2011 - Marco Simoncelli, Italian motorcycle road racer (b. 1987)
Events
425 - Valentinian III is elevated as Roman Emperor, at the age of 6.
502 - The Synodus Palmaris, called by Gothic king Theodoric the Great, discharges Pope Symmachus of all charges, thus ending the schism of Antipope Laurentius.
1086 - At the Battle of az-Zallaqah, the army of Yusuf ibn Tashfin defeats the forces of Castilian King Alfonso VI.
1157 - The Battle of Grathe Heath ends the civil war in Denmark. King Sweyn III is killed and Valdemar I restores the country.
1642 - Battle of Edgehill: First major battle of the First English Civil War.
1694 - American colonial forces, led by Sir William Phipps, fail to seize Quebec.
1707 - The first Parliament of Great Britain, i.e., the United Kingdom, meets.
1739 - War of Jenkins' Ear starts: British Prime Minister, Robert Walpole, reluctantly declares war on Spain.
1813 - The Pacific Fur Company trading post in Astoria, Oregon is turned over to the rival British North West Company (the fur trade in the Pacific Northwest was dominated for the next three decades by the United Kingdom).
1855 - Kansas Free State forces set up a competing government under their Topeka, Kansas, constitution, which outlaws slavery in the United States territory.
1861 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln suspends the writ of habeas corpus in Washington, D.C., for all military-related cases.
1929 - Great Depression: After a steady decline in stock market prices since a peak in September, the New York Stock Exchange begins to show signs of panic.
1929 - The first North American transcontinental air service begins between New York City and Los Angeles, California.
1930 - The first miniature golf tournament was completed in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
1935 - Dutch Schultz, Abe Landau, Otto Berman, and Bernard "Lulu" Rosencrantz are fatally shot at a saloon in Newark, New Jersey in what will become known as The Chophouse Massacre.
1941 - World War II: Field Marshal Georgy Zhukov takes command of Red Army operations to prevent the further advance into Russia of German forces and to prevent the Wehrmacht from capturing Moscow.
1941 - Odessa Massacre: 19,000 Jews are shot or burned alive at Dalnik in Odessa, by Romanian and German troops. The next day, another 10,000 Jews are killed. Romanian Lieutenant-Colonel Nicolae Deleanu administered the executions.
1942 - World War II: The Second Battle of El Alamein starts
1942 - All 12 passengers and crewmen aboard an American Airlines DC-3 airliner are killed when it is struck by a U.S. Army Air Forces bomber near Palm Springs, California. Amongst the victims is award-winning composer and songwriter Ralph Rainger ("Thanks for the Memory", "Love in Bloom", "Blue Hawaii").
1942 - The Battle for Henderson Field begins during the Guadalcanal Campaign and ends on October 26.
1944 - World War II: The Battle of Leyte Gulf begins
1946 - The United Nations General Assembly convened for the first time, at an auditorium in Flushing, Queens, New York City.
1956 - Thousands of Hungarians protest against the government and Soviet occupation. (The Hungarian Revolution is crushed on November 4).
1958 - The Smurfs, a fictional race of blue dwarves later popularized in a Hanna-Barbera animated cartoon series appear for the first time, in the story Le flute à six schtroumpfs, a Johan and Peewit adventure by Peyo which is serialized in the weekly comics magazine Spirou
1965 - Vietnam War: The 1st Cavalry Division (United States) (Airmobile), in conjunction with South Vietnamese forces, launch a new operation, seeking to destroy North Vietnamese forces in Pleiku in the II Corps Tactical Zone (the Central Highlands).
1973 - The Watergate Scandal: US President Richard M. Nixon agrees to turn over subpoenaed audio tapes of his Oval Office conversations about the scandal.
1973 - A United Nations sanctioned cease-fire officially ends the Yom Kippur War between Israel and Syria.
1983 - Lebanon Civil War: The U.S. Marines barracks in Beirut is hit by a truck bomb, killing 241 U.S. Marines. A French army barracks in Lebanon is also hit that same morning, killing 58 troops.
1989 - The Hungarian Republic is officially declared by president Mátyás Szűrös, replacing the communist Hungarian People's Republic.
1989 - Phillips Disaster in Pasadena, Texas killed 23 and injured 314.
1998 - Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Chairman Yasser Arafat reach a "land for peace" agreement.
2001 - The Provisional Irish Republican Army of Northern Ireland commences disarmament after peace talks.
2002 - Moscow Theatre Siege begins: Chechen terrorists seize the House of Culture theater in Moscow and take approximately 700 theater-goers hostage.
2004 - A powerful earthquake and its aftershocks hit Niigata prefecture, northern Japan, killing 35 people, injuring 2,200, and leaving 85,000 homeless or evacuated.
2010 - In preparation for the Seoul summit, finance ministers of the G-20 agree to reform the International Monetary Fund and shift 6% of the voting shares to developing nations and countries with emerging markets.
2011 - A magnitude 7.2 Mw earthquake jolted eastern Turkey near the city of Van, killing 604 people, and damaging about 2,200 buildings.
