1779
The College of Pennsylvania becomes the University of Pennsylvania and the first legally recognized university in America.
1789
Thanksgiving is first celebrated in the United States after Congress requested that President George Washington proclaim a “…day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity to peaceably establish a form of government for their safety and happiness…” After several subsequent US Presidents declared a national Thanksgiving, Abraham Lincoln finally made it an annual event with his 1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation. The official date of the holiday was changed from the fifth Thursday in November to the fourth Thursday in November by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939.
1834
Thomas Davenport invents the first commercially successful electric motor, which he used with great ingenuity to power a number of established inventions. He would receive a US patent February 25, 1837.
1895
Alfred Nobel signed his last will, which established the Nobel Prize.
1963
The Centaur II becomes the first flight of space vehicle fueled by a combination of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen when it is launched at 19:03 from Cape Canaveral.
1971
The Soviet Union’s Mars 2 lander becomes the first spacecraft to land on the surface of Mars. It was launched on May 19.
1987
Nintendo releases The Legend of Zelda for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in Europe.
1995
Microsoft releases Internet Explorer 2.0 web browser to compete with the popular Netscape Navigator web browser, which had a virtual monopoly on the web browser market. Microsoft markets the browser as having superior privacy protection.
The Star Trek: Voyager episode “Resistance” first airs. (No. 128) In it, Janeway accepts the help of an insane resistance fighter in order to free her imprisoned crew members. Memory Alpha entry
1996
The website of Nethosting is hacked by “01001000 00110111″. View an archived version of the defaced website.
1998
Sega launches the Dreamcast video game console in Japan. The system features a 200Mhz Hitachi SH-4 RISC processor, 16MB RAM, a 56kbps modem, a 32-bit Yamaha Super Intelligent Sound Processor, a proprietary 1.2 Gigabyte CD-ROM, and the Windows CE operating system. The system is accompanied by the release of five software titles including: Godzilla Generations, July, Pen Pen TriIcelon, Sega Rally 2, and Virtua Fighter 3. Price: ¥29,800 (about US$220)
2000
The Brazilian website of Banco Central do Brasil is hacked by the hacking group “prime suspectz”. The website is hosted on a server running Windows NT. View an archived version of the defaced website.
The E-Stamp Corporation stops selling postage over the Internet and lays off one third of its employees, blaming the cuts on high operating costs.
Martin Schweiger releases Orbiter, a freeware space shuttle simulator for Windows. Unlike other simulators, Orbiter is focused on controlling the shuttle, rather than on the views or destination of the flight. Visit the application’s official website.
Microsoft again denies it is a monopoly or has violated any antitrust laws when it files an appeal to throw out a lower court ruling that would force it to split into two smaller companies.
2001
Acclaim Entertainment releases the puzzle game Super Puzzle Bobble, which is also released under the title Super Bust-A-Move, for the Game Boy Advance.
A hydrogen atmosphere is discovered on the extrasolar planet Osiris (HD 209458b) by the Hubble Space Telescope. It is the first atmosphere ever detected on an extrasolar planet.
2002
The Star Trek: Enterprise episode “Vanishing Point” first airs. (No. 210) In it, Hoshi finds herself invisible after her first trip through the transporter, while the rest of the crew believing she’s dead. Memory Alpha entry
2004
Nintendo announces that over eight hundred thousand Game Boy Advance video game systems were sold over the Thanksgiving week in the US.
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