Events, Births and Deaths Happening on this Date

1614

American Indian princess Pocahontas married English colonist John Rolfe in Virginia.

1621

The Mayflower sailed from Plymouth, Mass., on a return trip to England.

1792

George Washington cast the first presidential veto, rejecting a congressional measure for apportioning representatives among the states.

1887

In Tuscumbia, Ala., teacher Anne Sullivan taught her blind and deaf pupil, Helen Keller, the meaning of the word ''water'' as spelled out in the manual alphabet.

1895

Playwright Oscar Wilde lost his criminal libel case against the Marquess of Queensberry, who had accused the writer of homosexual practices.

1951

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were sentenced to death for conspiring to commit espionage for the Soviet Union.

1984

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar became the highest-scoring player in NBA history with 31,421 career points. Announcer Steve Futterman makes the call.

1987

Fox Broadcasting Co. made its prime-time TV debut.

1999

Libya surrendered two suspects in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Scotland to a U.N. representative for trial in the Netherlands.

1999

In Laramie, Wyo., Russell Henderson pleaded guilty to kidnapping and felony murder in the death of Matthew Shepard, a gay college student.

2000

Yoshiro Mori took over as Japan's new prime minister, succeeding Keizo Obuchi, who'd been felled by a stroke.

2007

The cruise ship MS Sea Diamond strikes a volcanic reef near Nea Kameni and sinks the next day. Two passengers were never recovered and are presumed dead.

2009

North Korea launches its controversial Kwangmyongsong-2 rocket. The satellite passed over mainland Japan, which prompted an immediate reaction from the United Nations Security Council, as well as participating states of Six-party talks.

2010

Twenty-nine coal miners are killed in an explosion at the Upper Big Branch Mine in West Virginia.

2010

Up to 50 people are killed and another 100 injured in two militant suicide bombings and attacks in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan: the first on an Awami National Party rally in Timergara; the second on the U.S. Consulate in Peshawar.

2018

Agents with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid a slaughterhouse in Tennessee, detaining nearly 100 undocumented Hispanic workers in one of the largest workplace raids in the history of the United States.

1649

Elihu Yale, the English philanthropist for whom Yale University is named, was born.

1856

Black American educator Booker T. Washington was born in Franklin County, Va.

1964

Army Gen. Douglas MacArthur died in Washington, D.C., at age 84.

1975

Nationalist Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek died at age 87.

1976

Reclusive billionaire Howard Hughes died in Houston at age 72.

1991

Former Texas Sen. John Tower, his daughter and 21 other people were killed in a commuter plane crash near Brunswick, Ga.

1992

Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton died in Little Rock, Ark., at age 74.

1994

Kurt Cobain, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1967)

1997

Allen Ginsberg, poet laureate of the Beat Generation, died in New York City at age 70.

2000

Lee Petty, American race car driver (b. 1914)

2006

Gene Pitney, American singer-songwriter (b. 1940)