November 12
Today is observed internationally as
World Pneumonia Day.
There are
49 days remaining in 2016.
There are
42 days until Christmas.
Events
1439 –
Plymouth, becomes the first town incorporated by the English Parliament.
1892 –
William Heffelfinger becomes the first professional American football player on record, participating in his first paid game for the Allegheny Athletic Association.
1912 – The frozen bodies of
Robert Falcon Scott and his men are found on the
Ross Ice Shelf in Antarctica.
1927 –
Leon Trotsky is expelled from the Soviet Communist Party, leaving
Joseph Stalin in undisputed control of the Soviet Union.
1928 –
SS Vestris sinks approximately 200 miles (320 km) off Hampton Roads, Virginia, killing at least 110 passengers, mostly women and children who die after the vessel is abandoned.
1936 – In California, the
San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge opens to traffic.
1940 – World War II: Soviet Foreign Minister
Vyacheslav Molotov arrives in Berlin to discuss the possibility of the Soviet Union joining the Axis Powers.
1944 – World War II: The Royal Air Force launches 29
Avro Lancaster bombers, which sink the German battleship
Tirpitz, with 12,000 lb
Tallboy bombs off Tromsų, Norway.
1958 – A team of rock climbers led by
Warren Harding (no, not the former POTUS) completes the first ascent of
The Nose on
El Capitan in Yosemite Valley.
1970 – The Oregon Highway Division attempts to destroy a rotting beached Sperm whale
with 1,000 pounds of dynamite, leading to the now infamous
"exploding whale" incident.
1970 – The
1970 Bhola cyclone makes landfall on the coast of East Pakistan becoming the deadliest tropical cyclone in history, killing
300,000 - 500,000 people.
1979 –
Iran hostage crisis: In response to the hostage situation in Tehran, US President
Jimmy Carter orders a halt to all petroleum imports into the United States from Iran.
1980 – The NASA space probe
Voyager I makes its closest approach to
Saturn and takes the first images of its rings.
1981 – Space Shuttle program: Mission
STS-2, utilizing the
Space Shuttle Columbia, marks the first time a manned spacecraft is launched into space twice.
1990 –
Tim Berners-Lee publishes a formal proposal for the
World Wide Web.
1997 –
Ramzi Yousef is found guilty of masterminding the
1993 World Trade Center bombing.
1997 - US singer, keyboard player
Billy Preston was jailed for three years for possession of cocaine.
1999 -
Gary Glitter was sentenced to four months in a Bristol prison after being found guilty of downloading child pornography from the internet. He was released on 11th January 2000.
2001 - The three living former
Beatles met for the last time at
George Harrison's hotel in New York City for lunch. Harrison died two weeks later.
2003 –
Shanghai Transrapid sets a new
world speed record (501 kilometres per hour (311 mph)) for commercial railway systems, which remains the fastest for unmodified commercial rail vehicles.
2008 -
Mitch Mitchell, the British drummer with the
Jimi Hendrix Experience was found dead in his US hotel room aged 61.
2014 – The
Philae lander, deployed from the European Space Agency's
Rosetta probe, reaches the surface of
Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko.
Births
1815 – Elizabeth Cady Stanton; 1840 – Auguste Rodin

; 1897 – Karl Marx♪ ♫(no, not
that Karl Marx,
this one was a composer); 1903 – Jack Oakie; 1922 – Kim Hunter (
'STELLLLLAAA' in
A Streetcar Named Desire); 1929 – Grace Kelly; 1934 – Charles Manson; 1943 – Errol Brown♪ ♫(Hot Chocolate); 1944 – Booker T. Jones♪ ♫(Booker T. & the M.G.'s); 1944 – Al Michaels; 1945 – Neil Young

(CSNY, Crazy Horse, Buffalo Springfield); 1947 – Buck Dharma

(Blue Oyster Cult); 1958 – Megan Mullally ('Karen' on
Will & Grace); 1962 – Jon Dough (porn actor); 1964 – David Ellefson

(Megadeth); 1967 – Michael Moorer

; 1976 – Tevin Campbell♪ ♫; 1979 – Cote de Pablo ('Ziva' on NCIS); 1980 – Ryan Gosling; 1982 – Anne Hathaway; 1987 – Jason Day
Deaths
1035 – Cnut the Great; 1793 – Jean Sylvain Bailly

; 1916 – Percival Lowell; 1981 – William Holden; 1990 – Eve Arden; 1993 – H. R. Haldeman; 1994 – Wilma Rudolph

; 2003 – Jonathan Brandis; 2003 – Penny Singleton ('Dagwood Bumstead's' wife 'Blondie' in 28
Blondie movies, voice of 'Jane Jetson' in
The Jetsons); 2008 – Mitch Mitchell

(Jimi Hendrix Experience)