Today's Highlight in History:
On Dec. 8, 1987, President Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev signed a treaty at the White House calling for destruction of intermediate-range nuclear missiles.
On this date:
In 1776, during the Revolutionary War, George Washington's retreating army crossed the Delaware River from New Jersey into Pennsylvania.
In 1854, Pope Pius IX proclaimed the Catholic dogma of the Immaculate Conception, which holds that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was free of original sin from the moment of her own conception.
In 1863, President Lincoln announced his plan for the reconstruction of the South.
In 1886, the American Federation of Labor was founded in Columbus, Ohio.
In 1907, Oscar II, the king of Sweden and former king of Norway, died in Stockholm at age 78.
In 1941, the United States entered World War II as Congress declared war against Japan, a day after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
In 1949, the Chinese Nationalist government moved from the Chinese mainland to Formosa as the Communists pressed their attacks.
In 1980, rock star John Lennon was shot to death outside his New York City apartment building by Mark David Chapman.
In 1982, a man demanding an end to nuclear weapons held the Washington Monument hostage, threatening to blow it up with explosives he claimed were inside a van. After a 10-hour standoff, Norman D. Mayer was shot dead by police; it turned out there were no explosives.
In 1986, House Democrats selected Majority Leader Jim Wright to be the chamber's 48th speaker, succeeding Thomas P. "Tip" O'Neill.
Ten years ago: Federal hearings opened in Baltimore into the TWA Flight 800 disaster which had claimed 230 lives. In a $25 billion deal, Swiss Bank and Union Bank of Switzerland announced they would merge.
