Today is Saturday, October 17, the 290th day of 2009. There are 75 days left in the year.
1492 _ Columbus sights isle of San Salvador (Watling Island, Bahamas)
1860 _ First pro golf tournament held (Scotland) (Willie Park wins)
1918 _ Yugoslavia proclaims itself a republic
1931 _ Al Capone convicted of tax evasion, sentenced to 11 years in prison
1933 _ Albert Einstein arrives in the U.S., a refugee from Nazi Germany
1945 _ Juan Peron becomes dictator of Argentina
1957 _ French author Albert Camus awarded Nobel Prize in Literature
1977 _ Canada begins regular live TV coverage of parliament
1977 _ West German commandos storm hijacked Lufthansa in Mogadishu, Somalia freeing all 86 hostages and killing three of the four hijackers
1979 _ Mother Teresa of India, awarded the Nobel Peace Prize