On this day: Woolworths | Deadly flood in Troon

On this day in 2008 the high street retailer Woolworths, which had been trading since 1909, went into administration. Picture: Getty

26 November

1789: First national Thanksgiving Day in United States.

1857: First Australian parliament opened in Melbourne.

1912: Ten people died as severe south-westerly gale hit the west of Scotland. Troon suffered the worst flooding in its history, with four feet of water covering all streets in the vicinity of the Cross.

1914: HMS Bulwark blew up in Sheerness Harbour, Kent, killing 700.

1922: Howard Carter and the Earl of Carnarvon became the first men to see inside the tomb of Tutankhamen, near Luxor, since it was sealed 3,000 years before.

1940: Half a million Jews in Warsaw, Poland, were ordered to live within a walled ghetto.

1942: Soviet forces counter-attacked at Stalingrad, ending the Second World War siege and forcing Germans to retreat.

1949: India adopted constitution as federal republic within British Commonwealth.

1966: The world’s first major tidal power station was opened at St Malo, France.

1970: A Bolivian painter, disguised as priest, tried to kill Pope Paul in Manila, Philippines, but the pontiff escaped injury.

1972: Race Relations Act came into force in Britain. Employers could no longer discriminate on grounds of colour.

1978: Muslim religious leaders and politicians seeking to topple Shah of Iran called general strike that virtually paralysed Iran.

1981: Shirley Williams became the first MP elected under SDP banner when she won the Crosby by-election.

1983: Gold bars worth £25m stolen from Heathrow Airport.

1987: Typhoon in Philippines killed 270 people and damaged or destroyed 14,000 homes.

1992: The Queen agreed to pay income tax on her personal fortune, council tax on Balmoral and Sandringham and contribute more to the Royal Family budget.

2007: Gordon Brown, the prime minister, faced sleaze claims after the Labour Party’s general secretary, Peter Watt, was forced to resign over secret donations given to the party by property developer David Abrahams, using other people’s names.

2008: Woolworths, the high street retailer which had been trading since 1909, went into administration.

2008: Gunmen carried out a series of co-ordinated attacks across the Indian city of Mumbai (Bombay), killing almost 200 people and injuring around 300.

BIRTHDAYS

Tina Turner, singer and actress, 74; Garcelle Beauvais, actress, 47; Natasha Bedingfield, singer, 32; Hilary Benn, Labour politician, 60; Paul Burnett, disc jockey, 70; Matt Frei, broadcaster, 50; Grey Ruthven, 2nd Earl of Gowrie, chairman, Arts Council of England 1994-8, 74; John McVie, guitarist, 68; Trevor Morgan, actor, 27; Tammy Lynn Michaels, actress, 39; Peter Wheeler, rugby player, 65.

ANNIVERSARIES

Births: 1607 John Harvard, London-born founder of Harvard University; 1731 William Cowper, poet; 1905 Emlyn Williams, playwright and actor; 1922 Charles Schulz, cartoonist (Peanuts); 1924 Pat Phoenix, actress; 1940 Davey Graham, guitarist.

Deaths: 1703 Henry Winstanley, lighthouse builder; 1836 John MacAdam, Scottish road-making engineer and inventor of the road surface bearing his name; 1940 Harold Harmsworth, first Viscount Rothermere; 1956 Tommy Dorsey, trombonist and bandleader; 1996 Michael Bentine, comedian; 1996 Dame Joan Hammond, operatic soprano.