Today in History!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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334 BC - The Macedonian army of Alexander the Great defeats Darius III of Persia in the Battle of the Granicus.

1455 - King Henry VI was taken prisoner by the Yorkists at the Battle of St. Albans, during the War of the Roses.

1570 - 1ST Atlas 'Theatrum Orbis Terrarum' (Theatre of the World), published by Abraham Ortelius in Antwerp with 70 maps.

1819 - The steamship Savannah became the first to cross the Atlantic Ocean.

1841 - Henry Kennedy received a patent for the first reclining chair. All hail Henry Kennedy.

1843 - 1ST wagon train with 700 - 1000 pioneers, departs Independence, Missouri for Oregon.

1849 - Abraham Lincoln received a patent for a floating dry dock.

1868 - Near Marshfield, IN, The "Great Train Robbery" took place. The robbery was worth $96,000 in cash, gold and bonds to the seven members of the Reno gang.

1872 - The Amnesty Act restored civil rights to Southerners.

1891 - The first public motion picture was given in Thomas Edison's lab.

1906 - The Wright brothers received a patent their flying machine.

1939 - Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini signed a military alliance between Germany and Italy known as the "Pact of Steel."

1946 - First US rocket (WAC Corporal) to reach edge of space fired from White Sands Missile Range New Mexico.

1947 - The Truman Doctrine was enacted by the U.S. Congress to appropriate military and economic aid Turkey and Greece.

1967 - "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" premiered on PBS.

1969 - A lunar module of Apollo 10 flew within nine miles of the moon's surface. The event was a rehearsal for the first lunar landing.

1972 - U.S. President Nixon became the first U.S. president to visit Russia. He met with Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev.

1990 - In the Middle East, North and South Yemen merged to become a single state known as the Republic of Yemen.

1990 - Microsoft released Windows 3.0.

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1430 - Joan of Arc was captured by Burgundians. She was then sold to the English.

1533 - Henry VIII’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon was declared null and void.

1618 - Second Defenestration of Prague. Two Catholic Lords Regent and their secretary are thrown out of a window and amazingly are not seriously injured by the 70 foot fall. This event triggers the Thirty Years' War.

1701 - In London, Captain William Kidd was hanged after being convicted of murder and piracy.

1785 - Benjamin Franklin announces his invention of bifocals. So basically Franklin invented late middle age.

1788 - South Carolina became the eighth state to ratify U.S. Constitution.

1813 - South American independence leader Simon Bolivar enters Merida, leading the invasion of Venezuela, and is proclaimed El Libertador ("The Liberator").

1873 - Canada's North West Mounted Police force was established. The organization's name was changed to Royal Canadian Mounted Police in 1920.

1895 - The New York Public Library was created with an agreement that combined the city's existing Astor and Lenox libraries.

1900 - Civil War hero Sgt. William H. Carney became the first African American to receive the Medal of Honor, 37 years after the Battle of Fort Wagner.

1901 - American forces captured Filipino rebel leader Emilio Aguinaldo.

1915 - During World War I, Italy joined the Allies as they declared war on Austria-Hungary.

1934 - In Bienville Parish, LA, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were ambushed and killed by Texas Rangers. The bank robbers were riding in a stolen Ford Deluxe.

1945 - In Luneburg Germany, Heinrich Himmler, the head of the Nazi Gestapo, committed suicide while imprisoned by the Allied forces.

1949 - Federal Republic of [West] Germany created out of the American, British and French occupation zones.

1960 - Israel announced the capture of Nazi Adolf Eichmann in Argentina.

1985 - Thomas Patrick Cavanagh was sentenced to life in prison for trying to sell Stealth bomber secrets to the Soviet Union.

1992 - In Lisbon, Portugal , the U.S. and four former Soviet republics signed an agreement to implement the START missile reduction treaty that had been agreed to by the Soviet Union before it was dissolved.

1999 - Gerry Bloch, at age 81, became the oldest climber to scale El Capitan in Yosemite National Park. He broke his own record that he set in 1986 when he was 68 years old.

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1610 - Sir Thomas Gates institutes "laws divine moral and marshal," a harsh civil code for Jamestown. John Smith doesn't looks so bad now, huh?

1624 - After years of unprofitable operation Virginia’s charter was revoked and it became a royal colony.

1689 - The English Parliament passed Act of Toleration, protecting Protestants. Roman Catholics were specifically excluded from exemption.

1764 - Bostonian lawyer James Otis denounced "taxation without representation" and called for the colonies to unite in demonstrating their opposition to Britain’s new tax measures.

1798 - Believing that a French invasion of Ireland was imminent, Irish nationalists rose up against the British occupation.

1822 - At the Battle of Pichincha, Bolivar secured independence of the Quito.

1844 - Samuel F.B. Morse formally opened America's first telegraph line. The first message was sent from Washington, DC, to Baltimore, MD. The message was "What hath God wrought?"

1863 - Bushwackers led by Captain William Marchbanks attacked a U.S. Federal militia party in Nevada, Missouri. The Bushwackers were a pro Confederate guerrilla force.

1883 - After 14 years of construction the Brooklyn Bridge was opened to traffic.

1913 - The U.S. Department of Labor entered into its first strike mediation. The dispute was between the Railroad Clerks of the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad.

1930 - Amy Johnson became the first woman to fly from England to Australia.

1941 German battleship Bismarck sinks the British battle cruiser HMS Hood. 3 out of a crew of 1,416 survive.

1958 - United Press International was formed through a merger of the United Press and the International News Service.

1961 - The Freedom Riders were arrested in Jackson, Mississippi.

1967 - California Governor Ronald Reagan greeted Charles M. Schulz at the state capitol in observance of the legislature-proclaimed "Charles Schulz Day."

1976 - Britain and France opened trans-Atlantic Concorde service to Washington.

1980 - The International Court of Justice issued a final decision calling for the release of the hostages taken at the U.S. embassy in Tehran on November 4, 1979.

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585 BC - The first known prediction of a solar eclipse was made in Greece.

1085 - Alfonso VI took Toledo, Spain back from the Muslim forces.

1720 - The Ship "Le Grand St Antoine" reaches Marseille, bringing Europe's last major plague outbreak. Death toll from the outbreak is estimated to be nearly 100,000.

1787 - The Constitutional convention opened in Philadelphia with George Washington presiding.

1810 - In the May Revolution, citizens of Buenos Aires expel the Spanish Viceroy Cisneros during Semana de Mayo.

1844 - The first telegraphed news dispatch, sent from Washington, DC, to Baltimore, MD, appeared in the Baltimore "Patriot."

1911 - President of Mexico, Porfolio Diaz, resigned his office.

1925 - John Scopes was indicted for teaching the Darwinian theory in school.

1927 - Ford Motor Company announced that the Model A would replace the Model T.

1935 - Babe Ruth hit his final homerun, his 714th, and set a record that would stand for 39 years.

1946 - Jordan gained independence from Britain.

1953 - In Nevada, the first atomic cannon was fired. No word on the nuclear hand grenade yet.

1961 - JFK announces US goal of putting a man on Moon before the end of decade.

1968 - The Gateway Arch, part of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial in St. Louis, MO, was dedicated.

1977 - "Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope" opened and became the largest grossing film to date.

1977 - An opinion piece by Vietnam verteran Jan Scruggs appeared in "The Washington Post." The article called for a national memorial to "remind an ungrateful nation of what it has done to its sons" that had served in the Vietnam War.

1986 - Approximately 7 million Americans participated in "Hands Across America."

1997 - Poland adopted a constitution that removed all traces of communism.

1999 - A report by the U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People's Republic of China concluded that China had "stolen design information on the U.S. most-advanced thermonuclear weapons" and that China's penetration of U.S. weapons laboratories "spans at least the past several decades and almost certainly continues today."

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17 - Germanicus of Rome celebrated his victory over the Germans. This Germanicus is also the father of the much more infamous Caligula.

1328 - William of Ockham was forced to flee from Avignon by Pope John XXII.

1521 - Martin Luther was banned by the Edict of Worms because of his religious beliefs and writings.

1647 - A new law banned Catholic priests from the colony of Massachusetts. The penalty was banishment or death for a second offense.

1691 - Jacob Leiser, leader of the popular uprising in support of William and Mary’s accession to the English throne, was executed for treason.

1736 - The British and Chickasaw Indians defeated the French at the Battle of Ackia.

1791 - The French Assembly forced King Louis XVI to hand over the crown and state assets.

1805 - Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned King of Italy in Milan Cathedral.

1835 - A resolution was passed in the U.S. Congress stating that Congress has no authority over state slavery laws.

1864 - The Territory of Montana was organized.

1865 - Arrangements were made in New Orleans for the surrender of Confederate forces west of the Mississippi.

1868 - U.S. President Andrew Johnson was acquitted, by one vote, of all charges in his impeachment trial.

1896 - Dow Jones begins an index of 12 industrial stocks, closing at 40.94.

1896 - The last czar of Russia, Nicholas II, was crowned.

1908 At Masjed Soleyman in southwest Persia, the first major commercial oil strike in the Middle East is made, rights acquired by the United Kingdom.

1938 - The House Committee on Un-American Activities began its work of searching for subversives in the United States.

1940 - Allied troops retreat to Dunkirk in preparation for evacuation, France during World War II.

1946 - A patent was filed in the United States for an H-bomb.

1948 - The U.S. Congress passed Public Law 557 which permanently established the Civil Air Patrol as the Auxiliary of the new U.S. Air Force.

1959 - The word "Frisbee" became a registered trademark of Wham-O.

1969 - The Apollo 10 astronauts returned to Earth after a successful eight-day dress rehearsal for the first manned moon landing.

1972 - The Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT I) was signed by the U.S. and USSR. The short-term agreement put a freeze on the testing and deployment of intercontinental and submarine-launched ballistic missiles for a 5-year period.

1994 - U.S. President Clinton renewed trade privileges for China, and announced that his administration would no longer link China's trade status with its human rights record.

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1647 - Alse (Alice) Young, a resident of Windsor, CT, was executed for being a "witch." It was the first recorded American execution of a "witch."

1668 - Three colonists were expelled from Massachusetts for being Baptists.

1679 Habeaus Corpus Act, strengthening person's right to challenge unlawful arrest and imprisonment, passes in England.

1703 - Saint Petersburg founded by Russian Tsar Peter the Great.

1873 Heinrich Schliemann discovers "Priam's Treasure" a cache of gold and other objects in Hisarlik in Anatolia. This is the suspected location of the City of Troy.

1905 - The Japanese fleet destroys the Russian Eastern Sea fleet in the Battle of Tsushima. Before the battle Japanese Admiral Togo hoisted the "Z" flag. This was repeated later by Admiral Nagumo who hoisted the "Z" flag on 6 December 1941 when he was sure that he had achieved complete surprise over the US Navy prior to the pearl Harbor attack.

1907 - The Bubonic Plague broke out in San Francisco.

1919 - A U.S. Navy seaplane completed the first transatlantic flight.

1931 - Piccard and Knipfer made the first flight into the stratosphere, by balloon.

1933 - In the U.S., the Federal Securities Act was signed. The act required the registration of securities with the Federal Trade Commission.

1935 - The U.S. Supreme Court declared that President Franklin Roosevelt's National Industrial Recovery Act was unconstitutional.

1937 - In California, the Golden Gate Bridge was opened to pedestrian traffic. The bridge connected San Francisco and Marin County.

1940 - British and Allied forces begin the actual evacuation of Dunkirk (Operation Dynamo) during WWII.

1941 - U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt proclaimed an "unlimited national emergency" amid rising world tensions.

1941 - The German battleship Bismarck was sunk by British naval and air forces. 2,300 people were killed.

1942 - German General Erwin Rommel began a major offensive in Libya with his Afrika Korps.

1960 - A military coup overthrew the democratic government of Turkey.

1985 - In Beijing, representatives of Britain and China exchanged instruments of ratification on the pact returning Hong Kong to the Chinese in 1997.

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585 BC - Solar eclipse, as predicted by Greek philosopher Thales occurs leading to a truce in the war between Sparta and the Medes . This solar event is one of the cardinal or basic dates from which other dates are calculated.

1533 - England's Archbishop of Canterbury declared the marriage of King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn valid.

1588 - Spanish Armada under the Duke of Medina-Sidonia departs Lisbon to invade England.

1805 - Napoleon was crowned in Milan, Italy.

1830 - US President Andrew Jackson signs the Indian Removal Act, authorizing the Army to force Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole tribes out of Georgia and surrounding states, setting the stage for the Cherokee Trail of Tears.

1863 - The 54TH Massachusetts Infantry a black regiment left Boston to fight in the U.S. Civil War.

1900 - Britain annexed the Orange Free State.

1928 - Chrysler Corporation merged with Dodge Brothers, Inc.

1936 - Alan Turing submits "On Computable Numbers" for publication, in which he set out the theoretical basis for modern computers.

1940 - During World War II, Belgium surrendered to Germany.

1976 - The Peaceful Nuclear Explosion Treaty was signed, limiting any nuclear explosion - regardless of its purpose - to a yield of 150 kilotons.

1985 - David Jacobsen, director of the American University Hospital in Beirut, Lebanon, was abducted by pro-Iranian kidnappers. He was freed 17 months later.

1987 - Mathias Rust, a 19-year-old West German pilot, landed a private plane in Moscow's Red Square after evading Soviet air defenses. He was released August 3, 1988. The bird used was a single engine Cessna.

1998 - Pakistan matched India with five nuclear test blasts. The U.S., Japan and other nations imposed economic sanctions. Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said "Today, we have settled the score with India."

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1453 - Constantinople, capital of the Eastern Roman Empire falls to the Turks under Muhammad II ending the Byzantine Empire.

1592 - Battle of Sacheon: Korean navy led by Admiral Yi Sun Shin repels a Japanese fleet. A victory secured through the use of technology over numbers and more highly skilled individual combatants. This was the first use of the spiked and armored "Turtle Ships".

1660 - On his 30th birthday Charles II returns to London from exile in the Netherlands to claim the English throne after the Puritan Commonwealth comes to an end.

1721 - South Carolina was formally incorporated as a royal colony.

1765 - Patrick Henry denounced the Stamp Act before Virginia's House of Burgesses.

1790 - Rhode Island became the last of the original thirteen colonies to ratify the U.S. Constitution.

1827 - The first nautical school opened in Nantucket, MA, under the name Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin’s Lancasterian School. Glad it didn't have a pompous name or anything.

1848 - WIsconsin became the 30th state to join the United States.

1910 - An airplane raced a train from Albany, NY, to New York City. The airplane pilot Glenn Curtiss won the $10,000 prize.

1916 - U.S. forces invaded Dominican Republic and remained until 1924.

1932 - World War I veterans began arriving in Washington, DC. to demand cash bonuses they were not scheduled to receive for another 13 years.

1953 - Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay became first men to reach the top of Mount Everest.

1974 - U.S. President Nixon agreed to turn over 1,200 pages of edited Watergate transcripts.

1985 - Thirty-nine people were killed and 400 were injured in a riot at a European Cup soccer match in Brussels, Belgium.

1990 - Boris Yeltsin was elected president of the Russian republic by the Russian parliament.

1999 - Space shuttle Discovery completed the first docking with the International Space Station.

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1431 - Joan of Arc was burned at the stake in Rouen, France, at the age of 19.

1539 - Hernando de Soto, the Spanish explorer, landed in Florida with 600 soldiers to search for gold.

1783 - The first daily newspaper was published in the U.S. by Benjamin Towner called "The Pennsylvania Evening Post"

1814 - The First Treaty of Paris was declared, which returned France to its 1792 borders.

1848 - Mexico ratifies treaty giving US New Mexico, California, parts of Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and Colorado in return for $15 million.

1854 - The U.S. territories of Nebraska and Kansas were established.

1868 - Decoration Day the predecessor of Memorial Day was observed widely for the first time in the U.S. It was so named because the day was dedicated to the decoration of the graves of those who fell in fighting the Civil War and honoring their memory.

1883 - Twelve people were trampled to death in New York City in a stampede when a rumor that the Brooklyn Bridge was in danger of collapsing occurred.

1911 - Ray Harroun won the first Indianapolis 500. At the time, it was known as International 500-Mile Sweepstakes Race. Harroun's average speed was 74.59 miles per hour.

1921 - The U.S. Navy transferred the Teapot Dome oil reserves to the Department of the Interior.

1933 - Sally Rand introduced her exotic and erotic fan dance to audiences at Chicago’s Century of Progress Exposition.

1958 - Unidentified soldiers killed in World War II and the Korean conflicts were buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

1971 - Mariner 9, the American deep space probe blasted off on a journey to Mars.

1982 - Spain became the 16th NATO member. Spain was the first country to enter the Western alliance since West Germany in 1955.

1989 - The "Goddess of Democracy" statue (33 feet height) was erected in Tiananmen Square by student demonstrators.

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1433 - Sigismund was crowned emperor of Rome.

1578 - Martin Frobisher sails from Harwich, England, to Frobisher Bay, Canada. Frobisher eventually mines fools gold which was famously used to pave part of the streets of London.

1854 - The Kansas-Nebraska Act passed by the U.S. Congress.

1859 - In London, Big Ben went into operation.

1884 - Dr. John Harvey Kellogg patented "flaked cereal."

1900 - U.S. troops as part of an international contingent arrive in Peking to help put down the Boxer Rebellion and rescue the besieged legations there.

1902 - The Boer War ended between the Boers of South Africa and Great Britain with the Treaty of Vereeniging.

1907 - The first taxis arrived in New York City. They were the first in the United States.

1910 - The Union of South Africa was founded.

1913 - The 17th Amendment went into effect. It provided for popular election of U.S. senators.

1915 - A German Zeppelin made an air raid on London. With no radar or other detection devices and the limitations on the service ceilings of then top of the line fighters, the lighter than air ships were formidable as strategic bombers. Eventually technology caught up to the Zeppelins.

1916 - Battle of Jutland: Largest naval battle of World War I between the British Grand Fleet and the German High Seas Fleet which killed 8,645 in an inconclusive battle but strategic British victory. German fleet never puts to sea again in WWI.

1947 - Communists seized control of Hungary.

1955 - The U.S. Supreme Court ordered that all states must end racial segregation "with all deliberate speed."

1961 - South Africa became an independent republic.

1962 - Adolf Eichmann was hanged in Israel. Eichmann was a Gestapo official and was executed for his actions in the Nazi Holocaust.

1977 - The trans-Alaska oil pipeline was finished after 3 years of construction.

1994 - The U.S. announced it was no longer aiming long-range nuclear missiles at targets in the former Soviet Union.