On this day
1792
1798
1865
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1909
1931
1933
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1944
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1998
2005
2013
– The Postal Service Act, establishing the United States Post Office Department, is signed by President George Washington.
– Louis Alexandre Berthier removes Pope Pius VI from power.
– End of the Uruguayan War, with a peace agreement between President Tomás Villalba and rebel leader Venancio Flores, setting the scene for the destructive War of the Triple Alliance.
– In New York City the Metropolitan Museum of Art opens.
– The University of California opens its first medical school in San Francisco, California.
– Publication of the Futurist Manifesto in the French journal Le Figaro.
– The Congress of the United States approves the construction of the San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge by the state of California.
– Adolf Hitler secretly meets with German industrialists to arrange for financing of the Nazi Party’s upcoming election campaign.
– Caroline Mikkelsen becomes the first woman to set foot in Antarctica.
– Lieutenant Edward O’Hare becomes America’s first World War II flying ace.
– American movie studio executives agree to allow the Office of War Information to censor movies.
– World War II: The United States takes Eniwetok Island.
– Emmett Ashford becomes the first AfricanAmerican umpire in organized baseball by being authorized to be a substitute umpire in the Southwestern International League.
– Ranger 8 crashes into the moon after a successful mission of photographing possible landing sites for the Apollo program astronauts.
– The Soviet Union launches its Mir spacecraft. Remaining in orbit for 15 years, it is occupied for 10 of those years.
– American figure skater Tara Lipinski becomes the youngest gold-medalist at the Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
– Spain becomes the first country to vote in a referendum on ratification of the proposed Constitution of the European Union, passing it by a substantial margin, but on a low turnout.
– The smallest Extrasolar planet, Kepler-37b is discovered.