Monday, November 30

Today is Monday, November 30, the 334th day of 2009. There are 31 days left in the year.

Highlights in history on this date:

1652 - Dutch defeat English fleet off Dungeness, England.

1710 - Turkey declares war on Russia.

1718 - Sweden's "warrior king" Charles XII dies at Fredrikshald in Norway after being hit by a bullet in the head. The day was later declared a holiday for Swedish nationalists.

1782 - Americans and British sign preliminary peace articles in Paris, ending American Revolutionary War.

1804 - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase goes on trial, accused of political bias. He is acquitted by the Senate.

1838 - Mexico declares war on France after French occupation of Vera Cruz.

1853 - Turkish fleet is destroyed by Russia off Sinope.

1918 - Transylvania proclaims union with Romania.

1934 - Moroccan Nationalist movement is founded.

1938 - Members of Romanian Iron Guard are shot as government attempts to destroy Fascism.

1939 - The Soviet Union invades Finland.

1949 - Chinese Communists capture city of Chungking.

1953 - A U.S. delegate charges before the U.N. General Assembly in New York that Russians headed Korean prison camps where 38,000 Allied troops and Korean civilians were victims of Communist atrocities during the War.

1962 - U Thant of Burma is elected U.N. Secretary-General, succeeding the late Dag Hammarskjold.

1964 - Soviet Union launches spacecraft toward Mars in apparent race with U.S. Mariner 4.

1966 - The former British colony of Barbados gains independence.

1967 - Aden, South Yemen and Protectorate of South Arabia gain independence from Britain.

1971 - U.S. President Richard Nixon authorizes Import-Export Bank to extend credit to Romania, ending three-year ban on U.S. government-backed credits to Communist-bloc nations.

1975 - Four Timorese parties proclaim independence of the territory and its integration with Indonesia.

1980 - The Uruguayan military dictatorship loses a plebiscite to amend the constitution.

1981 - The United States and the Soviet Union open negotiations in Geneva aimed at reducing nuclear weapons in Europe.

1988 - Ethnic clashes between Armenians and Azerbaijanis kill 11 people in five Armenian cities.

1989 - Terrorists kill West German banker Alfred Herrhausen.

1990 - U.S. President George Bush announces he will send Secretary of State Jim Baker to Baghdad to invite the Iraqi foreign minister to the White House in a last effort to reach a peaceful end to the Persian Gulf crisis.

1991 - Fighting escalates in Croatia despite cease-fire as U.N. envoy Cyrus Vance prepares for talks on deploying up to 10,000 U.N. peacekeepers in Yugoslavia.

1992 - The European Community agrees to speed up expulsions of bogus asylum seekers, and turns down an appeal by Germany to share the influx of refugees.

1993 - In Belfast, Northern Ireland, gunmen murder a Catholic factory worker while politicians talk of peace; U.S. President Bill Clinton signs into law the Brady bill, which requires a five-day waiting period for handgun purchases and background checks of prospective buyers.

1996 - Rallying against Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, who annulled opposition victories in local elections, 150,000 people march through the Yugoslav capital of Belgrade.

1998 - The British hospital where General Augusto Pinochet is staying says he doesn't need medical care — a blow to the Chilean ex-dictator's plan to plead he is too ill to stand trial for extradition to Spain.

1999 - The opening of a 135-nation trade gathering in Seattle is disrupted by at least 40,000 demonstrators, some of whom clash with police.

2000 - South and North Korean relatives, separated for half a century, are reunited in the North Korean capital, Pyongyang.

2004 - A powerful storm triggers landslides and flash floods that kill nearly 340 people in the eastern Phillipines, and rescuers race to save people stranded in three coastal towns.

2005 - For the first time, women win elected posts in Saudi Arabia, picking up two seats in a city chamber of commerce after the government forced the body to allow businesswomen to vote and run.

2006 - Sudan's president rejects a proposal to send U.N. peacekeepers to Darfur to boost a beleaguered 7,000-member African Union force, crushing hopes for a quick solution to the violence spreading across central Africa.

2007 - A new form of the deadly Ebola virus is detected in an outbreak in western Uganda that has so far killed 16 people, the World Health Organization says.

2008 - Space shuttle Endeavour returns to Earth after a nearly 16-day mission to repair and upgrade the international space station.

Today's Birthdays:

Jonathan Swift, English satirist (1667-1745); Sir Winston Churchill, British statesman (1874-1965); Mark Twain, U.S. author (1835-1910); Ridley Scott, British film director (1937--); Mandy Patinkin, U.S. actor/singer (1952--); David Mamet, U.S. writer/director (1947--).

Thought For Today:

The real problem is what to do with the problem solvers after the problems are solved — Gay Talese, American author and journalist.