TODAY IN HISTORY

Today is Tuesday, Jan. 15, the 15th day of 2019. There are 350 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On Jan. 15, 1929, civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. was born in Atlanta.

On this date:

In 1559, England's Queen Elizabeth I was crowned in Westminster Abbey.

In 1862, the U.S. Senate confirmed President Abraham Lincoln's choice of Edwin M. Stanton to be the new Secretary of War, replacing Simon Cameron.

In 1892, the original rules of basketball, devised by James Naismith, were published for the first time in Springfield, Massachusetts, where the game originated.

In 1919, in Boston, a tank containing an estimated 2.3 million gallons of molasses burst, sending the dark syrup coursing through the city's North End, killing 21 people.

In 1943, work was completed on the Pentagon, the headquarters of the U.S. Department of War (now Defense).

In 1961, a U.S. Air Force radar tower off the New Jersey coast collapsed into the Atlantic Ocean during a severe storm, killing all 28 men aboard.

In 1973, President Richard M. Nixon announced the suspension of all U.S. offensive action in North Vietnam, citing progress in peace negotiations.

In 1981, the police drama series “Hill Street Blues” premiered on NBC.

In 1989, NATO, the Warsaw Pact and 12 other European countries adopted a human rights and security agreement in Vienna, Austria.

In 1993, a historic disarmament ceremony ended in Paris with the last of 125 countries signing a treaty banning chemical weapons.

Ten years ago: US Airways Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger ditched his Airbus 320 in the Hudson River after a flock of birds disabled both engines; all 155 people aboard survived.

Five years ago: In the latest in a series of nuclear stumbles, the U.S. Air Force disclosed that 34 officers entrusted with the world's deadliest weapons had been removed from launch duty for allegedly cheating — or tolerating cheating by others — on routine proficiency tests.

One year ago: Singer Dolores O'Riordan of the Irish rock band The Cranberries died at a London hotel at the age of 46; a coroner found that she had accidentally drowned in a bathtub after drinking.

Thought for Today: “I refuse to accept the idea that theis`-ness' of man's present nature makes him morally incapable of reaching up for theo`ught-ness' that forever confronts him.” — Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968).