What happened on November 8 ?

1519 - Hernán Cortés enters Tenochtitlán and Aztec ruler Moctezuma welcomes him with great pomp as would befit a returning god.

1520 - Stockholm Bloodbath begins: A successful invasion of Sweden by Danish forces results in the execution of around 100 persons.

1576 - Eighty Years' War: Pacification of Ghent - The States-General of the Netherlands meet and unite to oppose Spanish occupation.

1602 - The Bodleian Library at Oxford University is opened to the public.

1620 - The Battle of White Mountain, the first battle in the Thirty Years' War, takes place near Prague, ending in a decisive Catholic victory in only two hours.

1793 - In Paris, the French Revolutionary government opens the Louvre to the public as a museum.

1837 - Mary Lyon founds Mount Holyoke Female Seminary, which would later become Mount Holyoke College

1861 - American Civil War: The "Trent Affair" ? The USS San Jacinto stops the United Kingdom mailship Trent and arrests two Confederate envoys, sparking a diplomatic crisis between the UK and US.

1864 - U.S. presidential election, 1864: Abraham Lincoln is reelected in an overwhelming victory over George McClellan.

1889 - Montana is admitted as the 41st U.S. state.

1892 - U.S. presidential election, 1892: Grover Cleveland is elected over Benjamin Harrison and James B. Weaver to win the second of his non-consecutive terms.

1895 - While experimenting with electricity Wilhelm Röntgen discovers x-rays.

1917 - People's Commissars gives authority to Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin

1923 - Beer Hall Putsch: In Munich, Adolf Hitler leads the Nazis in an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the German government.

1932 - U.S. presidential election, 1932: Franklin D. Roosevelt defeats Herbert Hoover in a landslide victory.

1933 - Great Depression: New Deal - US President Franklin D. Roosevelt unveils the Civil Works Administration, an organization designed to create jobs for more than 4 million of the unemployed.

1935 - A dozen labor leaders come together to announce the creation of the Congress for Industrial Organization (CIO), an organization charged with pushing the cause for industrial unionism.

1935 - Fernand Bouisson becomes Prime Minister of France

1937 - The Nazi exhibition Der ewige Jude ("the eternal Jew") opens in Munich.

1939 - Venlo Incident: Two British agents of SIS are captured by the Germans.

1939 - In Munich, Adolf Hitler narrowly escapes an assassination attempt while celebrating the 16th anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch.

1941 - Albanian Communist Party founded.

1942 - World War II: Operation Torch - United States and United Kingdom forces land in French North Africa.

1942 - World War II: French resistance coup in Algiers, by which 400 Civil French patriots neutralized Vichyst XIXth Army Corps during 15 hours, arrested vichyst generals (Juin, Darlan, etc.), and so allowed the immediate success of Operation Torch in Algiers, then, from there, to the whole French North Africa.

1950 - Korean War: United States Air Force Lt. Russell J. Brown shoots down two North Korean MiG-15s in the first jet aircraft-to-jet aircraft dog fight in history.

1960 - U.S. presidential election, 1960: John F. Kennedy is elected over Richard M. Nixon, becoming the youngest man elected to that office.

1965 - The British Indian Ocean Territory is created, consisting of Chagos Archipelago, Aldabra, Farquhar and Des Roches islands.

1965 - The 173rd Airborne is ambushed by over 1,200 Viet Cong in Operation Hump during the Vietnam War.

1965 - The soap opera Days of Our Lives debuts on NBC in the United States.

1966 - Former Massachusetts Attorney General Edward Brooke becomes the first African American elected to the United States Senate.

1966 - U.S. President Lyndon Johnson signs into law an antitrust exemption allowing the National Football League to merge with the upstart American Football League.

1971 - The fourth album of British rock group Led Zeppelin (Led Zeppelin IV) is released, including one of the group's most well known songs, "Stairway to Heaven".

1973 - The right ear of John Paul Getty III is delivered to a newspaper together with a ransom note, convincing his father to pay 2.9 million USD.

1974 - In Salt Lake City, Utah, Carol DaRonch narrowly escapes abduction by serial killer Ted Bundy.

1979 - Foundation of the Chilean Communist Party (Proletarian Action).

1987 - Remembrance Day Bombing: In Enniskillen, Northern Ireland, an Provisional Irish Republican Army bomb explodes, at a ceremony honouring Britain's war dead, killing eleven people.

1988 - U.S. presidential election, 1988: George H. W. Bush is elected over Michael Dukakis.

1991 - Marion Barry is reelected mayor of Washington, D.C..

1994 - For the first time in 40 years the United States Republican Party takes control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate in midterm congressional elections.

1997 - US president Bill Clinton speaks at a dinner sponsored by the Human Rights Campaign, the USA's largest gay rights organisation.

2002 - Iraq disarmament crisis: UN Security Council Resolution 1441 ? The United Nations Security Council unanimously approves a resolution on Iraq, forcing Saddam Hussein to disarm or face "serious consequences".

2004 - War in Iraq: More than 10,000 U.S. troops and a small number of Iraqi army units participate in a siege on the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah.

2005 - Democratic U.S. Senator Jon Corzine is elected governor of New Jersey.