TODAY IN HISTORY

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

2001

President George W. Bush ordered U.S. troops to get ready for war and braced Americans for a long, difficult assault against terrorists to avenge the Sept. 11attack. Beleaguered Afghans streamed out of Kabul, fearing a U.S. military strike against Taliban rulers harboring Osama bin Laden.

ON THIS DATE

1776

British forces occupied New York City during the American Revolution.

1789

The U.S. Department of Foreign Affairs was renamed the Department of State.

1857

William Howard Taft — who served as President of the United States and as U.S. chief justice — was born in Cincinnati, Ohio.

1890

English mystery writer Agatha Christie was born in Torquay.

1935

The Nuremberg Laws deprived German Jews of their citizenship.

1959

Nikita Khrushchev became the first Soviet head of state to visit the United States as he arrived at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington.

1963

Four Black girls were killed when a bomb went off during Sunday services at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. (Three Ku Klux Klansmen were eventually convicted for their roles in the blast.)

1972

A federal grand jury in Washington indicted seven men in connection with the Watergate break-in.

1981

The Senate Judiciary Committee voted unanimously to approve the Supreme Court nomination of Sandra Day O’Connor.