Today In History
Today is Monday, March 29, the 88th day of 2021. There are 277 days left in the year.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT
› 1974: Eight Ohio National Guardsmen were indicted on federal charges stemming from the shooting deaths of four students at Kent State University. (The charges were later dismissed.)
ON THIS DATE
› 1638: Swedish colonists settled in present-day Delaware.
› 1812: The first White House wedding took place as Lucy Payne Washington, the sister of first lady Dolley Madison, married Supreme Court Justice Thomas Todd.
› 1861: President Abraham Lincoln ordered plans for a relief expedition to sail to South Carolina’s Fort Sumter, which was still in the hands of Union forces despite repeated demands by the Confederacy that it be turned over.
› 1867: Britain’s Parliament passed, and Queen Victoria signed, the British North America Act creating the Dominion of Canada, which came into being the following July.
› 1912: British explorer Robert Falcon Scott, with his doomed expedition stranded in an Antarctic blizzard after failing to be the first to reach the South Pole, wrote the last words of his journal: “For Gods sake look after our people.”
› 1936: German Chancellor Adolf Hitler claimed overwhelming victory in a plebiscite on his policies.
› 1951: Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were convicted in New York of conspiracy to commit espionage for the Soviet Union. (They were executed in June 1953.)
› 1971: Army Lt. William L. Calley Jr. was convicted of murdering 22 Vietnamese civilians in the 1968 My Lai massacre. (Calley ended up serving three years under house arrest.) A jury in Los Angeles recommended the death penalty for Charles Manson and three female followers for the 1969 Tate-La Bianca murders. (The sentences were commuted when the California state Supreme Court struck down the death penalty in 1972.)
› 1973: The last United States combat troops left South Vietnam, ending America’s direct military involvement in the Vietnam War.
› 2002: Israeli troops stormed Yasser Arafat’s headquarters complex in the West Bank in a raid that was launched in response to anti-Israeli attacks that had killed 30 people in three days.
› 2017: Britain filed for divorce from the European Union as Prime Minister Theresa May sent a six-page letter to EU Council President Donald Tusk.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS
Author Judith Guest is 85. Former British Prime Minister Sir John Major is 78. Comedian Eric Idle is 78. Composer Vangelis is 78. Basketball Hall of Famer Walt Frazier is 76. Singer Bobby Kimball (Toto) is 74. Actor Bud Cort is 73. Actor Brendan Gleeson is 66. Pro and College Football Hall of Famer Earl Campbell is 66. Actor Marina Sirtis is 66. Actor Christopher Lambert is 64. Rock singer Perry Farrell (Porno for Pyros; Jane’s Addiction) is 62. Comedian-actor Amy Sedaris is 60. Model Elle Macpherson is 58. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., is 57. Actor Annabella Sciorra is 57. Movie director Michel Hazanavicius is 54. Rock singer-musician John Popper (Blues Traveler) is 54. Actor Lucy Lawless is 53. Country singer Brady Seals is 52. Former White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs is 50. Actor Sam Hazeldine is 49. International Tennis Hall of Famer Jennifer Capriati is 45. Actor Chris D’Elia is 41. R&B singer PJ Morton is 40. Actor Megan Hilty is 40. Pop singer Kelly Sweet is 33.