Today in History: Microsoft announced Windows in 1983

The following are some of the major events that occurred on November 10 throughout history:

1293 – Java, Indonesia: Founding of the Majapahit Empire. Raden Wijaya was crowned the first monarch of the Majapahit kingdom on 10 November 1293, taking the throne name Kertarajasa Jayawardhana. This coronation marked the establishment of Majapahit, which grew into a powerful empire uniting much of the Indonesian archipelago and became a golden age in Indonesian history.

1444 – Varna, (present-day) Bulgaria: Battle of Varna – Crusaders defeated by Ottomans. On 10 November 1444, a Christian alliance led by Władysław III of Poland and Hungary (supported by Pope Eugenius IV) clashed with Sultan Murad II’s Ottoman army. The battle ended in a decisive Ottoman victory – Władysław III was killed – ending the European powers’ efforts to save Constantinople from Turkish conquest and enabling Ottoman expansion in the Balkans. This defeat essentially marked the last major Crusade against the Ottomans in the Middle Ages.

1659 – Pratapgad Fort, India: Battle of Pratapgarh – Rise of Maratha power. On 10 November 1659, Maratha leader Chhatrapati Shivaji met the Bijapur general Afzal Khan under the guise of truce negotiations and killed him in self-defence when Afzal attempted to stab him. Shivaji’s forces then ambushed and routed the disarrayed Bijapuri army. This victory – Shivaji’s first major triumph – ignited the growth of the Maratha Empire, shifting the power balance in 17th-century India.

1674 – New Amsterdam (New York City): Dutch cede New Netherland to England. On November 10, 1674, in accordance with the Treaty of Westminster that ended the Third Anglo-Dutch War, the Dutch formally surrendered New Netherland to English rule. Dutch Governor Anthony Colve was replaced by English Governor Edmund Andros on that day, renaming New Amsterdam as New York. This transfer secured English control of the strategic colony, shaping the future United States by establishing New York as an English (later British) territory.

1775 – Philadelphia, USA: Birth of the United States Marine Corps. The Continental Congress resolved on November 10, 1775, to raise two battalions of Marines. That same day in Philadelphia, Captain Samuel Nicholas – an innkeeper commissioned by Congress – began recruiting at Tun Tavern. This date is recognised as the founding of the U.S. Marine Corps. The Marine Corps went on to become a pivotal branch of the U.S. military, and November 10 is celebrated annually by Marines as the Corps’ birthday.

1871 – Ujiji, East Africa (now Tanzania): Stanley finds Livingstone. On November 10, 1871, after an arduous quest, explorer Henry Morton Stanley finally located the missing missionary Dr. David Livingstone in the town of Ujiji on Lake Tanganyika. Upon meeting the ailing Livingstone, Stanley reputedly greeted him with the famous phrase, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”. This encounter became one of history’s iconic moments of exploration and signaled the end of a worldwide mystery over Livingstone’s whereabouts.

1898 – Wilmington, North Carolina, USA: Wilmington Insurrection – coup and massacre. On November 10, 1898, white supremacists in Wilmington carried out a violent coup d’état against the city’s legitimately elected multiracial Fusionist government. They overthrew the local government and killed dozens of Black residents (estimates up to 60) in a planned massacre. This event – the only recorded coup in U.S. history – led to the disenfranchisement of Black citizens in North Carolina and exemplified the nadir of post-Reconstruction racial violence.

1928 – Kyoto, Japan: Enthronement of Emperor Hirohito (Shōwa). Emperor Hirohito had ascended the throne in 1926, but his formal enthronement ceremony was held on 10 November 1928 in Kyoto. On that day Hirohito was ceremonially installed as Emperor of Japan. His reign (the Shōwa era) would span 62 years – including World War II – making him Japan’s longest-reigning monarch and a central figure in 20th-century Japanese and world history.

1983 – New York City, USA: Microsoft announces Windows. On November 10, 1983, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates publicly unveiled Microsoft Windows 1.0, a new operating system with a graphical user interface. Designed to work with MS-DOS, Windows introduced features like pull-down menus, icons and multitasking in a windowed environment. Although Windows 1.0 itself only gained limited traction, this announcement heralded an operating system that would eventually dominate personal computing worldwide.

1989 – Berlin, Germany: People dismantle the Berlin Wall. On November 10, 1989, jubilant crowds of East and West Germans continued to tear down sections of the Berlin Wall, one day after East Germany opened its border crossings. What had stood for nearly 30 years as the stark symbol of the Cold War’s division began to crumble as Germans wielded hammers and cranes to remove it. The wall’s fall paved the way for German reunification less than a year later and signified the imminent collapse of communist regimes in Eastern Europe.