TODAY IN HISTORY

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT May 18, 1980

The Mount St. Helens volcano in Washington state exploded, leaving 57 people dead or missing.

ON THIS DATE 1896

The U.S. Supreme Court, in Plessy v. Ferguson, endorsed “separate but equal” racial segregation, a concept renounced 58 years later by Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.

1981

The New York Native, a gay newspaper, carried a story concerning rumors of “an exotic new disease” among homosexuals; it was the first published report about what came to be known as AIDS.

1998

The U.S. government filed an antitrust case against Microsoft, saying the powerful software company had a “choke hold” on competitors that was denying consumers important choices about how they bought and used computers.