NOVEMBER 13th

On this date in:
1775	U.S. forces captured Montreal during the American Revolution.
1789	Benjamin Franklin wrote in a letter to a friend, "In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes."
1856	Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis was born in Louisville, Ky.
1927	The Holland Tunnel linking New York City and New Jersey beneath the Hudson River opened to the public.
1942	The minimum draft age was lowered from 21 to 18.
1969	Vice President Spiro T. Agnew accused network TV news departments of bias and distortion, and urged viewers to lodge complaints.
1974	Karen Silkwood, a technician and union activist at the Kerr-McGee Cimarron plutonium plant near Crescent, Okla., was killed in a car crash.
1977	The comic strip "Li'l Abner" by Al Capp appeared in newspapers for the last time.
1979	Former California Gov. Ronald Reagan announced his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination.
1982	The Vietnam Veterans Memorial was dedicated in Washington, D.C.
1985	A mudslide triggered by the Nevado del Ruiz volcano buried the city of Armero, Colombia, killing some 23,000 people.
1997	The Disney musical "The Lion King" opened on Broadway.
1998	President Bill Clinton agreed to pay Paula Jones $850,000, ending the four-year legal battle over her sexual harassment lawsuit that spurred impeachment proceedings against him. Clinton did not admit guilt.
2001	Afghanistan's ruling Taliban abandoned the capital, Kabul, without a fight, allowing U.S.-backed northern alliance fighters to take over the city.
2002	Saddam Hussein's government agreed to the return of international weapons inspectors to Iraq.
2003	Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore, who had refused to remove a granite Ten Commandments monument from the state courthouse, was thrown off the bench by a judicial ethics panel for having "placed himself above the law."
2007	Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto demanded the resignation of U.S.-backed President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, dashing Western hopes the two would form an alliance to confront strengthening Islamic extremists.
2007	French rail workers went on a nine-day strike over President Nicolas Sarkozy's bid to strip away labor protections.

Article of the day

Vietnam Veterans Memorial dedicated

Near the end of a weeklong national salute to Americans who served in the Vietnam War, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial is dedicated in Washington after a march to its site by thousands of veterans of the conflict. The long-awaited memorial was a simple V-shaped black-granite wall inscribed with the names of the 57,939 Americans who died in the conflict, arranged in order of death, not rank, as was common in other memorials.

The designer of the memorial was Maya Lin, a Yale University architecture student who entered a nationwide competition to create a design for the monument. Lin, born in Ohio in 1959, was the daughter of Chinese immigrants. Many veterans' groups were opposed to Lin's winning design, which lacked a standard memorial's heroic statues and stirring words. However, a remarkable shift in public opinion occurred in the months after the memorial's dedication. Veterans and families of the dead walked the black reflective wall, seeking the names of their loved ones killed in the conflict. Once the name was located, visitors often made an etching or left a private offering, from notes and flowers to dog tags and cans of beer.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial soon became one of the most visited memorials in the nation's capital. A Smithsonian Institution director called it "a community of feelings, almost a sacred precinct," and a veteran declared that "it's the parade we never got." "The Wall" drew together both those who fought and those who marched against the war and served to promote national healing a decade after the divisive conflict's end.

Today Birthdays

Whoopi Goldberg turns 53 years old today.

AP Photo/Evan Agostini Actress-talk show host Whoopi Goldberg ("The View") turns 53 years old today.

86 Madeleine Sherwood Actress 74 Peter Arnett Journalist 74 Garry Marshall Producer, director 62 Ray Wylie Hubbard Country singer, songwriter 61 Joe Mantegna Actor 60 Sheila Frazier Actress 55 Frances Conroy Actress ("Six Feet Under") 55 Andrew Ranken Rock musician ("The Pogues") 55 Tracy Scoggins Actress 54 Chris Noth Actor ("Law and Order," "Sex and the City") 52 Rex Linn Actor ("CSI: Miami") 49 Caroline Goodall Actress 48 Neil Flynn Actor ("Scrubs") 45 Vinny Testaverde Football player 44 Walter Kibby Rock musician (Fishbone) 41 Jimmy Kimmel Comedian, talk show host ("Jimmy Kimmel Live") 41 Steve Zahn Actor 30 Nikolai Fraiture Rock musician (The Strokes) 28 Monique Coleman Actress ("High School Musical")