1513 - Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León sights Florida
1599 - Robert Devereux becomes Lieutenant-General of Ireland
1625 - Charles I, King Of England, Scotland & Ireland, ascends to throne
1668 - English King Charles II gives Bombay to East India Company
1708 - English pretender to the throne James III flees to Dunkerk
1709 - Dike at Hardinxveld breaks (Alblasserwaard flooded)
1713 - Spain losses Menorca & Gibraltar
1721 - France & Spain sign Treaty of Madrid
1758 - Battle at Emmerich: British army floats around France the Rhine
1790 - The shoelace invented
1794 - Congress authorizes the President "to provide a naval armament" (US Navy)
1802 - Treaty of Amiens-French Revolutionary War ends
1814 - Battle at Horseshoe Bend: General Andrew Jackson beats Creek-Indians
1841 - 1st US steam fire engine tested, New York, NY
1848 - John Parker Paynard originates medicated adhesive plaster
1849 - Joseph Couch patents steam-powered percussion rock drill
1855 - Abraham Gesner patents kerosene
1860 – M. L. Byrn patents "covered gimlet screw with a 'T' handle" (corkscrew)
1865 - Siege of Spanish Fort AL: captured by Federals
1866 - Andrew Rankin patents the urinal; President Johnson vetoes civil rights bill; it later becomes 14th Amendment
1884 - 1st long-distance telephone call, Boston-New York
1912 - 1st Japanese cherry blossom trees planted in Washington DC
1914 - 1st successful blood transfusion (in Brussels)
1920 - Hermann Müller becomes German chancellor (SPD)
1924 - Canada recognizes USSR; New French government of Poincaré begins
1930 - 1st US radio broadcast from a ship at sea
1931 - Charlie Chaplin receives France's distinguished Legion of Honor
1933 - Farm Credit Administration (US) authorized; Japan leaves League of Nations; Polythene discovered by Reginald Gibson & Eric William Fawcett
1940 - Himmler orders building of Auschwitz concentration camp, at Katowice
1941 - Britain leases defense bases in Trinidad to US for 99 years; Hitler signs Directive 27 (assault on Yugoslavia); Yugoslavian coup gets rid of pro-German Prince Paul
1942 - Allies raid German submarine base in St. Nazaire; Japan forces Java to use "Tokyo time" 1½ hour forward
1943 - Assassination attempt on Van de Peat at Amsterdams census bureau; US begins assault on Fondouk-pass, Tunisia
1944 - 1,000 Jews leave Drancy France for Auschwitz Concentration Camp; 2,000 Jews are murdered in Kaunas, Lithuania; 40 Jewish policemen in Riga Latvia ghetto are shot by the Gestapo; Children's Aktion-Nazis collect all the Jewish children of Lovno
1945 - British premier Churchill sails to eastern banks of Rhine; General Eisenhower declares German defenses on Western Front broken; Iwo Jima occupied, after 22,000 Japanese & 6,000 US killed; US 20th Army corps captures Wiesbaden
1950 - Netherlands recognizes People's Republic of China
1952 - Failed assassination attempt of German Chancellor Adenauer; Sun Records of Memphis begins releasing records
1953 - 21 die in a train crash in Conneaut OH
1956 - French commandos land in Algeria; US seizes US communist newspaper "Daily Worker"
1958 - Havana Hilton opens; Nikita Khrushchev becomes Soviet premier & 1st Secretary of Communist Party
1961 - Belgian government of Eyskens resigns; Failed assassination attempt on King Saif al-Islam Achmad of Yemen
1964 - Earthquake strikes Anchorage AK, 9.2 on Richter scale, 131 die from earthquake and resulting tsunami - most violent eathquake in US history; Great Train Robbers sentenced to a total of 307 years behind bars; UN troops arrive on Cyprus
1966 - Anti Vietnam war demonstrations in US, Europe & Australia
1968 - Suharto succeeds Sukarno as President of Indonesia
1969 - Launch of Mariner 7, flies 2,190 miles above southern Mars
1972 - Venera 8 launched to Venus
1976 – Washington, DC underground Metro opens
1977 - 583 die in aviation's worst disaster KLM-Pan Am 747 crash, Tenerife
1979 - Supreme Court rules, 8-1, cops can't randomly stop cars
1980 - Elevator in Vaal Reef South Africa gold mine crash 1900 meter down (23 die); Mount St. Helens becomes active after 123 years
1987 - President Habré's troops reconquer Faya Largeau Chad
1990 - Bus accidentally touches high voltage wire in Karagpur India; 21 die
1994 - Church in Piedmont AL collapses in tornado, 19 killed
1997 - 39 cult memebers in California commit mass suicide (Hale-Bopp); Martin Luther King's son meets with James Earl Ray
2134 - 32nd recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet

Birthdays
1746 - Carlo Bonaparte, Corsican attorney/father of emperor Napoleon
1780 - August L. Crelle, German inventor/mathematician (1st Prussian Railway)
1785 - Louis XVII, pretender to the throne during the French Revolution (1793-95)
1797 - Alfred V Comte de Vigny, French musketeer/writer (Moïse, Chatterton)
1823 - Samuel Kosciusko Zook, Brevet Major General (Union volunteers)
1844 - Adolphus Washington Greely, Arctic explorer, US Army General / Medal of Honor recipient, Greely was a Medal of Honor recipient / Chief Signal Officer (1887-1906)
1845 - Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen, discovered X-rays (Nobel 1901)
1847 - Otto Wallach, German (Nobel 1910)
1863 - Sir Henry Royce, automobile founder (Rolls-Royce)
1871 - Petrus J M Aalberse, Dutch minister of Labor (1918-25)
1893 - Dragoljub "Draza" Mihailovic, Yugoslavian General/Nazi collaborator
1897 - Carlo Mierendorff, German politician/anti-fascist
1901 - Erich Ollenhauer, German politician (SPD); Sato Eisaku, Japanese Prime Minister (1964-72) (Nobel 1974)
1912 - James Callaghan, British Prime Minister (1976-79)
1917 - Cyrus R. Vance, US Secretary of State (1977-80); Harry West, Unionist party leader (Unionist)
1921 - Tom Bevill (Representative- AL)
1927 - Anthony Lewis, newspaper columnist (New York Times)/author (Gideon's Trumpet); Lord Fanshawe of Richmond, MP
1928 - Douglas Applegate (Representative- OH)
1931 - R. P. Bauman, CEO (British Aerospace)
1938 - Jock Slater, Admiral
1939 - Jay C. Kim (Representative- CA)
1941 - Charles Pashayan, Jr. (Representative- CA)
1942 - Raymond J. McGrath (Representative-NY)
1943 - M. Robert Carr (Representative-MI)
1958 - Susan Molinari (Representative- NY)

Passings
0922 - Al-Hallaj al-Mughith-al-Hsayn Mansur, Persian mystic, beheaded at 64
0965 - Arnulf I the Elder/the Great, count of Flanders (918-65)
1211 - Sancho I King of Portugal (1185-1211), dies at 56
1378 - Gregory XI [Pierre R the Beaufort], last French Pope (1370-78)
1482 - Maria duchess of Burgundy/countess of Holland, dies at 25
1625 - James I Stuart, King of Scotland (1567)/England (1603-25), dies at 58
1701 - Anne Hilarion de Cotentin, count of Tourville/French Admiral, dies at 58
1850 - Wilhelm Bear German, banker/astronomer (Moon Map), dies at 53
1898 - Sajjid Ahmad Chan, co founder (Pakistan), dies at 80
1900 - Pieter J. Joubert [Smart Piet], South African General, dies at 69
1956 - Frans Beelaerts van Blokland, minister of Foreign affairs, dies at 84
1992 - James E. Webb, head of NASA (1961-68), dies at 84
1993 - Wilhelmus M. J. Russell, Dutch MP (KVP, CDA), dies at 74
1994 - Dennis Hartas, flier, dies at 69

Reported Missing in Action
1967
Palenscar, Alexander J. III, USN (NY); A4C shot down

1968
Badley, James Lindsday, USAF (OR); F4D shot down, KIA, body not recovered

Calhoun, Johnny C., US Army SF (GA); missing after ground action

Whitteker, Richard Lee, USAF (PA); F4D shot down, KIA, body not recovered

1969
Czerwiec, Raymond G., US Army (IL); disappeared on reconnaissance mission (w/Kerns)

Kerns, Gail M., US Army; disappeared on reconnaissance mission (w/Czerwiec), released by PRG March, 1973 (injured) – alive as of 1998

1972
The following USAF personnel reported MIA when their HH53C crashed:
Crow, Raymond J., Jr. (UT)

Dreher, Richard E. (OH); pilot

Manor, James (FL); pararescue

Pannabecker, David E. (PA); pararescue

Wagner, Raymond A. (IN); pararescue

Also reported missing this day in 1972:
Wong, Edward Puck Kow, US Army (CA); UH1H shot down (door gunner)