Events on November 21 55
Year 235
Pope Anterus succeeds Pontian as the nineteenth pope. During the persecutions of emperor Maximinus Thrax he is martyred.
Year 1386
Timur of Samarkand captures and sacks the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, taking King Bagrat V of Georgia captive.
Year 1676
The Danish astronomer Ole Rømer presents the first quantitative measurements of the speed of light.
Year 1783
In Paris, Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and François Laurent d'Arlandes, make the first untethered hot air balloon flight.
Year 1789
North Carolina ratifies the United States Constitution and is admitted as the 12th U.S. state.
Year 1861
American Civil War: Confederate President Jefferson Davis appoints Judah Benjamin Secretary of War.
Year 1877
Thomas Edison announces his invention of the phonograph, a machine that can record and play sound.
Year 1894
Port Arthur, China falls to the Japanese, a decisive victory of the First Sino-Japanese War; Japanese troops are accused of massacring the remaining inhabitants.
Year 1902
The Philadelphia Football Athletics defeated the Kanaweola Athletic Club of Elmira, New York, 39-0, in the first ever professional American football night game.
Year 1905
Albert Einstein's paper that leads to the mass-energy equivalence formula, E = mc², is published in the journal Annalen der Physik.
Year 1910
Sailors on board Brazil's warships including the Minas Geraes, São Paulo, and Bahia, violently rebel in what is now known as the Revolta da Chibata (Revolt of the Lash).
Year 1916
Mines from SM U-73 sink the HMHS Britannic, the largest ship lost in the First World War.
Year 1918
The Flag of Estonia, previously used by pro-independence activists, is formally adopted as the national flag of the Republic of Estonia.
Year 1918
A pogrom takes place in Lwów (now Lviv); over three days, at least 50 Jews and 270 Ukrainian Christians are killed by Poles.
Year 1920
Irish War of Independence: In Dublin, 31 people are killed in what became known as "Bloody Sunday".
Year 1922
Rebecca Latimer Felton of Georgia takes the oath of office, becoming the first female United States Senator.
Year 1927
Columbine Mine massacre: Striking coal miners are allegedly attacked with machine guns by a detachment of state police dressed in civilian clothes.
Year 1942
The completion of the Alaska Highway (also known as the Alcan Highway) is celebrated (however, the highway is not usable by general vehicles until 1943).
Year 1945
The United Auto Workers strike 92 General Motors plants in 50 cities to back up worker demands for a 30-percent raise.
Year 1950
Two Canadian National Railway trains collide in northeastern British Columbia in the Canoe River train crash; the death toll is 21, with 17 of them Canadian troops bound for Korea.
Year 1953
The Natural History Museum, London announces that the "Piltdown Man" skull, initially believed to be one of the most important fossilized hominid skulls ever found, is a hoax.
Year 1959
American disc jockey Alan Freed, who had popularized the term "rock and roll" and music of that style, is fired from WABC-AM radio over allegations he had participated in the payola scandal.
Year 1961
The "La Ronde" opens in Honolulu, first revolving restaurant in the United States.
Year 1962
The Chinese People's Liberation Army declares a unilateral ceasefire in the Sino-Indian War.
Year 1964
The Verrazano-Narrows Bridge opens to traffic. At the time it is the world's longest bridge span.
Year 1964
Second Vatican Council: The third session of the Roman Catholic Church's ecumenical council closes.
Year 1967
Vietnam War: American General William Westmoreland tells news reporters: "I am absolutely certain that whereas in 1965 the enemy was winning, today he is certainly losing."
Year 1969
U.S. President Richard Nixon and Japanese Premier Eisaku Satō agree on the return of Okinawa to Japanese control in 1972. The U.S. retains rights to bases on the island, but these are to be nuclear-free.
Year 1970
Vietnam War: Operation Ivory Coast: A joint United States Air Force and Army team raids the Sơn Tây prisoner-of-war camp in an attempt to free American prisoners of war thought to be held there.
Year 1971
Indian troops, partly aided by Mukti Bahini (Bengali guerrillas), defeat the Pakistan army in the Battle of Garibpur.
Year 1972
Voters in South Korea overwhelmingly approve a new constitution, giving legitimacy to Park Chung-hee and the Fourth Republic.
Year 1974
The Birmingham pub bombings kill 21 people. The Birmingham Six are sentenced to life in prison for the crime but subsequently acquitted.
Year 1977
Minister of Internal Affairs Allan Highet announces that the national anthems of New Zealand shall be the traditional anthem "God Save the Queen" and "God Defend New Zealand".
Year 1979
The United States Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan, is attacked by a mob and set on fire, killing four.
Year 1980
A deadly fire breaks out at the MGM Grand Hotel in Paradise, Nevada (now Bally's Las Vegas). Eighty-seven people are killed and more than 650 are injured in the worst disaster in Nevada history.
Year 1985
United States Navy intelligence analyst Jonathan Pollard is arrested for spying after being caught giving Israel classified information on Arab nations. He is subsequently sentenced to life in prison.
Year 1986
National Security Council member Oliver North and his secretary start to shred documents allegedly implicating them in the Iran-Contra affair.
Year 1992
A major tornado strikes the Houston, Texas area during the afternoon. Over the next two days the largest tornado outbreak ever to occur in the US during November spawns over 100 tornadoes.
Year 1995
The Dayton Agreement is initialed at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, near Dayton, Ohio, ending three and a half years of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Year 1996
Humberto Vidal explosion: Thirty-three people die when a Humberto Vidal shoe shop explodes.
Year 2002
NATO invites Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia to become members.
Year 2004
The second round of the Ukrainian presidential election is held, giving rise to massive protests and controversy over the election's integrity.
Year 2004
Dominica is hit by the most destructive earthquake in its history. The northern half of the island sustains the most damage, especially the town of Portsmouth. In neighboring Guadeloupe, one person is killed.
Year 2004
The Paris Club agrees to write off 80% (up to $100 billion) of Iraq's external debt.
Year 2006
Anti-Syrian Lebanese politician and government minister Pierre Gemayel is assassinated in suburban Beirut.
Year 2013
The first of to become massive protests start in Ukraine after President Viktor Yanukovych suspended signing the Ukraine-European Union Association Agreement.
Year 2014
A stampede in Kwekwe, Zimbabwe caused by the police firing tear gas kills at least eleven people and injures 40 others.
Year 2015
The government of Belgium imposed a security lockdown on Brussels, including the closure of shops, schools, public transportation, due to potential terrorist attacks.
Year ?
Judas Maccabeus, son of Mattathias of the Hasmonean family, restores the Temple in Jerusalem. This event is commemorated each year by the festival of Hanukkah.