December 17 ...

In 1777 France recognized American independence. In 1830 South American patriot Simon Bolivar died in Colombia. In 1903 Orville and Wilbur Wright made the first successful gasoline-powered airplane flight near Kitty Hawk, NC. In 1925 Col. William "Billy" Mitchell was convicted of insubordination at his court-martial. In 1939 the German pocket battleship Graf Spee was scuttled by its crew, bringing the Battle of the Rio de la Plata, off Uruguay, to an end. In 1944 the US Army announced the end of its policy of excluding Japanese-Americans from the West Coast, ensuring that Japanese-Americans would be released from detention camps. In 1957 the US successfully test-fired the Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile for the first time. In 1969 an estimated 50 million TV viewers watched Tiny Tim and Miss Vicki Budinger get married on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. In 1973 thirty-one people were killed at Rome airport when Arab terrorists hijacked a German airliner. In 1975 Lynette "Sqeaky" Fromme was sentenced to life in prison for her attempt on the life of President Ford. In 1976 WTCG-TV, Atlanta, GA, changed its call letters to WTBS, and was uplinked via satellite, becaming the first commercial TV station to cover the entire US. In 1978 OPEC decided to raise oil prices by 14.5% by the end of 1979. In 1986 singer Wayne Newton won a $19.2 million suit against NBC News, which had aired reports claiming a link between Newton and mob figures; the reports were proven to be false. Also on this day, Davina Thompson became the world's first recipient of a heart, lungs, and liver transplant. In 1992 US President Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, and Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari signed the North American Free Trade Agreement. In 1996 Peruvian guerrillas took hundreds of people hostage at the Japanese embassy in Lima. The siege ended on April 22, 1997, with a commando raid that resulted in the deaths of all the rebels, two commandos and one hostage. In 2000 President-elect Bush named Stanford professor Condoleezza Rice his national security adviser and Texas Supreme Court Justice Alberto Gonzales to be White House counsel; also on this day, President-elect Bush was named Time magazine's Person of the Year. In 2002 President George W. Bush ordered the Pentagon to have ready for use within two years a system for protecting American territory, troops and allies from ballistic missile attacks; also on this day, insurance and finance company Conseco Inc. filed for Chapter 11 protection -- it was the third-largest bankruptcy in US history. In 2004 President George W. Bush signed into law the largest overhaul of US intelligence gathering in 50 years.