Events, Births and Deaths Happening on this Date

1815

U.S. forces led by Gen. Andrew Jackson defeated the British in the Battle of New Orleans, the closing engagement of the War of 1812. This occurred two weeks after the War of 1812 officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Ghent.

1851

Jean Foucault demonstrated definitively that the Earth rotates on its axis.

1867

Congress overrode President Andrew Johnson's veto of a bill granting all adult male citizens of the District of Columbia the right to vote. It was the first law granting African-American men the right to vote.

1889

American inventor Herman Hollerith patented his tabulator, the first device for data processing; his firm would later become one of IBM's founding companies.

1894

Fire caused serious damage at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

1908

A subway line opened linking the New York boroughs of Brooklyn and Manhattan.

1916

Allied forces staged a full retreat from the shores of the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey, ending a disastrous invasion of the Ottoman Empire.

1918

Following the end of World War I, U.S. president Woodrow Wilson proposes 14 points for peace.

1959

General Charles de Gaulle is proclaimed first President of the new Fifth Republic in France during a brief ceremony at the Elysée Palace in Paris.

1961

The French people vote to grant Algeria its independence in a referendum after seven years of guerilla war.

1964

President Lyndon Johnson declared a ''War on Poverty.''

1973

Secret peace talks between the United States and North Vietnam resumed near Paris.

1982

American Telephone & Telegraph settled the Justice Department's antitrust lawsuit against it by agreeing to divest itself of the 22 Bell System companies.

1987

The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 2,000 for the first time, ending the day at 2,002.25.

1992

President George Bush collapsed during a state dinner in Tokyo; White House officials said Bush was suffering from stomach flu.

1994

Tonya Harding won the ladies' U.S. Figure Skating Championship in Detroit, a day after Nancy Kerrigan dropped out because of a clubbing attack that injured her right knee.(The U.S. Figure Skating Association later stripped Harding of the title.

1998

Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the World Trade Center bombing, was sentenced in New York to life in prison.

1999

The top two executives of Salt Lake City's Olympic Organizing Committee resigned amid disclosures that civic boosters had given cash to members of the International Olympic Committee.

1909

Evelyn Wood, U.S. educator.

1935

Elvis Aaron Presley, American singing legend and actor.

1942

Stephen Hawking, British theoretical physicist and mathematician.

1947

David Bowie, British singer and songwriter.

1642

Astronomer Galileo Galilei died in Arcetri, Italy.

1976

Chinese premier Chou En-lai died in Beijing at age 78.

1996

Former French president Francois Mitterrand died at age 79.