On this date:

1858: The fifth debate between Illinois senatorial candidates Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas took place in Galesburg.

1916: In the most lopsided victory in college football history, Georgia Tech defeated Cumberland University 222-0 in Atlanta.

1954: Marian Anderson became the first black singer hired by the Metropolitan Opera Company in New York.

1960: Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kennedy and Republican opponent Richard Nixon held their second televised debate, this one in Washington, D.C.

1979: Pope John Paul II concluded his week-long tour of the United States with a Mass on the Washington Mall.

1982: The Andrew Lloyd

Webber-Tim Rice musical

“Cats” opened on Broadway. The show ended its original run on Sept. 10, 2000, after a then-record 7,485 performances.

1985: Palestinian gunmen hijacked the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro in the Mediterranean. The hijackers killed Leon Klinghoffer, a Jewish-American tourist, before surrendering on Oct. 9.

1989: Hungary’s Communist Party renounced Marxism in favor of democratic socialism during a party congress in Budapest.

1992: Trade representatives of the United States, Canada and Mexico initialed the North American Free Trade Agreement during a ceremony in San Antonio, Texas, in the presence of President George H.W. Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari.