0772 - Adrian I begins his reign as Catholic Pope
1539 - Emperor Karel & King François I sign anti-English treaty
1587 - English queen Elizabeth I signs Mary Stuart's death sentence
1662 - Dutch garrison on Formosa surrenders for Chinese pirates
1669 - French King Louis XIV limits freedom of religion
1709 - British sailor Alexander Selkirk is rescued after being marooned on a desert island (Fernandez Island) for 5 years, his story is the inspiration for Daniel Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe"
1717 - Henri d'Aguesseau's 1st appointment as chancellor of France
1720 - Sweden & Prussia sign peace treaty
1742 - Sardinia & Austria sign alliance
1788 - 1st US steamboat patent issued, by Georgia to Briggs & Longstreet
1789 - Chinese troops driven out of Vietnam capital Thang Long
1790 - Supreme Court convenes for the 1st time (New York NY)
1793 - Patent granted Ralph Hodgson, New York, for oiled silk & linen; France declares war on England & Netherlands
1810 - Seville, Spain surrenders to the French
1814 - Volcano Mayon on Luzon Philippines erupts, killing 1,200
1840 - Baltimore College of Dental Surgery, 1st in US, incorporated
1861 - Texas becomes 7th state to secede
1862 - Julia Howe publishes "Battle Hymn of the Republic"
1864 - 2nd German-Danish war begins; Austrian/Prussian troops occupy Sleeswijk/Holstein; Battle of Yazoo River, Mississippi
1865 - 13th amendment approved (National Freedom Day); General Sherman's march through South Carolina begins; JS Rock, 1st Black lawyer to practice in Supreme Court, admitted to bar
1871 - Jefferson Long of Georgia is 1st Black to make an official speech in House of Representatives (opposing leniency to former Confederates)
1883 - French Lieutenant-Colonel Gustave Borgnis-Desbordes reaches Bamako on the Niger
1884 - 1st volume of the Oxford English Dictionary, A-Ant, published
1887 - Harvey Wilcox of Kansas subdivides 120 acres he owned in Southern California & starts selling it off as a real estate development (Hollywood)
1893 - Thomas Edison completes worlds 1st movie studio (West Orange NJ)
1898 - 1st auto insurance policy in US issued, by Travelers Insurance Company
1902 - China's empress Tzu-hsi forbids binding woman's feet
1905 - Hungarian premier Tisza resigns
1906 - 1st federal penitentiary building completed, Leavenworth KS
1910 - 1st British labour exchange opens; Dragoumis government forms in Greece
1917 - Admiral Tirpitz announces unlimited submarine war
1920 - 1st commercial armored car introduced (St Paul MN); Royal Canadian Mounted Police forms as Royal Northwest Mounted Police merge with Dominion Police
1923 - Allied ultimatum on Lithuanian occupation of Memel; Fascists Voluntary Militia forms in Italy under Mussolini
1924 - New British MacDonald government recognizes USSR
1926 - Kirghiz Autonomous Region in RSFSR becomes Kirghiz ASSR
1933 - Colonial government arrests Anton de Kom in Paramaribo Suriname; German Parliament dissolves, General Ludendorf predicts catastrophe
1934 - Austrian Chancellor Dollfuss dissolves all political parties but his own
1935 - 1st "March of Time" newsreel premieres at the Capitol
1937 - Stapleton, Staten Island, becomes a customs-free port
1940 - Russia begins new offensive against Finland
1942 - 2nd Norwegian government of Quisling forms
1943 - German occupiers make Vidkun Quisling Norwegian premier; Mussert forms pro Nazi shadow cabinet (Netherlands)
1944 - Supreme Soviet enlarges soviet republics' autonomy; US 7th Infantry/25th Marine Division lands on Kwajalein/Roi/Namur
1945 - US Army arrives at Siegfriedlinie
1946 - Trygve Lie, a Norwegian socialist, becomes 1st Secretary-General of UN; Republic of Hungary proclaimed, Zolt n Tildy as communist president
1947 - NV United Dutch Fokker's Aircraft established
1948 - Palestine Post building in Jerusalem bombed; Federation Malaysia forms from 9 sultanates
1950 - Urko Kekkonen elected president of Finland; USSR demands condemnation of Emperor Hirohito for war crimes
1951 - 1st X-ray moving picture process demonstrated; Alfred Krupp & 28 other German war criminals freed
1951 - UN condemns People's Republic of China as aggressor in Korea
1953 - "General Electric Theater" premieres on CBS TV; Reagan later hosts; "You Are There" with Walter Cronkite premieres on CBS television; Dr. A. de Waal appointed as Netherlands 1st female assistant Secretary of state; Flooding in Netherlands kills 1,835
1955 - H.C. Hansen appointed premier of Denmark
1956 - Hague Daily Newspaper reveals war crimes of Hague mayor Schokking
1957 - 1st black pilot (PH Young) on a US scheduled passenger airline
1958 - 1st US satellite (Explorer I) launched; Egypt & Syria announce plans to merge into United Arab Republic
1959 - Swiss males vote against voting rights for women; Texas Instruments requests patent of IC (Integrated Circuit)
1959 - Zack Wheat unanimously elected to baseball Hall of Fame
1960 - 4 students stage 1st civil rights sit-in, at Greensboro, NC Woolworth; Extreme right-wing rebels in Algiers surrender
1961 - 1st full-scale test of US Minuteman ICBM is successful
1963 - Nyasaland (now Malawi) becomes self-governing under Hastings Banda
1964 - Suriname River dammed
1965 - Martin Luther King Jr & 700 demonstrators arrested in Selma, AL; Peter Jennings, 26, becomes anchor of ABC's nightly news
1967 - Severe brush fires in Tasmania destroy $11 million & 60 lives
1968 - In what would become a famous photo, Saigon police chief Nguyen Ngoc Loan executes a Viet Cong officer with a pistol shot to the head; Vince Lombardi resigns as coach of the Green Bay Packers; Former Vice-President Richard Nixon announces candidacy for President; World trade conference Unctad 2 opens in New Delhi
1969 - Jim Morrison arrested for exposing himself in concert
1970 - Stalled commuter train rammed by express in Argentina, 139 die; West-Germany & USSR sign gas contract
1972 - 1st scientific hand-held calculator (HP-35) introduced ($395)
1975 - Otis Francis Tabler is 1st open homosexual to get security clearance to work for the Defense Department
1977 - Heavy blizzard in New England claims 100 lives
1978 - Director Roman Polanski skips bail & flees to France after pleading guilty to charges of engaging in sex with a 13-year-old girl
1978 - Harriet Tubman is 1st black woman honored on a US postage stamp
1979 - Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Iran after 15 years in exile; Patricia Hearst is released from a San Francisco prison for bank robbery
1981 - French government accord sends 60 Mirage fighter jets to Iraq
1982 - Senegal & Gambia form loose confederation (Senegambia); "Late Night With David Letterman" debuts on NBC-TV
1984 - Ravindara Mhatrem, Indian diplomat, kidnapped in England (killed 02/03); China & Netherlands regain diplomatic relations
1989 - Comet Schwassmann-Wachmann 1 at perihelion; Princess Diana of England visits New York NY
1991 - South African President F.W. de Klerk says he will repeal all apartheid laws; Afghanistan/Pakistan hit by earthquake - 1,200 die; US Air & Skywest Fairchild commuter jet collide at Los Angeles Airport killing 32
1993 - New York Judge Sol Wachtler indicted for harassing Joy Silverman; Soyuz TM-16 lands
1994 - Large meteorite falls near Kusaie, Pacific Ocean
1995 - Amtrak's New York-Tampa run ends
2003 - The Space Shuttle Columbia breaks up during re-entry into Earth's atmosphere, with the loss of all aboard.

Birthdays
1552 - Sir Edward Coke England, jurist/politician (defended common law)
1805 - Auguste Blanqui France, revolutionary (workers' leader)
1807 - William Bowen Campbell, Union Brigadier General
1819 - Henry Lawrence Eustis, Union Brigadier General
1829 - John Potts Slough, Union Brigadier General
1878 - Hattie Wyatt Caraway, politician/teacher/1st woman elected to senate
1882 - Louis St Laurent Compton, 12th Canadian PM (1948-57)
1896 - Anastasio "Tacho" Somoza, General/President of Nicaragua (1937-56)
1913 - Jeffrey Kindersley Quill Test pilot
1916 - Gordon Hobday Lord Lieutenant (Nottinghamshire)
1928 - Tom Lantos (Representative-CA)
1930 - Peter Tapsell, British MP
1931 - Boris Yeltsin Ural Mountains USSR, president of Russian SSR; Barrel [ABM] Frinking, teacher/Dutch MP (CVP); Ton [ABM] Frinking Dutch MP (CDA)
1932 - John Hart, newsman (CBS News Retrospective, NBC News); John Nott British MP
1935 - Vladimir Viktorovich Aksyonov, cosmonaut (Soyuz 22, T-2)
1939 - Paul E. Gillmor (Representative-OH)
1941 - Robert Walmsley, British Vice-Admiral
1943 - Lord Mountevans
1947 - Adam Ingram, British MP
1951 - Andrew Smith, British MP
1961 - Daniel M. Tani, astronaut

Passings
0656 - Sigebert III, King of Austrasia, dies at about 25
1204 - Alexius IV Angelus, regent of Byzantium (1203-04), murdered
1248 - Hendrik II, Duke of Brabant (1235-48)
1294 - Louis II the Stern, ruler of Upper-Bayern
1328 - Charles IV the Handsome, King of France (1322-28)
1650 - Rene Descartes, philosopher "I think therefore I am"
1666 - Sjihab al-Din Sultan C Shah Djahan mogol of India (Taj-Mahal), dies
1691 - Alexander VIII [Pietro Ottoboni], Italian Pope (1689-91), dies at 80
1733 - August II the Strong, King of Poland (355 children), dies at 62
1838 - Abraham de Veer, Dutch Governor-General of Suriname (1822-28), dies at 71
1908 - Carlos I, King of Portugal (1889-1908), assassinated by mob at 44
1957 - Friedrich von Paulus, German field marshal (Stalingrad), dies at 66
1966 - Nicholas Piantanida sets balloon flight record & dies in descent; Buster Keaton [Joseph Francis], US comic (General), dies at 69
1976 - Werner C. Heisenberg, physicist (Nobel 1932, field theory), dies at 74
1986 - Alva Myrdal, Swedish Nobel peace prize winner (1982), dies at 84
1991 - H.J. van Ommeren-Averink, Dutch MP (CPN); James G. MacDonald, cartoon voice (Mickey Mouse), dies at 84
1992 - Irving R. Kaufman federal judge (Rosenberg Case), dies at 81
2003 - Astronauts Rick D. Husband, William C. McCool, Michael P. Anderson, Ilan Ramon, Kalpana Chawla, Ph.D., David Brown, M.D., and Laurel Salton Clark, M.D., die when the Space Shuttle Columbia breaks up during re-entry (visit the NASA tribute)

Reported Missing in Action
1966
The following USMC personnel reported MIA when their KC130F was shot down during a refueling mission - all presumed KIA:
Alm, Richard A. (WA); crew

Coates, Donald L. (OR); crew

Humphrey, Galen F. (MO); navigator

Luker, Hubert B. (OH); crew

Prevost, Albert M. (CT); pilot

Vlahakos, Peter G., (ME); crewchief

Also reported MIA this day in 1966:
Dengler, Dieter, USN (CA); A1H shot down, escaped July, 1966 - alive as of 1998

Loheed, Hubert B., USN (MA); A4C shot down - remains ID'd August, 1994

1968
The following Civilians reported MIA when they were kidnapped / attacked at the Leprosarium near Ban Me Thuot, during the Tet Offensive:

Blood, Henry F., Wickcliff Translators; Killed in Captivity - remains ID'd July, 1998

Olsen, Betty Ann, Missionary Nurse (NY); DIC September, 1968

The following reported MIA during the Tet Offensive in Hue:
Adkins, Cloden, Civilian - Pacific Architects & Engineers; released by PRG March, 1973 - deceased as of October, 1997

Balagot, Arturo Mendoza, Civilian - Voice of America; released by DRV March, 1973 - deceased

Gostas, Theodore W., US Army (WY); released by PRG March, 1973 - alive as of 1998

Haukness, Steven A., Civilian - US State Department; remains recovered August, 1974 - ID'd March, 1975

Henderson, Alexander, Civilian; released by PRG March, 1973

Meyer, Lewis E., Civilian (CA); released by PRG March, 1973 - alive as of 1998

Olsen, Robert F., Civilian ; released by PRG March, 1973

Page, Russell J., Civilian; released by PRG March, 1973 - deceased

Rander, Donald J., Civilian (NY); released by PRG March, 1973 - alive as of 1998

Rushton, Thomas, Civilian - Pacific Architects & Engineers (CA); released by PRG March, 1973 - alive as of 1998

Spaulding, Richard Enid, Civilian, Pacific Architects & Engineers (OK); released by PRG March, 1973 - alive as of 1999

Stark, Lawrence J., Civilian (IL); released by PRG March, 1973 - alive and well as of 1998

Weaver, Eugene A., Civilian (WI); released by PRG March, 1973

Willis, Charles E., Civilian; released by PRG March, 1973 - alive as of 1998

Also reported MIA this day in 1968:
Johnson, Sandra, Civilian Teacher; captured with Nelson - released March, 1968

Murdock, Michael George, USMC (WA); CH46A shot down - remains recovered April, 1974

Manhard, Philip W., Civilian - US State Department; released by PRG March, 1973 (highest raking civilian captured) - deceased as of 1998

Nelson, Marjorie, Civilian Doctor; captured w/Johnson - released March, 1968

1969
Luna, Donald A., USAF (TX); O2A shot down