1974 – The Cleveland Indians had “Ten Cent Beer Night”. Due to the drunken and unruly fans the Indians forfeited to the Texas Rangers.
781 BC – Oldest Chinese recording of a solar eclipse
1070 – Roquefort cheese created in a cave near Roquefort, France
1391 – Mob led by Ferrand Martinez surrounds and sets fire to the Jewish quarter of Seville in Spain, the surviving Jews are sold into slavery
1615 – The fortress of Osaka, Japan, fell to shogun Ieyasu after a six month siege.
1629 – Dutch East India ship Batavia wrecks on Morning Reef off the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia, with 200 survivors (only 70 survive after three months due to mutiny and murders)
1647 – The British army seized King Charles I and held him as a hostage.
1674 – Horse racing was prohibited in Massachusetts.
1783 – A hot-air balloon was demonstrated by Joseph and Jacques Montgolfier. It reached a height of 1,500 feet.
1805 – Tripoli was forced to conclude peace with U.S. after conflicts over tribute.
1812 – The Louisiana Territory had its name changed to the Missouri Territory.
1876 – An express train called the Transcontinental Express arrives in San Francisco, California, via the First Transcontinental Railroad only 83 hours and 39 minutes after having left New York City.
1892 – The Sierra Club was incorporated in San Francisco.
1896 – Henry Ford made a successful test drive of his new car in Detroit, MI. He called the vehicle was called a “Quadricycle.”
1911 – Gold was discovered in Alaska’s Indian Creek.
1912 – Massachusetts passes 1st US minimum wage law
1919 – US Congress passes the Women’s Suffrage Bill, the 19th Amendment
1924 – An eternal light was dedicated at Madison Square in New York City in memory of all New York soldiers who died in World War I.
1928 – President of the Republic of China Zhang Zuolin is assassinated by Japanese agents
1939 – The first shopping cart was introduced by Sylvan Goldman in Oklahoma City, OK. It was actually a folding chair that had been mounted on wheels.
1940 – British complete the “Miracle of Dunkirk” by evacuating 338,226 allied troops from France via a flotilla of over 800 vessels including Royal Navy destroyers, merchant marine boats, fishing boats, pleasure craft and even lifeboats
1942 – The Battle of Midway, a decisive Allied victory in World War II, began.
1944 – The U.S. Fifth Army entered Rome, leading to the liberation of the city during World War II.
1944 – General Eisenhower cancels planned D-Day invasion on June 5th after receiving unfavorable weather reports
1947 – The House of Representatives approved the Taft-Hartley Act. The legislation allowed the President of the United States to intervene in labor disputes.
1956 – ‘Secret speech’ by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev criticising Joseph Stalin is made public
1974 – Saudi Arabia announces that it will increase its participation in Aramco to 60 percent
1974 – The Cleveland Indians had “Ten Cent Beer Night”. Due to the drunken and unruly fans the Indians forfeited to the Texas Rangers.
1985 – The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling striking down an Alabama law that provided for a daily minute of silence in public schools.
1986 – Jonathan Jay Pollard, a former Navy intelligence analyst, pled guilty in Washington to spying for Israel. He was sentenced to life in prison.
1986 – The California Supreme Court approved a law that limited the liability of manufacturers and other wealthy defendants. It was known as the “deep pockets law.”
1989 – People’s Army of China opened fire on crowds of prodemocracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square, killing thousands.
1989 – Poland holds the first free elections after World War II – The landslide victory of the Polish trade union, “Solidarity”, marked the beginning of the Autumn of Nations, a wave of revolutions resulting in the fall of communism.
1990 – Greyhound Bus files bankruptcy
1990 – Dr Jack Kevorkian assists an Oregon woman to commit suicide, beginning a national debate over the right to die
1997 – UN Security renews its “oilforfood” initiative whereby Iraq may sell $2 billion worth of oil to buy food, medicine and other necessities to alleviate civilian suffering under the sanctions imposed when it invaded Kuwait in 1990
1998 – Terry Nichols is sentenced to life in prison for his role in the Oklahoma City bombing
2003 – Martha Stewart was indicted on charges of insider trading.
2012 – US drone attack kills 15 militants in Pakistan, including high ranking al-Qaeda official, Abu Yahya al-Libi
2014 – 10 Nigerian generals and five other senior military officers are court-martialed for providing arms and information to jihadist terrorist group Boko Haram
2018 – US President Donald Trump tweets “I have the absolute right to PARDON myself”
2019 – Deforestation of the Amazon forest in Brazil the fastest for a decade as 740 square kilometers cleared in 30 days according to Brazilian space research institute
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
