Today in history

On June 29, 1767,

the British Parliament approved the Townsend Revenue Acts, which imposed import duties on certain goods shipped to America; colonists bitterly protested the Acts, which were repealed in 1770.

In 1776

Virginia adopted a state constitution, and Patrick Henry was made governor.

In 1868

George Ellery Hale, the astronomer who developed the 200- inch telescope that bears his name at California’s Palomar Mountain Observatory, was born in Chicago.

In 1900writer

and aviator Antoine Saint-Exupery was born in Lyon, France.

In 1936

baseball Hall of Famer Harmon Killebrew was born in Payette, Idaho.

In1941

Ignace Paderewski, Polish statesman, pianist and composer, died in New York; hewas 80.

In 1946

British authorities in Palestine arrested more than 2,700 Jews in a drive against terrorism.

In 1949

South Africa's government banned racially mixed marriages.

In 1954

the Atomic Energy Commission voted against reinstating J. Robert Oppenheimer's access to classified information.

In 1966

the U.S. bombed North Vietnam's capital, Hanoi, and the port of Haiphong for the first time during the Vietnam War.

In1967

actress Jayne Mansfield, 34, and two male companions died when their car struck a tractor-trailer east of New Orleans.