• On Oct. 28, 1961, rocker Chuck Berry began his second court trial for allegedly transporting a minor, in this case Janice Escalante, across state lines for immoral purposes in violation of the Mann Act, after he took her on the road with his traveling show. He was convicted and served three years in prison, where he studied accounting and continued to write songs.

• On Oct. 29, 1619, Sir Walter Raleigh, an English adventurer, writer and former favorite courtier of Queen Elizabeth I, was beheaded in London 15 years after a sentence of death was brought against him for conspiracy against King James I.

• On Oct. 30, 1811, Jane Austen’s now classic novel Sense and Sensibility made...