This Day in History

 In 1867, an U.S. Army post was established at Sitka, with General Jefferson C. Davis in command.

 In 1918, Juneau was quarantined to help prevent the spread of Spanish influenza.

 In 1940, radio station KINY-AM moved into the Decker Building in downtown Juneau.

 In 1942, the Alaska Highway, Alaska's first land link with the United States, was announced open for traffic.

 In 1965, an underground nuclear device, with four times the power of the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was detonated beneath Amchitka Island in the Aleutians. The blast, registering at 5.7 on the Richter scale, lifted the island a few feet above ground zero.

 In 1983, Alaska time zones were combined as the Alaska Time Zone.

In the nation

 In 1929, "Black Tuesday" descended upon the New York Stock Exchange. Prices collapsed amid panic selling and thousands of investors were wiped out as America's Great Depression began.

 In 1940, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson drew the first number - 158 - in America's first peacetime military draft.

 In 1966, the National Organization for Women was formally organized during a conference in Washington, D.C.

 In 1987, following the confirmation defeat of Robert H. Bork to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court, President Reagan announced his choice of Douglas H. Ginsburg, a nomination that fell apart over revelations of Ginsburg's previous marijuana use.

 In 1997, Chinese President Jiang Zemin met with President Clinton at the White House; the two leaders clashed over China's human rights record, but agreed to end the diplomatic chill between their countries.

 In 2006, the board of trustees of Gallaudet University, the nation's premier school for the deaf, voted to revoke the appointment of incoming president Jane Fernandes, who had been the subject of protests.

In the world

 In 1923, the Republic of Turkey was proclaimed.

 In 1967, Expo 67 in Montreal closed after six months.

 In 1997, the Baghdad government barred Americans from the U.N. disarmament effort in Iraq - a move that outraged chief weapons inspector Richard Butler and prompted him to suspend inspections.

 In 2002, a Minneapolis memorial service for the late Sen. Paul Wellstone turned into a virtual political rally as friends and relatives urged Minnesotans to honor his memory by putting a Democrat in his seat.

 In 2006, a Nigerian Boeing 737 jetliner crashed just after takeoff from Abuja airport, killing 96 of the 105 people on board. Brazil's president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, won re-election in a landslide.