A Blast From The Past

Today is Nov. 22.

John F. Kennedy was assassinated on this date in 1963.

President Kennedy was shot in the head while riding in an open motorcade in Dallas. The governor of Texas, John Connally, was wounded at the same time. The motorcade raced to the nearest hospital but the president could not be saved.

Within hours, Vice President Lyndon Johnson was sworn in as the 36th U.S. chief executive. Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested for the crime but would be shot to death before he could stand trial. His assailant, Jack Ruby, later died in jail of cancer.

Three American presidents had been assassinated before -- but this was the first time since the advent of broadcasting, and that allowed the public to learn of the shooting before any suspect had been arrested, and indeed before it was known the president had died.

Another nation lost its president on this date in 1989. Lebanon's newly elected president, Rene Moawad, died in bomb blast that also killed 17 other people in Syrian-patrolled Muslim west Beirut.

The same day, 12 U.S. Green Berets were evacuated from the San Salvador Sheraton. They were the last of nearly 100 people trapped when leftist rebels seized the hotel in the capital city of El Salvador.

Margaret Thatcher announced on this date in 1990 that she would step down as British prime minister. She resigned after failing to win a decisive victory in a battle for control of her Conservative Party. Thatcher had been named prime minister in May 1979 and served more than 11 years in office -- the longest tenure of any British prime minister in the 20th century.

The State Department invited Israeli and Arab negotiators to begin bilateral peace talks in Washington, D.C., on this date in 1991. So began a new round of Middle East peace talks.

In another peaceable action, the State Department ended a 22-year ban on travel to China this date in 1972.

It was on this date in 1992 that 10 women who had worked with Sen. Bob Packwood, R-Oregon, accused him of unwelcome sexual advances.

That same day, Woody Allen told the CBS news program "60 Minutes" that Mia Farrow vowed to do something "very nasty" to him before she charged him with sexually abusing their adopted seven-year-old daughter.

It was on this date in 1977 that supersonic Concorde jets began regularly scheduled flights to New York from London and Paris. SSTs were developed jointly by Britain and France.

And New Zealanders Robert Hamill and Phil Stubbs, on this date in 1997, arrived in Barbados from the Canary Islands in their boat, Kiwi Challenger, after 41 days, one hour and 55 minutes. It was a new record for rowing across the Atlantic.

We now return you to the present, already in progress.