Today's Highlight in History:
On Nov. 15, 1806, explorer Zebulon Pike sighted the mountaintop now known as Pikes Peak in present-day Colorado.
On this date:
In 1708, British statesman William Pitt (the Elder) was born in London.
In 1777, the Second Continental Congress approved the Articles of Confederation, a precursor to the Constitution of the United States.
In 1889, Brazil was proclaimed a republic as its emperor, Dom Pedro II, was overthrown.
In 1908, China's Empress Dowager Cixi died two weeks short of her 73rd birthday.
In 1939, President Roosevelt laid the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial in Washington.
In 1948, William Lyon Mackenzie King retired as prime minister of Canada after 21 years; he was succeeded by Louis St. Laurent.
In 1958, actor Tyrone Power died in Madrid, Spain, at age 44 while filming "Solomon and Sheba."
In 1966, the flight of Gemini 12 ended successfully as astronauts James A. Lovell and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin Jr. splashed down safely in the Atlantic.
In 1969, a quarter of a million protesters staged a peaceful demonstration in Washington against the Vietnam War.
In 1988, the Soviet Union launched its first space shuttle, Buran, on an unmanned 3 1/2-hour flight.
Ten years ago: Kwame Ture, the civil rights activist formerly known as Stokely Carmichael, died in Guinea at age 57.
