Today In History

[minidog]

1096 - Peter the Hermit gathered his army in Cologne.

1204 - The Fourth Crusade sacked Constantinople.

1606 - England adopted the original Union Jack as its flag.

1770 - The British Parliament repealed the Townsend Acts.

1782 - The British navy won its only naval engagement against the colonists in the American Revolution at the Battle of Saints, off Dominica.

1799 - Phineas Pratt patented the comb cutting machine.

1811 - The first colonists arrived at Cape Disappointment, Washington.

1833 - Charles Gaylor patented the fireproof safe.

1861 - Fort Sumter was shelled by Confederacy, starting America's Civil War.

1864 - Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest captured Fort Pillow, in Tennessee and slaughters the black Union troops there.

1877 - A catcher's mask was used in a baseball game for the first time by James Alexander Tyng.

1892 - Voters in Lockport, New York, became the first in the U.S. to use voting machines.

1905 - The Hippodrome opened in New York City.

1911 - Pierre Prier completed the first non-stop London-Paris flight in three hours and 56 minutes.

1916 - American cavalrymen and Mexican bandit troops clashed at Parrel, Mexico.

1927 - The British Cabinet came out in favor of women voting rights.

1934 - F. Scott Fitzgerald novel "Tender Is the Night" was first published.

1938 - The first U.S. law requiring a medical test for a marriage license was enacted in New York.

1944 - The U.S. Twentieth Air Force was activated to begin the strategic bombing of Japan.

1945 - In New York, the organization of the first eye bank, the Eye Bank for Sight Restoration, was announced.

1945 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt died in Warm Spring, GA. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 63. Harry S. Truman became president.

1955 - The University of Michigan Polio Vaccine Evaluation Center announced that the polio vaccine of Dr. Jonas Salk was "safe, effective and potent."

1961 - Soviet Yuri Alexeyevich Gagarin became first man to orbit the Earth.

1963 - Police used dogs and cattle prods on peaceful civil rights demonstrators in Birmingham, AL.

1966 - Emmett Ashford became the first African-American major league umpire.

1967 - Jim Brown made his TV acting debut on the NBC show "I Spy."

1969 - Lucy and Snoopy of the comic strip "Peanuts" made the cover of "Saturday Review."

1981 - The space shuttle Columbia blasted off from Cape Canaveral, FL, on its first test flight.

1983 - Harold Washington was elected the first black mayor of Chicago.

1984 - Astronauts aboard the space shuttle Challenger made the first satellite repair in orbit by returning the Solar Max satellite to space.

1984 - Israeli troops stormed a bus that had been hijacked the previous evening by four Arab terrorists. All the passengers were rescued and 2 of the hijackers were killed.

1985 - U.S. Senator Jake Garn of Utah became the first senator to fly in space as the shuttle Discovery lifted off from Cape Canaveral, FL.

1985 - In Spain, an explosion in a restaurant near a U.S. base killed 17 people.

1985 - Federal inspectors declared that four animals of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus were not unicorns. They were goats with horns that had been surgically implanted.

1987 - Texaco filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy after it failed to settle a legal dispute with Pennzoil Co.

1988 - Harvard University won a patent for a genetically altered mouse. It was the first patent for a life form.

1988 - The Chinese government named a new array of younger leaders to ensure economic reform.

1989 - In the U.S.S.R, ration cards were issued for the first time since World War II. The ration was prompted by a sugar shortage.

1992 - Disneyland Paris opened in Marne-La-Vallee, France.

1993 - NATO began enforcing a no-fly zone over Bosnia and Herzegovina.

2000 - More than 1,500 anti-drug agents raided four cities in Colombia and arrested 46 members of the "most powerful" heroin ring.

2000 - Robert Cleaves, 71, was convicted of second degree murder and was sentenced to 16 years in prison. Cleaves had repeatedly run over Arnold Guerreiro on September 30, 1998 with his car after the two had an argument.

2000 - Israel's High Court ordered the release of eight Lebanese detainees that had been held for years without a trial.

2002 - A first edition version of Beatrix Potter's "Peter Rabbit" sold for $64,780 at Sotheby's. A signed first edition of J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit" sold for $66,630. A copy of "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," signed by J.K. Rowling sold for $16,660. A 250-piece collection of rare works by Charles Dickens sold for $512,650.

2002 - It was announced that the South African version of "Sesame Street" would be introducing a character that was HIV-positive.

2002 - JCPenney Chairman Allen Questrom rang the opening bell to start the business day at the New York Stock Exchange as part of the company's centennial celebrations. James Cash (J.C.) Penney opened his first retail store on April 14, 1902.

 

[Fresno]

Thak You MiniD

 

[gunslingingbird]

1916 - American cavalrymen and Mexican bandit troops clashed at Parrel, Mexico.

Don't mean to be an ass, but it's Parral, not Parrel, Chihuahua, Mexico, and the Mexican troops were lead by my great grandfather, Pancho Villa.:thefinger

 

[dick van cock]

[...]and the Mexican troops were lead by my great grandfather, Pancho Villa.:thefinger

Not to forget the fatal date: Febrember 32nd, 1924:

Mexican troops disengage; a small squadron remains in the barracks at Guadalajara pledging allegiance to Pancho's cousin Aston Villa.

 

[minidog]

1598 - King Henry IV of France signed the Edict of Nantes which granted political rights to French Protestant Huguenots.

1759 - The French defeated the European allies in Battle of Bergen.

1775 - Lord North extended the New England Restraining Act to South, Carolina, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland. The act prohibited trade with any country other than Britain and Ireland.

1782 - Washington, NC, was incorporated as the first town to be named for George Washington.

1796 - The first known elephant to arrive in the United States from Bengal, India.

1808 - William "Juda" Henry Lane perfected the tap dance.

1829 - The English Parliament granted freedom of religion to Catholics.

1849 - The Hungarian Republic was proclaimed.

1861 - After 34 hours of bombardment, the Union-held Fort Sumter surrenders to Confederates.

1870 - The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in New York City.

1916 - The first hybrid, seed corn was purchased for 15-cents a bushel by Samuel Ramsay.

1919 - British forces killed hundreds of Indian nationalists in the Amritsar Massacre.

1933 - The first flight over Mount Everest was completed by Lord Clydesdale.

1941 - German troops captured Belgrade, Yugoslavia.

1943 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the Jefferson Memorial.

1945 - Vienna fell to Soviet troops.

1949 - Philip S. Hench and associates announced that cortizone was an effective treatment for rheumatoid arthritis.

1954 - Hank Aaron debuted with the Milwaukee Braves.

1959 - A Vatican edict prohibited Roman Catholics from voting for Communists.

1960 - The first navigational satellite was launched into Earth's orbit.

1961 - The U.N. General Assembly condemned South Africa due to apartheid.

1962 - In the U.S., major steel companies rescinded announced price increases. The John F. Kennedy administration had been applying pressure against the price increases.

1963 - Pete Rose of the Cincinnati Reds got his first hit in the major leagues.

1964 - Sidney Poitier became the first black to win an Oscar for best actor. It was for his role in the movie "Lilies of the Field."

1970 - An oxygen tank exploded on Apollo 13, preventing a planned moon landing.

1972 - The first strike in the history of major league baseball ended. Players had walked off the field 13 days earlier.

1976 - The U.S. Federal Reserve introduced $2 bicentennial notes.

1979 - The world's longest doubles ping-pong match ended after 101 hours.

1981 - Washington Post reporter Janet Cooke received a Pulitzer Prize for her feature about an 8-year-old heroin addict named "Jimmy." Cooke relinquished the prize two days later after admitting she had fabricated the story.

1984 - U.S. President Reagan sent emergency military aid to El Salvador without congressional approval.

1984 - Christopher Walker was killed in a fight with police in New Hampshire. Walker was wanted as a suspect in the kidnappings of 11 young women in several states.

1990 - The Soviet Union accepted responsibility for the World War II murders of thousands of imprisoned Polish officers in the Katyn Forest. The Soviets had previously blamed the massacre on the Nazis.

1997 - Tiger Woods became the youngest person to win the Masters Tournament at the age of 21. He also set a record when he finished at 18 under par.

1998 - NationsBank and BankAmerica announced a $62.5 billion merger, creating the country's first coast-to-coast bank.

1998 - Dolly, the world's first cloned sheep, gave natural birth to a healthy baby lamb.

1999 - Jack Kervorkian was sentenced in Pontiac, MI, to 10 to 25 years in prison for the second-degree murder of Thomas Youk. Youk's assisted suicide was videotaped and shown on "60 Minutes" in 1998.

2000 - Richard Gordon was charged with trying to extort $250,000 from Louie Anderson in exchange for not telling the tabloid media about Anderson once asking him for sex. Gordon was held without bail pending a court hearing.

2000 - It was announced that 69 people had died when the Arlahada, a Philippine ferry, capsized. 70 people were rescued.

2002 - Twenty-five Hindus were killed and about 30 were wounded when grenades were thrown by suspected Islamic guerrillas near Jammu-Kashir.

2002 - Venezuela's interim president, Pedro Carmona, resigned a day after taking office. Thousands of protesters had supported over the ousting of president Hugo Chavez.

 

[minidog]

1543 - Bartoleme Ferrelo returned to Spain after discovering San Francisco Bay in the New World.

1775 - The first abolitionist society in U.S. was organized in Philadelphia with Ben Franklin as president.

1793 - A royalist rebellion in Santo Domingo was crushed by French republican troops.

1828 - The first edition of Noah Webster's dictionary was published under the name "American Dictionary of the English Language."

1860 - The first Pony Express rider arrived in San Francisco with mail originating in St. Joseph, MO.

1865 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in Ford's Theater by John Wilkes Booth. He actually died early the next morning.

1894 - First public showing of Thomas Edison's kinetoscope took place.

1902 - James Cash (J.C.) Penney opened his first retail store in Kemmerer, WY. It was called the Golden Rule Store.

1910 - U.S. President William Howard Taft threw out the first ball for the Washington Senators and the Philadelphia Athletics.

1912 - The Atlantic passenger liner Titanic, on its maiden voyage hit an iceberg and began to sink. 1,517 people lost their lives and more than 700 survived.

1918 - The U.S. First Aero Squadron engaged in America's first aerial dogfight with enemy aircraft over Toul, France.

1925 - WGN became the first radio station to broadcast a regular season major league baseball game. The Cubs beat the Pirates 8-2.

1931 - King Alfonso XIII of Spain went into exile and the Spanish Republic was proclaimed.

1939 - The John Steinbeck novel "The Grapes of Wrath" was first published.

1946 - The civil war between Communists and nationalist resumed in China.

1953 - Viet Minh invaded Laos with 40,00 troops.

1956 - Ampex Corporation of Redwood City, CA, demonstrated the first commercial magnetic tape recorder for sound and picture.

1959 - The Taft Memorial Bell Tower was dedicated in Washington, DC.

1969 - For the first time, a major league baseball game was played in Montreal, Canada.

1981 - America's first space shuttle, Columbia, returned to Earth after a three-day test flight. The shuttle orbited the Earth 36 times during the mission.

1984 - The Texas Board of Education began requiring that the state's public school textbooks describe the evolution of human beings as "theory rather than fact".

1985 - The Russian paper "Pravda" called U.S. President Reagan's planned visit to Bitburg to visit the Nazi cemetery an "act of blasphemy".

1986 - U.S. President Reagan announced the U.S. air raid on military and terrorist related targets in Libya.

1987 - Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev proposed banning all missiles from Europe.

1988 - Representatives from the U.S.S.R., Pakistan, Afghanistan and the U.S. signed an agreement that called for the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan. The last Soviet troop left Afghanistan on February 15, 1989.

1988 - In New York, real estate tycoons Harry and Leona Helmsley were indicted for income tax evasion.

1990 - Cal Ripken of the Baltimore Orioles began a streak of 95 errorless games and 431 total chances by a shortstop.

1994 - Two American F-15 warplanes inadvertently shot down two U.S. helicopters over northern Iraq. 26 people were killed including 15 Americans.

1998 - The state of Virginia ignored the requests from the World Court and executed a Paraguayan for the murder of a U.S. woman.

1999 - Pakistan test-fired a ballistic missile that was capable of carrying a nuclear warhead and reaching its rival neighbor India.

2000 - After five years of deadlock, Russia approved the START II treaty that calls for the scrapping of U.S. and Russian nuclear warheads. The Russian government warned it would abandon all arms-control pacts if Washington continued with an anti-missile system.

2002 - U.S. President George W. Bush sent a letter of congratulations to JCPenny's associates for being in business for 100 years. James Cash (J.C.) Penney had opened his first retail store on April 14, 1902.

 

[minidog]

1784 - The first balloon was flown in Ireland.

1794 - "Courrier Francais" became the first French daily newspaper to be published in the U.S.

1813 - U.S. troops under James Wilkinson attacked the Spanish-held city of Mobile that would be in the future state of Alabama.

1817 - The first American school for the deaf was opened in Hartford, CT.

1850 - The city of San Francisco was incorporated.

1858 - At the Battle of Azimghur, the Mexicans defeated Spanish loyalists.

1861 - U.S. President Lincoln mobilized the Federal army.

1865 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln died from injuries inflicted by John Wilkes Booth.

1871 - "Wild Bill" Hickok became the marshal of Abilene, Kansas.

1880 - William Gladstone became Prime Minister of England.

1892 - The General Electric Company was organized.

1899 - Thomas Edison organized the Edison Portland Cement Company.

1912 - The ocean liner Titanic sank at 2:27 a.m. in the North Atlantic after hitting an iceberg the evening before. 1,517 people died and more than 700 people survived.

1917 - The British defeated the Germans at the battle of Arras.

1919 - British troops killed 400 Indians at Amritsar, India.

1923 - Insulin became generally available for people suffering with diabetes.

1934 - In the comic strip "Blondie," Dagwood and Blondie Bumstead welcomed a baby boy, Alexander. The child would be nicknamed, Baby Dumpling.

1940 - French and British troops landed at Narvik, Norway.

1945 - During World War II, British and Canadian troops liberated the Nazi concentration camp Bergen-Belsen.

1947 - Jackie Robinson played his first major league baseball game for the Brooklyn Dodgers. Previously he had only appeared in exhibition games.

1948 - The Arabs were defeated in the first Jewish-Arab battle.

1952 - U.S. President Harry Truman signed the official Japanese peace treaty.

1952 - The first B-52 prototype was tested in the air.

1953 - In Buenos Aires, six people were killed by a bomb at a rally addressed by President Peron.

1953 - Pope Pius XII gave his approval of psychoanalysis but warned of possible abuses.

1953 - Charlie Chaplin surrendered his U.S. re-entry permit rather than face proceedings by the U.S. Justice Department. Chaplin was accused of sympathizing with Communist groups.

1955 - Ray Kroc started the McDonald's restaurant chain.

1956 - The worlds’ first, all-color TV station was dedicated. It was WNBQ-TV in Chicago and is now WMAQ-TV.

1956 - General Motors announced that the first free piston automobile had been developed.

1959 - Cuban leader Fidel Castro began a U.S. goodwill tour.

1960 - The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) was organized at Shaw University.

1967 - Richard Speck was found guilty of murdering eight student nurses.

1983 - Tokyo Disneyland opened.

1984 - Ten members of a family were found murdered in their home in New York City. An infant was found crawling among the corpses.

1986 - U.S. F-111 warplanes attacked Libya in response to the bombing of a discotheque in Berlin on April 5, 1986.

1987 - In Northhampton, MA, Amy Carter, Abbie Hoffman and 13 others were acquitted on civil disobedience charges related with a CIA protest.

1987 - In New York City, Mbongeni Ngema's "Asinamali!" opened as the first South African play on Broadway.

1989 - Students in Beijing launched a series of pro democracy protests upon the death of former Communist Party leader Hu Yaobang. The protests led to the Tienanmen Square massacre.

1989 - In Sheffield, England, 93 people were killed and 180 were injured at a soccer game at Hillsborough Stadium when a crowd surged into an overcrowded standing area.

1994 - The World Trade Organization was established.

1997 - Christopher Reeve received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

1998 - Pol Pot died at the age of 73. The leader of the Khmer Rouge regime thereby evaded prosecution for the deaths of 2 million Cambodians.

1999 - In Algeria, former Foreign Minister Abdelaziz Bouteflika was elected president. All of the opposition candidates claimed that the vote was fraudulent and withdrew from the election.

1999 - In Rawalpindi, Pakistan, a panel of two Lahore High Court judges convicted former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, of corruption.

2000 - 600 anti-IMF (International Monetary Fund) protesters were arrested in Washington, DC, for demonstrating without a permit.

 

[Magnet]

Thanks again Mini

 

[minidog]

0069 - Otho committed suicide after being defeated by Vitellius' troops at Bedriacum.

0556 - Pelagius I began his reign as Catholic Pope.

1065 - The Norman Robert Guiscard took Bari. Five centuries of Byzantine rule in southern Italy ended.

1175 - Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor, signed the Treaty of Montebello with the Lombard League.

1705 - Queen Anne of England knighted Isaac Newton.

1746 - Bonnie Prince Charles was defeated at the battle of Culloden, the last pitched battle fought in Britain.

1818 - The U.S. Senate ratified Rush-Bagot amendment to form an unarmed U.S.-Canada border.

1851 - A lighthouse was swept away in a gale at Minot’s Ledge, MA.

1854 - San Salvador was destroyed by an earthquake.

1862 - Confederate President Jefferson Davis approved conscription act for white males between 18 and 35.

1862 - In the U.S., slavery was abolished by law in the District of Columbia.

1883 - Paul Kruger became president of the South African Republic.

1900 - The first book of postage stamps was issued. The two-cent stamps were available in books of 12, 24 and 48 stamps.

1905 - Andrew Carnegie donated $10,000,000 of personal money to set up the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

1912 - Harriet Quimby became the first woman to fly across the English Channel.

1917 - Vladimir Ilyich Lenin returned to Russia to start Bolshevik Revolution after years of exile.

1922 - Annie Oakley shot 100 clay targets in a row, to set a women's record.

1922 - The Soviet Union and Germany signed the Treaty of Rapallo under which Germany recognized the Soviet Union and diplomatic and trade relations were restored.

1935 - "Fibber McGee and Molly" premiered.

1940 - The first no-hit, no-run game to be thrown on an opening day of the major league baseball season was earned by Bob Feller. The Cleveland Indians beat the Chicago White Sox 1-0.

1942 - The Island of Malta was awarded the George Cross in recognition for heroism under constant German air attack.

1944 - The destroyer USS Laffey survived immense damage from attacks by 22 Japanese aircraft off Okinawa.

1945 - American troops entered Nuremberg, Germany.

1947 - The Zoomar lens, invented by Dr. Frank Back, was demonstrated in New York City. It was the first lens to exhibit zooming effects.

1947 - In Texas City, TX, the French ship Grandcamp, carrying ammonium nitrate fertilizer, caught fire and blew up. The explosions and resulting fires killed 576 people.

1948 - In Paris, the Organization for European Economic Co-operation was set up.

1951 - 75 people were killed when the British submarine Affray sank in the English Channel.

1953 - The British royal yacht Britannia was launched.

1962 - Walter Cronkite began anchoring "The CBS Evening News".

1968 - The Pentagon announced that troops would begin coming home from Vietnam.

1968 - Major league baseball’s longest night game was played. The 24 innings took six hours, six minutes to play.

1972 - Apollo 16 blasted off on a voyage to the moon. It was the fifth manned moon landing.

1972 - Two giants pandas arrived in the U.S. from China.

1975 - The Khmer Rouge Rebels won control of Cambodia after a five years of civil war. They renamed the country Kampuchea and began a reign of terror.

1977 - The ban on women attending West Point was lifted.

1978 - In Orissa, India, 180 people died when a tornado hit.

1982 - Queen Elizabeth proclaimed Canada's new constitution in effect. The act severed the last colonial links with Britain.

1985 - Mickey Mantle was reinstated after being banned from baseball for several years.

1987 - The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) sternly warned U.S. radio stations to watch the use of indecent language on the airwaves.

1987 - The U.S. Patent Office began allowing the patenting of new animals created by genetic engineering.

1992 - Italian financier Carlo de Benedetti and 32 others were convicted of fraud in connection with the 1982 collapse of Banco Ambrosiano.

1992 - The House ethics committee listed 303 current and former lawmakers who had overdrawn their House bank accounts.

1995 - The European Union and Canada agreed to protect threatened fish stocks in the north Atlantic.

1996 - Britain's Prince Andrew and his wife, Sarah, the Duchess of York, announced that they were in the process of getting a divorce.

1996 - An Italian court found former Prime Minister Bettino Craxi guilty on charges of corruption. He was sentenced to eight years and three months in prison.

1999 - Wayne Gretzky announced his retirement from the National Hockey League (NHL).

2002 - The U.S. Supreme Court overturned major parts of a 1996 child pornography law based on rights to free speech.

 

[Fresno]

Cool miniD thank you

 

[gunslingingbird]

Just out of curiosity, mini d, are you a historian, do you read lots of encyclopedia articles, or do you just not have anything else to do than find what happened on this day in history? It's not that I'm against this thread, in fact, I think it's one of the better threads on the forum, it's just that you post about 50 things that happened on this day in history every day, and I'm somewhat curious about how you know all this stuff.

 

[minidog]

i just spend all day typing it out in the hope that people actually enjoy it

1492 - Christopher Columbus signed a contract with Spain to find a passage to Asia and the Indies.

1521 - Martin Luther was excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church.

1524 - New York Harbor was discovered by Giovanni Verrazano.

1535 - Antonio Mendoza was appointed first viceroy of New Spain.

1629 - Horses were first imported into the colonies by the American Massachusetts Bay Colony.

1704 - John Campbell published what would eventually become the first successful American newspaper. It was known as the Boston "News-Letter."

1758 - Frances Williams published a collection of Latin poems. He was the first African-American to graduate from a college in the western hemisphere.

1808 - Bayonne Decree by Napoleon I of France ordered the seizure of U.S. ships.

1810 - Pineapple cheese was patented by Lewis M. Norton.

1824 - Russia abandoned all North American claims south of 54' 40'.

1860 - New Yorkers learned of a new law that required fire escapes to be provided for tenement houses.

1861 - Virginia became the eighth state to secede from the Union.

1864 - U.S. Civil War General Grant banned the trading of prisoners.

1865 - Mary Surratt was arrested as a conspirator in the Lincoln assassination.

1875 - The game "snooker" was invented by Sir Neville Chamberlain.

1895 - China and Japan signed the Treaty of Shimonoseki. It was the end of the first Sino-Japanese War. In the treaty China ceded Taiwan to Japan.

1916 - The American Academy of Arts and Letters obtained a charter from the U.S. Congress.

1917 - A bill in Congress to establish Daylight Saving Time was defeated. It was passed a couple of months later.

1935 - "Lights Out" debuted on NBC Radio. It ran until 1952.

1941 - Igor Sikorsky accomplished the first successful helicopter lift-off from water near Stratford, CT.

1941 - The office of Price Administration was established in the U.S. to handle rationing.

1946 - The last French troops left Syria.

1947 - Jackie Robinson (Brooklyn Dodgers) performed a bunt for his first major league hit.

1961 - About 1,400 U.S.-supported Cuban exiles invaded Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in an attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro. It was an unsuccessful attack.

1964 - Jerrie Mock became first woman to fly an airplane solo around the world.

1964 - The Ford Motor Company unveiled its new Mustang model.

1967 - "The Joey Bishop Show" debuted on ABC-TV.

1967 - The U.S. Supreme Court barred Muhammad Ali's request to be blocked from induction into the U.S. Army.

1969 - In Los Angeles, Sirhan Sirhan was convicted of assassinating U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy.

1969 - Czechoslovak Communist Party chairman Alexander Dubcek was deposed.

1970 - Apollo 13 returned to Earth safely after an on-board accident with an oxygen tank.

1975 - Khmer Rouge forces capture the capital of Cambodia, Phnom Penh. It was the end of the five-year war.

1983 - In Warsaw, police routed 1,000 Solidarity supporters.

1984 - In London, gunmen from the Libyan Embassy fired into an anti-Libya protest. One policewoman was killed and 10 others were wounded.

1985 - The U.S. Postal Service unveiled its new 22-cent, "LOVE" stamp.

1985 - In Lebanon, the cabinet resigned as Shiites took W. Beirut.

1987 - In Sri Lanka, Tamil guerrillas killed 122 people in a road ambush.

1989 - In Poland, courts gave Solidarity legal status.

1993 - A federal jury in Los Angeles convicted two former police officers of violating the civil rights of beaten motorist Rodney King. Two other officers were acquitted.

1996 - Erik and Lyle Menendez were sentenced to life in prison without parole for killing their parents.

1999 - In India, the government of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee collapsed after losing a vote of confidence.

2002 - At the National Maritime Museum in London, the exhibit "Skin Deep - A History of Tattooing" opened.

 

[gunslingingbird]

If I was ever on Cash Cab and needed a mobile shout out for a history-related question, you'd be the first person I'd want to call.

 

[minidog]

1521 - Martin Luther confronted the emperor Charles V in the Diet of Worms and refused to retract his views that led to his excommunication.

1676 - Sudbury, Massachusetts, was attacked by Indians.

1775 - American revolutionaries Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott rode though the towns of Massachusetts giving the warning that "the British are coming."

1791 - National Guardsmen prevented Louis XVI and his family from leaving Paris.

1818 - A regiment of Indians and blacks were defeated at the Battle of Suwann, in Florida, ending the first Seminole War.

1834 - William Lamb became prime minister of England.

1838 - The Wilkes' expedition to the South Pole set sail.

1846 - The telegraph ticker was patented by R.E. House

1847 - U.S. forces defeated the Mexicans at Cerro Gordo.

1853 - The first train in Asia began running from Bombay to Tanna.

1861 - Colonel Robert E. Lee turned down an offer to command the Union armies during the U.S. Civil War.

1877 - Charles Cros wrote a paper that described the process of recording and reproducing sound. In France, Cros is regarded as the inventor of the phonograph. In the U.S., Thomas Edison gets the credit.

1895 - New York State passed an act that established free public baths.

1906 - San Francisco, CA, was hit with an earthquake. The orginal death toll was cited at about 700. Later information indicated that the death toll may have been 3 to 4 times the original estimate.

1910 - Walter R. Brookins made the first airplane flight at night.

1923 - Yankee Stadium opened in the Bronx, NY. The Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox 4-1. John Phillip Sousa's band played the National Anthem.

1924 - Simon and Schuster, Inc. published the first "Crossword Puzzle Book."

1934 - The first Laundromat opened in Fort Worth, TX.

1937 - Leon Trotsky called for the overthrow of Soviet leader Josef Stalin.

1938 - U.S. President Roosevelt threw out the first ball preceding the season opener between the Washington Senators and the Philadelphia Athletics.

1942 - James H. Doolittle and his squadron, from the USS Hornet, raided Tokyo and other Japanese cities.

1942 - The Vichy government capitulated to Adolf Hitler and invited Pierre Laval to form a new government in France.

1943 - Traveling in a bomber, Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, was shot down by American P-38 fighters.

1945 - American war correspondent Ernie Pyle was killed by Japanese gunfire on the Pacific island of Ie Shima, off Okinawa. He was 44 years old.

1946 - The League of Nations was dissolved.

1949 - The Republic of Ireland was established.

1950 - The first transatlantic jet passenger trip was completed.

1954 - Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser seized power in Egypt.

1955 - Albert Einstein died.

1956 - Actress Grace Kelly and Prince Rainier of Monaco were married. The religious ceremony took place April 19.

1960 - The Mutual Broadcasting System was sold to the 3M Company of Minnesota for $1.25 million.

1978 - The U.S. Senate approved the transfer of the Panama Canal to Panama on December 31, 1999.

1979 - The TV show "Real People" premiered.

1980 - Rhodesia became in independent nation of Zimbabwe.

1983 - The U.S. Embassy in Beirut was blown up by a suicide car-bomber. 63 people were killed including 17 Americans.

1984 - Daredevils Mike MacCarthy and Amanda Tucker made a sky dive from the Eiffel Tower. The jump ended safely.

1985 - Ted Turner filed for a hostile takeover of CBS.

1985 - Tulane University abolished its 72-year-old basketball program. The reason was charges of fixed games, drug abuse, and payments to players.

1989 - Thousands of Chinese students demanding democracy tried to storm Communist Party headquarters in Beijing.

1999 - Wayne Gretzky (New York Rangers) played his final game in the NHL. He retired as the NHL's all-time leading scorer and holder of 61 individual records.

2000 - The Nasdaq had the biggest one-day point gain in its history.

2000 - Joan Lunden and Jeff Konigsberg were married.

2002 - Actor Robert Blake and his bodyguard were arrested in connection with the shooting death of Blake's wife about a year before.

2002 - The Amtrack Auto Train derailed in a remote area of north Florida. Four people were killed and 133 were injured.

2002 - The city legislature of Berlin decided to make Marlene Dietrich an honorary citizen. Dietrich had gone to the United States in 1930. She refused to return to Germany after Adolf Hitler came to power.

 

[dick van cock]

1521 - Martin Luther confronted the emperor Charles V in the Diet of Worms.

:throwup:

No wonder, protestants are so measly ... :1orglaugh

 

[minidog]

1012 - Aelfheah was murdered by Danes who had been ravaging the south of England. Aelfhear became the 29th Archbishop of Canterbury in 1005.

1539 - Emperor Charles V reached a truce with German Protestants at Frankfurt, Germany.

1587 - English admiral Sir Francis Drake entered Cadiz harbor and sank the Spanish fleet.

1689 - Residents of Boston ousted their governor, Edmond Andros.

1713 - Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI issued the Pragmatic Sanction, which gave women the rights of succession to Hapsburg possessions.

1764 - The English Parliament banned the American colonies from printing paper money.

1770 - Captain James Cook discovered New South Wales, Australia. Cook originally named the land Point Hicks.

1775 - The American Revolution began as fighting broke out at Lexington, MA.

1782 - The Netherlands recognized the new United States.

1794 - Tadeusz Kosciuszko forced the Russians out of Warsaw.

1802 - The Spanish reopened the New Orleans port to American merchants.

1839 - The Kingdom of Belgium was recognized by all the states of Europe when the Treaty of London was signed.

1852 - The California Historical Society was founded.

1861 - Thaddeus S. C. Lowe sailed 900 miles in nine hours in a hot air balloon.

1861 - The Baltimore riots resulted in four Union soldiers and nine civilians killed.

1861 - U.S. President Lincoln ordered a blockade of Confederate ports.

1892 - The Duryea gasoline buggy was introduced in the U.S. by Charles and Frank Duryea.

1897 - The first annual Boston Marathon was held. It was the first of its type in the U.S.

1927 - In China, Hankow communists declared war on Chaing Kai-shek.

1933 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued a proclamation that removed the U.S. went off of the gold standard.

1938 - General Francisco Franco declared victory in the Spanish Civil War.

1939 - Connecticut approved the Bill of Rights for the U.S. Constitution after 148 years.

1943 - The Warsaw Ghetto uprising against Nazi rule began. The Jews were able to fight off the Germans for 28 days.

1951 - General Douglas MacArthur gave his "Old Soldiers" speech before the U.S. Congress. In the address General MacArthur said that "Old soldiers never die, they just fade away."

1951 - Shigeki Tanaka won the Boston Marathon. Tanaka had survived the atomic blast at Hiroshima, Japan during World War II.

1956 - Actress Grace Kelly became Princess Grace of Monaco when she married Prince Rainier III of Monaco. The civil ceremony took place on April 18.

1958 - The San Francisco Giants and the Los Angeles Dodgers played the first major league baseball game on the West Coast.

1960 - Baseball uniforms began displaying player's names on their backs.

1967 - Surveyor 3 landed on the moon and began sending photos back to the U.S.

1971 - Russia launched the Salyut into orbit around Earth. It was the first space station.

1975 - India launched its first satellite with aid from the USSR.

1977 - Alex Haley received a special Pulitzer Prize for his book "Roots."

1982 - NASA named Sally Ride to be first woman astronaut.

1987 - In Phoenix, AZ, skydiver Gregory Robertson went into a 200-mph free-fall to save an unconscious colleague 3,500 feet from the ground.

1987 - The last California condor known to be in the wild was captured and placed in a breeding program at the San Diego Wild Animal Park.

1989 - A gun turret exploded aboard the USS Iowa. 47 sailors were killed.

1989 - A giant asteroid passed within 500,000 miles of Earth.

1989 - In El Salvador, Attorney General Alvadora was killed by a car bomb.

1993 - The Branch-Davidian’s compound in Waco, TX, burned to the ground. It was the end of a 51-day standoff between the cult and U.S. federal agents. 86 people were killed including 17 children. Nine of the Branch Davidians escaped the fire.

1994 - A Los Angeles jury awarded $3.8 million to Rodney King for violation of his civil rights.

1995 - The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, OK, was destroyed by a bomb. It was the worst bombing on U.S. territory. 168 people were killed including 19 children, and 500 were injured. Timothy McVeigh was found guilty of the bombing on June 2, 1997.

1998 - Wang Dan, a leader of 1989 Tienanmen Square pro democracy protests, was freed by the Chinese government.

2000 - The Oklahoma City National Memorial was dedicated on the fifth anniversary of the bombing in Oklahoma that killed 168 people.

2000 - Letters written by Greta Garbo were put on exhibit. The letters were made public ten years after Garbo's death.

2000 - In the Philippines, Air Philippines GAP 541 crashed while preparing to land. 131 people were killed.

2002 - The USS Cole was relaunched. In Yemen, 17 sailors were killed when the ship was attacked by terrorists on October 12, 2000. The attack was blamed on Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network.

 

[minidog]

753 BC - Today is the traditional date of the foundation of Rome.

43 BC - Marcus Antonius was defeated by Octavian near Modena, Italy.

1526 - Mongol Emperor Babur annihilated the Indian Army of Ibrahim Lodi.

1649 - The Maryland Toleration Act was passed, allowing all freedom of worship.

1689 - William III and Mary II were crowned joint king and queen of England, Scotland and Ireland.

1789 - John Adams was sworn in as the first U.S. Vice President.

1836 - General Sam Houston defeated Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto. This battle decided the independence of Texas.

1856 - The Mississippi River was crossed by a rail train for the first time (between Davenport, IA, and Rock Island, IL).

1862 - The U.S. Congress established the U.S. Mint in Denver, CO.

1865 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln's funeral train left Washington.

1892 - The first Buffalo was born in Golden Gate Park.

1898 - The Spanish-American War began.

1914 - U.S. Marines occupied Vera Cruz, Mexico.

1916 - Bill Carlisle, the infamous ‘last train robber,’ robbed a train in Hanna, WY.

1918 - German fighter ace Baron von Richthofen, "The Red Baron," was shot down and killed during World War I.

1940 - "Take It or Leave It" premiered on CBS Radio.

1943 - U.S. President Roosevelt announced that several Doolittle pilots had been executed by the Japanese.

1953 - In New York, the Sidney Janis Gallery held the Dada exhibition.

1956 - Leonard Ross, age 10, became the youngest prizewinner on the "The Big Surprise". He won $100,000.

1959 - The largest fish ever hooked by a rod and reel was caught by Alf Dean. It was a 16-foot, 10-inch white shark that weighed 2,664 pounds.

1960 - Brasilia became the capital of Brazil.

1961 - The French army revolted in Algeria.

1967 - Svetlana Alliluyeva (Svetlana Stalina) defected in New York City. She was the daughter of Joseph Stalin.

1967 - In Athens, Army colonels took over the government and installed Constantine Kollias as premier.

1972 - Apollo 16 astronauts John Young and Charles Duke explored the surface of the moon.

1975 - South Vietnam president, Nguyen Van Thieu, resigned, condemning the United States.

1977 - "Annie" opened on Broadway.

1984 - In France, it was announced that doctors had found virus believed to cause AIDS.

1985 - Manuel Ortega proposed a cease-fire for Nicaragua.

1986 - Geraldo Rivera opened a vault that belonged to Al Capone at the Lexington Hotel in Chicago. Nothing of interest was found inside.

1987 - Special occasion stamps were offered for the first time by the U.S. Postal Service. "Happy Birthday" and "Get Well" were among the first to be offered.

1992 - Robert Alton Harris became the first person executed by the state of California in 25 years. He was put to death for the 1978 murder of two teen-age boys.

1994 - Jackie Parker became the first woman to qualify to fly an F-16 combat plane.

1998 - Astronomers announced in Washington that they had discovered possible signs of a new family of planets orbiting a star 220 light-years away.

2000 - In Sinking Spring, PA, a man chased his estranged girlfriend through town and then forced her car into the path of an oncoming train. The woman and her 3 passengers were killed.

2000 - North Carolina researchers announced that the heart of a 66 million-year-old dinosaur was more like a mammal or bird than that of a reptile.

2000 - The 1998 Children's Online Privacy Protection Act went into effect.

2002 - In the city of General Santos, 14 people were killed and 69 were injured in a bomb attack on a department store. The attack was blamed on Muslim extremists.

2003 - North and South Korea agreed to hold Cabinet-level talks the following week.

 

[minidog]

1500 - Portuguese navigator Pedro Alvares Cabral discovered Brazil.

1509 - Henry VIII ascended to the throne of England upon the death of his father Henry VII.

1529 - Spain and Portugal divided the eastern hemisphere in Treaty of Saragosa.

1745 - The Peace of Fussen was signed, restoring the status quo of Germany.

1792 - U.S. President George Washington proclaimed American neutrality in the war in Europe.

1861 - Robert E. Lee was named commander of Virginia forces.

1864 - The U.S. Congress mandated that all coins minted as U.S. currency bear the inscription "In God We Trust".

1876 - Eight baseball teams began the inaugural season of the National League.

1889 - At noon, the Oklahoma land rush officially started as thousands of Americans race for new, unclaimed land.

1898 - The first shot of the Spanish-American war occurred when the USS Nashville captured a Spanish merchant ship.

1914 - Babe Ruth made his pitching debut with the Baltimore Orioles.

1915 - At the Second Battle Ypres the Germans became the first country to use poison gas.

1915 - The New York Yankees wore pinstripes and the hat-in-the-ring logo for the first time.

1918 - British naval forces attempted to sink block-ships in the German U-boat bases at the Battle of Zeeburgge.

1930 - The U.S., Britain and Japan signed the London Naval Treaty, which regulated submarine warfare and limited shipbuilding.

1931 - Egypt signed the treaty of friendship with Iraq.

1931 - James G. Ray landed an autogyro on the lawn of the White House.

1944 - During World War II, the Allies launched a major attack against the Japanese in Hollandia, New Guinea.

1952 - An atomic test conducted in Nevada was the first nuclear explosion shown on live network television.

1954 - The U.S. Senate Army-McCarthy televised hearings began.

1967 - Randy Matson set a new world record with a shot put toss of 71 feet, and 5 1/2 inches in College Station, TX.

1970 - The first "Earth Day" was observed by millions of Americans.

1976 - Barbara Walters became first female nightly network news anchor.

1987 - The American Physical Society said that the "Star Wars" missile system was "highly questionable" and would take ten years to research.

1993 - The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum was dedicated in Washington, DC.

1997 - In Lima, Peru government commandos storm and capture the residence of the Japanese ambassador ending a 126-day hostage crisis. In the rescue 71 hostages were saved. Those killed: one hostage (of a heart attack), two soldiers, and all 14 rebels.

1997 - 93 people are killed in the insurgency of extremist Muslims that continued in Algeria in a town south of Algiers.

1999 - The Watson Family received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

2000 - Elian Gonzalez was reunited with his father. He had to be taken from his Miami relatives by U.S. agents in a predawn raid.

2000 - ABC-TV aired a small portion of the Clinton-DiCaprio interview.

2002 - Philippino President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo ordered a state of emergency in the city of General Santos in response to a series of bombing attacks the day before. The attacks were blamed on Muslim extremists.

2005 - Zacarias Moussaoui plead guilty to conspiring with hijackers in the September 11, 2001, plot to attack American buildings and citizens.

 

[minidog]

0303 - Perseus was arrested, tortured, and put to death.

1348 - The first English order of knighthood was founded. It was the Order of the Garter.

1500 - Pedro Cabal claimed Brazil for Portugal.

1521 - The Comuneros were crushed by royalist troops in Spain.

1759 - The British seized Basse-Terre and Guadeloupe in the Antilies from France.

1789 - U.S. President George Washington moved into Franklin House, New York. It was the first executive mansion.

1789 - "Courier De Boston" was published for the first time. It was the first Roman Catholic magazine in the U.S.

1826 - Missolonghi fell to Egyptian forces.

1861 - Arkansas troops seized Fort Smith.

1872 - Charlotte E. Ray became the first black woman lawyer.

1895 - Russia, France, and Germany forced Japan to return the Liaodong peninsula to China.

1896 - The Vitascope system for projecting movies onto a screen was demonstrated in New York City.

1900 - The word "hillbilly" was first used in print in an article in the "New York Journal." It was spelled "Hill-Billie".

1908 - U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt signed an act creating the U.S. Army Reserve.

1915 - The A.C.A. became the National Advisory Council on Aeronautics (NACA).

1920 - The Turkish Grand National Assembly had its first meeting in Ankara.

1921 - Charles Paddock set a record time in the 300-meter track event when he posted a time of 33.2 seconds.

1924 - The U.S. Senate passed the Soldiers Bonus Bill.

1940 - About 200 people died in a dance-hall fire in Natchez, MS.

1945 - The Soviet Army fought its way into Berlin.

1948 - Johnny Longden became the first race jockey to ride 3,000 career winners.

1950 - Chaing evacuated Hainan, leaving mainland China to Mao and the communists.

1951 - The Associated Press began use of the new service of teletype setting.

1954 - Hank Aaron of the Milwaukee Braves hit his first major-league home run on this day.

1964 - Ken Johnson of the Houston Astros threw the first no-hitter for a loss. The game was lost 1-0 to the Cincinnati Reds due to two errors.

1967 - The Soyuz 1 was launched by Russia.

1968 - The Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethren Church merged to form the United Methodist Church.

1969 - Sirhan Sirhan was sentenced to death for killing U.S. Senator Robert Kennedy. The sentence was later reduced to life in prison.

1971 - The Soyuz 10 was launched.

1985 - The Coca-Cola Company announced that it was changing its 99-year-old secret formula. New Coke was not successful, which resulted in the resumption of selling the original version.

1985 - The U.S. House rejected $14 million in aid to Nicaragua.

1987 - An apartment complex being built in Bridgeport, Connecticut collapsed. 28 construction workers were killed.

1988 - A U.S. federal law took effect that banned smoking on flights that were under two hours.

1988 - Kanellos Kanelopoulos set three world records for human-powered flight when he stayed in the air for 74 miles and four hours in his pedal-powered "Daedalus".

1989 - It was reported that 277 had been killed in the most recent rebel attack in Afghanistan.

1989 - Kareem Abdul-Jabbar played his last regular season game in the NBA.

1996 - A New York civil-court jury ordered Bernhard Goetz to pay $43 million to Darrell Cabey. Cabey was paralyzed when he was shot in subway car in 1984.

1996 - An auction of the late Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis' possessions began at Sotheby's in New York City.

1997 - An infertility doctor in California announced that a 63-year-old woman had given birth in late 1996. The child was from a donor egg. The woman is the oldest known woman to give birth.

1998 - James Earl Ray died, at age 70, while serving a life sentence for the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Ray had confessed to the crime and then later insisted he had been framed.

1999 - In Washington, DC, the heads of state and government of the 19 NATO nations celebrated the organization's 50th anniversary.

2003 - U.S. President Bush signed legislation that authorized the design change of the 5-cent coin (nickel) for release in 2004. It was the first change to the coin in 65 years. The change, to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Louisiana Purchase, was planned to run for only two years before returning to the previous design.

 

[minidog]

1519 - Envoys of Montezuma II attended the first Easter mass in Central America.

1547 - Charles V's troops defeated the Protestant League of Schmalkalden at the battle of Muhlburg.

1558 - Mary, Queen of Scotland, married the French dauphin, Francis.

1800 - The Library of Congress was established with a $5,000 allocation.

1805 - The U.S. Marines attacked and captured the town of Derna in Tripoli.

1833 - A patent was granted for first soda fountain.

1877 - Russia declared war on the Ottoman Empire.

1877 - In the U.S., federal troops were ordered out of New Orleans. This was the end to the North's post-Civil War rule in the South.

1884 - Otto von Bismarck cabled Cape Town that South Africa was now a German colony.

1889 - The Edison General Electric Company was organized.

1897 - William Price became the first to be named White House news reporter.

1898 - Spain declared war on the U.S., rejecting America's ultimatum for Spain to withdraw from Cuba.

1915 - During World War I, the Ottoman Turkish Empire began the mass deportation of Armenians.

1916 - Irish nationalist launched the Easter Rebellion against British occupation forces. They were overtaken several days later.

1944 - The first B-29 arrived in China, over the Hump of the Himalayas.

1948 - The Berlin airlift began to relieve the surrounded city.

1952 - Raymond Burr made his TV acting debut on the "Gruen Guild Playhouse" in an episode titled, "The Tiger."

1953 - Winston Churchill was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II.

1955 - "X-Minus One," a science fiction show, was first heard for the first time on NBC radio.

1961 - Sandy Koufax of the Los Angeles Dodgers struck out 18 batters becoming the first major-league pitcher to do so on two different occasions.

1961 - U.S. President Kennedy accepted "sole responsibility" following Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba.

1962 - MIT sent a TV signal by satellite for the first time.

1967 - Soviet astronaut Vladimir Komarov died when his craft crashed with a tangled parachute.

1967 - The newest Greek regime banned miniskirts.

1968 - Leftist students took over several campus buildings at Columbia University.

1970 - The People's Republic of China launched its first satellite.

1973 - Albert Sabin reported that herpesviruses were factors in nine kinds of cancer.

1974 - David Bowie released "Diamond Dogs."

1981 - The IBM Personal Computer was introduced.

1987 - In Palm Bay, FL, a gunman opened fire in a mall. He killed six and wounded 10.

1989 - Thousands of students began striking in Beijing.

1990 - The space shuttle Discovery blasted off from Cape Canaveral, FL. It was carrying the $1.5 billion Hubble Space Telescope.

1990 - Michael Milken plead guilty to six felonies and agreed to pay a $600 million penalty. He was later sentenced to ten years in prison. Milken had sold junk-bond in the 1980s.

1994 - Madonna visited the San Antonio Spurs locker room to congratulate David Robinson on his 71-point performance.

1997 - The U.S. Senate ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention. The global treaty banned the development, production, storage and use of chemical weapons.

1998 - ABC confirmed that it was canceling the TV series "Ellen." The show was the first series to feature an openly gay lead character.

2000 - ABC-TV aired the TV movie "The Three Stooges."

2003 - A U.S. official reported the North Korea had claimed to have nuclear weapons.