1983: Soviet nuclear false alarm incident: Military officer Stanislav Petrov identifies a report of an incoming nuclear missile as a computer error and not an American first strike.
1981: Baseball: Nolan Ryan sets a Major League record by throwing his fifth no-hitter.
1960: In Chicago, the first televised debate takes place between presidential candidates Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy.
1959: Typhoon Vera, the strongest typhoon to hit Japan in recorded history, makes landfall, killing 4,580 people and leaving nearly 1.6 million others homeless.
1954: Japanese rail ferry Tōya Maru sinks during a typhoon in the Tsugaru Strait, Japan, killing 1,172.
1942: The Holocaust: August Frank, a higher official of the SS concentration camp administration department, issues a memorandum containing a great deal of operational detail in how Jews should be "evacuated".
1687: The city council of Amsterdam votes to support William of Orange's invasion of England, which became the Glorious Revolution.
1687: The Parthenon in Athens is partially destroyed by an explosion caused by the bombing from Venetian forces led by Morosini who are besieging the Ottoman Turks stationed in Athens.
1580: SirFrancis Drake finishes his circumnavigation of the Earth.