• 1525 - Martin Luther married Katharina von Bora, against the celibacy doctrine decreed by the Roman Catholic Church on priests and nuns.
• 1625 - King Charles I is married to the French princess Henrietta Maria de Bourbon
• 1774 - Rhode Island becomes the first of Britain's North American colonies to ban the importation of slaves.
• 1777 - American Revolutionary War: Marquis de Lafayette lands near Charleston, South Carolina, in order to help the Continental Congress to train its army.
• 1798 - Mission San Luis Rey de Francia is founded.
• 1805 - Lewis and Clark Expedition: Scouting ahead of the expedition, Meriwether Lewis and four companions sight the Great Falls of the Missouri River.
• 1871 - In Labrador, a hurricane kills 300 people.
• 1881 - The USS Jeannette is crushed in an Arctic Ocean ice pack.
• 1886 - A fire devastates much of Vancouver, British Columbia.
• 1886 - King Ludwig II of Bavaria is found dead in Lake Starnberg south of Munich at 11:30 PM.
• 1893 - Grover Cleveland undergoes secret, successful surgery to remove large, cancerous portion of his jaw; operation not revealed to US public until 1917, nine years after the president's death.
• 1898 - Yukon Territory is formed, with Dawson chosen as its capital.
• 1917 - deadliest German air raid on London during WWI carried out by Gotha G bombers and results in 162 deaths, including 46 children, and 432 injuries.
• 1927 - A ticker-tape parade is held for aviator Charles Lindbergh down 5th Avenue in New York City.
• 1934 - Adolf Hitler and Mussolini meet in Venice, Italy; Mussolini later describes the German dictator as "a silly little monkey".
• 1935 - In one of the biggest upsets in championship boxing, the 10 to 1 underdog James J. Braddock defeated Max Baer in Long Island City, New York, and became the heavyweight champion of the world.
• 1942 - The United States opens its Office of War Information.
• 1944 - World War II: Germany launches a counter attack on Carentan.
• 1944 - World War II: Germany launches a V1 Flying Bomb attack on England. Only four of the eleven bombs actually hit their targets.
• 1952 - Catalina affair, a Swedish Douglas DC-3 was shot down by a Soviet MiG-15 fighter.
• 1953 - Hungarian Prime Minister Mátyás Rákosi is replaced by Imre Nagy
• 1955 - Mir Mine, the first diamond mine of the USSR, is discovered.
• 1956 - Real Madrid win the inaugural European Champion Clubs' Cup final, defeating Stade de Reims 4-3 at the Parc des Princes, Paris.
• 1966 - The United States Supreme Court rules in Miranda v. Arizona that the police must inform suspects of their rights before questioning them.
• 1967 - U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson nominates Solicitor-General Thurgood Marshall to become the first black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
• 1970 - "The Long and Winding Road" becomes the Beatles' last Number 1 song.
• 1971 - Vietnam War: The New York Times begins to publish the Pentagon Papers.
• 1977 - Convicted Martin Luther King Jr. assassin James Earl Ray is recaptured after escaping from prison three days before.
• 1978 - Israeli Defense Forces withdraw from Lebanon.
• 1981 - At the Trooping the Colour ceremony in London, a teenager, Marcus Sarjeant, fires six blank shots at Queen Elizabeth II.
• 1982 - Fahd becomes King of Saudi Arabia upon the death of his brother, Khalid.
• 1983 - Pioneer 10 becomes the first manmade object to leave the solar system.
• 1994 - A jury in Anchorage, Alaska, blames recklessness by Exxon and Captain Joseph Hazelwood for the Exxon Valdez disaster, allowing victims of the oil spill to seek $15 billion in damages.
• 1995 - French president Jacques Chirac announces the resumption of nuclear tests in French Polynesia.
• 1996 - The Montana Freemen surrender after an 81-day standoff with FBI agents.
• 1997 - A jury sentences Timothy McVeigh to the death penalty for his part in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.
• 2000 - President Kim Dae Jung of South Korea meets Kim Jong-il, leader of North Korea, for the beginning of the first ever inter-Korea summit, in the northern capital of Pyongyang.
• 2000 - Italy pardons Mehmet Ali Agca, the Turkish gunman who tried to kill Pope John Paul II in 1981.
• 2002 - The United States of America withdraws from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
• 2005 - A jury in Santa Maria, California acquits pop singer Michael Jackson of molesting 13-year-old Gavin Arvizo at his Neverland Ranch.
• 2007 - Al Askari Mosque bombed again.

Births