On this day in history
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1733: France declares war on Austria over the question of Polish succession.
1789: In Versailles France, Joseph Guillotin says the most humane way of carrying out a death sentence is decapitation by a single blow of a blade.
1845: The U.S. Naval Academy is founded at Annapolis, Md.
1911: The Panama Canal opens.
1941: Soviet troops halt the German advance on Moscow.
1953: The Mutual Defense Treaty between the U.S. and South Korea is signed.
1970: The Quebec Provincial Minister of Labour, Pierre Laporte, is kidnapped by terrorists.
1971: The London Bridge, built in 1831 and dismantled in 1967, reopens in Lake Havusu City, Arizona, after being sold to Robert P. McCulloch and moved to the United States.
1985: An Egyptian plane carrying hijackers of the Achille Lauro cruise ship is intercepted by US Navy F-14s and forced to land at a NATO base in Sicily.
2008: Orakzai bombing takes place in Afghanistan: members of the Taliban drive an explosive-laden truck into a meeting of 600 people discussing ways to rid their area of the Taliban; the bomb kills 110.
