What happened on November 15 ?

655 - Battle of Winwaed: Penda of Mercia defeated by Oswiu of Northumbria.

1515 - Thomas Cardinal Wolsey invested as a Cardinal

1533 - Francisco Pizarro arrives in Cuzco, Peru.

1777 - American Revolutionary War: After 16 months of debate the Continental Congress approves the Articles of Confederation.

1791 - The first U.S Catholic college, Georgetown University, opens its doors.

1806 - Pike expedition: Lieutenant Zebulon Pike sees a distant mountain peak while near the Colorado foothills of the Rocky Mountains (it was later named Pikes Peak).

1854 - In Egypt, the Suez Canal, linking the Mediterranean Sea with the Red Sea, is given the needed royal concession by Said.

1864 - American Civil War: Union General William Tecumseh Sherman burns Atlanta, Georgia and starts Sherman's March to the Sea.

1889 - Brazil is declared a republic by Marechal Deodoro da Fonseca and Emperor Pedro II is deposed in a military coup.

1920 - First assembly of the League of Nations is held in Geneva.

1926 - The NBC radio network opens with 24 stations.

1935 - Canada and the United States signed the reciprocal trade agreement in Washington.

1939 - In Washington, DC, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt lays the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial.

1941 - SS chief Heinrich Himmler orders the arrest and deportation to concentration camps of all homosexuals in Germany, with the exception of certain top Nazi officials.

1942 - World War II: Battle of Guadalcanal ends.

1943 - German SS leader Heinrich Himmler orders that Gypsies were to be put "on the same level as Jews and placed in concentration camps." (see Porajmos)

1948 - Louis Stephen St. Laurent succeeds William Lyon Mackenzie King as Prime Minister of Canada. King had the longest combined time (3 terms, 22 years in total) as Premier in Commonwealth of Nations history.

1949 - Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte executed for assassinating Mahatma Gandhi.

1956 - The first film starring Elvis Presley, Love Me Tender, opens.

1958 - Morocco promulgates a press code.

1959 - Four members of the Herbert Clutter Family murdered at their farm outside Holcomb, Kansas.

1960 - The Polaris missile is test launched.

1966 - Gemini program: Gemini 12 splashes down safely in the Atlantic Ocean.

1967 - The only fatality of the X-15 program occurs during the 191st flight when Air Force test pilot Michael J. Adams loses control of his aircraft, and is destroyed mid-air over the Mojave Desert.

1969 - Cold War: The Soviet submarine K-19 collides with the American submarine USS Gato in the Barents Sea.

1969 - Vietnam War: In Washington, DC, 250,000-500,000 protesters staged a peaceful demonstration against the war.

1969 - Dave Thomas opens the first Wendy's fast food restaurant in Dublin, Ohio.

1970 the Soviet Lunokhod 1 moon rover lands on the moon

1971 - Intel releases world's first commercial single-chip microprocessor, the 4004.

1976 - René Lévesque and the Parti Québécois take power to become the first Quebec government of the 20th century clearly in favour of independence.

1978 - A chartered DC-8 crashes near Colombo, Sri Lanka, killing 183.

1979 - A package from the Unabomber Ted Kaczynski begins smoking in the cargo hold of a flight from Chicago to Washington, forcing the plane to make an emergency landing.

1983 - Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is founded.

1985 - A research assistant is injured as a package from the Unabomber addressed to a University of Michigan professor explodes.

1985 - The Anglo-Irish Agreement is signed at Hillsborough Castle by British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Irish Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald.

1987 - Continental Airlines Flight 1713, a Douglas DC-9-14 jetliner, crashes in a snowstorm at Denver, Colorado Stapleton International Airport, killing 28 occupants, while 54 survive the crash.

1988 - In the Soviet Union, the unmanned Shuttle Buran is launched on her first and last space flight.

1988 - Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: An independent State of Palestine is proclaimed by the Palestinian National Council.

1989 - Sachin Tendulkar makes his Test cricket debut playing for India against Pakistan.

1990 - Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Atlantis launches with flight STS-38.

1990 - Producers acknowledge that Milli Vanilli, who won the 1990 "Best New Artist" Grammy Award, did not sing themselves on their album.

2000 - A chartered Antonov AN-24 crashes after takeoff from Luanda, Angola killing more than 40 people

2002 - Hu Jintao becomes general secretary of the Communist Party of China.

2003 - The first day of the 2003 Istanbul Bombings takes place, to be followed by additional bombings on November 20.

2004 - New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey leaves office, three months after resigning due to a gay extra-marital affair. State Senator Richard Codey takes over as interim governor.