历史上的今天:11月17日

Today's Highlight in History:
On November 17th, 1800, Congress held its first session in Washington in the partially¹ completed Capitol building.

On this date:
In 1558, Elizabeth the First ascended²（上升，攀登） the English throne upon the death of Queen Mary.

In 1869, the Suez Canal opened in Egypt.

In 1917, sculptor³（雕刻家） August Rodin died in Meudon, France.

In 1925, actor Rock Hudson was born in Winnetka, Illinois.

In 1934, Lyndon Baines Johnson married Claudia Alta Taylor, better known as "Lady Bird."

In 1962, Washington's Dulles International Airport was dedicated⁴ by President Kennedy.

In 1970, the Soviet⁵ Union landed an unmanned, remote-controlled vehicle on the moon, the "Lunokhod One."

In 1973, President Nixon told Associated Press managing editors meeting in Orlando, Florida, "People have got to know whether or not their president is a crook⁶（恶棍）. Well, I'm not a crook."

In 1979, Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini ordered the release of 13 female and black American hostages being held at the US Embassy in Tehran.

In 1997, 62 people, most of them foreign tourists, were killed when six militants⁷ opened fire at the Temple of Hatshepsut in Luxor, Egypt; the attackers were killed by police.

Ten years ago: President Bush, on the first visit to Czechoslovakia by a US president, told a cheering crowd of 100,000 in Prague that "America will stand with you" through hard times ahead.

Five years ago: The commander of US forces in the Pacific called the rape⁸ of a 12-year-old Okinawan girl "absolutely stupid" and said in Washington the incident could have been avoided if the US servicemen involved had simply paid for sex. (Admiral Richard C. Macke later apologized for his remarks, and took early retirement⁹.)

One year ago: Officials close to the investigation¹⁰ into the crash of EgyptAir Flight 990 said a relief co-pilot alone in the cockpit（驾驶舱） had said, in Arabic: "I made my decision now; I put my faith in God's hands" just before the jetliner（喷气客机） began its fatal plunge¹¹. (In Egypt, relatives angrily rejected any notion that relief co-pilot Gameel el-Batouty had deliberately¹² crashed the plane.)