Today in history
1852 — French inventor Henri Giffard makes the first flight in a powered airship,cruising with steam power over Paris.
1869 — Thousands of businesses are ruined in a Wall Street panic that becomes known as Black Friday.
1917 – Ten New Zealand soldiers are killed after being hit by a train on a British railway, following confusion arising from an unscheduled stop.
1932 — The Poona Pact between Hindu religious leaders, forced by Mahatma Gandhi’s hunger strike, gives new electoral rights to ‘‘untouchables’’.
1968 — In the US, the CBS current affairs programme 60 Minutes premieres on television.
1988 — Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson sets a world record of 9.79 seconds to win the men’s 100m sprint gold medal at the Seoul Summer Olympics. He is later stripped of the medal for taking drugs.
1990 — East Germany formally withdraws from Warsaw Pact.
1991 — UN Security Council unanimously orders worldwide arms embargo against Yugoslavia and all warring factions there.
1993 — Nelson Mandela asks the world community to lift economic and diplomatic sanctions against South Africa; Norodom Sihanouk reclaims the Cambodian throne he gave up in 1955; Former Philippine first lady Imelda Marcos is convicted of corruption and sentenced to at least 18 years in jail.
1994 — Officials stop trucks and hand out antibiotics to those fleeing a deadly plague outbreak in western India in an effort to keep the disease from spreading.
2002 — Britain publishes a dossier on Iraq’s weapons programme, which claims Saddam Hussein can launch a weapon of mass destruction at just 45 minutes’ notice.
2003 – New Zealand broadcaster Paul Holmes triggers an uproar after calling United Nations Secretarygeneral Kofi Annan a ‘‘cheeky darkie’’ during a radio-show tirade.
2009 – The death of New Zealand entertainer Sir Howard Morrison, aged 74.
2011 — Vladimir Putin’s decision to reclaim the presidency next year sets up the possibility that he could rule Russia until 2024.
2012 – The attempt to extradite alleged internet pirate Kim Dotcom from New Zealand to the United States is shaken by revelations he had been spied on illegally by NZ.
Today’s Birthdays: F Scott Fitzgerald, US writer (1896-1940); Lord (Howard Walter) Florey, Don Brash, NZ economist, politician and Reserve Bank governor (1940-); Linda Mccartney, Us-born wife of Beatle Sir Paul (1941-1998); Gerry Marsden, British singer (1942-); Liam Finn, New Zealand musician and songwriter (1983-).