1. On November 15, 1777, American Revolutionary War hero General Lafayette arrived in Baltimore, Maryland on his way to Philadelphia to meet with the Continental Congress. Lafayette was a French aristocrat who had joined the American cause and became a trusted advisor to General George Washington.

2. November 15, 1864 was the day that Union troops under General William Tecumseh Sherman burned the wealthy Southern city of Atlanta, Georgia to the ground. The destruction of Atlanta and its war industries helped break the Confederate economy and hasten the end of the Civil War.

3. In 1919, Maryland Governor Albert Ritchie signed a bill that prohibited the teaching of evolution in public schools. This controversial law, known as the "monkey trial law," became the subject of the famous Scopes Monkey Trial in Tennessee in 1925.

4. On November 15, 1938, the historic African American community of Rosewood, Florida was destroyed by a mob of white vigilantes in a violent racial riot. Many of the residents were killed or forced to flee, and the town was never rebuilt.

5. In 1972, the Maryland state flag was officially adopted by the General Assembly. The flag, which features the arms of the Calvert and Crossland families, symbols of Maryland's early English settlers, is one of the most recognizable state flags in the United States.