Today in history

On March 7, 1965, a march by civil rights demonstrators was violently broken up at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, by state troopers and a sheriff's posse in what came to be known as "Bloody Sunday."

In 1530, Pope Clement VII threatened to excommunicate England's King Henry VIII if he went through with plans to marry Anne Boleyn, who became Henry's second wife after Catherine of Aragon. (The pope made good on his excommunication threat in 1533.)

In 1793, during the French Revolutionary Wars, France declared war on Spain.

In 1850, in a three-hour speech to the U.S. Senate, Daniel Webster of Massachusetts endorsed the Compromise of 1850 as a means of preserving the Union.

In 1918, Japanese corporation Panasonic had its beginnings as Konosuke Matsushita (mahtsoosh-tah) founded Matsushita Electric Housewares Manufacturing Works in Osaka. The musical comedy "Oh, Look!" featuring the song "I'm Always Chasing Rainbows" opened on Broadway.

In 1926, the first successful trans-Atlantic radio-telephone conversations took place between New York and London.

In 1936, Adolf Hitler ordered his troops to march into the Rhineland, thereby breaking the Treaty of Versailles (vehr-SY') and the Locarno Pact.

In 1945, during World War II, U.S. forces crossed the Rhine at Remagen, Germany, using the damaged but still usable Ludendorff Bridge.

In 1955, the first TV production of the musical "Peter Pan" starring Mary Martin aired on NBC.

In 1967, the musical "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown," based on the "Peanuts" comic strips by Charles M. Schulz, opened in New York's Greenwich Village, beginning an off-Broadway run of 1,597 performances.

In 1975, the U.S. Senate revised its filibuster rule, allowing 60 senators to limit debate in most cases, instead of the previously required two-thirds of senators present.