On this day: October 30
Orson Welles broadcasts "The War of the Worlds," buffalo wings are born, Ali and Foreman square off in the "Rumble in the Jungle," and Michael Jordan returns to the NBA, all on this day.
1735: John Adams, the second president of the United States, is born in Braintree, Mass. His son, John Quincy Adams, would also become the sixth president of the U.S.
1735: John Adams, the second president of the United States, is born in Braintree, Mass. His son, John Quincy Adams, would also become the sixth president of the U.S.
1831: In Southampton County, Virginia, escaped slave Nat Turner is captured and arrested for leading the bloodiest slave rebellion in United States history. The Aug. 21, 1831, rebellion resulted in 60 white deaths and at least 100 black deaths. Turner would be convicted and sentenced to death on Nov. 5 and hanged six days later.
1868: John Willis Menard of Louisiana is elected in a special election to fill an unexpired term of a deceased congressman, becoming the first African American elected to Congress. When his opponent later contested the outcome, Menard would appeal his case on the floor of the House of Representatives, becoming the first African American to address the chamber while in session. The Committee of Elections ruled in favor of the opponent, although Menard was financially compensated, receiving the same salary that he would have earned as a legislator.
1885: Poet Ezra Pound, whose best-known works include "Ripostes," "Hugh Selwyn Mauberley" and his unfinished 120-section epic "The Cantos," is born in Hailey, Idaho Territory.
1892: Bodybuilder Charles Atlas, best known for the mail-order bodybuilding course he co-created in 1929, is born under the birth name Angelo Siciliano in Acri, Italy.
1918: Aboard the British battleship HMS Agamemnon, anchored in the port of Mudros on the Aegean island of Lemnos, representatives of Great Britain and the Ottoman Empire sign an armistice treaty marking the end of Ottoman participation in World War I. Although the Ottoman Empire had initially intended to stay neutral in the conflict, it ultimately aligned with Germany and entered the war in October 1914.
1932: Film director Louis Malle, best known for the movies "Le Monde du silence," "Atlantic City" and "Au revoir, les enfants," is born in Thumeries, Nord, France. He's seen here at the Cannes Film Festival in 1993.
1938: Orson Welles broadcasts his radio play of H. G. Wells' "The War of the Worlds," causing anxiety in some of the audience in the United States. The first two-thirds of the 60-minute broadcast were presented as a series of simulated news bulletins, which suggested to many listeners that an actual alien invasion by Martians was currently in progress. The episode, which was met with outrage by some listeners, newspapers and public figures, helped secure Welles' fame.
1939: Singer Grace Slick, best known as the lead singer for the rock band Jefferson Airplane, and later incarnations of the band as Jefferson Starship and Starship, is born under the birth name Grace Barnett Wing in Evanston, Ill.
1942: Lt. Tony Fasson, Able Seaman Colin Grazier and canteen assistant Tommy Brown from the British warship HMS Petard (pictured) board the German submarine U-559, retrieving material which would lead to the decryption of the German Enigma code. Grazier and Fasson are inside the boat, attempting to escape, when the U-boat founders and both are drowned. Grazier and Fasson were later awarded the George Cross posthumously and Brown was awarded the George Medal.
1945: Actor Henry Winkler, best known for his role as Arthur "Fonzie" Fonzarelli (left) on the TV sitcom "Happy Days," is born in New York City.
1960: Soccer star Diego Maradona, considered by many experts to be the greatest soccer player of all time, is born in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Maradona (seen here in 2012) would play in four FIFA World Cup tournaments, including the 1986 tournament, where he captained Argentina and led them to their victory over West Germany in the final, winning the Golden Ball award as the tournament's best player.
1961: The Soviet Union detonates the hydrogen bomb Tsar Bomba over the Novaya Zemlya archipelago in the Arctic Ocean north of Russia. At 50 megatons of yield, it is still the largest explosive device ever detonated, nuclear or otherwise.
1964: According to one popularly accepted historical account, buffalo wings are created at the Anchor Bar in Buffalo, N.Y. Making a late night snack for her son and his friends, owner Teressa Bellissimo takes some of the leftover chicken wings from the kitchen, fries them up, coats them with a spicy sauce, and serves them with a side of celery and bleu cheese dressing.
1970: Jim Morrison is sentenced to six months of hard labor and a $500 fine for public exposure and 60 days of hard labor for profanity, stemming from a March 1, 1969, performance by The Doors in which a drunken and verbally abusive Morrison allegedly exposed himself for a brief instance. He's was freed on a $50,000 bond while appealing the conviction, but would die before the appeal could be heard.
1973: The Bosporus Bridge in Istanbul, Turkey, is completed, connecting the continents of Europe and Asia over the Bosporus strait for the first time.
1973: Tom Seaver of the New York Mets becomes the first non-20-game-winner to win a Cy Young Award, going 19-10 and leading the National League in ERA (2.08), complete games (18) and strikeouts (251). It was the second of three Cy Young Awards he would win during his Hall of Fame career.
1974: The "Rumble in the Jungle" boxing match between undefeated world Heavyweight champion George Foreman and former world champion and challenger Muhammad Ali takes place in Kinshasa, Zaire. Ali wins by knocking out Foreman in the eighth round. The fight was originally set to take place in September, but Foreman was injured and cut near his eye during training, pushing the fight back. While the fight took place in the early morning hours of Oct. 30 in Zaire, it was still Oct. 29 when it was shown live in America, as this poster shows.
1978: Actor Matthew Morrison, best known as teacher Will Schuester on the TV show "Glee," is born in Fort Ord, Calif.
1981: Model Ivanka Trump, the daughter Czech model Ivana Trump and business magnate Donald Trump, is born in New York City.
1987: In Japan, NEC releases the first 16-bit (fourth generation) video game console, the PC Engine, which was later sold in other markets, including the United States, under the name TurboGrafx-16.
1995: Quebec sovereignists narrowly lose a referendum to decide whether the province should secede from Canada. The vote is 50.6 percent to 49.4 percent.
2000: Comedian, author and composer Steve Allen, best known as the first host of "The Tonight Show," dies of heart attack following a car accident at the age of 78 in Los Angeles.
2001: Michael Jordan returns to the NBA with the Washington Wizards after more than three years of retirement. The Wizards lose 93-91 to the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden in his first game back.
2001: Michael Jackson's album "Invincible" is released. The album, which included the singles "You Rock My World," "Cry" and "Butterflies," would peak at No. 1 in 11 countries, including the United States (with sales of 363,000 units its first week), the United Kingdom, Australia, France and Switzerland and sell more than 13 million copies worldwide.
2002: Rapper and musician Jam Master Jay, the DJ of the legendary rap trio Run-DMC, is shot and killed in a recording studio in Jamaica, Queens, N.Y. The shooting of the 37-year-old rap star, whose real name was Jason Mizell, remains unsolved a decade later.
2005: Civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks becomes the first woman to lie in honor in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda.
2007: Singer and actor Robert Goulet, whose Broadway debut in 1960's "Camelot" launched an award-winning stage and recording career, dies of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis at the age of 73 while waiting for a lung transplant at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.
