Events, Births and Deaths Happening on this Date

1743

The first recorded town meeting in America was held, at Faneuil Hall in Boston.

1780

During the American Revolutionary War Spanish forces capture Fort Charlotte in Mobile, Alabama, the last British frontier post capable of threatening New Orleans.

1794

Eli Whitney received a patent for his cotton gin, an invention that revolutionized America's cotton industry.

1900

The Gold Standard Act is ratified by Congress, placing the United States currency on the gold standard.

1901

Utah governor Heber Manning Wells vetoes a bill that would have eased restriction on polygamy.

1903

Pelican Island National Wildlife Refuge, the first national wildlife refuge in the US, is established by President Theodore Roosevelt.

1921

Six members of a group of Irish Republican Army activists known as the Forgotten Ten, are hanged in Dublin's Mountjoy Prison.

1923

President Harding became the first chief executive to file an income tax report.

1923

Charlie Daly and three other members of the Irish Republican Army are executed by Irish Free State forces.

1939

The Republic of Czechoslovakia was dissolved, opening the way for Nazi occupation.

1939

Slovakia declares independence under German pressure.

1942

Anne Miller becomes the first American patient to be treated with penicillin, under the care of Orvan Hess and John Bumstead.

1943

Aaron Copland's ''Fanfare for the Common Man'' premiered in New York City, with George Szell conducting.

1945

The R.A.F. drop the Grand Slam bomb in action for the first time, on a railway viaduct near Bielefeld, Germany.

1951

United Nations troops recapture Seoul for the second time during the Korean War.

1961

A USAF B-52 bomber crashes near Yuba City, California while carrying nuclear weapons.

1964

A jury in Dallas found Jack Ruby guilty of murdering Lee Harvey Oswald, the accused assassin of President Kennedy, the previous November.

1964

Jack Ruby is convicted of killing Lee Harvey Oswald, the assumed assassin of John F. Kennedy.

1967

The body of President Kennedy was moved from a temporary grave to a permanent memorial site at Arlington National Cemetery.

1967

The body of U.S. President John F. Kennedy is moved to a permanent burial place at Arlington National Cemetery.

1972

Sterling Airways Flight 296 crashes near Kalba, United Arab Emirates while on approach to Dubai International Airport, killing 112 people.

1978

The Israel Defense Forces launch Operation Litani, a seven-day campaign to invade and occupy southern Lebanon.

1979

Alia Royal Jordanian Flight 600 crashes at Doha International Airport, killing 45 people.

1980

A Polish airliner crashed while making an emergency landing near Warsaw, killing all 87 people aboard, including 22 members of a U.S. amateur boxing team.

1980

LOT Polish Airlines Flight 007 crashes during final approach near Warsaw, Poland, killing 87 people, including a 14-man American boxing team.

1982

The South African government bombs the headquarters of the African National Congress in London.

1988

In the Johnson South Reef Skirmish Chinese forces defeat Vietnamese forces in an altercation over control of one of the Spratly Islands.

1990

The Soviet Congress elected Mikhail S. Gorbachev to the country's new, powerful presidency, a day after creating the post.

1993

An independent U.N.-sponsored commission released a report blaming the bulk of atrocities committed during El Salvador's civil war on the country's military.

1994

Associate Attorney General Webster Hubbell, a longtime friend of President and Mrs. Clinton, resigned because of controversy over billings he'd charged while in private law practice.

1995

American astronaut Norman Thagard became the first American to enter space aboard a Russian rocket as he and two cosmonauts blasted off aboard a Soyuz spacecraft, headed for the Mir space station.

1999

The Clinton administration conceded the Chinese had gained from technology allegedly stolen from a federal nuclear weapons lab but insisted the government responded decisively.

2000

Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore clinched their presidential nominations in a sweep of Southern primaries.

2006

Israeli troops raid an American-supervised Palestinian prison in Jericho to capture six Palestinian prisoners, including PFLP chief Ahmad Sa'adat.

2007

The Nandigram violence in Nandigram, West Bengal, results in the deaths of at least 14 people.

2008

A series of riots, protests, and demonstrations erupt in Lhasa and subsequently spread elsewhere in Tibet.

2017

A naming ceremony for the chemical element nihonium takes place in Tokyo, with then Crown Prince Naruhito in attendance.

2019

Cyclone Idai makes landfall near Beira, Mozambique, causing devastating floods and over 1,000 deaths.

2021

Burmese security forces kill at least 65 civilians in the Hlaingthaya massacre.

1854

Thomas R. Marshall, American lawyer and politician, 28th Vice President of the United States of America (d. 1925)

1874

Anton Philips, Dutch businessman, co-founded Philips Electronics (d. 1951)

1879

Albert Einstein, German-American physicist, engineer, and academic, Nobel Prize laureate was was born in Ulm, Kingdom of Wurttemberg, German Empire (d. 1955)

1997

Simone Biles, American artistic gymnast. Her 11 Olympic medals and 30 World Championship medals make her the most decorated gymnast in history. She is widely regarded as one of the greatest gymnasts of all time.

1883

German political philosopher Karl Marx died in London.

2025

Alan Simpson was an American politician from Wyoming. A member of the Republican Party, he served as a member of the United States Senate from 1979 to 1997.