This Day in History
In Alaska
• In 1959, the Juneau Chamber of Commerce recommended that a proposed Southeast Alaska Ferry System be financed as part of the Federal Interstate Road Network.
• In 1962, William Egan was re-elected as governor of the state of Alaska.
• In 1971, the Atomic Energy Commission detonated a five-megaton nuclear warhead beneath Amchitka Island in the Aleutians.
• In 1979, a workroom and the library at the Alaska State Museum in Juneau were closed due to asbestos dust from the insulation.
In the nation
• In 1860, former Illinois congressman Abraham Lincoln defeated three other candidates for the presidency.
• In 1861, Jefferson Davis was elected to a six-year term as president of the Confederacy.
• In 1888, Benjamin Harrison won the presidential election, defeating incumbent Grover Cleveland with enough electoral votes, even though Cleveland led in the popular vote.
• In 1900, President McKinley was re-elected, beating Democrat William Jennings Bryan.
• In 1906, Republican Charles Evans Hughes was elected governor of New York, defeating newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst.
• In 1928, in a first, the results of Herbert Hoover's election victory over Alfred E. Smith were flashed onto an electric sign outside the New York Times building.
• In 1956, President Eisenhower won re-election, defeating Democrat Adlai E. Stevenson.
• In 1962, Democrat Edward M. Kennedy was elected senator from Massachusetts.
• In 1976, Benjamin L. Hooks was chosen to be the new executive director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, succeeding Roy Wilkins.