Date·Lore

On This Day · The 316th day of the year

November 12

November 12 carries 10 recorded events spanning between 1892 and 2011. Pudge Heffelfinger becomes the first professional American football player on record, participating in his first paid game for the Allegheny Athletic Association.

♏ZodiacScorpio ◈BirthstoneTopaz ❀Birth flowerChrysanthemum

Compiled & reviewed by · Last reviewed July 13, 2026

What happened on November 12?

November 12 is the 316th day of the year. It marks 10 notable events in history, dated between 1892 and 2011. Famous people born on November 12 include Neil Young, Luguelín Santos and Grace Kelly.

The shape of the day

25 years on from American Airlines Flight 587, November 12 is a date with an anniversary worth pausing on. Most of the weight falls in the 20th century, where conflict is a recurring thread.

Scorpio is the sign for November 12 — read more on the Scorpio page, or see November's birthstone & birth flower.

Released on November 12

Movies, games, albums & shows

2025

  • Game Winter Burrow
  • Movie Now You See Me: Now You Don't

2024

  • Game The Rise of the Golden Idol
  • Game Farming Simulator 25

2021

  • Game Shin Megami Tensei V

Release data from TMDB & IGDB.

Events

10 notable moments
  1. 1892

    Pudge Heffelfinger

    Pudge Heffelfinger becomes the first professional American football player on record, participating in his first paid game for the Allegheny Athletic Association.

  2. 1940

    World War II

    World War II: The Battle of Gabon ends as Free French Forces take Libreville, Gabon, and all of French Equatorial Africa from Vichy French forces.

  3. 1956

    Suez Crisis

    In the midst of the Suez Crisis, Palestinian refugees are shot dead in Rafah by Israel Defense Force soldiers following the invasion of the Gaza Strip.

  4. 1970

    1970 Bhola cyclone

    The 1970 Bhola cyclone makes landfall on the coast of East Pakistan, becoming the deadliest tropical cyclone in history.

  5. 1970

    Oregon Department of Transportation

    The Oregon Highway Division attempts to destroy a rotting beached sperm whale with explosives, leading to the now infamous "exploding whale" incident.

  6. 1990

    Tim Berners-Lee

    Tim Berners-Lee publishes a formal proposal for the World Wide Web.

  7. 1991

    Santa Cruz massacre

    Santa Cruz massacre: The Indonesian Army open fire on a crowd of student protesters in Dili, East Timor.

  8. 1996

    Saudia

    A Saudi Arabian Airlines Boeing 747 and a Kazakh Ilyushin Il-76 cargo plane collide in mid-air near New Delhi, killing 349 in the deadliest mid-air collision to date.

  9. 2001

    American Airlines Flight 587

    In New York City, American Airlines Flight 587, an Airbus A300 en route to the Dominican Republic, crashes minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Airport, killing all 260 on board and five on the ground.

  10. 2011

    Bid Kaneh explosion

    A blast in Iran's Shahid Modarres missile base leads to the death of 17 of the Revolutionary Guards members, including Hassan Tehrani Moghaddam, a key figure in Iran's missile program.

Famous birthday twins

Born on November 12

Neil Young

b. 1945

Canadian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer

Luguelín Santos

b. 1992

Dominican sprinter

Grace Kelly

b. 1929

American actress, later Princess Grace of Monaco

Sun Yat-sen

b. 1866

Chinese physician and politician, 1st President of the Republic of China

Auguste Rodin

b. 1840

French sculptor and illustrator, created The Thinker

Nadia Comăneci

b. 1961

Romanian gymnast and coach

Anne Hathaway

b. 1982

American actress

Loriot

b. 1923

German humorist, actor, and director

Deaths

  • 1994Wilma Rudolph
  • 1972Rudolf Friml
  • 1971Hanna Neumann
  • 1969Liu Shaoqi
  • 1742Friedrich Hoffmann
  • 973Burchard III, Duke of Swabia

Holidays & observances

  • —Birth of Sun Yat-Sen, also Doctors' Day and Cultural Renaissance Day. (Republic of China)
  • —Christian feast day: Arsatius
  • —Christian feast day: Astrik (or Anastasius) of Pannonhalma
  • —Christian feast day: Cumméne Fota
  • —Christian feast day: Cunibert
  • —Christian feast day: Emilian of Cogolla
  • —Christian feast day: Imerius of Immertal
  • —Christian feast day: Josaphat Kuntsevych (Roman Catholic Church, Greek Catholic Church)

Historical facts, event summaries, and biographical lines above are adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC BY-SA) license. DateLore adds curation, structure, and original editorial commentary. DateLore is not affiliated with the Wikimedia Foundation.

About the author

Roman Tailor compiles and reviews every date on DateLore. He's the writer and editor behind the site's editorial essays and the day-by-day almanac. Corrections and questions are welcome — read more about DateLore or get in touch.

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