India Launches its First Lunar Mission. The unmanned space probe called Chandrayaan-1 was launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation. The probe successfully landed on the Moon on November 14, 2008, making India the 5th country to land a spacecraft on the Moon.

François Duvalier takes office. François Duvalier, also known as Papa Doc, became the President of Haiti.

End of the Long March in China. The Long March, a 6000-mile journey made by members of the Red Army led by Mao Zedong came to an end. The March was undertaken as a way to escape the Nationalist army of Chiang Kai-shek. The end of the March is also known in China as the “union of the three armies”.

International Meridian Conference Adopts Greenwich, England as initial longitudinal meridian. 26 countries participated in the conference which was held in Washington, D.C. In addition to making the meridian passing through the Observatory of Greenwich as the initial meridian for longitude or 0 degree longitude, the conference also defined a universal day which would “begin for all the world at the moment of mean midnight at the initial meridian, coinciding with the beginning of the civil day and date of that meridian; and is to be counted from zero up to twenty-four hours”.

First Person to Jump With a Parachute. French balloonist André-Jacques Garnerin jumped out of a balloon over Parc Monceau in Paris using a silk parachute that he made himself.