Today’s Highlight in History:

On October 9, 1940, rock-and-roll legend John Lennon was born in Liverpool, England. (On this date in 1975, his son, Sean, was born in New York.)

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On this date:

In 1888, the public was first admitted to the Washington Monument.

In 1914, the Belgian city of Antwerp fell to German forces during World War I.

In 1934, King Alexander I of Yugoslavia was assassinated in Marseille, France, by a Macedonian gunman.

In 1946, the Eugene O’Neill drama “The Iceman Cometh” opened at the Martin Beck Theater in New York.

In 1958, Pope Pius XII died at age 82, ending a 19-year papacy. (He was succeeded by Pope John XXIII.)

In 1967, Latin American guerrilla leader Che Guevara was killed by the Bolivian army a day after he was captured.

In 1975, Soviet scientist Andrei Sakharov was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In 1985, the hijackers of the Achille Lauro cruise liner surrendered two days after seizing the vessel in the Mediterranean. (Passenger Leon Klinghoffer was killed by the hijackers during the standoff.)

In 1995, a sabotaged section of track caused an Amtrak train, the Sunset Limited, to derail in Arizona; one person was killed and about 80 were injured (the case remains unsolved).

In 2009, President Barack Obama was named the recipient of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize for what the Norwegian Nobel Committee called “his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”

Ten years ago: Dozens of foreign tourists fled devastated lakeside Mayan towns as Guatemalan officials said they would abandon communities buried by landslides caused by Hurricane Stan and declare them mass graveyards. A driverless Volkswagen Touareg, designed by Stanford University, won a $2 million race across the rugged Nevada desert, beating four other robot-guided vehicles that completed a Pentagon-sponsored contest aimed at making warfare safer for humans. Actor-comedian Louis Nye died in Los Angeles at age 92.

Five years ago: Chile’s 33 trapped miners cheered and embraced each other as a drill punched into their underground chamber where they had been stuck for an agonizing 66 days. The International Monetary Fund wrapped up two days of talks in Washington without resolving deep differences over currency movements. A crush of fans circled a flower-graced mosaic in Central Park’s Strawberry Fields and sang lyrics from “Imagine” to honor John Lennon on his 70th birthday.

One year ago: Six U.S. military planes arrived in the Ebola hot zone with more Marines as West African leaders pleaded for the world’s help in dealing with what Sierra Leone President Ernest Bai Koroma described as “a tragedy unforeseen in modern times.” French novelist Patrick Modiano was named the recipient of the Nobel Prize in literature. Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Carolyn Kizer, 89, died in Sonoma, California.

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