November 6 Birthday
On November 6, 1860, Abraham Lincoln was elected president. He won 39.8% of the popular vote in a four-way race and 180 of 303 electoral votes. He carried every free state and not a single Southern state. South Carolina seceded on December 20. Within six months, eleven states had left the Union and formed the Confederacy. The election of a president who opposed the expansion of slavery was the trigger, but the conditions for secession had been building for decades. Lincoln received no votes in ten Southern states — his name was not on the ballot. James Naismith, born this day in 1861, invented basketball in December 1891 at a YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts. He was a physical education instructor who needed an indoor game to keep his students active during winter. He nailed two peach baskets to the gymnasium balcony and used a soccer ball. The first game had nine players per side and ended 1-0. Naismith never patented the game. He lived to see it become an Olympic sport in 1936. People born on November 6 fall under the zodiac sign of Scorpio. The birthstone is Topaz and the birth flower is Chrysanthemum. Historical events on November 6 include 1860: Abraham Lincoln elected 16th President of the United States, 1869: First intercollegiate football game — Rutgers defeats Princeton 6-4, 1913: Mohandas Gandhi arrested leading Indian miners' march in South Africa. Famous people born on November 6 include John Philip Sousa (1854), James Naismith (1861), Mike Nichols (1931).