Today in history
1612 - Protestant Union of Germany signs defensive alliance with England.
1882 - After more than 15 years of robbing banks and trains, United States outlaw Jesse James is shot in the back at St Joseph, Missouri, by a member of his gang.
1913 - English suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst is found guilty of encouraging supporters to arson and sentenced to three years in prison.
1933 - First flight over Mt Everest in the Himalayas is made by four Britons in two biplanes.
1943 - Tensions between Kiwi troops and their American counterparts posted to New Zealand boil over into a mass brawl in central Wellington, dubbed the Battle of Manners St.
1949 - US President Harry Trusman signs the Marshall Plan, which brings US$5 billion in aid to 16 European countries.
1968 - Less than 24 hours before his assassination in Memphis, Tennessee, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr delivers his famous ‘‘mountaintop’’ speech to a rally of striking sanitation workers.
1973 - The world’s first portable cellphone is made in New York.
1982 - Britain dispatches a naval taskforce to the south Atlantic to reclaim the disputed Falkland Islands from Argentina.
1986 - Peter Pears, British operatic tenor, dies.
1990 - Jazz singer Sarah Vaughan dies in suburban Los Angeles at age 66.
1991 - Death of British novelist Graham Greene, aged 86, in Switzerland.
1999 - Lionel Bart, British composer of the musical Oliver!, dies aged 68.
2000 - A federal judge in Washington rules that Microsoft has violated US anti-trust laws by keeping ‘‘an oppressive thumb’’ on competitors during the race to link Americans to the internet.
2007 - A commission of inquiry into the culture of the New Zealand police force prompts an apology to the nation from Police Commissioner Howard Broad for the ‘‘disgraceful’’ actions of a few rogue officers.
2016 - Publication of the Panama Papers, confidential documents from law firm Mossack Fonseca that expose illegal tax activity.
Henry IV, King of England (1367-1413); Washington Irving, US writer (1783-1859); Marlon Brando, US actor (1924-2004); Doris Day, US actress-singer (1924-); Jane Goodall, British primatologist (1934-); Jimmy Mcgriff, US jazz musician (1936-2008); Alec Baldwin, US actor (1958-); Eddie Murphy, US actor (1961-); Nigel Farage, English politician (1964-); Jennie Garth, US actress (1972-); Amanda Bynes, US actress (1986-).