1992 – U.S. Vice President Dan Quayle instructed a student to spell “potato” with an “e” on the end during a spelling bee. He had relied on a faulty flash card that had been written by the student’s teacher.
763 BC – Assyrians record a solar eclipse that will be used to fix the chronology of Mesopotamian history
923 – Battle of Soissons: King Robert I of France is killed and King Charles the Simple is arrested by the supporters of Duke Rudolph of Burgundy
1215 – King John of England put his seal on the Magna Carta.
1219 – Dannebrog is the flag of Denmark and the oldest national flag in the world. According to legend, it fell from the sky during the Battle of Lyndanisse (now Tallinn) in Estonia, and turned the Danes’ luck
1381 – The English peasant revolt was crushed in London.
1389 – Ottoman Turks crushed Serbia in the Battle of Kosovo.
1567 – Republic of Genoa expels Jews from its whole territory
1607 – Colonists in North America completed James Fort in Jamestown, VA.
1667 – Jean-Baptiste Denys administered the first fully-documented human blood transfusion. He successfully transfused the blood of a sheep to a 15-year old boy.
1775 – George Washington was appointed head of the Continental Army by the Second Continental Congress.
1804 – Twelfth Amendment to the US Constitution, establishing the procedure for electing the President and Vice President, ratified in Congress
1826 – Ottoman Sultan Mahmud II abolishes the elite Janissary corps executing thousands for treason to make way for a more modern army
1836 – Arkansas became the 25th U.S. state.
1846 – The United States and Britain settled a boundary dispute concerning the boundary between the U.S. and Canada, by signing a treaty.
1859 – Pig War: Ambiguity in the Oregon Treaty leads to the “Northwestern Boundary Dispute” between U.S. and British/Canadian settlers
1864 – An order to establish a military burial ground was signed by Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton. The location later became known as Arlington National Cemetery.
1864 – US Congress passes legislation equalizing pay for Black soldiers
1878 – World’s first moving pictures caught on camera (used 12 cameras, each taking 1 picture) done to see if all 4 of a horse’s hooves leave the ground
1907 – Researcher George Soper publishes the results of his investigation into recent typhoid outbreaks in the New York area and announces that Mary Mallon [Typhoid Mary] is the likely source of the outbreak
1911 – The Computing-Tabulating-Recording Co. was incorporated in the state of New York. The company was later renamed International Business Machines (IBM) Corp.
1916 – U.S. President Woodrow Wilson signed a bill incorporating the Boy Scouts of America.
1920 – African American circus workers, Elias Clayton, Elmer Jackson and Isaac McGhie are taken from jail and lynched by a white mob of thousands in Duluth, Minnesota
1940 – The French fortress of Verdun was captured by Germans.
1940 – World War II: France surrenders to NAZI Germany, German troops occupy Paris
1944 – American forces began their successful invasion of Saipan during World War II.
1948 – Soviet authorities announced that the Autobahn would be closed indefinitely “for repairs.”
1959 – Galapagos Islands are made Ecuador’s first national park, banning the capture of species
1969 – The Campaign for Social Justice publish a second edition of ‘Northern Ireland The Plain Truth’ which set out the allegations of discrimination against Catholics by Unionists in the region
1977 – Spain holds the first free elections since 1936 – The transition to democracy followed nearly four decades of right-wing dictatorship under Francisco Franco. Adolfo Suárez became Spain’s first democratically elected Prime Minister.
1981 – The U.S. agreed to provide Pakistan with $3 billion in military and economic aid from October 1982 to October 1987.
1982 – Supreme Court rules all children, regardless of citizenship, are entitled to a public education
1983 – The U.S. Supreme Court reinforced its position on abortion by striking down state and local restriction on abortions.
1986 – Pravda, the Communist Party newspaper, reported that the chief engineer of the Chernobyl nuclear plant was dismissed for mishandling the incident at the plant.
1991 – Mount Pinatubo explodes – The stratovolcano’s eruption was one of the most violent of the 20th century. About 800 people died, but the event had also global consequences. For example, it caused a global temperature drop of 0.5 °C (0.9 °F).
1992 – It was ruled by the U.S. Supreme Court that the government could kidnap criminal suspects from foreign countries for prosecution.
1992 – U.S. Vice President Dan Quayle instructed a student to spell “potato” with an “e” on the end during a spelling bee. He had relied on a faulty flash card that had been written by the student’s teacher.
2001 – ExxonMobil and Qatar Petroleum sign a letter of intent for a natural gas to liquids (GTL) project that would be the largest in the world
2002 – Near earth asteroid 2002 MN missed the Earth by 75,000 miles (120,000 km), about one-third of the distance between the Earth and the Moon
2006 – Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument (Papahānaumokuākea) established, at 582,578 square miles one of the largest marine conservation areas in the world
2015 – Remains of a 2,000 year old women dubbed “the sleeping beauty” are announced discovered in Northern Ethiopia from ancient kingdom of Aksum
2020 – In landmark decision US Supreme Court rules 6-3 that gay and transgender workers cannot be discriminated against in the workplace
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
