Cuban Missile Crisis begins – Chicago Tribune

Today is Thursday, October 16th, day 289 of 2025. There are 76 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On October 16, 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis began when President John F. Kennedy was informed that intelligence photographs had revealed the presence of Soviet nuclear missile sites in Cuba.

Also on this day:

American lexicographer Noah Webster was born in 1758 in Hartford, Connecticut.

In 1793, Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, was beheaded during the French Revolution.

In 1859, radical abolitionist John Brown led an unsuccessful raid on the U.S. arsenal at Harpers Ferry in what was then western Virginia. The raid failed to provoke Brown's planned slave rebellion, but it did increase hostility between the North and South, leading to the Civil War. (Ten of Brown's men were killed, the rest fled, and Brown and six of his followers were captured and executed.)

In 1934, the Chinese Communists, besieged by the Nationalists, began their year-long “long march” from southeast to northwest China.

In 1964, China detonated its first atomic bomb, codenamed “596”, at the Lop Nur test site.

In 1968, American athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos caused controversy at the Mexico City Olympics by giving the “Black Power” salute during the victory ceremony after they won gold and bronze medals in the 200 meters.

In 1978, the College of Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church chose Cardinal Karol Wojtyła as the new Pope; he took the name John Paul II.

In 1984, Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu was named winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for his decades of nonviolent struggle for racial equality in South Africa.

In 1987, 18-month-old Jessica McClure was pulled from an abandoned well in Midland, Texas, after being stuck there for more than two days. Efforts to save “Baby Jessica” have captured the nation's attention.

In 1991, a gunman opened fire at Luby's Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas, killing 23 people before killing himself.

In 1995, Washington, D.C. hosted the Million Man March, a gathering of black men to promote unity in the face of economic and social issues affecting African Americans.