Events on November 15 54

Justin II succeeds his uncle, Justinian I, as emperor of the Byzantine Empire.

Battle of the Winwaed: Penda of Mercia is defeated by Oswiu of Northumbria.

Battle of Morgarten: The Schweizer Eidgenossenschaft ambushes the army of Leopold I.

Commanded by Francisco Pizarro, Spanish conquistadors under Hernando de Soto meet Inca Empire leader Atahualpa for the first time outside Cajamarca, arranging a meeting on the city plaza the following day.

Francisco Pizarro arrives in Cuzco, the capital of the Inca Empire.

Battle of Zsibó: Austrian-Danish victory over the Kurucs (Hungarians).

The secondly-built Castellania in Valletta is officially inaugurated with the blessing of the interior Chapel of Sorrows.

American Revolutionary War: After 16 months of debate the Continental Congress approves the Articles of Confederation.

The first U.S. Catholic college, Georgetown University, opens its doors.

Pike expedition: Lieutenant Zebulon Pike sees a distant mountain peak while near the Colorado foothills of the Rocky Mountains. (It is later named Pikes Peak.)

American Civil War: Union General William Tecumseh Sherman begins Sherman's March to the Sea.

Brazil is declared a republic by Marshal Deodoro da Fonseca as Emperor Pedro II is deposed in a military coup.

Harry Turner becomes the first player to die from game-related injuries in the "Ohio League", the direct predecessor to the National Football League.

Winston Churchill resigns from his Government, and soon commands the 6th Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers on the Western Front.

First assembly of the League of Nations is held in Geneva, Switzerland.

The Free City of Danzig is established.

Over 1,000 are massacred during a general strike in Guayaquil, Ecuador.

The NBC radio network opens with 24 stations.

The RNLI lifeboat Mary Stanford capsized in Rye Harbour with the loss of the entire 17-man crew.

Thailand has its first election

Manuel L. Quezon is inaugurated as the second President of the Philippines.

In Washington, D.C., US President Franklin D. Roosevelt lays the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial.

World War II: The Battle of Guadalcanal ends in a decisive Allied victory.

The Holocaust: German SS leader Heinrich Himmler orders that Gypsies are to be put "on the same level as Jews and placed in concentration camps"

Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte are executed for assassinating Mahatma Gandhi.

Greek resistance leader Nikos Beloyannis, along with 11 resistance members, is sentenced to death by the court-martial.

The first part of Saint Petersburg Metro is opened.

The murders of the Clutter Family in Holcomb, Kansas, which inspired Truman Capote's non-fiction book In Cold Blood.

Project Gemini: Gemini 12 completes the program's final mission, when it splashes down safely in the Atlantic Ocean.

A Boeing 727 carrying Pan Am Flight 708 crashes near Berlin, Germany, killing all three people on board.

The only fatality of the North American X-15 program occurs during the 191st flight when Air Force test pilot Michael J. Adams loses control of his aircraft which is destroyed mid-air over the Mojave Desert.

Cold War: The Soviet submarine K-19 collides with the American submarine USS Gato in the Barents Sea.

Vietnam War: In Washington, D.C., 250,000-500,000 protesters staged a peaceful demonstration against the war, including a symbolic "March Against Death".

Intel releases the world's first commercial single-chip microprocessor, the 4004.

René Lévesque and the Parti Québécois take power to become the first Quebec government of the 20th century clearly in favor of independence.

A chartered Douglas DC-8 crashes near Colombo, Sri Lanka, killing 183.

A package from Unabomber Ted Kaczynski begins smoking in the cargo hold of a flight from Chicago to Washington, D.C., forcing the plane to make an emergency landing.

Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus declared independence. Recognized only by Turkey.

A research assistant is injured when a package from the Unabomber addressed to a University of Michigan professor explodes.

The Anglo-Irish Agreement is signed at Hillsborough Castle by British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Irish Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald.

In Brașov, Romania, workers rebel against the communist regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu.

In the Soviet Union, the unmanned Shuttle Buran makes its only space flight.

Israeli-Palestinian conflict: An independent State of Palestine is proclaimed by the Palestinian National Council.

The first Fairtrade label, Max Havelaar, is launched in the Netherlands.

Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Atlantis launches with flight STS-38.

The Communist People's Republic of Bulgaria is disestablished and a new republican government is instituted.

A chartered Antonov An-24 crashes after takeoff from Luanda, Angola, killing more than 40 people.

Jharkhand state comes into existence in India.

Hu Jintao becomes General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and a new nine-member Politburo Standing Committee is inaugurated.

The first day of the 2003 Istanbul bombings, in which two car bombs, targeting two synagogues, explode, killing 25 people and wounding about 300.

Al Jazeera English launches worldwide.

Cyclone Sidr hits Bangladesh, killing an estimated 5,000 people and destroying parts of the world's largest mangrove forest, the Sundarbans.

Xi Jinping becomes General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and a new seven-member Politburo Standing Committee is inaugurated.

Hong Kong High Court bans elected politicians Yau Wai-ching and Baggio Leung from the city's Parliament.[1]