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more events on November 12
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2003
Shanghai Transrapid sets a new world speed record (311 mph or 501 kph) for commercial railway systems.
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The first Italians to die in the Iraq War are among 23 fatalities from a suicide bomb attack on an Italian police base in Nasiriya, iraq.
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1997
Ramzi Yousef convicted of masterminding the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
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1996
A Saudi Arabian Airlines Boeing 747 collides with a Kazakh Illyushin II-76 cargo plane near New Delhi, killing 349. It is the deadliest mid-air collision to date (2013) and third-deadliest aircraft accident.
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1990
Sir Timothy John “Tim” Berners-Lee, a British computer scientist, publishes a formal proposal for the creation of the World Wide Web.
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Crown Prince Akihito is formally installed as Emperor Akihito of Japan.
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1987
Boris Yeltsin is fired as head of Moscow’s Communist Party for criticizing the slow pace of reform.
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1971
President Richard Nixon announces the withdrawal of about 45,000 U.S. troops from Vietnam by February.
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1968
Sammy Sosa, pro baseball player from Dominican Republic; only MLB player to hit 60 or more home runs in a single season three times, he was denied entry into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2013 after as-yet unproven allegations he used performance-enhancing drugs.
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The U.S. Supreme Court voids an Arkansas law banning the teaching of evolution in public schools.
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1962
Naomi Wolf, activist, author of The Beauty Myth; a leader in what has been described as the third wave of the feminist movement.
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1961
Nadia Comaneci, Olympic gold medal-winning Romanian gymnast; named one of the athletes of the century by Laureus World Sports Academy (2000).
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1960
The satellite Discoverer XVII is launched into orbit from California’s Vandenberg AFB.
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1957
Tim Samaras, engineer and storm chaser who contributed to scientific knowledge of tornadoes; killed along with his son Paul and meteorologist Carl Young by a tornado with winds of nearly 300 mph near El Reno, Okla,, in 2013.
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1952
Ronald Burkle, business magnate; founded Yucaipa Companies private investment firm and is co-owner of the Pittsburgh Penguins pro hockey team.