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The Niagara Falls Suspension Bridge was the world's first working railway suspension bridge. It spanned 825 feet (251 m) and stood 2.5 miles (4.0 km) downstream of Niagara Falls from 1855 to 1897. Connecting Niagara Falls, Ontario to Niagara Falls, New York, the bridge carried mixed traffic on its two decks across the Niagara River; trains crossed over the river by way of the bridge's upper deck while pedestrians and carriages used the lower. The Suspension Bridge was part of Canadian politician William Hamilton Merritt's vision to promote trade within his country and with its neighbor the United States. On March 18, 1855, a fully-laden passenger train drove across the upper deck at 5 miles per hour (8.0 km/h), and officially opened the completed bridge. Its success proved that contrary to general opinion a safe and operational railway suspension bridge was tenable, and allayed concerns induced by the 1854 collapse of the Wheeling Suspension Bridge. The Suspension Bridge was finally replaced by the Steel Arch Bridge, which was later renamed the Whirlpool Rapids Bridge, on August 27, 1897. (more...)

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That International Rag

• ... that Irving Berlin stuffed towels into a piano while he was composing "That International Rag" (listen) to muffle the sound because other hotel guests made noise complaints?
• ... that Nakamura Yoshikoto, director of the South Manchurian Railway, sponsored his childhood friend, the famed author Natsume Soseki on a publicity jaunt to Manchuria?
• ... that the historic monuments in the Los Angeles Harbor area include a Civil War Powder Magazine, a World War I coastal artillery battery, and the bridge of a World War II heavy cruiser?
• ... that according to John Foxe and Raphael Holinshed, the fate of Lady Jane Grey drove Richard Morgan insane?
• ... that Aerosteon, a 9-metre (30 ft) long bipedal carnivorous dinosaur that lived approximately 84 million years ago, had air-sacs in its bones similar to those in the respiratory systems of modern birds?
• ... that Korean composer and violinist Hong Nan-pa is best known for his song Bongseonhwa written in 1919 which was widely sung during the Japanese occupation of Korea?
• ... that the Great Mosque of Aleppo, built by the Umayyads in 717, is the oldest mosque in Aleppo, Syria?
• ... that the opening theme of the eighth season of the Bleach anime, "After Dark", was provided by the Japanese rock band Asian Kung-Fu Generation?
• ... that in 1947, Thelma Dewitty became not just the first African American hired to teach in the Seattle Public Schools, but one of the first married women as well?
  
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• Luc Montagnier (pictured) and Françoise Barré-Sinoussi, who discovered the human immunodeficiency virus, and Harald zur Hausen, who discovered that human papilloma viruses can cause cervical cancer in women, are announced as winners of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Medicine.
• In rugby league, the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles defeat the Melbourne Storm 40–0, a record-breaking margin, to win the 2008 NRL Grand Final.
• President George W. Bush of the United States signs the revised Emergency Economic Stabilization Act into law after passage in the Congress.
• The U.S. Congress approves the civilian nuclear agreement between the U.S. and India.
• Fifty Somali pirates capture the Ukrainian cargo ship MV Faina, along with its cargo of weapons and ammunition, and 33 T-72 tanks.
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October 7: Double Ninth Festival in the Chinese calendar (2008); Feast Day of St. Osyth

• 1542 – Explorer Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo became the first European to set foot on Santa Catalina Island off the coast of California.
• 1571 – The Ottoman Empire was decisively defeated by the Christian West for the first time, as a multinational fleet led by Don John of Austria crushed the Turkish navy near the Gulf of Corinth in the Battle of Lepanto (painting by Paolo Veronese pictured).
• 1868 – Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, USA opened, with an initial enrollment of 412 students the next day.
• 1949 – East Berlin and the Soviet Zone of Occupied Germany became the German Democratic Republic.
• 1958 – Attempting to control the political instability in Pakistan, President Iskander Mirza suspended the 1956 constitution, imposed martial law, and cancelled the elections scheduled for January 1959.