On This Day: President George H.W. Bush orders troops to Somalia

Dec. 4 (UPI) -- On this date in history:

In 1881, the Los Angeles Times published its first edition.

In 1918, President Woodrow Wilson became the first sitting U.S. president to travel to Europe. He lead the U.S. delegation to a peace conference ending World War I.

In 1942, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered liquidation of the Works Projects Administration, created during the Great Depression to provide work for the unemployed. The WPA was originally called the Works Progress Administration.

In 1954, the first Burger King fast-food restaurant opened -- in Miami.

File Photo by Stephen Shaver/UPI

In 1971, India joined East Pakistan in its war for independence from West Pakistan. East Pakistan became the republic of Bangladesh.

In 1991, American Terry Anderson was freed by his pro-Iranian captors after six years.

In 1992, President George H.W. Bush ordered U.S. troops into Somalia.

In 1997, health officials in Europe voted to ban most forms of advertising of tobacco beginning in four to five years.

In 2006, John Bolton resigned as U.S. envoy to the United Nations. He had been a harsh critic of U.N. bureaucracy.

In 2009, an Italian jury found U.S. exchange student Amanda Knox and her Italian boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, guilty of murdering her roommate, Meredith Kercher. Knox and Sollecito were acquitted in 2011.

File Photo by Jim Bryant/UPI

In 2012, Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker, responding to a challenge to survive on food stamps, began a week of spending less than $5 a day on food -- posting his grocery receipts on Facebook and Twitter. "This is hard," said Booker, who became a U.S. senator in 2013.

In 2013, Pittsburgh Steelers Coach Mike Tomlin was fined $100,000 by the NFL for stepping onto the field and interfering with a kickoff return in a 22-20 loss to the Baltimore Ravens on Nov. 28. Tomlin said it was "an inexcusable blunder on my part."

In 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court allowed President Donald Trump's travel ban for six mostly Muslim countries to take full effect amid ongoing legal challenges.