On Dec. 2, 1777, according to legend, Philadelphia housewife and nurse Lydia Darragh saves the lives of General George Washington and his Continental Army when she overhears the British planning a surprise attack on Washington’s army.
On this day in 1859, abolitionist John Brown is hanged for his raid on Harper’s Ferry. He wrote, “The crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood.”
On Dec. 1, 1955, Rosa Parks refused to obey bus driver James F. Blake’s order that she give up her seat to make room for a white passenger in Montgomery, Alabama, sparking the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
On Nov. 30, 1967, Democratic Senator Eugene J. McCarthy of Minnesota declared he would challenge Lyndon Johnson, the incumbent president of his own party, over the Vietnam War. McCarthy’s strong showing in the 1968 New Hampshire primary drove Johnson from the race.
On this date in 1835, writer Samuel Clemens, known as Mark Twain, was born. On this date in 1874, Winston Churchill was born.
On Nov. 29, 1775, in the hope of winning aid for the American war effort, the Second Continental Congress established a Committee of Secret Correspondence to provide European nations with the Patriots’ interpretation of events in the North American colonies.
On Nov. 28, 1989, with communist regimes in neighboring countries collapsing and growing protests at home, Czechoslovakian Communist Party officials announced they would give up their monopoly on political power. Elections were held the following month ushering in the first non-communist government in over 40 years.
On Nov. 27, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson was informed by the Pentagon that success in Vietnam would require increasing American troop strength there from 120,000 to 400,000. In 1968, the number of U.S. soldiers in Vietnam reached 543,000 – the highest level of the war.