On this day in history: 23 March

1857 - American industrialist Elisha Otis installs his first elevator at 488 Broadway in New York City

1970 - South Africa is banned from the Davis Cup - the largest international tennis event, owing to its apartheid policy

1881 - The Boers and Britain sign a peace accord known as the Pretoria Convention which effectively ends the First Boer War

1994 - Following an interim report of the Goldstone Commission, which probed allegations of a ‘third force’ in political violence, President FW De Klerk announces that a further ten unnamed officers implicated in the report are being withdrawn from service