THIS WEEK
IN HISTORY
November
26 - December 2, 1999
On
November 28, 1520, a Portuguese navigator named Ferdinand Magellan became
the first explorer to reach the Pacific Ocean from the Atlantic Ocean.
Magellan set sail from Spain on September 20, 1520 with five ships and
285 men. His mission was to find a western passageway to the Spice Islands
in Indonesia. Magellan's journey landed on the island of Guam on March
6, 1521. He then continued onto the Phillippines. On April 27, 1521,
Magellan was killed by natives of Mactan Island. His ships sailed on
without him and in 1522, one of the original ships landed back in Spain.
The ship that made it back to Spain completed the first sail around
the entire world.
Have
you read the classic book Little Women? This popular children's book
was written by Louisa May Alcott. She was born on Novmber 29, 1832.
Ms. Alcott started out writing stories and poems. By age 15, she was
writing and producing plays. Other famous books she has written include:
Little Men, Jo's Boys, and Rose in Bloom.
On
November 28, 1893, women were first given the right to vote. The first
place that women were allowed to vote in an election was New Zealand.
Australian women were the next permitted to vote followed by several
Scandinavian countries. The United States allowed women to vote in 1920.
By the end of World War II almost all women in the world could vote.
To this day the women of Kuwait are still not permitted to vote in elections.
Your
parents may say that one of the great guitar players of the 1960's was
Jimi Hendrix. November 27, 1942 was his birthday. Hendrix was a breathtaking
performer who was able to combine rock and blues tunes with unbelievable
guitar talent. Hendrix was famous in Europe before he found American
fame in 1967.
Rosa
Parks was arrested on December 1, 1955 while riding a Montgomery, Alabama.
The law in Alabama at the time was that a black person had to give up
his/her seat on a bus for a white person. Ms. Parks was arrested for
refusing to give up her seat for a white man. After she was arrested,
a minister named Martin Luther King, Jr. organized a bus boycott. This
was a very important step in fighting racial segregation.
