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Watery Ways
 November 4, 1825 - The opening of the Erie Canal was celebrated as New York Governor DeWitt Clinton performed a Wedding of The Waters ceremony by pouring fresh water that had just arrived from Lake Erie into the salt water of New York Harbor.The canal had officially opened nine days earlier when the first watercraft began its journey along the 363-mile, man-made waterway from Buffalo to Albany. From there boats could then enter the Hudson River and sail toward New York City. The canal, which is 40-feet wide and only 4-feet deep, was originally proposed in 1807. Construction did not begin until 1817 and took eight years to complete.The canal created a navigable water route from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes and established New York City as the most important harbor on the Eastern Seaboard.
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In a Man's World
 November 4, 1924 - Nellie Ross, the wife of the recently deceased William Ross, was elected in a special election to succeed her husband's role as Governor of Wyoming, thus becoming the first female governor in the United States.Ross would serve for two years before narrowly losing the next election to Frank Emerson. Ross went on to play a role in national politics, running for Vice President during the 1928 Democratic primary election and serving as the first female director of U.S. Mint from 1933 to 1953. Wyoming, which was also the first state to allow women the right to vote, has not had a female governor since.
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American Bandits
 November 7, 1908 - The infamous bank robbers Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were allegedly killed in San Vicente, Bolivia, after robbing the payroll courier for a local mining company. Cassidy and the Kid, whose real names were Robert Parker and Harry Longabaugh, had escaped to South America in 1901 to avoid capture in the United States. After the payroll courier had been robbed, two American bandits were killed in a gunfight with Bolivian soldiers and police.Not knowing who the men were the Bolivian officials buried them in unmarked graves. No DNA evidence has been found to successfully prove that Parker and Longabaugh died in Bolivia and several existing accounts claim the men later returned to the United States.
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