On this date...

Vesta Stoudt

In 1763, the French and Indian War officially ended. France lost all claims to Canada and gave Louisiana to Spain. France reclaimed Louisiana in 1800 before selling the territory to the United States in 1803.

In 1776, the Patriot ship 'America' was captured on the Cape Fear River by two British ships stationed there, with credit going to HMS Cruizer, commanded by British Capt. Francis Parry.

In 1776, Washington writes to Major General Charles Lee with sympathy for Lee’s gout. He asks to borrow William Palfrey, a Massachusetts officer, because Washington is drowning in paperwork and short of capable “pen-men.”

In 1779, between 250 and 350 North Carolina & Georgia Patriot militia attempted to retake Captain Robert Carr's Georgia militia fort in Wilkes County, from 80 Loyalist Militia, starting on the 8th, but abandoned the siege when they heard that another Loyalist force was on the move nearby.

In 1863, the 1st US fire extinguisher patent was granted to Alanson Crane of Virginia.

In 1870, the City of Anaheim in California incorporated for the 1st time, but disincorporated after two years as the tax burden was too high.

In 1883, a Fire at the uninsured New Hall Hotel in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, killed 71.

In 1915, US President Woodrow Wilson protested to Britain about the use of US flags on British merchant ships to deceive the Germans.

In 1924, Bucky Harris, at 27, becomes youngest major league baseball manager (Washington Senators).

In 1927, US President Calvin Coolidge asked for a second disarmament conference.

In 1939, the American film classic Stagecoach, widely considered to be the first “adult” western, had its world premiere. One of director John Ford's defining movies, it also elevated John Wayne to stardom.

In 1940, the first "Tom and Jerry" cartoon, "Puss Gets the Boot" was created by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera and released in theaters by MGM.

In 1942, American chemist James Franklin Hyde was granted a patent for fused silica, a glass production breakthrough.

In 1942, Glenn Miller and his Orchestra were awarded the first-ever gold record for selling 1 million copies of "Chattanooga Choo Choo."

In 1943, Duct tape was born when Vesta Stoudt, a factory worker packing WWII munitions, wrote FDR outlining—with drawings—her idea to replace weak paper packing tape with a tougher, waterproof cloth version. Impressed, FDR pushed her idea into production.

In 1946, Charles "Lucky" Luciano was deported to Italy and never returned to the United States.

In 1954, President Dwight Eisenhower warned against US intervention in Vietnam.

In 1959, an F4-intensity tornado tore through the St. Louis area, killing 21 people and injuring 345.

In 1961, Walter Piston's 7th Symphony, commissioned by the Philadelphia Orchestra premieres under the direction of Eugene Ormandy; wins 1961 Pulitzer Prize.

In 1962, Francis Gary Powers, the U.S. pilot captured by the Soviet Union during the U-2 Incident in 1960, was exchanged for jailed Soviet informant Rudolf Abel.

In 1966, Ralph Nader, a young lawyer and the author of the groundbreaking book Unsafe at Any Speed: The Designed-In Dangers of the American Automobile, testified before Congress for the first time about unsafe practices in the auto industry.

In 1967, the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, dealing with presidential disability and succession, was adopted as Minnesota and Nevada ratified it.

In 1971, four journalists, including photographer Larry Burrows of Life magazine, Kent Potter of United Press International, Henri Huett of the Associated Press, and Keisaburo Shimamoto of Newsweek, died in a South Vietnamese helicopter operating in Laos. The journalists had been covering Operation Lam Son 719, a limited attack into Laos by South Vietnamese forces, when their helicopter crashed.

In 1981, eight people were killed when a fire set by a busboy broke out at the Las Vegas Hilton hotel-casino.

In 1989, Ron Brown was elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee, becoming the first African-American to head a major U.S. political party.

In 1992, Former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson, accused of raping 18-year-old beauty-pageant contestant Desiree Washington, was found guilty by an Indiana jury. The following month, Tyson was given a 10-year prison sentence, with four years suspended.

In 1996, world chess champion Garry Kasparov lost the first game of a match in Philadelphia against an IBM computer dubbed “Deep Blue.” (Kasparov ended up winning the match, 4 games to 2; however, he was defeated by Deep Blue in a rematch the following year.)

In 2003, Iraq agreed to allow U-2 surveillance flights over its territory, meeting a key demand by U.N. inspectors searching for banned weapons; President George W. Bush brushed aside Iraqi concessions as too little, too late.

In 2007, Gen. David Petraeus took charge of U.S. forces in Iraq.