1870 – The US Weather Bureau (someday to become the National Weather Service) issued its first weather warning for a storm on the Great Lakes. It was accurate, but there was no high-pitched beep yet.

http://www.crh.noaa.gov/dtx/november_8th_1870.php

1887 – German immigrant Emile Berliner patented a successful system of sound recording that used flat disks instead of cylinders. The first versions were made of glass. Talk about your broken records.

http://inventors.about.com/od/gstartinventions/a/gramophone.htm

1895 – German physicist Wilhelm Roentgen, working in his lab in Wurzburg noticed a strange effect while studying vacuum tubes covered in black cardboard. He eventually saw his own skeleton and went on to publish a paper “On a new kind of rays.” The rays would end up being called X-Rays.
http://www.bl.uk/learning/cult/bodies/xray/roentgen.html
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1901/rontgen-bio.html

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1960 – The JOSS (Johniac Open Shop System) conversational time-sharing service began on the Rand Corporation’s Johnniac computer. Time sharing reduced the time programmers had to wait after turning in their punch cards.
http://www.computer.org/csdl/mags/co/2012/11/mco2012110012.html

1994 – University of North Carolina student radio station WXYC began what is considered the world’s first Internet radio broadcast. DJ Michael Shoffner set it up. The simulcast continues today.

http://www.wxyc.org/about/simulcast

1996 – NASA launched the Mars global surveyor, humanity’s return to Mars after a 10-year absence. The mission discovered much about the Geology of the planet.

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/programmissions/missions/past/globalsurveyor/

Read Tom’s science fiction and other fiction books at Merritt’s Books site.

1928 – The New York Times began flashing headlines outside its offices in Times Square using an electronic sign that wrapped around the 4th floor called the Motograph News Bulletin.

http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/edn-moments/4400674/Motograph-News-Bulletin-debuts-in-New-York-City–November-6–1928

1935 – Edwin Armstrong presented his paper “A Method of Reducing Disturbances in Radio Signaling by a System of Frequency Modulation” to the New York section of the Institute of Radio Engineers, braving the skepticism of AT&T’s John Renshaw Carson who wrote previously that FM radio had no particular advantages over AM.
http://www.qsl.net/n9zia/pdf/armstrong_fm.pdf

1980 – Microsoft signed a contract with IBM to create an operating system for the new IBM PC. Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer had convinced the heritage tech company that the two were not only talented enough to pull it off, but that they should be paid a royalty on the software.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Fedn-75MkBoC&pg=PT2&lpg=PT2&dq=november+6+1980+microsoft+IBM&source=bl&ots=OoyHRBm3FL&sig=mS5a–_vRypSzsF_GjCO0u81hAM&hl=en#v=onepage&q=november%206%201980%20microsoft%20IBM&f=false

Read Tom’s science fiction and other fiction books at Merritt’s Books site.

1895 – The US Patent office granted George B. Selden the US patent for his road engine, often considered the first car. He made good money licensing the patent, until Henry Ford crushed him in court. Hence the reason none of us drive Seldens.

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/george-selden-patents-gas-powered-car

1994 – Ken McCarthy of the Internet Gazette along with Marc Andreessen of the brand new Netscape (still called Mosaic Communications Corp) and Mark Graham held the first conference to focus on the commercial potential of the World Wide Web.

http://www.kenmccarthy.com/archive/ig1.html

2007 – China’s first lunar satellite, the Chang’e 1 went into orbit around the Moon. The spacecraft operated until March 2009.

https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraftDisplay.do?id=2007-051A

2007 – The Open Handset Alliance introduced a little something called the Android operating system for mobile phones. Few people expected it to seriously challenge the dominance of Blackberry and Palm.

http://crave.cnet.co.uk/mobiles/android-is-5-years-old-today-heres-how-it-all-began-50009685/

Read Tom’s science fiction and other fiction books at Merritt’s Books site.

1879 – James Jacob Ritty patented the first cash register as “Ritty’s Incorruptible Cashier”. He was motivated to invent it by the no-good thieving employees at his saloon.

http://blogs.loc.gov/inside_adams/2010/11/necessity-is-the-mother-of-invention/

1939 – Packard Motor Co. exhibited the first air-conditioned automobile at the 40th Automobile Show in Chicago, Illinois.
https://www.yahoo.com/autos/bp/november-4-packard-offers-first-car-air-conditioner-132542726.html

1952 – Fresh off census duty, the UNIVAC computer projected General Dwight David Eisenhower would defeat Adlai Stevenson for President of the US. All the polls showed Stevenson had a clear advantage so CBS delayed using the projection fearing inaccuracy.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/09/univac-the-troubled-life-of-americas-first-computer/

Read Tom’s science fiction and other fiction books at Merritt’s Books site.