TODAY IN HISTORY

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

May 17, 2004

Massachusetts became the first state to allow same-sex marriages.

ALSO ON THIS DATE 1536

Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer declared the marriage of England’s King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn invalid after she failed to produce a male heir; Boleyn, already condemned for high treason, was executed two days later.

1792

The New York Stock Exchange had its beginnings as a group of brokers met under a tree on Wall Street and signed the Buttonwood Agreement.

1946

President Harry S. Truman seized control of the nation’s railroads, delaying _ but not preventing _ a threatened strike by engineers and trainmen.

1954

A unanimous U.S. Supreme Court handed down its Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka decision which held that racially segregated public schools were inherently unequal, and therefore unconstitutional.

1968

Nine men and women, including brothers Daniel and Philip Berrigan, entered the Selective Service office in Catonsville, Maryland, seized several hundred draft files and burned them outside to protest the Vietnam War before being arrested.

1973

A special committee convened by the U.S. Senate began its televised hearings into the Watergate scandal.

1987

37 American sailors were killed when an Iraqi warplane attacked the U.S. Navy frigate Stark in the Persian Gulf.

1996

President Bill Clinton signed a measure requiring neighborhood notification when sex offenders move in.

2002

Former President Jimmy Carter ended a historic visit to Cuba sharply at odds with the Bush administration over how to deal with Fidel Castro.