Today in History in 1938 Orson Welles broadcasts his radio play of H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds, causing a nationwide panic.

The On This Day In History archives at “Simple English Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia” contains over 200,000 events, birthdays and deaths from 6,000 years of history. Here is a roundup of a few of them:

October 30 is the 303rd day of the year (304th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 62 days remaining until the end of the year.

EVENTS

758 - Guangzhou is sacked by Arab and Persian pirates.

1226 - Tran Thu Do, head of the Tran clan of Vietnam, forces Ly Hue Tong, the last emperor of the Ly Dynasty, to commit suicide.

1270 - The Eighth Crusade and Siege of Tunis end by an agreement between Charles I of Sicily and the Sultan of Tunis.

1340 - Portuguese and Castilian forces halt a Marinid invasion in the Battle of Rio Soldado.

1470 – Henry VI of England returns to the English throne after Earl of Warwick defeats Yorkists in battle.

1485 – Henry VII of England is crowned King.

1534 - The English Parliament passes the Act of Supremacy, making King Henry VIII of England head of the English Church, a title previously held by the Pope.

1657 - Spanish forces fail to retake Jamaica at the Battle of Ocho Rios during the Anglo-Spanish War.

1813 - French troops surrender at Pamplona, ending Spain's War of Independence.

1817 - The independent government of Venezuela is formed by Simon Bolivar.

1831 - Nat Turner, who led the Slave Rebellion, is detained.

1863 - Danish Prince Wilhelm arrives in Athens to become King George I of Greece.

1864 - The Second War of Schleswig ends: Denmark surrenders its claim to Schleswig, Holstein and Lauenburg, which come under Prussian and Austrian control.

1864 – Helena, Montana is founded after four prospectors discover gold at "Last Chance Gulch."

1880 - Tegucigalpa becomes the capital city of Honduras.

1905 – Tsar Nicholas II of Russia grants Russia's first constitution, creating a legislative assembly.

1918 – The Ottoman Empire signs an armistice with the Allies, ending the First World War in the Middle East.

1920 - The Communist Party of Australia is founded in Sydney.

1921 - The Argentina national football team wins the Campeonato Sudamericana for the first time. The competition later becomes the Copa America.

1922 - Victor Emmanuel III of Italy names Benito Mussolini as Prime Minister.

1925 - John Logie Baird creates the United Kingdom's first television transmitter.

1929 - The Stuttgart cable car is built in Stuttgart, Germany.

1938 – Orson Welles broadcasts his radio play of H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds, causing a nationwide panic.

1941 – World War II: Franklin Delano Roosevelt approves US$1 billion in Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet Union.

1944 – Anne Frank is deported from Auschwitz to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.

1945 - Baseball player Jackie Robinson of the Kansas City Monarchs signs a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers, leading to the breaking of the color barrier in the sport.

1953 - George Marshall wins the Nobel Peace Prize.

1960 - Michael Woodruff performs his first successful kidney transplant in the United Kingdom at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary.

1961 – The Soviet Union detonates the hydrogen bomb Tsar Bomba. It is the largest nuclear device ever detonated. Nikita Khrushchev says that the scientists had planned to make it larger, but had reduced the yield to prevent breaking all the windows in Moscow.

1961 – Due to "violations of Lenin's precepts", it is decreed that Joseph Stalin's body be removed from its place of honour inside Lenin's tomb and buried near the Kremlin wall with a plain granite marker instead.

1965 – Vietnam War: Just miles from Da Nang, United States Marines stop an large attack of NLF forces, killing 56 guerrillas. Among the dead, a sketch of Marine positions was found on the body of a 13-year-old Vietnamese boy who sold drinks to the Marines the day before.

1970 – In Vietnam, the worst monsoon to hit the area in six years causes large floods, kills 293, leaves 200,000 homeless and virtually halts the Vietnam War.

1972 - Two commuter trains collide in Chicago, Illinois, kills 45 people.

1973 - The Bosphorus Bridge in Istanbul is completed.

1974 – "The Rumble in the Jungle": Muhammad Ali knocks out George Foreman in Kinshasa, Zaire to regain the World Heavyweight Boxing championship.

1975 – Prince Juan Carlos becomes Spain's acting head of state, taking over for the country's ailing dictator, Gen. Francisco Franco.

1980 – El Salvador and Honduras sign a peace treaty to put the border dispute fought over in 1969's Football War before the International Court of Justice.

1983 – The first democratic elections in Argentina after seven years of military rule are held.

1983 – An earthquake in eastern Turkey, near Erzurum, kills around 1,300 people.

1985 - The Space Shuttle Challenger lifts off on what would become its final successful mission.

1988 - Ayrton Senna wins his first Formula One title.

1991 – The Madrid Conference for Middle East peace talks opens.

1995 – Quebec independence referendum: Voters in Quebec narrowly choose to stay part of Canada.

1997 - Mary McAleese is elected President of Ireland.

1998 - 5,500 people are killed by Hurricane Mitch in Honduras.

2000 – The Somoni replaces the Rouble as the currency of Tajikistan.

2002 – British television Service Freeview starts transmitting throughout parts of the United Kingdom.

2003 - Basketball player LeBron James makes his first appearance in the NBA, for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

2005 – Having been destroyed in the Firebombing of Dresden in World War II, the Frauenkirche (Church of Our Lady), is reconsecrated.

2007 - The hosting of the 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup is given to Germany, and it is announced that the 2014 FIFA World Cup would take place in Brazil.

2013 - A bus fuel tank catches fire in Mahabubnagar, India, killing 45 people.

2014 - Emergency rule is declared in Burkina Faso after protests in the capital Ouagadougou against President Blaise Compaoré extending his time in office.

2014 - Sweden becomes the first European Union country to recognize the State of Palestine.

2015 - A fire at a nightclub in Bucharest, Romania, kills 64 people.

2019 - Chile withdraws as host of the December 2019 International climate change summit over the 2019 Chilean protests; Madrid offers to host it instead.