The Senate approved the treaty finalizing the Louisiana Purchase, an acquisition Napoleon Bonaparte agreed to after his ambitions in the Americas collapsed following the loss of Haiti to revolution and renewed war with Britain. The deal roughly doubled the size of the United States overnight, opening the trans-Mississippi west to American expansion and setting the stage for decades of westward settlement, conflict with Native nations, and the spread of slavery into new territories.
On what became known as Black Thursday, the New York Stock Exchange saw nearly 13 million shares traded amid frantic selling, nearly three times the normal volume. Leading bankers pooled funds to prop up prices that afternoon, temporarily calming markets, but the reprieve proved brief. Within days, Black Monday and Black Tuesday would follow, cascading into the worst economic collapse in modern American history.
American forces under Admiral Thomas Kinkaid and Third Fleet commander William Halsey engaged Japanese naval forces attempting to disrupt the U.S. invasion of Leyte. Fighting on October 24 included the sinking of the battleship Musashi and the beginning of the Battle of Surigao Strait, part of a sprawling four-part engagement. Japan's navy suffered losses from which it never recovered, and the battle also saw the first organized kamikaze attacks.
Following ratification by the five permanent Security Council members and a majority of other signatories, the United Nations Charter entered into force, creating an international body meant to prevent another world war. Fifty-one nations became founding members, meeting first in San Francisco earlier that year to hammer out the document. October 24 has been celebrated as United Nations Day ever since.
A day after student protests in Budapest exploded into open revolt, Soviet armored units entered the Hungarian capital to crush the uprising, only to face fierce resistance from armed civilians, students, and defecting soldiers. The rebellion, sparked by demands for reform and the withdrawal of Soviet troops, briefly succeeded in installing reformist leader Imre Nagy before a second, larger Soviet invasion in November crushed it decisively, killing thousands and sending 200,000 refugees fleeing abroad.
As part of his authenticité program to strip away colonial-era names and symbols, President Mobutu Sese Seko officially changed the country's name from the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the Republic of Zaire. The name, derived from a Portuguese corruption of a Kikongo word for the Congo River, was meant to evoke African authenticity, even as Mobutu's kleptocratic and increasingly brutal rule drove the country toward economic ruin.
Following growing friction with Czechoslovak sports authorities, who resented her increasingly Americanized style and independence, Martina Navratilova applied for asylum in the United States. The move effectively ended her ability to return home and launched a career in which she would become one of the greatest tennis players in history, eventually winning 18 Grand Slam singles titles and becoming a U.S. citizen in 1981.