On this day in 2000, Chen Shui-bian, a leader of the proindependence movement that sought statehood for the Republic of China (Taiwan), was elected president of Taiwan, breaking the Nationalist Party's 55-year rule.

More Events on this day:

1974: Seven member countries of OPEC lifted a five-month oil embargo against the United States.

1965: Soviet cosmonaut Aleksey Arkhipovich Leonov became the first man to walk in space after passing through an air lock on the spacecraft Voskhod 2.

1964: Speed skater Bonnie Blair, one of the most successful American women athletes in Olympic competition, was born in Cornwall, New York.

1906: The first monoplane, constructed by the Romanian inventor Trajan Vuia, made a flight of 12 metres (40 feet).

1902: Italian operatic tenor Enrico Caruso, one of the first musicians to document his voice on the gramophone, made his first phonograph recording.

1766: The British Parliament repealed the Stamp Act of 1765 after violent protests from American colonists.

John Updike

American writer John Updike, whose novels, short stories, and poems are known for their realistic but subtle depiction of “American, Protestant, small-town, middle-class” life, was born this day in 1932.