GOOD MORNING – TODAY IS WEDNESDAY, October 15, the 288th day of 2014 with 77 to follow. Sunrise in the Boston area is @ 6:56 and sunset is @ 6:03. The moon is waning. The morning stars are stars are Jupiter, Uranus & Venus. The evening stars are Mars, Mercury, Neptune & Saturn.
ON THIS DAY IN: 1581 – The first major ballet was staged at the request of Catherine de’ Medici at the palace in Paris.
1582 – The Gregorian calendar was adopted in Italy, Spain, Portugal, and France; 5 Oct became 15 Oct.
1815 – Napoleon began his exile on the island of St. Helena, after suffering a final defeat against a force under the Duke of Wellington.
1878 – Thomas A. Edison founded the Edison Electric Light Co.
1883 – U.S. Supreme Court struck down a significant part of the Civil Rights Act of 1875, saying that only state-imposed discrimination was unlawful.
1914 – Congress passed the Clayton Anti-Trust Act.
1915 – During World War I, Bulgaria allied itself with the Central European Powers.
1946 – Nazi war criminal Hermann Goering, founder of the Gestapo, poisoned himself hours before he was to have been executed.
1951 – “I Love Lucy” premiered on TV.
1961 – Amnesty International, the human rights organization, was established in London.
1964 – Nikita Khrushchev was replaced by Leonid Brezhnev as leader of the Soviet Union.
1965 – First draft card was burned in protest of the U.S.’s involvement in Vietnam.
1966 – President Lyndon Johnson signed a bill creating the Department of Transportation.
1976 – First televised debate between vice-presidential nominees took place, involving Democrat Walter F. Mondale and Republican Bob Dole.
1990 – Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
1991 – U.S. Senate narrowly confirmed the nomination of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, 52-to-48, despite sexual harassment allegations.
1993 – Nelson Mandela and F.W. de Klerk were named winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.
1994 – President Jean-Bertrand Aristide returned to Haiti after three years in exile.
2003 – A Staten Island ferry crashed into a pier amid high winds, killing 11 people and injuring 71 others.