Born On This Day:

• Jean Racine (baptized), 1639
• Benjamin Disraeli, 1804
• Giacomo Puccini, 1858
• Connie Mack, 1862
• Edgard Varese, 1883
• J. Arthur Rank, 1888
• Andre Kostelanetz, 1901
• Kenneth Rexroth, 1905
• Dame Peggy Ashcroft, 1907
• Lady Bird Johnson, 1912
• Gene Rayburn, 1917
• Milton Katseles, 1933
• Hector Elizondo, 1936
• Diane Sawyer, 1945
• Steve Garvey, 1948
• Robin & Maurice Gibb, 1949
• Ralph Fiennes, 1962

Died On This Day:

• Saint Francis Xavier, 1552
• Theodore Rousseau, 1867
• George Eliot, 1880
• Baron Richard von Krafft-Ebing, 1902
• Frances X. Cabrini, 1917
• Ma Rainey, 1939
• Nathaniel West killed, 1940
• Beatrix Potter, 1943
• Josef von Sternberg, 1969
• Darryl F. Zanuck, 1979
• Samuel Beckett, 1989
• Butterfly McQueen, 1995
• Joe Cocker, 2014

Today's Events:

• 1808 - First performance of Beethoven's Fifth and Sixth Symphonies together in Vienna.
• 1849 - Socialist activist Fyodor Dostoevsky, receives last-minute reprive from firing squad; goes on to write "Crime and Punishment."
• 1877 - Thomas Alva Edison brings new device to Scientific American, gives demo of his tin foil phonograph.
• 1882 - Thomas Alva Edison's friend, Ed Johnson, turns on first electrically lighted Christmas tree.
• 1894 - U.S. Golf Association (USGA) formed to standardize rules of game.
• 1894 - Framed Alfred Dreyfus convicted of treason by a French court-martial and sent to Devil's Island.
• 1895 - Willhelm von Rontgen makes first radiograph or X-ray of his wife's hand.
• 1941 - Japanese conquer Wake Island after 15 day battle against 400 U.S. Marines. WWII
• 1946 - Mafia convention at Hotel Nacional, Havana, Cuba; mob decides to eliminate Bugsy Siegel whose Las Vegas Hotel sinks them deep in debt.
• 1956 - First gorilla born in captivity at Columbus, Ohio Zoo; weight 3.5 lbs, named 'Colo.'
• 1964 - James Bond film 'Goldfinger' opens. Grosses $23 million.
• 1984 - Bigoted vigilante Bernhard Goetz shoots four Black teenage boys on New York subway train.
• 1989 - Uprising in Romania; evil murdering Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu overthrown.

Feast Day of Saint:

• Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini

Holiday:

• Day of Rahilla son of Buddha
• Zodiac: Sagittarius ends, Capricornus begins

Non-Specific Holiday:

• ADVENT SUNDAY, Sunday nearest to feast of Saint Andrew (Nov. 30) whether before or after.
• CHANUKKA (Jewish Feast of Lights), eight day holiday beginning on 25th day of lunar month Kislev.
• TSAO CHÜN, Festival of the Kitchen God in China (23rd day of the twelfth moon (or 24th in Kwantung)
• CH'U HSI, Night of the Thirtieth (29th day of the twelfth moon)
• KWANZAA - African American Heritage celebrated December 26 - January 1