridge connecting Newport to Jamestown, 3) historic buildings in Newport, 4) the Naval War College, 5) the Marble House mansion (owned by the Vanderbilts), 6) the Breakers mansion (also owned by the Vanderbilts), and 7) Belcourt Castle (owned by Oliver Hazard Perry Belmont).

Newport is a city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island, United States, about 30 miles (48 km) south of Providence. Known as a New England summer resort and for the famous Newport Mansions, it is the home of Salve Regina University and Naval Station Newport which houses the United States Naval War College, the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, and a major United States Navy training center. The city is the seat of Newport County. Newport was known for being one of the "Summer White Houses" during the administrations of Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy. The population was 26,475 at the 2000 census.

During the American Revolution, Newport was the scene of much activity. One of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, William Ellery, came from Newport. He later served on the Naval Committee. In the winter of 1775 and 1776, the Rhode Island legislature put militia General William West in charge of rooting out loyalists in Newport, and several notable individuals such as Joseph Wanton and Thomas Vernon were exiled to the northern part of the state. In the fall of 1776, the British, seeing that Newport could be used as a naval base to attack New York (which they had recently occupied) took over the city. Because most of the population was pro independence, the British allowed them to leave. The city was repopulated with loyalists and British soldiers. For the next three years, the whole of the Narragansett Bay area became one large battlefield, with Newport being a British fortress.
In the summer of 1778, the Americans began the campaign known as the Battle of Rhode Island. This was the first joint operation between the Americans and the French after the signing of the treaty of alliance. The Americans based in Tiverton, planned a formal siege of the town. However, the French (wanting a frontal assault) refused to take part in the siege. This weakened the American position and the British were able to expel the Americans from the island. The following year, the British, wanting to concentrate their forces in New York, abandoned Newport. In 1780, the French under Rochambeau landed in Newport and for the rest of the war Newport was the base of the French forces in the United States. The first Catholic mass in Rhode Island was said in Newport during this time.
By the time the war ended (1783) Newport's population had fallen from over 9,000 (according to the census of 1774) to less than 4,000. Over 200 abandoned buildings were torn down in the 1780s. Also, the war destroyed Newport's economic wealth, as years of military occupation closed the city to any form of trade. The Newport merchants moved away, some to Providence, others to Boston and New York.

Until 1900, Newport was one of two capitals of Rhode Island, the other being Providence. The state legislature would alternate its sessions between the two cities. Connecticut was the only other state to have more than one capital at one time.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier were married in St. Mary's Church in Newport on September 12, 1953.
Presidents Kennedy and Eisenhower both made Newport the sites of their "Summer White Houses" during their years in office. Eisenhower stayed at Quarters A at the Naval War College, while Kennedy used Hammersmith Farm.
In the 20th century, immigrants from Portugal and the Caribbean began settling in Newport, adding to the rich diversity of the city.
The city has long been entwined with the U.S. Navy. From 1952 to 1973, it hosted the Cruiser-Destroyer Force of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet, and subsequently it has from time to time hosted smaller numbers of warships. It held the campus of the U.S. Naval Academy during the Civil War, when the undergraduate officer training school was temporarily moved north from Annapolis, Maryland. It remains home to the U.S. Naval War College and the Naval Education and Training Command (NETC), the center of Surface Warfare Officer training, and a large division of the Naval Undersea Warfare Center. The aircraft carriers USS Saratoga (CV-60) and USS Forrestal (CV-59) moored at the docks used by the Cruiser-Destroyer Force.
The departure of the Cruiser-Destroyer fleet in 1973 was devastating to the local economy. The population of Newport decreased, businesses closed, and property values plummeted. However, in the late 1960s, the city had began revitalizing the downtown area with the construction of America's Cup Avenue, malls of stores and condominiums, and upscale hotels. Construction was completed on the Newport Bridge. The Preservation Society of Newport County began opening Newport's historic mansions to the public, and the tourist industry became Newport's primary commercial enterprise over the subsequent years.

Today's Jumble (9/30/08):

SIONE = NOISE; SNAPY = PANSY; MYSLOB = SYMBOL; LETTEK = KETTLE

CIRCLED LETTERS = SEPSSOTTL

What it takes to become a ballroom dancer.

"LOTS (OF) STEPS"

Today is National Mud Pack Day. "Cheers" premiers, 1982; "The Flintstones" premiered on ABC, 1960; The Hoover Dam is dedicated, 1935; the last episode of "The Howdy Doody Show" airs on NBC, 1960. (Clarabell finally spoke and said "Goodbye kids."); Tylenol laced with cyanide kills six people in the Chicago, Illinois area, 1982.

Other things on this day in history:

1399 - Henry IV is proclaimed King of England.
1744 - France and Spain defeat the Kingdom of Sardinia at the Battle of Madonna dell'Olmo.
1791 - The Magic Flute, the last opera composed by Mozart premiered at Theater an der Wien in Vienna, Austria.
1791 - The National Constituent Assembly in Paris is dissolved; Parisians hail Maximilien Robespierre and Jérôme Pétion as incorruptible patriots.
1813 - Battle of Bárbula: Simón Bolívar defeats Santiago Bobadilla.
1860 - Britain's first tram service begins in Birkenhead, Merseyside.
1882 - The world's first commercial hydroelectric power plant (later known as Appleton Edison Light Company) begins operation on the Fox River in Appleton, Wisconsin, United States.
1888 - Jack the Ripper kills his third and fourth victims, Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes.
1895 - Madagascar becomes a French protectorate.
1901 - Hubert Cecil Booth patents the vacuum cleaner.
1903 - New Gresham's School officially opened by Field Marshal Sir Evelyn Wood.
1906 - Real Academia Galega, Galician language biggest linguistic authority starts working in Havana.
1927 - Babe Ruth becomes the first baseball player to hit 60 home runs in a season
1931 - Start of "Die Voortrekkers" youth movement for Afrikaners in Bloemfontein, South Africa.
1935 - The Hoover Dam, astride the border between the U.S. states of Arizona and Nevada, is dedicated.
1938 - At 2:00 am, Britain, France, Germany and Italy sign the Munich Agreement, allowing Germany to occupy the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia.
1938 - The League of Nations unanimously outlaws "intentional bombings of civilian populations".
1939 - Britain first evacuates citizens in anticipation of war.
1939 - General Władysław Sikorski becomes commander-in-chief of the Polish Government in exile.
1945 - Bourne End rail crash, Hertfordshire, England killed 43
1947 - The Islamic Republic of Pakistan joins the United Nations.
1947 - The World Series, featuring New York Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers, is televised for the first time.
1949 - The Berlin Airlift ends.
1954 - The U.S. Navy submarine USS Nautilus is commissioned as the world's first nuclear reactor powered vessel.
1955 - Film icon James Dean dies in a road accident, at age 24.
1962 - Mexican-American labor leader César Chávez founds the United Farm Workers.
1962 - James Meredith enters the University of Mississippi, defying segregation.
1965 - General Suharto rises to power after an alleged coup by the Communist Party of Indonesia. In response, Suharto and his army massacre over a million Indonesians suspected of being communists.
1966 - The British protectorate of Bechuanaland declares its independence, and becomes the Republic of Botswana. Seretse Khama takes office as the first President.
1967 - BBC Radio 1 is launched; the BBC's other national radio stations also adopt numeric names. Tony Blackburn presents the first show.
1970 - Jordan makes a deal with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) for the release of the remaining hostages from the Dawson's Field hijackings.
1975 - The Hughes (later McDonnell-Douglas, now Boeing) AH-64 Apache makes its first flight.
1977 - Due to US budget cuts and dwindling power reserves, the Apollo program's ALSEP experiment packages left on the Moon are shut down.
1977 - Philippine political prisoners, Eugenio Lopez, Jr. and Sergio Osmeña III successfully escaped from Fort Bonifacio Maximum Security Prison in the Philippines
1979 - The Hong Kong MTR commenced service with the opening of its Modified Initial System (aka. Kwun Tong Line).
1980 - Ethernet specifications published by Xerox working with Intel and Digital Equipment Corporation.
1982 - Cyanide-laced Tylenol kills six people in the Chicago area. Seven were killed in all. The incident is known as the Tylenol murders.
1986 - Mordechai Vanunu, who revealed details of Israel covert nuclear program to British media, was kidnapped in Rome, Italy.
1989 - Foreign Minister of West Germany Hans-Dietrich Genscher's speech from the balcony of the German embassy in Prague.
1990 - The Dalai Lama unveils the Canadian Tribute to Human Rights in Canada's capital city of Ottawa.
1991 - President Jean-Bertrand Aristide of Haiti is forced from office.
1993 - An earthquake hits India's Latur and Osmanabad district of Marathwada (Aurangabad division) in Maharashtra state leaving tens of thousands of people dead and many more homeless.
1999 - Japan's worst nuclear accident at a uranium reprocessing facility in Tōkai-mura, northeast of Tokyo.
2004 - The first images of a live giant squid in its natural habitat are taken 600 miles south of Tokyo.
2004 - The AIM-54 Phoenix, the primary missile for the F-14 Tomcat, retired from service. Almost two years later, the Tomcat retires.
2005 - The Parliament of Catalonia passes with 120 plus votes and 15 against, the Project of New Catalan Statute of Autonomy, proclaiming in its article 1, "Catalonia is a nation".
2005 - The controversial drawings of Muhammad are printed in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten.
2006 - the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia adopted the Constitutional Act that proclaimed the new Constitution of Serbia.

Where to go today? It's raining in New England so let's go where it's often not raining. Let's visit Naples, Florida. Sallie (STCC visitor) is familiar with Naples.

The photos are: 1) the historic town center of Naples at the intersection of 12th Avenue and 3rd Street, 2) the Naples city dock, 3) the Naples Pier, 4) a close up of the Naples Pier and the beach, and 5) the Sugden Community Theater, home of the Naples Players.

Naples is a city in Collier County, Florida, USA. As of 1 July 2006, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated the city's population at 21,804. Naples is a Principal City of the Naples-Marco Island, Florida Metropolitan Statistical Area, which had an estimated total population of 314,649 on 1 July 2006. Despite being the largest city in Collier County, the city of Naples is not its county seat; rather the county seat is located east of the city in unincorporated East Naples.

Naples was founded during the late 1880s by former Confederate general and Kentucky U.S. Senator John Stuart Williams and his partner, Louisville businessman Walter N. Haldeman, the publisher of the Louisville Courier-Journal. Throughout the 1870s and '80's, magazine and newspaper stories telling of the area's mild climate and abundant fish and game likened it to the sunny Italian peninsula. The name Naples caught on when promoters described the bay as "surpassing the bay in Naples, Italy".

Naples is home to several major land reserves, including the Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary, Everglades National Park, Big Cypress National Preserve, Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge, Ten Thousand Islands National Wildlife Refuge, and Picayune Strand State Forest. The Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary is known not only for its 11,000 acres (45 km²) of landscape and wildlife, but for a two and a half mile length boardwalk winding through the sanctuary . The Naples area is also home to the Naples Zoo at Caribbean Gardens, which dates back to 1919.
The city is served by the Naples Municipal Airport. DayJet provides nonstop flights to many Florida and South Eastern cities and Yellow Air Taxi also provides service to Key West, Florida. Southwest Florida International Airport, in South Fort Myers, Florida, handles the vast majority of commercial air traffic in and out of the region, which over 8 million passengers in 2007.
Naples is home to an estimated 250 Fortune 500 CEOs.[citation needed]
Downtown Naples is home to The Naples Players, and the 5th Avenue South and 3rd Street South shopping districts, which feature a variety of antique shops. Gallery Row, also downtown, is a concentration among the numerous art galleries spread throughout the downtown area. The Village on Venetian Bay is an upscale open-air shopping district on the Gulf coast. Located directly off of Tamiami Trail are the Waterside Shops, an upscale open-air center home to such high-end retailers as Saks Fifth Avenue, Gucci, Tiffany & Co., and Lacoste. A two-story Barnes and Noble is located on site as well. Near downtown on Naples Bay and the Gordon River is the shopping district Tin City. This open-air shopping center specializes in antiques and handmade local novelties. Naples hosts The Oliver Group Champions Cup of the Outback Champions Tennis Series each year. Naples is also the home to swamp buggy races, held three times each year at the Florida Sports Park.
Tourism is a main industry for the City of Naples. Notable resorts and hotels within the city limits include the Ritz-Carlton, the Naples Beach Hotel and Golf Club, La Playa Beach and Golf Resort, the Naples Grande Beach Resort and Club (which will join The Waldorf=Astoria Collection in the fall of 2008.), the Inn on Fifth and the Edgewater Beach Hotel and Club.

Today's Jumble (9/29/08):

CEEPA = PEACE; CLATH = LATCH; FIMITS = MISFIT; LEPHER = HELPER

CIRCLED LETTERS = EATHSFTELE

In for dinner but frequently out all night.

"FALSE TEETH"

Today is Confucius Day. It is also Telly Monster's birthday (this Sesame Street character debuted on this day in 1979).

Other things on this day in history:

522 BC - Darius I of Persia kills the Magian usurper Gaumâta, securing his hold as king of the Persian Empire.
480 BC - Battle of Salamis: The Greek fleet under Themistocles defeats the Persian fleet under Xerxes I.
61 BC - Pompey the Great celebrates his third triumph for victories over the pirates and the end of the Mithridatic Wars on his 45th birthday.
1227 - Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, is excommunicated by Pope Gregory IX for his failure to go on crusade.
1364 - Battle of Auray: English forces defeat French in Brittany; end of the Breton War of Succession.
1567 - The second War of Religion in France breaks out.
1567 - At a dinner, the Duke of Alba arrests the Count of Egmont and the Count of Hoorn for treason.
1650 - Henry Robinson opens his Office of Addresses and Encounters - the first historically documented dating service - in Threadneedle Street, London.
1789 - The U.S. War Department first establishes a regular army with a strength of several hundred men.
1789 - The first U.S. Congress adjourns.
1829 - The Metropolitan Police of London, also known as the Met, is founded.
1848 - Battle of Pákozd: Hungarian forces defeat Croats at Pákozd; the first battle of the War of Independence.
1850 - The Roman Catholic hierarchy is re-established in England and Wales by Pope Pius IX.
1864 - American Civil War: The Battle of Chaffin's Farm is fought.
1885 - The first practical public electric tramway in the world is opened in Blackpool, England.
1907 - The cornerstone is laid at Washington National Cathedral in the U.S. capital.
1911 - Italy declares war on the Ottoman Empire.
1916 - John D. Rockefeller becomes the first billionaire.
1918 - The Hindenburg Line is broken by Allied forces during World War I. Bulgaria signs an armistice.
1924 - Plutarco Elías Calles is proclaimed President of Mexico.
1941 - Holocaust in Kiev, Ukraine: German Einsatzgruppe C starts Babi Yar massacre. According to the Einsatzgruppen Operational Situation Report No. 101, at least 33,771 Jews from Kiev and its suburbs were killed at Babi Yar on September 29 - 30, 1941.
1943 - U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower and Italian Marshal Pietro Badoglio sign an armistice aboard the Royal Navy battleship HMS Nelson off Malta.
1954 - The convention establishing CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) is signed.
1954 - Major League Baseball: Willie Mays of the then New York Giants makes "The Catch" at The Polo Grounds in Game 1 of the World Series.
1957 - 20 MCi (740 petabecquerels) of radioactive material is released in an explosion at the Soviet Mayak nuclear plant at Chelyabinsk.
1960 - Nikita Khrushchev, leader of Soviet Union, disorders a meeting of the United Nations General Assembly with a number of angry outbursts.
1962 - Alouette 1, the first Canadian satellite, is launched.
1963 - The second period of the Second Vatican Council opens.
1964 - The Argentine comic strip Mafalda is published for the first time.
1966 - The Chevrolet Camaro, originally named Panther, is introduced.
1971 - Oman joins the Arab League.
1972 - Sino-Japanese relations: Japan establishes diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China after breaking official ties with the Republic of China.
1975 - WGPR in Detroit, Michigan, becomes the world's first black-owned-and-operated television station.
1979 - Pope John Paul II became the first pope to set foot on Irish soil with his pastoral visit to the Republic of Ireland.
1982 - Tylenol Crisis of 1982 began when the first of seven individuals died in metropolitan Chicago.
1988 - Space Shuttle: NASA launches STS-26, the return to flight mission, after the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.
1990 - Washington National Cathedral finished.
1990 - The YF-22, which would later become the F-22 Raptor, flies for the first time.
1991 - Military coup in Haiti.
1992 - Brazilian President Fernando Collor de Mello resigns.
1995 - The United States Navy disbands Fighter Squadron #84 (VF-84), the celebrated Jolly Rogers.
2001 - The Syracuse Herald-Journal, a U.S. newspaper dating back to 1839, ceases publication.
2003 - Hurricane Juan makes landfall in Nova Scotia.
2004 - The asteroid 4179 Toutatis passes within four lunar distances of Earth.
2004 - The Burt Rutan Ansari X Prize entry SpaceShipOne performed a successful spaceflight, the first of two needed to win the prize.
2005 - US Senate confirms John Roberts to be the next Chief Justice of the United States.
2006 - US Representative Mark Foley resigns after allegations of inappropriate emails to house pages were introduced.
2007 - Calder Hall, the world's first commercial nuclear power station, the magnox reactor and Calder hall was demolished in a controlled explosion.
2007 - Geelong thrash Port Adelaide by 119 points to win its' first VFL/AFL premiership since 1963.

It's off to Paterson, New Jersey (where I often have to go on business).

The photos are: 1) The Great Falls of the Passaic River, 2) Market St. in downtown Paterson, 3) Rook's Castle on Garrett Mountain, 4) the Paterson skyline at dusk, and 5) the Paterson skyline showing the Passaic River canyon (home of many of the mills that onced fluorished in the city).

Paterson is a city in Passaic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the United States 2000 Census, the city population was 149,222. Census population projections indicate a population of 146,545 as of 2007, making it New Jersey's third largest city. It is the county seat of Passaic County. Paterson is known as the "Silk City" for its dominant role in silk production during the later 19th century.
Paterson was originally formed as a township from portions of Acquackanonk Township on April 11, 1831, while the area was still part of Essex County. Paterson became part of the newly-created Passaic County on February 7, 1837. Paterson was incorporated as a city on April 14, 1851, based on the results of a referendum held that day. The city was reincorporated on March 14, 1861.

In 1791, Alexander Hamilton helped found the Society for the Establishment of Useful Manufactures (S.U.M.), which helped encourage the harnessing of energy from the Great Falls of the Passaic, to secure economic independence from British manufacturers. Paterson, which was founded by the society, became the cradle of the industrial revolution in America. Paterson was named for William Paterson, Governor of New Jersey, statesman, and signer of the Constitution. French architect, engineer, and city planner Pierre L'Enfant, who developed the plans for Washington, D.C., was the first superintendent for the S.U.M. project. He devised a plan, which would harness the power of the Great Falls through a channel in the rock and an aqueduct. However, the society's directors felt he was taking too long and was over budget. He was replaced by Peter Colt, who used a less-complicated reservoir system to get the water flowing to factories in 1794. Eventually, Colt's system developed some problems and a scheme resembling L'Enfant's original plan was used after 1846. L'Enfant, meanwhile, brought his city plans with him when he designed Washington, and that city's layout resembles the plan he wanted to develop for Paterson.
The industries developed in Paterson were powered by the 77-foot high Great Falls, and a system of water raceways that harnessed the power of the falls. The city began growing around the falls and until 1914 the mills were powered by the waterfalls. The district originally included dozens of mill buildings and other manufacturing structures associated with the textile industry and later, the firearms, silk, and railroad locomotive manufacturing industries. In the latter half of the 1800s, silk production became the dominant industry and formed the basis of Paterson's most prosperous period, earning it the nickname "Silk City." In 1835, Samuel Colt began producing firearms in Paterson, although within a few years he moved his business to Hartford, Connecticut. Later in the 19th century, Paterson was the site of early experiments with submarines by Irish-American inventor John Holland. Two of Holland's early models — one found at the bottom of the Passaic River — are on display in the Paterson Museum, housed in a former mill near the Passaic Falls.
The city was a mecca for immigrant laborers who worked in its factories as well. Paterson was also the site of historic labor unrest that focused on anti-child labor legislation, and the six-month long Paterson silk strike of 1913 that demanded the eight-hour day and better working conditions, but was defeated by the employers with workers forced to return under pre-strike conditions. Factory workers labored long hours for low wages under dangerous conditions and lived in crowded tenement buildings around the mills. The factories then moved south where there were no labor unions and later overseas.
In 1932, Paterson opened Hinchliffe Stadium, a 9,500-seat stadium named in honor of John V. Hinchliffe, a former Paterson mayor. Hinchliffe originally served as the site for high school and semi-professional athletic events. From 1933–1937, 1939-1945, Hinchliffe was the home of the New York Black Yankees and in 1936 the home of the New York Cubans of the Negro National League. The historic ballpark was also a venue for many professional football games, track and field events, boxing matches and auto/motorcycle racing, including those done by Abbott and Costello. In the 1963, Paterson Public Schools acquired the stadium and used it for public school events until 1997. The Paterson Public Schools neglected the stadium, yet managed to embody a corrupt state of affairs. Currently, Hinchliffe stadium is in a state of disrepair. However, Hinchliffe is one of few Negro League stadiums left standing in the United States. Hinchliffe Stadium is on the National Register of Historic Places.
World War II helped a little, when Paterson played an important part in the aircraft engine industry. By the end of WWII, however, there was a decline in urban areas and Paterson was no exception. Since the 1970s the city has been plagued with high unemployment rates. By 1980, Paterson was one of the most distressed cities in the United States. The city no longer has a single movie theater, its major department stores had closed, and the social indices of despair — childhood AIDS, unemployment, homelessness, illiteracy, and graduation rates — all moved in the wrong direction during the prosperity of the 1990s economic boom. The failing schools have since been taken over by the state.
Once a premier shopping and leisure destination of northern New Jersey, competition from the malls in upscale neighboring towns like Wayne and Paramus have forced the big-chain stores out of Paterson’s downtown. The biggest industries are now small businesses because the factories have moved overseas. However, the city still, as always, attracts many immigrants. Many of these immigrants have revived the city's economy especially through small businesses.
The downtown area was struck by massive fires several times, the most recent of which occurred in 1991. In this fire, a near full city block (bordered on the north and south by Main and Washington Street and on the east and west by Ellison Street and College Boulevard, a stretch of Van Houten Street that is dominated by Passaic County Community College) was engulfed in flames due to an electrical fire in the basement of a bar. The area was so badly damaged that most of the burned buildings were demolished, with an outdoor mall standing in their place. The most notable of the buildings to be destroyed was the Meyer Brothers department store, which was one of the few remaining department stores in the city.

Today's Jumble (9/28/08):

SNEFTA = FASTEN; ABHORR = HARBOR; BELTOG = GOBLET; CASIMO = MOSAIC; TUBECK = BUCKET; FIGYEF = EFFIGY

CIRCLED LETTERS = TNRORGOOAIKTEF

When the countertop salesmanwas paid, he - - -

"TOOK (IT) FOR GRANITE"

Today is National Good Neighbor Day. It is also Ask A Stupid Question Day.

Other things on this day in history:

48 BC - Pompey the Great is assassinated on orders of King Ptolemy of Egypt after landing in Egypt.
351 - Battle of Mursa Major: the Roman Emperor Constantius II defeats the usurper Magnentius.
365 - Roman usurper Procopius bribes two legions passing by Constantinople, and proclaims himself Roman emperor.
935 - Saint Wenceslas is murdered by his brother, Boleslaus I of Bohemia.
995 - Members of Slavník's dynasty - Spytimír, Pobraslav, Pořej and Čáslav are murdered by Boleslaus's son, Boleslaus II the Pious.
1066 - William the Conqueror invades England: the Norman Conquest begins.
1106 - The Battle of Tinchebrai - Henry I of England defeats his brother, Robert Curthose.
1322 - Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor defeats Frederick I of Austria in the Battle of Mühldorf.
1448 - Christian I is crowned king of Denmark.
1542 - Navigator João Rodrigues Cabrilho of Portugal arrives as what is now San Diego, California, United States.
1708 - Peter the Great defeats the Swedes at the Battle of Lesnaya.
1779 - American Revolution: Samuel Huntington is elected President of the Continental Congress, succeeding John Jay.
1781 - American forces backed by a French fleet begin the siege of Yorktown, Virginia, during the American Revolutionary War.
1787 - The newly completed United States Constitution is voted on by the U.S. Congress to be sent to the state legislatures for approval.
1844 - Oscar I of Sweden-Norway is crowned king of Sweden.
1867 - Toronto becomes the capital of Ontario.
1867 - The United States takes control of Midway Island.
1868 - Battle of Alcolea causes Queen Isabella II of Spain to flee to France.
1889 - The first General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM) defines the length of a meter as the distance between two lines on a standard bar of an alloy of platinum with ten percent iridium, measured at the melting point of ice.
1891 - Club Atletico Peñarol is founded under the name of Central Uruguay Railway Cricket Club
1907 - Bhagat Singh one of the most influential revolutionaries of Indian independence movement was born in the Khatkar Kalan village near Banga in the Lyallpur district of Punjab.
1928 - UK passes the Dangerous Drugs Act outlawing cannabis.
1928 - Sir Alexander Fleming notices a bacteria-killing mold growing in his laboratory, discovering what later became known as penicillin.
1939 - Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union agree on a division of Poland after their invasion during World War II.
1939 - Warsaw surrenders to Nazi Germany during World War II.
1941 - Major League Baseball: Ted Williams of the Boston Red Sox finishes the season with a batting average of .406. He is the latest major league player to have a batting average of .400 or better.
1944 - Soviet Army troops liberate Klooga concentration camp in Klooga, Estonia.
1958 - France ratifies a new Constitution of France; the French Fifth Republic is then formed upon the formal adoption of the new constitution on October 4. Guinea rejects the new constitution, voting for independence instead.
1961 - A military coup in Damascus effectively ends the United Arab Republic, the union between Egypt and Syria.
1962 - Paddington tram depot fire destroys 65 trams in Brisbane, Australia.
1971 - UK passes the Misuse of Drugs Act banning the medicinal use of cannabis.
1972 - Canada defeats the USSR in the eigth and final game of the ice hockey Summit Series.
1973 - ITT Building in New York City bombed to protest ITT's involvement in the September 11 1973 coup d'état in Chile.
1975 - The Spaghetti House siege, in which nine people were taken as hostages, takes place in London.
1994 - The car ferry MS Estonia sinks in Baltic Sea, killing 852 people.
1995 - Bob Denard and a group of mercenaries take the islands of Comoros in a coup.
2000 - Al-Aqsa Intifada: Ariel Sharon visits the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.