This Day in History: Nov. 26

On this day, Nov. 26 …

1942: Warner Bros. motion picture "Casablanca," starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, has its world premiere at the Hollywood Theater in New York City.

Also on this day: 

• 1789: Americans observe a day of thanksgiving set aside by President George Washington to mark the adoption of the Constitution of the United States.
• 1825: The first college social fraternity, the Kappa Alpha Society, is formed at Union College in Schenectady, N.Y.
• 1883: Former slave and abolitionist Sojourner Truth dies in Battle Creek, Mich.
• 1917: The National Hockey League is founded in Montreal, succeeding the National Hockey Association.
• 1941: U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull delivers a note to Japan’s ambassador to the United States, Kichisaburo Nomura, setting forth U.S. demands for “lasting and extensive peace throughout the Pacific area.” The same day, a Japanese naval task force consisting of six aircraft carriers leaves the Kuril Islands, headed toward Hawaii.
• 1950: China enters the Korean War, launching a counteroffensive against soldiers from the United Nations, the U.S. and South Korea.
• 1973: President Richard Nixon’s personal secretary, Rose Mary Woods, tells a federal court that she accidentally caused part of the 18-1/2-minute gap in a key Watergate tape.
• 1986: President Ronald Reagan appoints a commission headed by former Sen. John Tower to investigate his National Security Council staff in the wake of the Iran-Contra affair.
• 1991: The Stars and Stripes were lowered for the last time at Clark Air Base in the Philippines as the United States abandoned one of its oldest and largest overseas installations, which was damaged by a volcano.
• 2000: Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris certifies George W. Bush the winner over Al Gore in the state’s presidential balloting by a 537-vote margin.
• 2008: Teams of heavily armed gunmen, allegedly from Pakistan, storm luxury hotels, a popular tourist attraction and a crowded train station in Mumbai, India, leaving at least 166 people dead in a rampage lasting some 60 hours.
• 2008: A Missouri mother on trial in a landmark cyberbullying case is convicted by a federal jury in Los Angeles of three minor offenses for her role in a mean-spirited internet hoax that apparently drove a 13-year-old girl, Megan Meier, to suicide. (However, Lori Drew’s convictions would be thrown out.)

Video

• 2017: Congressman John Conyers of Michigan gives up his leadership position as the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee while denying allegations that he had sexually harassed female staff members. (Conyers ultimately resigns from Congress because of the scandal.)

• 2017: Amid allegations that he groped women in the past, Minnesota Democratic Sen. Al Franken says he feels “embarrassed and ashamed” but that he looks forward to gradually regaining the trust of voters. (Less than two weeks later, Franken would announce his resignation from Congress.)