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Today in History October 15

533 Byzantine General Belisarius makes his formal entry into Carthage, having conquered it from the Vandals

1892 An attempt to rob two banks in Coffeyville, Kan., ends in disaster for the Dalton gang as four of the five outlaws are killed and Emmet Dalton is seriously wounded.

1914 Congress passes the Clayton Anti-Trust Act, which labor leader Samuel Gompers calls "labor's charter of freedom." The act exempts unions from anti-trust laws; strikes, picketing and boycotting become legal; corporate interlocking directorates become illegal, as does setting prices which would effect a monopoly

1950 President Harry Truman meets with General Douglas MacArthur at Wake Island to discuss U.N. progress in the Korean War.

1964 Nikita Khrushchev is replaced by Leonid Brezhnev as leader of the Soviet Union.

1987 The Great Storm of 1987 strikes the UK and Europe during the night of Oct 15-16, killing over 20 people and causing widespread damage.

1989 Canadian hockey player Wayne Gretzky makes his 1,851st goal, breaking the all-time scoring record in the National Hockey League.

1990 Mikhail Gorbachev, leader of the USSR, receives Nobel Peace Prize for his work in making his country more open and reducing Cold War tensions.

1997Andy Green of the UK becomes the first person to break the sound barrier in the Earth's atmosphere, driving the ThrustSSC supersonic car to a record 763 mph (1,228 km/h).

2003 China launches its first manned space mission, Shenzhou I.

2008 Dow Jones Industrial Average plummets 733.08 points, the second-largest percentage drop in the Dow's history.

2017 Actress Alyssa Milano's tweet “If you’ve been sexually harassed or assaulted write ‘me too’" prompts flood of replies across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter

2019 Record 12 Democratic presidential candidates participate in a live TV debate in Westerville, Ohio

Born on October 15

1920 Mario Puzo, novelist and screenwriter best known for The Godfather.

1924 Lee Iacocca, engineer, businessman; assisted in designing Ford Mustang and Pinto; later, as CEO of Chrysler Corp., he is credited with saving Chrysler from bankruptcy

1942 Penny Marshall, actress, producer, director; Laverne of Laverne & Shirley TV sitcom (1976-83); directed Big (1988), the first film directed by a woman to gross over $100 million in US box office receipts.


Joke of the Day

Proudly showing off his new apartment to a friend late one night, the drunk led the way to his bedroom, where there was a big brass gong.
“What’s that big brass gong for?” asked the friend.
“It’s not a gong. It’s a talking clock,” the drunk replied.
“A talking clock? How’s it work?”
“Watch,” said the drunk. He picked up a hammer, gave the gong an ear-shattering pound and stepped back. Someone on the other side of the wall screamed, “Hey, you jerk! It’s three in the morning!”