November 21

164 BC – Judas Maccabeus, son of Mattathias, restores the Temple in Jerusalem after retaking the city, and relighting the lamps, keeps them burning from a 1 day supply of oil that lasts 8 days.  This is commemorated by the festival of Hanukkah.

1676 – The Danish astronomer Ole Rømer presents the first quantitative measurements of the speed of light.

1783 – In Paris, Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and François Laurent d’Arlandes make the first untethered hot air balloon flight.

1789 – North Carolina ratifies the United States Constitution and is admitted as the 12th U.S. state.

1877 – Thomas Edison announces his invention of the phonograph

1902 – The Philadelphia Football Athletics defeats the Kanaweola Athletic Club of Elmira, New York, 39–0, at Elmira, in the first professional American football night game.

1905 – Albert Einstein publishes 4 papers in the German science journal Annalen der Physik., one of which; Ist die Trägheit eines Körpers von seinem Energieinhalt abhängig? – “Does the Inertia of an object Depend Upon Its Energy Content?” – leads to the mass/energy equivalence formula, E = mc²

1922 – Rebecca Latimer Felton of Georgia takes the oath of office, becoming the first female Senator.

1943 – During World War II, continuing operations in the Gilbert Islands, a company sized element of U.S. Marines offload from the submarine USS Nautilus to assault Abemama Atoll, 94 miles southeast of Tarawa.

1944 – On combat patrol in the Taiwan Strait during World War II, the crew of the American submarine SS-315, USS Sealion becomes the only one to sink a battleship when they torpedo the IJN Kongō. 

1945 – Members of the the United Auto Workers begin labor strikes at 92 General Motors plants in 50 cities.

1953 – The Natural History Museum in London announces that the “Piltdown Man” skull is a hoax.

1963 – Robert Stroud the ‘Birdman of Alcatraz’ dies, completing his life sentence in solitary confinement for murder at the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri

1964 – The Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge, connecting Staten Island and Brooklyn, opens to traffic. At the time it is the world’s longest bridge span.

1969 – The first permanent ARPANET link is established between UCLA and the Stanford Research Institute .

1970 – In Operation Ivory Coast, a joint U.S. Air Force and Army team raids the Sơn Tây prisoner of war camp 23 miles west of Hanoi in North Vietnam, in an attempt to free American prisoners of war believed to be held there. The failure to detect the removal of the prisoners prior to the raid leads to a major reorganization of the U.S. intelligence community.

1979 – The United States Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan, is attacked by a mob and set on fire, killing 2 U.S. service members, Marine Security Guard Corporal Steven Crowley, and Army Chief Warrant Officer Bryan Ellis

1980 – A fire breaks out at the MGM Grand Hotel in Paradise, Nevada killing 87 people and injuring more than 650.

1985 – U.S. Navy intelligence analyst Jonathan Pollard is arrested for spying after being caught giving Israel classified information on Arab nations

1992 – A major tornado outbreak, the largest tornado ever to occur in the US during November, spawns over 100 tornadoes through the southeast and midwest over a period of 3 days, causing 26 deaths and over $300 million in damage,

1995 – The Dayton Agreement is initialed at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, at Dayton, Ohio, ending 3 1/2 years of war between Bosnia and Herzegovina of the former Yugoslavia.

2002 – NATO invites Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia to become members.

2019 – Tesla introduces the SUV Cybertruck.

2021 – A man driving an SUV plows through a Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin, killing 6 people and injuring 62.  A little less than a year later, he is convicted at trial and sentenced to 6 terms of life imprisonment without parole, to be served consecutively.