On This Day

[Raistlin]

1097 - The Crusaders defeated the Turks at Dorylaeum.

1841 - The Erie Railroad rolled out its first passenger train.

1859 - Charles Blondin became the first person to cross Niagara Falls on a tightrope.

1894 - Korea declared independence from China and asked for Japanese aid.

1908 - A meteor explosion in Siberia knocked down trees in a 40-mile radius and struck people unconscious some 40 miles away.

1912 - Belgian workers went on strike to demand universal suffrage.

1913 - Fighting broke out between Bulgaria and Greece and Spain. It was the beginning of the Second Balkan War.

1915 - During World War I, the Second Battle Artois ended when the French failed to take Vimy Ridge.

U.S. President Warren G. Harding appointed former President William Howard Taft chief justice of the United States.

1922 - Irish rebels in London assassinate Sir Henry Wilson, the British deputy for Northern Ireland.

1930 - France pulled its troops out of Germany’s Rhineland.

1934 - Adolf Hitler purged the Nazi Party by destroying the SA and bringing to power the SS in the "Night of the Long Knives."

1935 - Fascists caused an uproar at the League of Nations when Haile Selassie of Ethiopia speaks.

1936 - Margaret Mitchell’s book, "Gone with the Wind," was published.

1950 - U.S. President Harry Truman ordered U.S. troops into Korea and authorizes the draft.

1951 - On orders from Washington, General Matthew Ridgeway broadcasts that the United Nations was willing to discuss an armistice with North Korea.

1952 - CBS-TV debuted "The Guiding Light."

1953 - The first Corvette rolled off the Chevrolet assembly line in Flint, MI. It sold for $3,250.

1955 - The U.S. began funding West Germany’s rearmament.

1957 - The American occupation headquarters in Japan was dissolved.

1958 - The U.S. Congress passed a law authorizing the admission of Alaska as the 49th state in the Union.

1960 - The Katanga province seceded from Congo (upon Congo's independence from Belgium).

1962 - Los Angeles Dodger Sandy Koufax pitched his first no-hitter in a game with the New York Mets.

1964 - The last of U.N. troops left Congo after a four-year effort to bring stability to the country.

1970 - The Cincinnati Reds moved to their new home at Riverfront Stadium.

1971 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the government could not prevent the Washington Post or the New York Times from publishing the Pentagon Papers.

1971 - The Soviet spacecraft Soyuz 11 returned to Earth. The three cosmonauts were found dead inside.

1971 - The 26th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified when Ohio became the 38th state to approve it. The amendment lowered the minimum voting age to 18.

1974 - Russian ballet dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov defected in Toronto, Canada.

1974 - The July 4th scene from the Steven Spielberg movie "Jaws" was filmed.

1977 - U.S. President Jimmy Carter announced his opposition to the B-1 bomber.

1984 - The longest professional football game took place in the United States Football League (USFL). The Los Angeles Express beat the Michigan Panthers 27-21 after 93 minutes and 33 seconds.

1985 - Yul Brynner left his role as the King of Siam after 4,600 performances in "The King and I."

1986 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that states could outlaw homosexual acts between consenting adults.

1994 - The U.S. Figure Skating Association stripped Tonya Harding of the 1994 national championship and banned her from the organization for life for an attack on rival Nancy Kerrigan.

1998 - Officials confirmed that the remains of a Vietnam War serviceman buried in the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery were identified as those of Air Force pilot Michael J. Blassie.

2000 - U.S. President Clinton signed the E-Signature bill to give the same legal validity to an electronic signature as a signature in pen and ink.

2004 - The international Cassini spacecraft entered Saturn's orbit. The craft had been on a nearly seven-year journey.

[Raistlin]

0096 - Vespasian, a Roman Army leader, was hailed as a Roman Emperor by the Egyptian legions.

1543 - England and Scotland signed the peace of Greenwich.

1596 - An English fleet under the Earl of Essex, Lord Howard of Effingham and Francis Vere captured and sacked Cadiz, Spain.

1690 - The French defeated the forces of the Grand Alliance at Fleurus in the Netherlands.

1798 - Napoleon Bonaparte took Alexandria, Egypt.

1847 - The U.S. Post Office issued its first adhesive stamps.

1862 - The U.S. Congress established the Bureau of Internal Revenue.

1863 - During the U.S. Civil War, the first day's fighting at Gettysburg began.

1867 - Canada became an independent dominion.

1874 - The Philadelphia Zoological Society zoo opened as the first zoo in the United States.

1876 - Montenegro declared war on the Turks.

1893 - The first bicycle race track in America to be made out of wood was opened in San Francisco, CA.

1897 - Three years after the first issue of "Billboard Advertising" was published, the publication was renamed, "The Billboard".

1898 - During the Spanish-American War, Theodore Roosevelt and his "Rough Riders" waged a victorious assault on San Juan Hill in Cuba.

1905 - The USDA Forest Service was created within the Department of Agriculture. The agency was given the mission to sustain healthy, diverse, and productive forests and grasslands for present and future generations.

1909 - Thomas Edison began commercially manufacturing his new "A" type alkaline storage batteries.

1916 - The massive Allied offensive known as the Battle of the Somme began in France. The battle was the first to use tanks.

1934 - The Federal Communications Commission replaced the Federal Radio Commission as the regulator of broadcasting in the United States.

1940 - In Washington, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge was opened to traffic. The bridge collapsed during a wind storm on November 7, 1940.

1941 - Bulova Watch Company sponsored the first TV commercial in New York City, NY.

1942 - German troops captured Sevestpol, Crimea, in the Soviet Union.

1943 - The U.S. Government began automatically withholding federal income tax from paychecks.

1945 - New York established the New York State Commission Against Discrimination to prevent discrimination in employment because of race, creed or natural origin. It was the first such agency in the U.S.

1946 - U.S. President Harry Truman signed Public Law 476 that incorporated the Civil Air Patrol as a benevolent, nonprofit organization. The Civil Air Patrol was created on December 1, 1941.

1946 - The U.S. exploded a 20-kiloton atomic bomb near Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.

1948 - The price of a subway ride in New York City was increased from 5 cents to 10.

1950 - American ground troops arrived in South Korea to stem the tide of the advancing North Korean army.

1951 - Bob Feller set a major league baseball record as he pitched his third no-hitter for the Cleveland Indians.

1960 - Somalia gained its independence from Britain through the unification of Somaliland with Italian Somalia.

1961 - British troops landed in Kuwait to aid against Iraqi threats.

1961 - The first community air-raid shelter was built. The shelter in Boise, ID had a capacity of 1,000 people and family memberships sold for $100.

1963 - The U.S. postmaster introduced the five-digit ZIP (Zoning Improvement Plan) code.

1966 - The Medicare federal insurance program went into effect.

1968 - The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty was signed by 60 countries. It limited the spreading of nuclear material for military purposes. On May 11, 1995, the treaty was extended indefinitely.

1969 - Britain's Prince Charles was invested as the Prince of Wales.

1974 - Isavel Peron became the president of Argentina upon the death of her husband, Juan.

1979 - Susan B. Anthony was commemorated on a U.S. coin, the Susan B. Anthony dollar.

1979 - Sony introduced the Walkman.

1980 - "O Canada" was proclaimed the national anthem of Canada.

1980 - U.S. President Jimmy Carter signed legislation that provided for 2 acres of land near the Lincoln Memorial for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

1981 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that candidates for federal office had an "affirmative right" to go on national television.

1985 - Robin Yount (Milwaukee Brewers) got the 1,800th hit of his career.

1987 - John Kevin Hill, at age 11, became the youngest to fly across the U.S. when he landed at National Airport in Washington, DC.

1989 - The Montreal Protocol, an international treaty, went into effect. It limited the production of ozone-destroying chemicals.

1991 - Court TV began airing.

1991 - The Warsaw Pact dissolved.

1994 - Yasser Arafat of the Palestinian Liberation Organization visited the Gaza Strip.

1997 - The sovereignty over Hong Kong was transferred from Great Britain to China. Britain had controlled Hong Kong as a colony for 156 years.

1999 - The U.S. Justice Department released new regulations that granted the attorney general sole power to appoint and oversee special counsels. The 1978 independent-counsel statute expired on June 30.

2003 - In Hong Kong, thousands of protesters marched to show their opposition to anti-subversion legislation.

[Raistlin]

1298 - An army under Albert of Austria defeated and killed Adolf of Nassua near Worms, Germany.

1625 - The Spanish army took Breda, Spain, after nearly a year of siege.

1644 - Lord Cromwell crushed the Royalists at the Battle of Marston Moor near York, England.

1747 - Marshall Saxe led the French forces to victory over an Anglo-Dutch force under the Duke of Cumberland at the Battle of Lauffeld.

1776 - Richard Henry Lee’s resolution that the American colonies "are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States" was adopted by the Continental Congress.

1850 - Prussia agreed to pull out of Schlewig and Holstein, Germany.

1850 - Benjamin Lane patented a gas mask with a breathing apparatus. (Patent US7476 A)

1857 - New York City’s first elevated railroad officially opened for business.

1858 - Czar Alexander II freed the serfs working on imperial lands.

1881 - Charles J. Guiteau fatally wounded U.S. President James A. Garfield in Washington, DC.

1890 - The U.S. Congress passed the Sherman Antitrust Act.

1926 - The U.S. Congress established the Army Air Corps.

1937 - American aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart disappeared in the Central Pacific during an attempt to fly around the world at the equator.

1939 - At Mount Rushmore, Theodore Roosevelt's face was dedicated.

1944 - American bombers, as part of Operation Gardening, dropped land mines, leaflets and bombs on German-occupied Budapest.

1947 - An object crashed near Roswell, NM. The U.S. Army Air Force insisted it was a weather balloon, but eyewitness accounts led to speculation that it might have been an alien spacecraft.

1962 - Wal-Mart Discount City opened in Rogers, Arkansas. It was the first Walmart store.

1964 - U.S. President Johnson signed the "Civil Rights Act of 1964" into law. The act made it illegal in the U.S. to discriminate against others because of their race.

1967 - The U.S. Marine Corps launched Operation Buffalo in response to the North Vietnamese Army's efforts to seize the Marine base at Con Thien.

1976 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled the death penalty was not inherently cruel or unusual.

1976 - North Vietnam and South Vietnam were reunited.

1979 - The U.S. Mint officially released the Susan B. Anthony coin in Rochester, NY.

1980 - U.S. President Jimmy Carter reinstated draft registration for males 18 years of age.

1981 - Soyuz T-6 returned to Earth.

1982 - Larry Walters ("Lawnchair Larry") took flight in his homeade airship that consisted of a lawnchair with 45 helium-filled weather balloons attached to it. He stayed in flight for about an hour.

1985 - General Motors announced that it was installing electronic road maps as an option in some of its higher-priced cars.

1995 - "Forbes" magazine reported that Microsoft's chairman, Bill Gates, was the worth $12.9 billion, making him the world's richest man. In 1999, he was worth about $77 billion.

1998 - Cable News Network (CNN) retracted a story that alleged that U.S. commandos had used nerve gas to kill American defectors during the Vietnam War.

2000 - In Mexico, Vicente Fox Quesada of the National Action Party (PAN) defeated Francisco Labastida Ochoa of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in the presidential election. The PRI had controlled the presidency in Mexico since the party was founded in 1929.

[Raistlin]

1608 - The city of Quebec was founded by Samuel de Champlain.

1775 - U.S. Gen. George Washington took command of the Continental Army at Cambridge, MA.

1790 - In Paris, the marquis of Condorcet proposed granting civil rights to women.

1844 - Ambassador Caleb Cushing successfully negotiated a commercial treaty with China that opened five Chinese ports to U.S. merchants and protected the rights of American citizens in China.

1863 - The U.S. Civil War Battle of Gettysburg, PA, ended after three days. It was a major victory for the North as Confederate troops retreated.

1871 - The Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad Company introduced the first narrow-gauge locomotive. It was called the "Montezuma."

1878 - John Wise flew the first dirigible in Lancaster, PA.

1880 - "Science" began publication. Thomas Edison had provided the principle funding.

1890 - IDaho became the 43rd state to join the United States of America.

1898 - During the Spanish American War, a fleet of Spanish ships in Cuba's Santiago Harbor attempted to run a blockade of U.S. naval forces. Nearly all of the Spanish ships were destroyed in the battle that followed.

1903 - The first cable across the Pacific Ocean was spliced between Honolulu, Midway, Guam and Manila.

1912 - Rube Marquard of the New York Giants set a baseball pitching record when earned his 19th consecutive win.

1922 - "Fruit Garden and Home" magazine was introduced. It was later renamed "Better Homes and Gardens."

1924 - Clarence Birdseye founded the General Seafood Corp.

1930 - The U.S. Congress created the U.S. Veterans Administration.

1934 - U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) made its first payment to Lydia Losiger.

1937 - Del Mar race track opened in Del Mar, CA.

1939 - Chic Young’s comic strip character, "Blondie" was first heard on CBS radio.

1940 - Bud Abbott and Lou Costello debuted on NBC radio.

1944 - The U.S. First Army opened a general offensive to break out of the hedgerow area of Normandy, France.

1944 - During World War II, Soviet forces recaptured Minsk.

1945 - U.S. troops landed at Balikpapan and take Sepinggan airfield on Borneo in the Pacific.

1945 - The first civilian passenger car built since February 1942 was driven off the assembly line at the Ford Motor Company plant in Detroit, MI. Production had been diverted due to World War II.

1950 - U.S. carrier-based planes attacked airfields in the Pyongyang-Chinnampo area of North Korea in the first air-strike of the Korean War.

1954 - Food rationing ended in Great Britain almost nine years after the end of World War II.

1962 - Jackie Robinson became the first African American to be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

1974 - The Threshold Test Ban Treaty was signed, prohibiting underground nuclear weapons tests with yields greater than 150 kilotons.

1981 - The Associated Press ran its first story about two rare illnesses afflicting homosexual men. One of the diseases was later named AIDS.

1986 - U.S. President Reagan presided over a ceremony in New York Harbor that saw the relighting of the renovated Statue of Liberty.

1986 - Mikhail Baryshnikov became a U.S. citizen at Ellis Island, New York Harbor.

1991 - U.S. President George H.W. Bush formally inaugurated the Mount Rushmore National Memorial in South Dakota.

2014 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 17,000 for the first time.

[Raistlin]

1776 - The amended Declaration of Independence, prepared by Thomas Jefferson, was approved and signed by John Hancock, the President of the Continental Congress in America.

1802 - The U.S. Military Academy officially opened at West Point, NY.

1803 - The Louisiana Purchase was announced in newspapers. The property was purchased, by the U.S. from France, was for $15 million (or 3 cents an acre). The "Corps of Discovery," led by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, began the exploration of the territory on May 14, 1804.

1817 - Construction began on the Erie Canal, to connect Lake Erie and the Hudson River.

1845 - American writer Henry David Thoreau began his two-year experiment in simple living at Walden Pond, near Concord, MA.

1848 - In Washington, DC, the cornerstone for the Washington Monument was laid.

1855 - The first edition of "Leaves of Grass," by Walt Whitman, was published in Brooklyn, NY.

1863 - The Confederate town of Vicksburg, MS, surrendered to General Ulysses S. Grant.

1881 - Tuskegee Institute opened in Alabama.

1884 - Bullfighting was introduced in the U.S. in Dodge City, KS.

1886 - The first rodeo in America was held at Prescott, AZ.

1892 - The first double-decked street car service was inaugurated in San Diego, CA.

1894 - After seizing power, Judge Stanford B. Dole declared Hawaii a republic.

1901 - William H. Taft became the American governor of the Philippines.

1910 - Race riots broke out all over the United States after African-American jack Johnson knocked out Jim Jeffries in a heavyweight boxing match.

1934 - Boxer Joe Louis won his first professional fight.

1934 - At Mount Rushmore, George Washington's face was dedicated.

1939 - Lou Gehrig retired from major league baseball.

1946 - The Philippines achieved full independence for the first time in over four hundred years.

1955 - The first king cobra snakes born in captivity in the U.S. hatched at the Bronx Zoo in New York City.

1957 - The U.S. Postal Service issued the 4¢ Flag stamp.

1959 - The 49-star U.S. flag became official.

1960 - The 50-star U.S. flag made its debut in Philadelphia, PA.

1966 - U.S. President Johnson signed the Freedom of Information Act, which went into effect the following year.

1976 - The U.S. celebrated its Bicentennial.

1982 - The Soviets performed a nuclear test at Eastern Kazakhl Semipalitinsk.

1987 - Klaus Barbie, the former Gestapo chief known as the "Butcher of Lyon," was convicted by a French court of crimes against humanity and sentenced to life in prison.

1997 - The Mars Pathfinder, an unmanned spacecraft, landed on Mars. A rover named Sojourner was deployed to gather data about the surface of the planet.

1997 - Ferry service between Manhattan and Staten Island was made free of charge. Previously, the charge had ranged from 5 cents to 50 cents.

2004 - In New York, the cornerstone of the Freedom Tower (One World Trade Center) was laid on the former World Trade Center site.

2005 - NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft took pictures as a space probe smashed into the Tempel 1 comet. The mission was aimed at learning more about comets that formed from the leftover buidling blocks of the solar system. The Deep Impact mission launched on January 12, 2005.

2009 - North Korea launched seven ballistic missiles into waters off its east coast that defied U.N. resolutions.

2009 - The Statue of Liberty's crown reopened to visitors. It had been closed to the public since 2001.

[Raistlin]

Today's: Famous Birthdays - music history

1806 - A Spanish army repelled the British during their attempt to retake Buenos Aires, Argentina.

1811 - Venezuela became the first South American country to declare independence from Spain.

1814 - U.S. troops under Jacob Brown defeated a superior British force at Chippewa, Canada.

1830 - France occupied the North African city of Algiers.

1832 - The German government began curtailing freedom of the press after German Democrats advocate a revolt against Austrian rule.

1839 - British naval forces bombarded Dingai on Zhoushan Island in China and then occupied it.

1863 - U.S. Federal troops occupied Vicksburg, MS, and distributed supplies to the citizens.

1865 - William Booth founded the Salvation Army in London.

1865 - The U.S. Secret Service Division was created to combat currency counterfeiting, forging and the altering of currency and securities..

1892 - Andrew Beard was issued a patent for the rotary engine.

1916 - Adelina and August Van Buren started on the first successful transcontinental motorcycle tour to be attempted by two women. They started in New York City and arrived in San Diego, CA, on September 12, 1916.

1935 - "Hawaii Call" was broadcast for the first time.

1935 - U.S. President Roosevelt signed the National Labor Relations Act into law. The act authorized labor to organize for the purpose of collective bargaining.

1940 - During World War II, Britain and the Vichy government in France broke diplomatic relations.

1941 - German troops reached the Dnieper River in the Soviet Union.

1943 - The battle of Kursk began as German tanks attack the Soviet salient. It was the largest tank battle in history.

1946 - The bikini bathing suit, created by Louis Reard, made its debut during a fashion show at the Molitor Pool in Paris. Micheline Bernardini wore the two-piece outfit.

1947 - Larry Doby signed a contract with the Cleveland Indians, becoming the first black player in the American League.

1948 - Britain's National Health Service Act went into effect, providing government-financed medical and dental care.

1950 - U.S. forces engaged the North Koreans for the first time at Osan, South Korea.

1951 - Dr. William Shockley announced that he had invented the junction transistor.

1962 - Algeria became independent after 132 years of French rule.

1975 - Arthur Ashe became the first black man to win a Wimbledon singles title when he defeated Jimmy Connors.

1984 - The U.S. Supreme Court weakened the 70-year-old "exclusionary rule," deciding that evidence seized with defective court warrants could be used against defendants in criminal trials.

1989 - Former U.S. National Security Council aide Oliver North received a $150,000 fine and a suspended prison term for his part in the Iran-Contra affair. The convictions were later overturned.

1991 - Regulators shut down the Pakistani-managed Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) in eight countries. The charge was fraud, drug money laundering and illegal infiltration into the U.S. banking system.

1995 - The U.S. Justice Department decided not to take antitrust action against Ticketmaster.

1998 - Japan joined U.S. and Russia in space exploration with the launching of the Planet-B probe to Mars.

2000 - Jordanian security agents shot and killed a Syrian hijacker after he threw a grenade that exploded and wounded 15 passengers aboard a Royal Jordanian airliner.

2000 - 10 Bengal tigers, including 7 rare white tigers, died at the Nandankanan Zoo in India. The tigers died of trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness).

2000 - Euan Blair, the oldest son of British prime minister Tony Blair, was arrested after police found him drunk and lying on the ground in London's Leicester Square.

[Raistlin]

1483 - King Richard III of England was crowned.

1699 - Captain William Kidd, the pirate, was captured in Boston, MA, and deported back to England.

1777 - British forces captured Fort Ticonderoga during the American Revolution.

1854 - In Jackson, MI, the Republican Party held its first convention.

1858 - Lyman Blake patented the shoe manufacturing machine.

1885 - Louis Pasteur successfully tested his anti-rabies vaccine. The child used in the test later became the director of the Pasteur Institute.

1905 - Fingerprints were exchanged for the first time between officials in Europe and the U.S. The person in question was John Walker.

1917 - During World War I, Arab forces led by T.E. Lawrence captured the port of Aqaba from the Turks.

1919 - A British dirigible landed in New York at Roosevelt Field. It completed the first crossing of the Atlantic Ocean by an airship.

1923 - The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was established.

1928 - "The Lights of New York" was previewed in New York's Strand Theatre. It was the first all-talking movie.

1932 - The postage rate for first class mail in the U.S. went from 2-cents to 3-cents.

1933 - The first All-Star baseball game was held in Chicago. The American League beat the National League 4-2.

1942 - Diarist Anne Frank and her family took refuge from the Nazis in Amsterdam.

1945 - U.S. President Truman signed an order creating the Medal of Freedom.

1945 - Nicaragua became the first nation to formally accept the United Nations Charter.

1947 - "Candid Microphone" began airing on ABC radio.

1948 - Frieda Hennok became the first woman to serve as the commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission.

1957 - Althea Gibson won the Wimbledon women’s singles tennis title. She was the first black athlete to win the event.

1966 - Malawi became a republic within the Commonwealth with Dr. Hastings Banda as its first president.

1967 - The Biafran War erupted. The war lasted two-and-a-half years. About 600,000 people died.

1981 - Former President of Argentina Isabel Peron was freed after five years of house arrest by a federal court.

1981 - The Dupont Company announced an agreement to purchase Conoco, Inc. (Continental Oil Co.) for $7 billion. At the time it was the largest merger in corporate history.

1983 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that retirement plans could not pay women smaller monthly payments solely because of their gender.

1983 - Fred Lynn (California Angels) hit the first grand slam in an All-Star game. The American League defeated the National League 13-3.

1985 - Martina Navratilova won her 4th consecutive Wimbledon singles title.

1985 - The submarine Nautilus arrived in Groton, Connecticut. The vessel had been towed from Mare Island Naval Shipyard.

1988 - Several popular beaches were closed in New York City due to medical waste and other debris began washing up on the seashores.

1989 - The U.S. Army destroyed its last Pershing 1-A missiles at an ammunition plant in Karnack, TX. The dismantling was under the terms of the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty.

1996 - Steffi Graf won her seventh Wimbledon title.

1997 - The Mars Pathfinder released Sojourner, a robot rover on the surface of Mars. The spacecraft landed on the red planet on July 4th.

1997 - In Cambodia, Second Prime Minister Hun Sen ousted First Prime Minister Norodom Ranariddh and claimed to have the capital under his control.

1998 - Protestants rioted in many parts of Northern Ireland after British authorities blocked an Orange Order march in Portadown.

2000 - A jury awarded former NHL player Tony Twist $24 million for the unauthorized use of his name in the comic book Spawn and the HBO cartoon series. Co-defendant HBO settled with Twist out of court for an undisclosed amount.

[Raistlin]

Today's: Famous Birthdays - music history

1754 - Kings College opened in New York City. It was renamed Columbia College 30 years later.

1846 - U.S. annexation of California was proclaimed at Monterey after the surrender of a Mexican garrison.

1862 - The first railroad post office was tested on the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad in Missouri.

1885 - G. Moore Peters patented the cartridge-loading machine.

1917 - Aleksandr Kerensky formed a provisional government in Russia.

1920 - A device known as the radio compass was used for the first time on a U.S. Navy airplane near Norfolk, VA.

1930 - Construction began on Boulder Dam, later Hoover Dam, on the Colorado River.

1937 - Japanese forces invaded China.

1946 - Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini was canonized as the first American saint.

1949 - "Dragnet" was first heard on NBC radio.

1950 - The U.N. Security Council authorized military aid for South Korea.

1969 - Canada's House of Commons gave final approval to a measure that made the French language equal to English throughout the national government.

1981 - U.S. President Reagan announced he was nominating Arizona Judge Sandra Day O'Connor to become the first female justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.

1983 - Eleven-year-old Samantha Smith of Manchester, Maine, left for a visit to the Soviet Union at the personal invitation of Soviet leader Yuri V. Andropov.

1987 - Public testimony at the Iran-Contra hearing began.

1994 - Amazon.com, Inc. was founded in Seattle, Washington under the name "Cadabra."

1998 - A jury in Santa Monica, CA, convicted Mikail Markhasev of murdering Ennis Cosby, Bill Cosby's only son, during a roadside robbery.

1999 - In Sierra Leone, President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah and rebel leader Foday Sankoh signed a pact to end the nation's civil war.

2000 - Cisco Systems Inc. announced that it would buy Netiverse Inc. for $210 million in stock. It was the 13th time Cisco had purchased a company in 2000.

2000 - Amazon.com announced that they had sold almost 400,000 copies of "Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire," making it the biggest selling book in e-tailing history.

2003 - In Liberia, a team of U.S. military experts arrived at the U.S. embassy compound to assess whether to deploy troops as part of a peacekeeping force in the country.

[Raistlin]

Today's: Famous Birthdays - music history

1099 - Christian soldiers on the First Crusade march around Jerusalem.

1608 - The first French settlement at Quebec was established by Samuel de Champlain.

1663 - King Charles II of England granted a charter to Rhode Island.

1693 - Uniforms for police in New York City were authorized.

1709 - Peter the Great defeated Charles XII at Poltava, in the Ukraine, The Swedish empire was effectively ended.

1755 - Britain broke off diplomatic relations with France as their disputes in the New World intensified.

1776 - Col. John Nixon gave the first public reading of the U.S. Declaration of Independence to a crowd at Independence Square in Philadelphia.

1794 - French troops captured Brussels, Belgium.

1795 - Kent County Free School changed its name to Washington College. It was the first college to be named after U.S. President George Washington. The school was established by an act of the Maryland Assembly in 1723.

1815 - Louis XVIII returned to Paris after the defeat of Napoleon.

1865 - C.E. Barnes patented the machine gun.

1879 - The first ship to use electric lights departed from San Francisco, CA.

1881 - Edward Berner, druggist in Two Rivers, WI, poured chocolate syrup on ice cream in a dish. To this time chocolate syrup had only been used for making ice-cream sodas.

1889 - The Wall Street Journal was first published.

1889 - John L. Sullivan defeated Jake Kilrain, in the last championship bare-knuckle fight. The fight lasted 75 rounds.

1907 - Florenz Ziegfeld staged his first "Follies" on the roof of the New York Theater in New York City.

1919 - U.S. President Wilson returned from the Versailles Peace Conference in France.

1947 - Demolition work began in New York City for the new permanent headquarters of the United Nations.

1950 - General Douglas MacArthur was named commander-in-chief of United Nations forces in Korea.

1953 - Notre Dame announced that the next five years of its football games would be shown in theatres over closed circuit TV.

1960 - The Soviet Union charged Gary Powers with espionage. He was shot down in a U-2 spy plane.

1963 - All Cuban-owned assets in the United States were frozen.

1969 - The U.S. Patent Office issued a patent for the game "Twister."

1970 - The San Francisco Giant’s Jim Ray Hart became the first National League player in 59 seasons to collect six runs batted (RBI) during a single inning.

1981 - The Solar Challenger became the frist solar-powered airplane to cross the English Channel.

1986 - Kurt Waldheim was inaugurated as president of Austria despite controversy over his alleged ties to Nazi war crimes.

1997 - The Mayo Clinic and the U.S. government warned that the diet-drug combination known as "fen-phen" could cause serious heart and lung damage.

1997 - NATO invited Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic to join the alliance in 1999.

2000 - J.K. Rowling's "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" was released in the U.S. It was the fourth Harry Potter book.

2010 - The Solar Impulse completed the first 24-hour flight by a solar powered plane.

[Raistlin]

0118 - Hadrian, Rome's new emperor, made his entry into the city.

0455 - Avitus, the Roman military commander in Gaul, became Emperor of the West.

1540 - England's King Henry VIII had his 6-month-old marriage to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves, annulled.

1609 - In a letter to the crown, the emperor Rudolf II granted Bohemia freedom of worship.

1755 - General Edward Braddock was mortally wounded when French and Indian troops ambushed his force of British regulars and colonial militia. He died on July 13.

1776 - The American Declaration of Independence was read aloud to Gen. George Washington's troops in New York.

1789 - In Versailles, the French National Assembly declared itself the Constituent Assembly and began to prepare a French constitution.

1790 - The Swedish navy captured one third of the Russian fleet at the naval battle of Svensksund in the Baltic Sea.

1792 - S.L. Mitchell of Columbia College in New York City became the first Professor of Agriculture.

1808 - The leather-splitting machine was patented by Samuel Parker.

1816 - Argentina declared independence from Spain.

1847 - A 10-hour work day was established for workers in the state of New Hampshire.

1868 - The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified. The amendment was designed to grant citizenship to and protect the civil liberties of recently freed slaves. It did this by prohibiting states from denying or abridging the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, depriving any person of his life, liberty, or property without due process of law, or denying to any person within their jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

1872 - The doughnut cutter was patented by John F. Blondel.

1877 - Alexander Graham Bell, Gardiner Greene Hubbard, Thomas Sanders and Thomas Watson formed the Bell Telephone Company.

1878 - The corncob pipe was patented by Henry Tibbe.

1900 - The Commonwealth of Australia was established by an act of the British Parliament, uniting the separate colonies under a federal government.

1922 - Johnny Weissmuller became the first person to swim the 100 meters freestyle in less than a minute.

1935 - Norman Bright ran the two mile event in the record time of 9 minutes, 13.2 seconds at a meet in New York City.

1943 - American and British forces made an amphibious landing on Sicily.

1947 - The engagement of Britain's Princess Elizabeth to Lt. Philip Mountbatten was announced.

1951 - U.S. President Truman asked Congress to formally end the state of war between the United States and Germany.

1953 - New York Airways began the first commuter passenger service by helicopter.

1968 - The first All-Star baseball game to be played indoors took place at the Astrodome in Houston, TX.

1971 - The United States turned over complete responsibility of the Demilitarized Zone to South Vietnamese units.

1985 - Herschel Walker of the New Jersey Generals was named the Most Valuable Player in the United States Football League (USFL).

1985 - Joe Namath signed a five-year pact with ABC-TV to provide commentary for "Monday Night Football".

1997 - Mike Tyson was banned from the boxing ring and fined $3 million for biting the ear of opponent Evander Holyfield.

2005 - Danny Way, a daredevil skateboarder, rolled down a large ramp and jumped across the Great Wall of China. He was the first person to clear the wall without motorized aid.

[Raistlin]

1609 - The Catholic states in Germany set up a league under the leadership of Maximillian of Bavaria.

1679 - The British crown claimed New Hampshire as a royal colony.

1776 - The statue of King George III was pulled down in New York City.

1778 - In support of the American Revolution, Louis XVI declared war on England.

1821 - U.S. troops took possession of Florida. The territory was sold by Spain.

1832 - U.S. President Andrew Jackson vetoed legislation to re-charter the Second Bank of the United States.

1866 - Edison P. Clark patented his indelible pencil.

1890 - Wyoming became the 44th state to join the United States.

1900 - ‘His Master’s Voice’, was registered with the U.S. Patent Office. The logo of the Victor Recording Company, and later, RCA Victor, shows the dog, Nipper, looking into the horn of a gramophone machine.

1910 - W.R. Brookins became the first to fly an airplane at an altitude of one mile.

1913 - The highest temperature ever recorded in the U.S. was 134 degrees in Death Valley, CA.

1919 - The Treaty of Versailles was hand delivered to the U.S. Senate by President Wilson.

1925 - The official news agency of the Soviet Union, TASS, was established.

1928 - George Eastman first demonstrated color motion pictures.

1929 - The U.S. government began issuing paper money in the small size.

1938 - Howard Hughes completed a 91 hour flight around the world.

1940 - The 114-day Battle of Britain began during World War II.

1943 - Arthur Ashe, the first African-American inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame, was born. He had won 33 career titles.

1949 - The first practical rectangular television was presented. The picture tube measured 12 by 16 and sold for $12.

1951 - Armistice talks aimed at ending the Korean conflict began at Kaesong.

1951 - Sugar Ray Robinson was defeated for only the second time in 133 fights as Randy Turpin took the middleweight crown.

1953 - American forces withdraw from Pork Chop Hill in Korea after heavy fighting.

1962 - The Telstar Communications satellite was launched. The satellite relayed TV and telephone signals between Europe and the U.S.

1962 - Fred Baldasare swam the English Channel underwater. It was a 42 miles and took 18 hours.

1969 - The National League was divided up into two baseball divisions.

1973 - Britain granted the Bahamas their independence after three centuries of British colonial rule.

1984 - Dwight ‘Doc’ Gooden, of the New York Mets, became the youngest player to appear in an All-Star Game as a pitcher. He was 19 years, 7 months, and 24 days old.

1985 - Coca-Cola resumed selling the old formula of Coke, it was renamed "Coca-Cola Classic." It was also announced that they would continue to sell "New" Coke.

1989 - Mel Blanc, the "man of a thousand voices," died at age 81. He was known for such cartoon characters as Daffy Duck, Bugs Bunny and Porky Pig.

1990 - Mikhail Gorbachev won re-election as the leader of the Soviet Communist Party.

1991 - Boris Yeltsin took the oath of office as the first elected president of the Russian republic.

1991 - U.S. President Bush lifted economic sanctions against South Africa, citing its "profound transformation" toward racial equality.

1993 - Kenyan runner Yobes Ondieki became the first man to run 10,000 meters in less than 27 minutes.

1997 - Scientists in London said DNA from a Neanderthal skeleton supported a theory that all humanity descended from an "African Eve" 100,000 to 200,000 years ago.

1998 - The World Bank approved a $700 million loan to Thailand.

1998 - The U.S. military delivered the remains of Air Force 1st Lt. Michael Blassie to his family in St. Louis. He had been placed in Arlington Cemetery's Tomb of the Unknown in 1984. His identity had been confirmed with DNA tests.

1999 - The heads of six African nations that had troops in the Democratic Republic of the Congo signed a cease-fire agreement that would end the civil war in that nation.

2002 - Peter Paul Rubens' painting "The Massacre of the Innocents" sold for $76.2 million at Sotheby's.

[Raistlin]

1346 - Charles IV of Luxembourg was elected Holy Roman Emperor in Germany.

1533 - Henry VIII, who divorced his wife and became head of the church of England, was excommunicated from the Catholic Church by Pope Clement VII.

1708 - The French were defeated at Oudenarde, Malplaquet, in the Netherlands by the Duke of Marlborough and Eugene of Savoy.

1742 - A papal decree was issued condemning the disciplining actions of the Jesuits in China.

1786 - Morocco agreed to stop attacking American ships in the Mediterranean for a payment of $10,000.

1798 - The U.S. Marine Corps was formally re-established by "An Act for Establishing a Marine Corps" passed by the U.S. Congress. The act also created the U.S. Marine Band. The Marines were first commissioned by the Continental Congress on November 10, 1775.

1804 - The United States' first secretary of the treasury, Alexander Hamilton, was killed by Vice President Aaron Burr in a duel.

1864 - In the U.S., Confederate forces led by Gen. Jubal Early began an invasion of Washington, DC. They turned back the next day.

1914 - Babe Ruth debuted in the major leagues with the Boston Red Sox.

1918 - Enrico Caruso recorded "Over There" written by George M. Cohan.

1934 - The first appointments to the newly created Federal Communications Commission were made.

1934 - U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt became the first American chief executive to travel through the Panama Canal while in office.

1955 - The U.S. Air Force Academy was dedicated in Colorado at Lowry Air Base.

1960 - In Honolulu, HI, the first tournament held outside the Continental U.S., sanctioned by the U.S. Golf Association, began.

1962 - The first transatlantic TV transmission was sent through the Telstar I satellite.

1972 - U.S. forces broke the 95-day siege at An Loc in Vietnam.

1977 - The Medal of Freedom was awarded posthumously to Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in a White House ceremony.

1979 - The abandoned U.S. space station Skylab returned to Earth. It burned up in the atmosphere and showered debris over the Indian Ocean and Australia.

1985 - Dr. H. Harlan Stone announced that he had used zippers for stitches on 28 patients. The zippers were used when he thought he may have to re-operate.

1985 - Nolan Ryan (Houston Astros) became the first major league pitcher to earn 4,000 strikeouts in a career. (Texas)

1987 - Bo Jackson signed a contract to play football for the L.A. Raiders for 5 years. He was also continued to play baseball for the Kansas City Royals. (California)

1995 - Full diplomatic relations were established between the United States and Vietnam.

1998 - U.S. Air Force Lt. Michael Blassie, a casualty of the Vietnam War, was laid to rest near his Missouri home. He had been positively identified from his remains that had been enshrined in the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington, VA.

1999 - A U.S. Air Force jet flew over the Antarctic and dropped off emergency medical supplies for Dr. Jerri Nelson after she had discovered a lump in her breast. Nelso was at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Research Center.

2000 - The video "Jaws," the Anniversary Collector's Edition, was released.

2000 - Liam Neeson broke his pelvis after hitting a deer with his Harley Davidson motorcycle.

[Raistlin]

1096 - Crusaders under Peter the Hermit reached Sofia, Bulgaria. There they met their Byzantine escort, which brought them safely the rest of the way to Constantinople. by August 1.

1543 - England's King Henry VIII married his sixth and last wife, Catherine Parr.

1690 - Protestant forces led by William of Orange defeated the Roman Catholic army of James II.

1691 - William III defeated the allied Irish and French armies at the Battle of Aughrim, Ireland.

1790 - The French Assembly approved a Civil Constitution providing for the election of priests and bishops.

1806 - The Confederation of the Rhine was established in Germany.

1862 - The U.S. Congress authorized the Medal of Honor.

1864 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln witnessed the battle where Union forces repelled Jubal Early's army on the outskirts of Washington, DC.

1870 - The first rotary can opener with a cutting wheel was patented by William W. Lyman.

1912 - The first foreign-made film to premiere in America, "Queen Elizabeth", was shown.

1931 - A major league baseball record for doubles was set as the St. Louis Cardinals and the Chicago Cubs combined for a total of 23.

1933 - A minimum wage of 40 cents an hour was established in the U.S.

1941 - Moscow was bombed by the German Luftwaffe for the first time.

1946 - "The Adventures of Sam Spade" was heard on ABC radio for the first time.

1954 - U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower proposed a highway modernization program, with costs to be shared by federal and state governments.

1954 - The Major League Baseball Players Association was organized in Cleveland, OH.

1957 - The U.S. surgeon general, Leroy E. Burney, reported that there was a direct link between smoking and lung cancer.

1960 - Manufacturing began for the Etch A Sketch®.

1974 - John Ehrlichman, a former aide to U.S. President Nixon, and three others were convicted of conspiring to violate the civil rights of Daniel Ellsberg's former psychiatrist.

1982 - "E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial" broke all box-office records by surpassing the $100-million mark of ticket sales in the first 31 days of its opening.

1982 - The last of the distinctive-looking Checker taxicabs rolled off the assembly line in Kalamazoo, MI.

1984 - Democratic presidential candidate Walter F. Mondale named U.S. Rep. Geraldine A. Ferraro of New York to be his running mate. Ferraro was the first woman to run for vice president on a major party ticket.

1990 - Russian republic president Boris N. Yeltsin announced his resignation from the the Soviet Communist Party.

1998 - 1.7 billion people watched soccer's World Cup finals between France and Brazil. France won 3-0.

1999 - Walt Disney Co. announced that it was merging all of its Internet operations together with Infoseek into Go.com.

2000 - Russia launched the Zvezda after two years of delays. The module was built to be the living quarters for the International Space Station (ISS.)

2000 - The movie "X-Men" premiered in New York.

[Raistlin]

1099 - The Crusaders launched their final assault on Muslims in Jerusalem.

1534 - The Ottoman armies captured Tabriz in northwestern Persia.

1558 - Led by the court of Egmont, the Spanish army defeated the French at Gravelines, France.

1585 - A group of 108 English colonists, led by Sir Richard Grenville, reached Roanoke Island, NC.

1643 - In England, the Roundheads, led by Sir William Waller, were defeated by royalist troops under Lord Wilmot in the Battle of Roundway Down.

1754 - At the beginning of the French and Indian War, George Washington surrendered the small, circular Fort Necessity in southwestern Pennsylvania to the French.

1787 - The U.S. Congress, under the Articles of Confederation, enacted the Northwest Ordinance, which established the rules for governing the Northwest Territory, for admitting new states to the Union and limiting the expansion of slavery.

1812 - The first pawnbroking ordinance was passed in New York City.

1832 - Henry Schoolcraft discovered the source of the Mississippi River in Minnesota.

1836 - John Ruggles received patent #1 from the U.S. Patent Office for a traction wheel used in locomotive steam engines. All 9,957 previous patents were not numbered.

1863 - Opponents of the Civil War draft began three days of rioting in New York City, which resulted in more than 1,000 casualties.

1875 - David Brown patented the first cash-carrier system.

1878 - The Congress of Berlin divided the Balkans among European powers.

1896 - Philadelphia’s Ed Delahanty became the second major league player to hit four home runs in a single game.

1931 - A major German financial institution, Danabank, failed. This led to the closing of all banks in Germany until August 5.

1941 - Britain and the Soviet Union signed a mutual aid pact, that provided the means for Britain to send war material to the Soviet Union.

1954 - In Geneva, the United States, Great Britain and France reached an accord on Indochina which divided Vietnam into two countries, North and South, along the 17th parallel.

1972 - Carroll Rosenbloom (owner of the Baltimore Colts) and Robert Irsay (owner of the Los Angeles Rams) traded teams.

1973 - David Bedford set a new world record in the 10,000-meter race in London. His time was 27 minutes, 31 seconds.

1978 - Lee Iacocca was fired as president of Ford Motor Co. by chairman Henry Ford II.

1982 - The All-Star Game was played outside the United States for the first time. They played in Montreal, Canada.

1984 - In Arkansas, Terry Wallis was injured in a car accident and was left comatose. He came out of the coma in June of 2003.

1998 - "Image of an Assassination" went on sale. The video documentary is of Abraham Zapruder's home video of U.S. President Kennedy's assassination in Dallas.

1998 - RealNetworks Inc. rolled out a test version of RealSystem G2. G2 is a streaming video and audio delivery system.

2000 - The United States and Vietnam singed a major trade agreement. The pact still needed to be approved by the U.S. Congress.

2000 - Sprint Corp. and WorldCom canceled their planned merger due to opposition by regulators in the United States and Europe.

[Raistlin]

1223 - In France, Louis VIII succeeded his father, Philip Augustus.

1430 - Joan of Arc, taken prisoner by the Burgundians in May, was handed over to Pierre Cauchon, the bishop of Beauvais.

1456 - Hungarians defeated the Ottomans at the Battle of Belgrade.

1536 - France and Portugal signed the naval treaty of Lyons, which aligned them against Spain.

1789 - French Revolution began with Parisians stormed the Bastille prison and released the seven prisoners inside.

1798 - The U.S. Congress passed the Sedition Act. The act made it a federal crime to write, publish, or utter false or malicious statements about the U.S. government.

1868 - Alvin J. Fellows patented the tape measure.

1891 - The primacy of Thomas Edison's lamp patents was upheld in the court decision Electric Light Company vs. U.S. Electric Lighting Company.

1900 - European Allies retook Tientsin, China, from the rebelling Boxers.

1908 - "The Adventures of Dolly" opened at the Union Square Theatre in New York City.

1911 - Harry N. Atwood landed an airplane on the lawn of the White House to accept an award from U.S. President William Taft.

1914 - Robert H. Goddard patented liquid rocket-fuel.

1933 - All German political parties except the Nazi Party were outlawed.

1940 - A force of German Ju-88 bombers attacked Suez, Egypt, from bases in Crete.

1941 - Vichy French Foreign Legionaries signed an armistice in Damascus, which allowed them to join the Free French Foreign Legion.

1945 - American battleships and cruisers bombarded the Japanese home islands for the first time.

1946 - Dr. Benjamin Spock’s "The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care" was first published.

1951 - The first sports event to be shown in color, on CBS-TV, was the Molly Pitcher Handicap at Oceanport, NJ.

1951 - The George Washington Carver National Monument in Joplin, MO, became the first national park to honor an African American.

1958 - The army of Iraq overthrew the monarchy.

1965 - The American space probe Mariner 4 flew by Mars, and sent back photographs of the planet.

1967 - Eddie Mathews (Houston Astros) hit his 500th career home run.

1968 - Hank Aaron (Atlanta Braves) hit his 500th career home run.

1981 - The All-Star Game was postponed because of a 33-day-old baseball players strike. The game was held on August 9.

1998 - Los Angeles sued 15 tobacco companies for $2.5 billion over the dangers of secondhand smoke.

2001 - Beijing was awarded the 2008 Olympics. It was the first time that the China had been awarded the games.

2003 - Jerry Springer officially filed papers to run for the U.S. Senate from Ohio.

2008 - The iTunes music Store reached 10 million applications downloaded.

2008 - In Japan, construction began on the Tokyo Skytree tower.

[Raistlin]

1099 - Jerusalem fell to the Crusaders.

1410 - Poles and Lithuanians defeated the Teutonic knights at Tannenburg, Prussia.

1789 - The electors of Paris set up a "Commune" to live without the authority of the government.

1806 - Lieutenant Zebulon Pike began his western expedition from Fort Belle Fountaine, near St. Louis, MO.

1813 - Napoleon Bonaparte's representatives met with the Allies in Prague to discuss peace terms.

1834 - Lord Napier of England arrived in Macao, China as the first chief superintendent of trade.

1870 - Georgia became the last of the Confederate states to be readmitted to the Union.

1876 - George Washington Bradley of St. Louis pitched the first no-hitter in baseball in a 2-0 win over Hartford.

1885 - In New York, the Niagara Reservation State Park opened.

1888 - "Printers’ Ink" was first sold.

1895 - Ex-prime minister of Bulgaria, Stephen Stambulov, was murdered by Macedonian rebels.

1901 - Over 74,000 Pittsburgh steel workers went on strike.

1904 - The first Buddhist temple in the U.S. was established in Los Angeles, CA.

1916 - In Seattle, WA, Pacific Aero Products was incorporated by William Boeing. The company was later renamed Boeing Co.

1918 - The Second Battle of the Marne began during World War I.

1922 - The duck-billed platypus arrived in America, direct from Australia. It was exhibited at the Bronx Zoo in New York City.

1942 - The first supply flight from India to China over the 'Hump' was carried to help China's war effort.

1958 - Five thousand U.S. Marines landed in Beirut, Lebanon, to protect the pro-Western government. The troops withdrew October 25, 1958.

1965 - The spacecraft Mariner IV sent back the first close-up pictures of the planet Mars.

1968 - ABC-TV premiered "One Life to Live".

1968 - Commercial air travel began between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., when the first plane, a Soviet Aeroflot jet, landed at Kennedy International Airport in New York.

1971 - U.S. President Nixon announced he would visit the People's Republic of China to seek a "normalization of relations."

1972 - NASA's Pioneer 10 spacecraft became the first to enter the asteroid belt.

1973 - Nolan Ryan (California Angels) became the first pitcher in two decades to win two no-hitters in a season. (California)

1981 - Steven Ford, son of former President Gerald R. Ford, appeared in a seduction scene of "The Young and the Restless" on CBS-TV. Ford played the part of Andy.

1985 - Baseball players voted to strike on August 6th if no contract was reached with baseball owners. The strike turned out to be just a one-day interruption.

1987 - Taiwan ended thirty-seven years of martial law.

2006 - The social networking service Twitter was launched.

2009 - "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" was released in theaters in the U.S. It was the sixth movie in the series.

2011 - "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2" was released in theaters in the U.S. and U.K. It was the final film in the Harry Potter series.

[Raistlin]

1765 - Prime Minister of England Lord Greenville resigned and was replaced by Lord Rockingham.

1774 - Russia and the Ottoman Empire signed the treaty of Kuchuk-Kainardji, ending their six-year war.

1779 - American troops under General Anthony Wayne captured Stony Point, NY.

1790 - The District of Columbia, or Washington, DC, was established as the permanent seat of the United States Government.

1791 - Louis XVI was suspended from office until he agreed to ratify the constitution.

1845 - The New York Yacht Club hosted the first American boating regatta.

1862 - David G. Farragut became the first rear admiral in the U.S. Navy.

1875 - The new French constitution was finalized.

1912 - Bradley A. Fiske patented the airplane torpedo.

1926 - The first underwater color photographs appeared in "National Geographic" magazine. The pictures had been taken near the Florida Keys.

1935 - Oklahoma City became the first city in the U.S. to install parking meters.

1940 - Adolf Hitler ordered the preparations to begin on the invasion of England, known as Operation Sea Lion.

1942 - French police officers rounded up 13,000 Jews and held them in the Winter Velodrome. The round-up was part of an agreement between Pierre Laval and the Nazis. Germany had agreed to not deport French Jews if France arrested foreign Jews.

1944 - Soviet troops occupied Vilna, Lithuania, in their drive toward Germany.

1945 - The United States detonated the first atomic bomb in a test at Alamogordo, NM.

1950 - The largest crowd in sporting history was 199,854. They watched the Uruguay defeat Brazil in the World Cup soccer finals in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

1951 - J.D. Salinger's novel "The Catcher in the Rye" was first published.

1957 - Marine Major John Glenn set a transcontinental speed record when he flew a jet from California to New York in 3 hours, 23 minutes and 8 seconds.

1964 - Little League Baseball Incorporated was granted a Federal Charter unanimously by the United States Senate and House of Representatives.

1969 - Apollo 11 blasted off from Cape Kennedy, FL, and began the first manned mission to land on the moon.

1970 - The Pittsburgh Pirates played their first game at Three Rivers Stadium.

1973 - Alexander P. Butterfield informed the Senate committee investigating the Watergate affair of the existence of recorded tapes.

1979 - Saddam Hussein became president of Iraq after forcing Hasan al-Bakr to resign.

1981 - After 23 years with the name Datsun, executives of Nissan changed the name of their cars to Nissan.

1985 - The All-Star Game, televised on NBC-TV, was the first program broadcast in stereo by a TV network.

2005 - J.K. Rowling's book "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" was released. It was the sixth in the Harry Potter series. The book sold 6.9 million copies on its first day of release.

2009 - In Chicago, Sears Tower was renamed Willis Tower.

[Raistlin]

1212 - The Moslems were crushed in the Spanish crusade.

1453 - France defeated England at Castillon, France, which ended the 100 Years' War.

1785 - France limited the importation of goods from Britain.

1815 - Napoleon Bonaparte surrendered to the British at Rochefort, France.

1821 - Spain ceded Florida to the U.S.

1862 - National cemeteries were authorized by the U.S. government.

1866 - Authorization was given to build a tunnel beneath the Chicago River. The three-year project cost $512,709.

1867 - Harvard School of Dental Medicine was established in Boston, MA. It was the first dental school in the U.S.

1898 - U.S. troops under General William R. Shafter took Santiago de Cuba during the Spanish-American War.

1917 - The British royal family adopted the Windsor name.

1920 - Sinclair Lewis finished his novel "Main Street."

1941 - The longest hitting streak in baseball history ended when the Cleveland Indians pitchers held New York Yankee Joe DiMaggio hitless for the first time in 57 games.

1941 - Brigadier General Soervell directed Architect G. Edwin Bergstrom to have basic plans and architectural perspectives for an office building that could house 40,000 War Department employees on his desk by the following Monday morning. The building became known as the Pentagon.

1945 - U.S. President Truman, Soviet leader Josef Stalin and British Prime Minister Winston S. Churchill began meeting at Potsdam in the final Allied summit of World War II. During the meeting Stalin made the comment that "Hitler had escaped."

1946 - Chinese communists opened a drive against the Nationalist army on the Yangtze River.

1950 - The television show "The Colgate Comedy Hour" debuted featuring Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.

1954 - The Brooklyn Dodgers made history as the first team with a majority of black players.

1955 - Disneyland opened in Anaheim, CA.

1960 - Francis Gary Powers pled guilty to spying charges in a Moscow court after his U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union.

1966 - Ho Chi Minh ordered a partial mobilization of North Vietnam forces to defend against American air strikes.

1975 - An Apollo spaceship docked with a Soyuz spacecraft in orbit. It was the first link up between the U.S. and Soviet Union.

1979 - Nicaraguan President Anastasio Somoza resigned and fled to Miami in exile. (Florida)

1986 - The largest bankruptcy filing in U.S. history took place when LTV Corporation asked for court protection from more than 20,000 creditors. LTV Corp. had debts in excess of $4 billion.

1987 - Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North and rear Admiral John Poindexter begin testifying to Congress at the "Iran-Contra" hearings.

1995 - The Nasdaq composite stock index rose above 1,000 for the first time.

1997 - After 117 years, the Woolworth Corp. closed its last 400 stores.

1998 - Biologists reported that they had deciphered the genome (genetic map) of the syphilis bacterium.

2008 - In China, construction of the Shanghai World Financial Center was completed.

[Raistlin]

0064 - The Great Fire of Rome began.

1536 - The authority of the pope was declared void in England.

1743 - "The New York Weekly Journal" published the first half-page newspaper ad.

1789 - Robespierre, a deputy from Arras, France, decided to back the French Revolution.

1812 - Great Britain signed the Treaty of Orebro, making peace with Russia and Sweden.

1830 - Uruguay adopted a liberal constitution.

1872 - The Ballot Act was passed in Great Britain, providing for secret election ballots.

1914 - Six planes of the U.S. Army helped to form an aviation division called the Signal Corps.

1927 - Ty Cobb set a major league baseball record by getting his 4,000th career hit. He hit 4,191 before he retired in 1928.

1932 - The U.S. and Canada signed a treaty to develop the St. Lawrence Seaway.

1935 - Ethiopian King Haile Selassie urged his countrymen to fight to the last man against the invading Italian army.

1936 - The first Oscar Meyer Wienermobile rolled out of General Body Company’s factory in Chicago, IL.

1936 - The Spanish Civil War began as Gen. Francisco Franco led an uprising of army troops based in Spanish North Africa.

1936 - "The Columbia Workshop" debuted on CBS radio.

1942 - The German Me-262, the first jet-propelled aircraft to fly in combat, made its first flight.

1944 - U.S. troops captured Saint-Lo, France, ending the battle of the hedgerows.

1944 - Hideki Tojo was removed as Japanese premier and war minister due to setbacks suffered by his country in World War II.

1947 - U.S. President Truman signed the Presidential Succession Act, which placed the Speaker of the House and the Senate President Pro Tempore next in the line of succession after the vice president.

1964 - Pete Rose (Cincinnati Reds) hit the only grand slam home run of his career.

1970 - Ron Hunt (San Francisco Giants) was hit by a pitch for the 119th time in his career.

1971 - New Zealand and Australia announced they would pull their troops out of Vietnam.

1985 - jack Nicklaus II, at age 23 years old, made his playing debut on the pro golf tour at the Quad Cities Open in Coal Valley, IL.

2000 - It was announced that Christopher Reeve would direct and serve as executive producer on the TV movie "Rescuing Jeffrey."

2001 - A train derailed, involving 60 cars, in a Baltimore train tunnel. The fire that resulted lasted for six days and virtually closed down downtown Baltimore for several days. (Maryland)

[Raistlin]

1525 - The Catholic princes of Germany formed the Dessau League to fight against the Reformation.

1553 - Fifteen-year-old Lady Jane Grey was deposed as Queen of England after claiming the crown for nine days. Mary, the daughter of King Henry VIII, was proclaimed Queen.

1788 - Prices plunged on the Paris stock market.

1799 - The Rosetta Stone, a tablet with hieroglyphic translations into Greek, was found in Egypt.

1848 - The Women's Rights Convention took place in Seneca Fall, NY. Bloomers were introduced at the convention.

1870 - France declared war on Prussia.

1909 - The first unassisted triple play in major-league baseball was made by Cleveland Indians shortstop Neal Ball in a game against Boston.

1939 - Dr. Roy P. Scholz became the first surgeon to use fiberglass sutures.

1942 - German U-boats were withdrawn from positions off the U.S. Atlantic coast due to effective American anti-submarine countermeasures.

1943 - During World War II, more than 150 B-17 and 112 B-24 bombers attacked Rome for the first time.

1946 - Marilyn Monroe acted in her first screen test.

1960 - Juan Marichal (San Francisco Giants) became the first pitcher to get a one-hitter in his major league debut.

1964 - In Illinois, Cahokia Mounds was designated as a U.S. National Landmark.

1971 - In New York, the topping out ceremony for Two World Trade Center (South Tower) took place. The ceremony for One World Trade Center had taken place on December 23, 1970.

1974 - The House Judiciary Committee recommended that U.S. President Richard Nixon should stand trial in the Senate for any of the five impeachment charges against him.

1975 - The Apollo and Soyuz spacecrafts separated after being linked in orbit for two days.

1979 - In Nicaragua, the dictatorship of the Somozas was overthrown by the Sandinista National Liberation Front (Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional or FSLN).

1982 - The U.S. Census Bureau reported that 14% of the population had an income below the official poverty level in 1981.

1984 - Geraldine Ferraro was nominated by the Democratic Party to become the first woman from a major political party to run for the office of U.S. Vice-President.

1985 - George Bell won first place in a biggest feet contest with a shoe size of 28-1/2. Bell, at age 26, stood 7 feet 10 inches tall.

1985 - Christa McAuliffe of New Hampshire was chosen to be the first schoolteacher to ride aboard the space shuttle. She died with six others when the Challenger exploded the following year.

[Raistlin]

1801 - A 1,235 pound cheese ball was pressed at the farm of Elisha Brown, Jr. The ball of cheese was later loaded on a horse-driven wagon and presented to U.S. President Thomas Jefferson at the White House.

1810 - Colombia declared independence from Spain.

1859 - Brooklyn and New York played baseball at Fashion Park Race Course on Long Island, NY. The game marked the first time that admission had been charged for to see a ball game. It cost $.50 to get in and the players on the field did not receive a salary (until 1863).

1861 - The Congress of the Confederate States began holding sessions in Richmond, VA.

1868 - Legislation that ordered U.S. tax stamps to be placed on all cigarette packs was passed.

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. (Montana)

1917 - The draft lottery in World War I went into operation.

1935 - NBC radio debuted "G-men." The show was later renamed "Gangbusters."

1942 - The first detachment of the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, (WACS) began basic training at Fort Des Moines, Iowa.

1944 - An attempt by a group of German officials to assassinate Adolf Hitler failed. The bomb exploded at Hitler's Rastenburg headquarters. Hitler was only wounded.

1944 - U.S. President Roosevelt was nominated for an unprecedented fourth term of office at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

1947 - The National Football League (NFL) ruled that no professional team could sign a player who had college eligibility remaining.

1961 - "Stop the World, I Want to Get Off" opened in London.

1969 - Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin E. Aldrin, Jr. became the first men to walk on the moon.

1974 - Turkish forces invaded Cyprus.

1976 - America's Viking I robot spacecraft made a successful landing on Mars.

1982 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan pulled the U.S. out of comprehensive test ban negotiations indefinitely.

1985 - Treasure hunters began raising $400 million in coins and silver from the Spanish galleon "Nuestra Senora de Atocha." The ship sank in 1622 40 miles of the coast of Key West, FL.

1992 - Vaclav Havel, the playwright who led the Velvet Revolution against communism, stepped down as president of Czechoslovakia.

1998 - Russia won a $11.2 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund to help avert the devaluation of its currency.

2003 - In India, elephants used for commercial work began wearing reflectors to avoid being hit by cars during night work.

[Raistlin]

Today's: Famous Birthdays - music history

1376 - The legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin leading rats out of town is said to have occurred on this date.

1587 - A second English colony was established on Roanoke Island off North Carolina. The colony vanished under mysterious circumstances.

1796 - Cleveland was founded by General Moses Cleaveland.

1798 - The USS Constitution was underway and out to sea for the first time since being launched on October 21, 1797.

1812 - English troops under the Duke of Wellington defeated the French at the Battle of Salamanca in Spain.

1926 - Babe Ruth caught a baseball at Mitchell Field in New York. The ball had been dropped from an airplane flying at 250 feet.

1933 - Wiley Post ended his around-the-world flight. He had traveled 15,596 miles in 7 days, 18 hours and 45 minutes.

1937 - The U.S. Senate rejected President Roosevelt's proposal to add more justices to the Supreme Court.

1943 - American forces led by General George S. Patton captured Palermo, Sicily.

1941 - Plans for the Pentagon were presented to the House Subcommittee on Appropriations.

1955 - U.S. Vice-President Richard M. Nixon chaired a cabinet meeting in Washington, DC. It was the first time that a Vice-President had carried out the task.

1965 - "Till Death Us Do Part" debuted on England’s BBC-TV.

1975 - Confederate General Robert E. Lee had his U.S. citizenship restored by the U.S. Congress.

1987 - The U.S. began its policy of escorting re-flagged Kuwaiti tankers up and down the Persian Gulf to protect them from possible attack by Iran.

1998 - Iran tested medium-range missile, capable of reaching Israel or Saudi Arabia.

2000 - Astronomers at the University of Arizona announced that they had found a 17th moon orbiting Jupiter.

2003 - In northern Iraq, Saddam Hussein's sons Odai and Qusai died after a gunfight with U.S. forces.

2003 - In Paris, France, a fire broke out near the top of the Eiffel Tower. About 4,000 visitors were evacuated and no injuries were reported.

2004 - The September 11 commission's final report was released. The 575-page report concluded that hijackers exploited "deep institutional failings within our government." The report was released to White House officials the day before.

2009 - The longest total solar eclipse of the 21st century, lasting up to 6 minutes and 38.8 seconds, occurred over parts of Asia and the Pacific Ocean.

2011 - Space Shuttle Atlantis landed successfully at Kennedy Space Center after completing STS-135. It was the final flight of NASA's space shuttle program.

[Raistlin]

1715 - The first lighthouse in America was authorized for construction at Little Brewster Island, Massachusetts.

1827 - The first swimming school in the U.S. opened in Boston, MA.

1829 - William Burt patented the typographer, which was the first typewriter.

1877 - The first municipal railroad passenger service began in Cincinnati, Ohio.

1886 - Steve Brodie, a New York saloonkeeper, claimed to have made a daredevil plunge from the Brooklyn Bridge into the East River.

1904 - The ice cream cone was invented by Charles E. Menches during the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis, MO.

1914 - Austria-Hungary issued an ultimatum to Serbia following the killing of Archduke Francis Ferdinand by a Serb assassin. The dispute led to World War I.

1938 - The first federal game preserve was approved by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The area was 2,000 acres in Utah.

1945 - The first passenger train observation car was placed in service by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad.

1952 - Egyptian military officers led by Gamal Abdel Nasser overthrew King Farouk I.

1954 - A law was passed that stated "The Secretary of the Navy is authorized to repair, equip, and restore the United States Ship Constitution, as far as may be practicable, to her original appearance, but not for active service, and thereafter to maintain the United States Ship Constitution at Boston, Massachusetts."

1958 - The submarine Nautilus departed from Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, under orders to conduct "Operation Sunshine." The mission was to be the first vessel to cross the north pole by ship. The Nautils achieved the goal on August 3, 1958.

1962 - The "Telstar" communications satellite sent the first live TV broadcast to Europe.

1972 - Eddie Merckx of Belgium won his fourth consecutive Tour de France bicycling competition.

1972 - The U.S. launched Landsat 1 (ERTS-1). It was the first Earth-resources satellite.

1984 - Miss America, Vanessa Williams, turned in her crown after it had been discovered that nude photos of her had appeared in "Penthouse" magazine. She was the first to resign the title.

1985 - Commodore unveiled the personal computer Amiga 1000.

1986 - Britain's Prince Andrew married Sarah Ferguson at Westminster Abbey in London. They divorced in 1996.

1998 - U.S. scientists at the University of Hawaii turned out more than 50 "carbon-copy" mice, with a cloning technique.

2000 - Lance Armstrong won his second Tour de France.

[Raistlin]

1847 - Mormon leader Brigham Young and his followers arrived in the valley of the Great Salt Lake in present-day Utah.

1847 - Richard M. Hoe patented the rotary-type printing press.

1849 - Georgetown University in Washington, DC, presented its first Doctor of music Degree. It was given to Professor Henry Dielman.

1866 - Tennessee became the first state to be readmitted to the Union after the U.S. Civil War.

1923 - The Treaty of Lausanne, which settled the boundaries of modern Turkey, was concluded in Switzerland.

1929 - U.S. President Hoover proclaimed the Kellogg-Briand Pact, which renounced war as an instrument of foreign policy.

1933 - The first broadcast of "The Romance of Helen Trent" was heard on radio. 7,222 episodes were aired.

1933 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave his fourth "Fireside Chat."

1948 - Soviet occupation forces in Germany blockaded West Berlin. The U.S.-British airlift began the following day.

1956 - Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis ended their team. They ended the partnership a decade after it began on July 25, 1946.

1969 - The Apollo 11 astronauts splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean.

1974 - The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that President Nixon had to turn over subpoenaed White House tape recordings to the Watergate special prosecutor.

1978 - Billy Martin was fired for the first of three times as the manager of the New York Yankees baseball team.

1985 - Walt Disney released their 25th full-length cartoon. The work was "The Black Cauldron."

1987 - Hulda Crooks, at 91 years of age, climbed Mt. Fuji. Hulda became the oldest person to climb Japan’s highest peak.

1998 - Roy O. Disney received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

[Raistlin]

Today's: Famous Birthdays - music history

0326 - Constantine refused to carry out the traditional pagan sacrifices.

1394 - Charles VI of France issued a decree for the general expulsion of Jews from France.

1564 - Maximillian II became emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.

1587 - Japanese strong-man Hideyoshi banned Christianity in Japan and ordered all Christians to leave.

1593 - France's King Henry IV converted from Protestantism to Roman Catholicism.

1759 - British forces defeated a French army at Fort Niagara in Canada.

1799 - Napoleon Bonaparte defeated the Ottomans at Aboukir, Egypt.

1805 - Aaron Burr visited New Orleans with plans to establish a new country, with New Orleans as the capital city.

1845 - China granted Belgium equal trading rights with Britain, France and the United States.

1850 - In Worcester, MA, Harvard and Yale University freshmen met in the first intercollegiate billiards match.

1850 - Gold was discovered in the Rogue River in OR.

1854 - The paper collar was patented by Walter Hunt.

1861 - The Crittenden Resolution, which called for the American Civil War to be fought to preserve the Union and not for slavery, was passed by the U.S. Congress.

1866 - Ulysses S. Grant was named General of the Army. He was the first American officer to hold the rank.

1868 - The U.S. Congress passed an act creating the Wyoming Territory.

1871 - Seth Wheeler patented perforated wrapping paper.

1907 - Korea became a protectorate of Japan.

1909 - French aviator Louis Bleriot flew across the English Channel in a monoplane. He traveled from Calais to Dover in 37 minutes. He was the first man to fly across the channel.

1914 - Russia declared that it would act to protect Serbian sovereignty.

1924 - Greece announced the deportation of 50,000 Armenians.

1939 - W2XBS TV in New York City presented the first musical comedy seen on TV. The show was "Topsy and Eva."

1941 - The U.S. government froze all Japanese and Chinese assets.

1943 - Italian Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini was overthrown in a coup.

1946 - The U.S. detonated an atomic bomb at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific. It was the first underwater test of the device.

1946 - Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis staged their first show as a team at Club 500 in Atlantic City, NJ.

1947 - Fortune Gordien of Oslo, Norway set a world record discus throw of 178.47 feet.

1952 - Puerto Rico became a self-governing commonwealth of the U.S.

1978 - Louise Joy Brown, the first test-tube baby, was born in Oldham, England. She had been conceived through in-vitro fertilization.

1978 - Pete Rose (Cincinnati Red) broke the National League record for consecutive base hits as he got a hit in 38 straight games.

1984 - Soviet cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya became the first woman to walk in space. She was aboard the orbiting space station Salyut 7.

1987 - The Salt Lake City Trappers set a professional baseball record as the team won its 29th game in a row. (Utah)

1994 - Israel and Jordan formally ended the state of war that had existed between them since 1948.

1997 - K.R. Narayanan became India's president. He was the first member of the Dalits caste to do so.

1998 - The USS Harry S. Truman was commissioned and put into service by the U.S. Navy.

1999 - Lance Armstrong won the Tour de France. He was only the second American to win the race.

2010 - WikiLeaks leaked to the public more than 90,000 internal reports involving the U.S.-led War in Afghanistan from 2004-2010.