Events, Births and Deaths Happening on this Date

1861

The Congress of the Confederate States began holding sessions in Richmond, Va.

1871

British Columbia joined Confederation as a Canadian province.

1881

Sioux Indian leader Sitting Bull, a fugitive since the Battle of the Little Big Horn, surrendered to federal troops.

1917

The first 20th-century military draft lottery was held, as Secretary of War Newton Baker made the initial selections while wearing a blindfold.

1934

Seattle, police fire tear gas on and club 2,000 striking longshoremen. The governor of Oregon calls out the National Guard to break a strike on the Portland docks.

1934

Police in Minneapolis fire upon striking truck drivers, during the Minneapolis Teamsters Strike of 1934, killing 2 and wounding 67.

1938

United States Department of Justice files suit in New York City against the motion picture industry charging violations of the Sherman Antitrust Act in regards to the studio system. The case would eventually result in a break-up of the industry in 1948.

1940

The first ever Billboard record singles chart was published. The #1 song for the next week was "I'll Never Smile Again," by Frank Sinatra and Tommy Dorsey and his orchestra.

1942

The first detachment of the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, later known as WACs, began basic training at Fort Des Moines, Iowa.

1944

An attempt by a group of German officials to assassinate Adolf Hitler failed as a bomb explosion at Hitler's Rastenburg headquarters only wounded the Nazi leader.

1944

President Roosevelt was nominated for an unprecedented fourth term of office at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

1944

Adolf Hitler survives an assassination attempt led by German Army Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg.

1951

King Abdullah I of Jordan is assassinated by a Palestinian while attending Friday prayers in Jerusalem.

1969

Apollo 11's crew successfully makes the first human landing on the Moon in the Sea of Tranquility. Americans Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin become the first humans to walk on the Moon six and a half hours later.

1976

America's Viking 1 robot spacecraft made a successful, first-ever landing on Mars.

1977

A flash flood hit Johnstown, Pa., killing 80 people and causing $350 million worth of damage.

1977

The Central Intelligence Agency releases documents under the Freedom of Information Act revealing it had engaged in mind-control experiments.

1982

The Provisional IRA detonates two bombs in Hyde Park and Regent's Park in central London, killing eight soldiers, wounding forty-seven people, and leading to the deaths of seven horses.

1990

A federal appeals court set aside Oliver North's Iran-Contra convictions, reversing one outright.

1992

Vaclav Havel, the playwright who led the Velvet Revolution against communism, stepped down as president of Czechoslovakia.

1994

Bosnian Serbs rejected an international peace plan sponsored by the United States, Russia, France, Britain and Germany.

1997

Seven people were arrested after New York City police found scores of deaf Mexicans kept in slave-like conditions and forced to peddle trinkets for the smugglers who had brought them to the United States.

1997

The fully restored USS Constitution (a.k.a. Old Ironsides) celebrates its 200th birthday by setting sail for the first time in 116 years.

1999

After 38 years at the bottom of the Atlantic, astronaut Gus Grissom's Liberty Bell 7 Mercury capsule was lifted to the surface.

1999

The Chinese Communist Party begins a campaign against Falun Gong, arresting thousands nationwide.

2005

Canada becomes the 4th country to permit same-sex marriage

2011

In Guinea, up to 80 people, including soldiers, are arrested for a failed assassination attempt on President Alpha Conde, which occurred July 19

2012

James Holmes opened fire at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, killing 12 and injuring 70 others.

2013

A training exercise emergency causes two U.S. marine harrier jets to drop several hundred unarmed bombs on the Great Barrier Reef, a World Heritage site

2013

17 government soldiers are killed in an attack by FARC revolutionaries in the Colombian department of Arauca.

2014

The U.S. states that evidence suggests a Russian-made missile was fired at Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17; the missile strike killed all 298 people aboard

2015

Golfer Zach Johnson wins the British Open, becoming one of only six golfers in history to win at both the St. Andrews Old Course and the Augusta National course

2015

Cuba and the United States restored diplomatic relations, relations had been severed in 1961 during the Cold War.

2017

O. J. Simpson is granted parole to be released from prison after serving nine years of a 33-year sentence after being convicted of armed robbery in Las Vegas.

2021

American businessman Jeff Bezos flies to space aboard New Shepard NS-16 operated by his private spaceflight company Blue Origin.

1919

Edmund Hillary, born in Auckland, New Zealand, mountaineer, explorer, first climber to summit Mount Everest. (d. 2008)

1933

Nelson Doubleday, publisher, Doubleday, owner for the New York Mets baseball team

1938

Natalie Wood was an American actress who began her career in film as a child and successfully transitioned to young adult roles. (d. 1981)

1944

T. G. Sheppard (born William Neal Browder) is an American country music singer-songwriter. He had 14 number-one hits on the US country charts between 1974 and 1986.

1947

Carlos Santana, an Mexican-American singer-songwriter and guitarist who rose to fame in the late 1960s and early 1970s with his band Santana, which pioneered a fusion of rock and roll and Latin American jazz.

1953

Thomas Loren Friedman is an American political commentator and author. He is a three-time Pulitzer Prize winner who is a weekly columnist for The New York Times.

1964

Chris Cornell was an American singer, songwriter and musician best known as the lead vocalist, rhythm guitarist, and primary lyricist for the rock bands Soundgarden and Audioslave. (d. 2017)

1966

Stone Gossard, American singer-songwriter and guitarist for the rock band Pearl Jam. Along with Jeff Ament, Mike McCready, and Eddie Vedder, he is one of the founding members of the band.

1923

Francisco "Pancho" Villa was a general in the Mexican Revolution. He was a key figure in the revolutionary movement that forced out President Porfirio Diaz and brought Francisco I. Madero to power in 1911. (b. 1878)

1937

Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi, 1st Marquis of Marconi was an Italian inventor and electrical engineer, known for his creation of a practical radio wave-based wireless telegraph system. This led to Marconi being credited as the inventor of radio.

1973

Bruce Lee was a Chinese-American martial artist and actor whose career spanned Hong Kong and the United States. He was the founder of Jeet Kune Do, a hybrid martial arts philosophy. (b. 1940)

1993

Vince Foster Jr. was an American attorney and political figure who served as deputy White House counsel during the first six months of the Clinton administration was found shot to death in a park near Washington. His death was ruled a suicide.(b. 1945)

2007

Tamara Faye Messner was an American evangelist, singer, author, talk show host, and television personality. She gained notice for her work with The PTL Club, a televangelist program she co-founded with her husband Jim Bakker in 1974. (b. 1942)

2013

Helen Thomas, an American Journalist and author who reported on the White House for nearly fifty years, dies at the age of 92. (b. 1920)

2024

Jerry Miller died in Tacoma, Washington, at age 81. He was lead guitarist for the rock band Moby Grape which was formed in San Francisco in 1966. After leaving Moby Grape, Miller helped form The Rhythm Dukes and also performed as a solo artist.