United States Historical Events is a daily guide to the important events that shaped America to what it is today. This is a compilation of significant events for the month of November including the birth and death of famous Americans as well as laws promulgated by authorities. The list is constantly updated to incorporate the most recent events.
United States Historical Events in November
| Day | Year | Event |
| 1 | 1952 | The United States detonates the hydrogen bomb, the world’s first thermonuclear weapon. |
| 1 | 1955 | United Airlines Flight 629 exploded over Longmont, Colorado killing all 44 people on board. |
| 2 | 1734 | Birthday: Daniel Boone, a pioneer who is famous for his exploration and settlement of Kentucky. |
| 2 | 1795 | Birthday: James K. Polk, the 11th US president, was born in Pineville, North Carolina. |
| 2 | 1865 | Birthday: Warren Harding, the 29th US president, was born in Blooming Grove, Ohio. |
| 2 | 1889 | North Dakota and South Dakota became the 39th and 40th state respectively to the admitted to the Union. |
| 3 | 1783 | The American Continental Army is disbanded. |
| 3 | 1793 | Birth: Stephen F. Austin, considered as the “Father of Texas” for the successful colonization of the region by bringing 300 families and their slaves from the United States to the Tejas region in 1825. |
| 4 | 1791 | Battle of the Wabash, also called St. Clair’s defeat, considered as the most decisive defeat in the history of the American military by native American Indians. |
| 4 | 1939 | United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders the United States Customs Service to implement the Neutrality Act of 1939 which allows cash-and-carry purchases of weapons by belligerents. |
| 5 | 1895 | The first US patent for automobile was granted to inventor George B. Selden. |
| 5 | 1996 | Proposition 215, or the Compassionate Use Act of 1996 was enacted in California by means of the initiative process. This law permits the use of medical cannabis despite marijuana’s lack of the normal Food and Drug Administration testing for safety and efficacy. |
| 6 | 1798 | The Metropolitan Archdiocese of Baltimore, the premier Catholic archdiocese in the United States, was established. |
| 6 | 1861 | Birth: James Naismith, Canadian-American who is best known as the inventor of basketball in Springfield, Massachusetts. |
| 6 | 1947 | Meet The Press, the longest running television show, makes its debut. |
| 6 | 1971 | The largest U.S. underground hydrogen bomb, code-named Cannikin, was tested on Amchitka Island in the Aleutians by the United States Atomic Energy Commission tests. |
| 7 | 1786 | Founding of the Stoughton Musical Society, the oldest musical organization in the United States. |
| 8 | 1889 | Montana became the 41th state respectively to the admitted to the Union. |
| 9 | 1872 | The Great Boston Fire of 1872 – considered as one of the costliest conflagration in American history. |
| 10 | 1775 | Samuel Nicholas organizes the United States Marine Corps at Tun Tavern in Philadelphia. |
| 10 | 1999 | Samuel Nicholas organizes the United States Marine Corps at Tun Tavern in Philadelphia. |
| 11 | 1889 | Washington became the 42th state to the admitted to the Union. |
| 12 | 1936 | The San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge in California opens to traffic. |
| 13 | 1956 | The Supreme Court of the United States declares Alabama laws requiring segregated buses illegal. The declaration ended the Montgomery bus boycott. |
| 13 | 1986 | US Congress signed into law the Compact of Free Association (COFA), an international agreement establishing and governing the relationships of free association between the United States and the three Pacific Island sovereign states of the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), and the Republic of Palau. |
| 14 | 1784 | Samuel Seabury was consecrated as the first American Episcopal bishop of the Anglican Church in the United States. |
| 14 | 1967 | A patent for ruby laser systems, the world’s first laser was given to American physicist Theodore Maiman. |
| 14 | 1740 | The University of Pennsylvania was established by Benjamin Franklin in Philadelphia. |
| 15 | 1968 | The Cleveland Transit System becomes the first rapid transit system to provide direct transportation service from its major airport to the city’s downtown. |
| 16 | 1907 | Oklahoma became the 46th state to the admitted to the Union. |
| 17 | 1746 | Birth: Robert Livingston, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States; a member of the Committee of Five that drafted the Declaration of Independence, and the first Secretary of Foreign Affairs |
| 17 | 1858 | Founding of the city of Denver in Colorado. |
| 18 | 1886 | Death: Chester Arthur, the 21st US president, died in New York City at age 57. |
| 18 | 1923 | Birth: Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr., the second person and the first American to travel into space and, in 1971, he became the fifth and oldest person to walk on the Moon at age 47. |
| 19 | 1831 | Birthday: James Garfield Jr., the 20th US president, was born in Moreland Hills, Ohio. |
| 19 | 1863 | President Abraham Lincoln delivers his Gettysburg Address, one of the most well-known speeches in history. |
| 20 | 1942 | Birthday: Joseph Biden Jr., the 46th US president, was born in Pennsylvania, United States. |
| 21 | 1789 | North Carolina became the 12th state to the admitted to the Union. |
| 22 | 1963 | Death by Assassination: John Kennedy, the 35th US president, died in Dallas, Texas. |
| 23 | 1804 | Birthday: Franklin Pierce, the 14th US president, was born in Hillsborough, New Hampshire. |
| 24 | 1784 | Birthday: Zachary Taylor, the 12th US president, was born in Barboursville, Virginia. |
| 25 | 1984 | Thirty-six top musicians gather to record Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” at a Notting Hill studio with the goal of raising money for famine relief in Ethiopia. |
| 25 | 2002 | Establishment of the United States Department of Homeland Security as a result of the Homeland Security Act of 2002, enacted in response to the September 11 attacks. |
| 26 | 1778 | Captain James Cook becomes the first European to visit Maui island in Hawaii. |
| 26 | 1784 | The Holy See in Rome established the Apostolic Prefecture of the United States, the earliest Roman Catholic ecclesiastical jurisdiction in the Unites States. |
| 27 | 1839 | Founding of the American Statistical Association in Boston, Massachusetts |
| 28 | 1964 | NASA launches the Mariner 4 probe toward planet Mars. |
| 28 | 1953 | Death: Enrico Fermi, the naturalized American physicist who created the world’s first nuclear reactor, the Chicago Pile-1 that ushered in the nuclear age. |
| 29 | 1877 | Inventor Thomas Edison demonstrates his phonograph for the first time. |
| 30 | 1675 | Cecil Calvert, the founder of Maryland’s first European settlement, died in England. |
| 30 | 1729 | Birth: Samuel Seabury, the first American Episcopal bishop and a leading Loyalist in New York City during the American Revolution |
| 30 | 1999 | Exxon Oil merged with Mobil to become ExxonMobil, the largest oil company in the United States. |
| 30 | 2018 | Death: George H. W. Bush, the 41st US president, died in Houston, Texas. |
RELATED: United States Historical Events in January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, December
