Today in History: November 7, first woman elected to Congress

Today is Saturday, Nov. 7, the 311th day of 2026. There are 54 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On Nov. 7, 1916, Jeannette Rankin of Montana won election to the U.S. House of Representatives, becoming the first woman elected to either chamber of Congress.

Also on this date:

In 1811, the Battle of Tippecanoe was fought near present-day Lafayette, Indiana, as a U.S. expeditionary force led by Maj. Gen. William Henry Harrison defeated Native American warriors from Tecumseh’s confederacy.

In 1917, Russia’s Bolshevik Revolution took place as forces led by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin overthrew the provisional government of Alexander Kerensky.

In 1940, Washington state’s original Tacoma Narrows Bridge, nicknamed “Galloping Gertie,” collapsed into Puget Sound during a windstorm just four months after opening to traffic.

In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt won an unprecedented fourth term in office, defeating Republican Thomas E. Dewey.

In 1967, Carl Stokes became the first Black person elected mayor of a major U.S. city, winning the post in Cleveland, Ohio.

In 1972, President Richard Nixon was reelected in a landslide over Democrat George McGovern.

In 1989, L. Douglas Wilder won the governor’s race in Virginia, becoming the first elected Black governor in U.S. history; David N. Dinkins was elected New York City’s first Black mayor.

In 1991, basketball star Magic Johnson announced that he had tested positive for HIV and was retiring.

In 1996, NASA launched the Mars Global Surveyor from Cape Canaveral, Florida, the first successful U.S. mission to the red planet in about two decades. The orbiter became the longest-operating spacecraft sent to Mars at that time before NASA lost contact with it in November 2006.

In 2011, a jury in Los Angeles convicted Michael Jackson’s doctor, Conrad Murray, of involuntary manslaughter for supplying a powerful anesthetic implicated in the pop star's 2009 death. (Murray was sentenced to four years in prison. He served two years and was released in October 2013.)

In 2020, Democrat Joe Biden clinched victory over Republican President Donald Trump as a win in Pennsylvania pushed Biden over the threshold of 270 Electoral College votes. Trump refused to concede.

Today’s Birthdays: Baseball Hall of Famer Jim Kaat is 87. Former singer Johnny Rivers is 83. Singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell is 82. Retired Army general and former CIA Director David Petraeus is 73. Actor Christopher Knight (TV: “The Brady Bunch”) is 68. Rock guitarist Tommy Thayer (KISS) is 66. DJ-producer David Guetta is 58. Actor Yunjin Kim is 52. Actor-comedian Adam DeVine is 43. Actor Algee Smith is 32. Professional boxer Gervonta “Tank” Davis is 32. Pop singer Lorde is 29. Actor Amybeth McNulty is 25.