Events, Births and Deaths Happening on this Date

1775

U.S. forces, under the command of Gen. Richard Montgomery, captured Montreal during the American Revolution.

1789

Benjamin Franklin wrote a letter to a friend in which he said, ''In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.''

1789

U.S. President George Washington returns to Washington at the end of his first presidential tour.

1851

The telegraph service between London and Paris started operations.

1927

The Holland Tunnel opened to the public, linking New York City and New Jersey beneath the Hudson River.

1933

In Austin, Minnesota, workers at the packing plant of George A. Hormel and Company hold the first sit-down strike in American labor history.

1940

The Walt Disney animated movie ''Fantasia'' had its world premiere in New York.

1942

The minimum draft age was lowered from 21 to 18.

1945

The Chinese coastal Great Wall town of Shanhaikwan was captured by General Chiang Kai-Shek's troops. This was one of the most significant victories of the nationalists over the communists at this time.

1956

The Supreme Court struck down laws calling for racial segregation on public buses.

1969

Vice President Spiro T. Agnew accused network television news departments of bias and distortion, and urged viewers to lodge complaints.

1969

War moratorium demonstrations occur across the nation.

1969

Britain's first live quintuplets born this century make satisfactory progress at Queen Charlotte's maternity hospital in London.

1977

The comic strip ''Li'l Abner'' by Al Capp appeared in newspapers for the last time.

1982

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is dedicated in Washington, D.C. The names of more than 58,000 lost soldiers are inscribed on a long wall of polished black granite.

1985

A mudslide triggered by the Nevado del Ruiz volcano buried the city of Armero, Colombia, killing some 23,000 people.

1998

President Clinton agreed to pay Paula Jones $850,000, ending the four-year legal battle over her sexual harassment lawsuit that spurred impeachment proceedings against him. Clinton did not admit guilt or apologize.

2000

Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush failed to win a court order barring manual recounts of ballots in Florida. Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris announced she would end the recounting at 5 p.m. the next day.

2001

In the first such act since World War II, US President George W. Bush signs an executive order allowing military tribunals against foreigners suspected of connections to terrorist acts or planned acts on the United States.

2003

Justice Roy Moore, the man who refused to take down the Ten Commandments from an Alabama state justice building, was suspended by Alabama's Court of the Judiciary who unanimously removed him from his post as Chief Justice.

354

Saint Augustine, Christian theologian and philosopher.

1312

Edward III, father of Edward the Black Prince and John of Gaunt.

1850

Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish author

1856

Louis Brandeis, Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

1955

Whoopi Goldberg, American comic actress.

1974

Karen Silkwood, a technician and union activist at the Kerr-McGee Cimarron plutonium plant near Crescent, Okla., was killed in a car crash.

1975

R. C. Sherriff, English writer.

1982

Chesney Allen, a popular British entertainer during the World War II period.