On This Day: U.S. ends China travel ban

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A tourist takes a picture of a snow sculpture during the 33rd Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival in Harbin, the capital of China’s Northeastern Heilongjiang rovince, on January 7. On November 22, 1972, the U.S. State Department ended a 22-year ban on U.S. travel to China. File Photo by Stephen Shaver/UPI | License Photo
Nov. 22 (UPI) — On this date in history: In 1718, Edward Teach, also known as the pirate Blackbeard, was killed off North Carolina’s Outer Banks during a battle with a British navy force. Advertisement
In 1858, the city of Denver was founded.
In 1935, a Pan American Martin 130 “flying boat” called the China Clipper began regular trans-Pacific mail service. The flight from San Francisco to Manila, Philippines, took 59 hours and 48 minutes.
In 1943, meeting in Cairo, Egypt, President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Chinese Premier Chiang Kai-Shek discuss ways to defeat the Empire of Japan.
In 1950, a train wreck in New York City killed 79 people.
In 1954, the Humane Society of the United States was founded.
File Photo by Bill Greenblatt/UPI
In 1963, U.S. President John F. Kennedy, 46, in the third year of his first term, was assassinated while riding in a motorcade in Dallas. Vice President Lyndon Johnson was sworn in as the nation’s 36th chief executive. Lee Harvey Oswald was charged with Kennedy’s slaying but was killed before he could go to trial.
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In 1972, the U.S. State Department ended a 22-year ban on U.S. travel to China.
In 1977, the Anglo-French supersonic Concorde jetliner began scheduled flights to New York from London and Paris.
In 1988, the U.S. Air Force publicly unveiled the B-2 Stealth bomber for the first time before some 2,500 spectators, including members of Congress and other dignitaries.
In 1989, newly elected Lebanese President Rene Moawad died in bomb blast that also killed 17 other people in Syrian-patrolled Muslim West Beirut.
In 1990, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher resigned after 11 years in office.
File Photo by Rich Lipsk/UPI
In 1993, Mexico’s Senate approved the North American Free Trade Agreement. Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari called it a “triumph.”
In 1997, New Zealanders Robert Hamill and Phil Stubbs arrived in Barbados from the Canary Islands in their boat, Kiwi Challenger, after 41 days, 1 hour and 55 minutes — a record for rowing across the Atlantic.
In 2002, at least 100 people died in riots in northern Nigeria sparked by a religious controversy over the Miss World beauty pageant.
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In 2005, Angela Merkel was sworn in as Germany’s chancellor. She was the first woman and first person from East Germany to lead the country.
In 2010, about 400 people were killed and hundreds injured in a panic-driven stampede on a densely crowded suspension bridge during Cambodia’s Water Festival in Phnom Penh.
In 2016, President Barack Obama awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom posthumously to Grace Hopper for her roles as a pioneering computer scientist and Navy admiral. Also awarded that day were: Tom Hanks, Ellen DeGeneres, Robert De Niro, Robert Redford, Lorne Michaels, Bruce Springsteen, Diana Ross, Cicely Tyson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Michael Jordan, Vin Scully, Elouise Cobell, Bill Gates, Melinda Gates, Frank Gehry, Maya Lin and Richard Garwin.
In 2020, Russian tennis star Daniil Medvedev beat Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Dominic Thiem en route to his first ATP Finals title London.