Sir Walter Raleigh, English adventurer, writer and favorite courtier of Queen Elizabeth I, is beheaded in London, under a sentence brought against him 15 years earlier for conspiracy against King James I. During Elizabeth’s reign, Raleigh organized three major expeditions to America, including the first English settlement in America, in 1587—the ill-fated Roanoke settlement located […]

On October 29, 1901, President William McKinley’s assassin, Leon Czolgosz, is executed in the electric chair at Auburn Prison in New York. Czolgosz had shot McKinley on September 6, 1901; the president succumbed to his wounds eight days later. McKinley was shaking hands in a long reception line at the Pan-American Exhibition in Buffalo, New […]

Black Tuesday hits Wall Street on October 29, 1929 as investors trade 16,410,030 shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day. Billions of dollars were lost, wiping out thousands of investors, and stock tickers ran hours behind because the machinery could not handle the tremendous volume of trading. In the aftermath of […]

On October 29, 1955, almost one month after up-and-coming actor James Dean died in a tragic car crash at the age of 24, Warner Bros. Pictures releases his second major film, Rebel Without a Cause. In the movie, Dean played Jim Stark, a rebellious teenager who moves to Los Angeles, where he clashes with his father, […]

Israeli armed forces push into Egypt toward the Suez Canal, initiating the Suez Crisis. They would soon be joined by French and British forces, creating a serious Cold War problem in the Middle East. The catalyst for the joint Israeli-British-French attack on Egypt was the nationalization of the Suez Canal by Egyptian leader General Gamal […]

On October 29, 1965, nine months after its subject’s assassination, The Autobiography of Malcolm X is first published. The non-traditional autobiography of a singular figure in Black history, the book tells the story and establishes some of the core elements of the legacy of the slain civil rights leader. The idea for the Autobiography came […]

On October 29, 1969, researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, successfully send the Stanford Research Institute a first-of-its-kind electronic message on ARPANET, the forerunner of the modern internet. At the time, what we now call the internet began as a rudimentary experimental computer network, commissioned and funded by the Advanced Research Projects Agency […]

Following several outbursts, the judge orders “Chicago Eight” defendant Bobby Seale gagged and chained to his chair during his trial. Seale and his seven fellow defendants (David Dellinger, Rennie Davis, Thomas Hayden, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Lee Weiner, and John Froines) had been charged with conspiracy to cross state lines with intent to cause a […]

Duane Allman, a slide guitarist and the leader of the Allman Brothers Band, is killed on October 29, 1971 when he loses control of his motorcycle and drives into the side of a flatbed truck in Macon, Georgia. He was 24 years old. After Allman’s death, his band continued to tour and record. In 2004, […]

Nearly 40 years after he became the first American to orbit the Earth, Senator John Hershel Glenn, Jr., is launched into space again as a payload specialist aboard the space shuttle Discovery.

On October 29, 2003, 18-year-old basketball prodigy LeBron James scores 25 points, grabs six rebounds and dishes out nine assists, but his Cleveland Cavaliers lose to the more experienced Sacramento Kings, 106-92. His debut is one of the most impressive in league history—only months earlier, James had graduated from high school. “I was able to […]

On October 29, 2015, the Chinese government officially announces the end of its one-child policy, ending the most extreme state birth control project in history after 35 years. Adapted from a two-child policy instituted in 1970, these extreme measures were deemed necessary due to concerns over the rapidly expanding Chinese population, which had ballooned from […]