TODAY IN HISTORY

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT 1974

President Gerald R. Ford announced a conditional amnesty program for Vietnam war deserters and draftevaders.

ALSO ON THIS DATE 1630

The Massachusetts village of Shawmut changed its name to Boston.

1810

Mexico began its revolt against Spanish rule.

1908

General Motors was founded in Flint, Michigan, by William C. Durant.

1982

The massacre of between 1,200 and 1,400 Palestinian men, women and children at the hands of Israeli-allied Christian Phalange militiamen began in west Beirut’s Sabra and Shatila refugee camps.

1987

Two dozen countries signed the Montreal Protocol, a treaty designed to save the Earth’s ozone layer by calling on nations to reduce emissions of harmful chemicals by the year 2000.

2001

President George W. Bush, speaking on the South Lawn of the White House, said there was “no question” Osama bin Laden and his followers were the prime suspects in the Sept. 11attacks; Bush pledged the government would “find them, get them running and hunt them down.”

2007

Contractors for the U.S. security firm Blackwater USA guarding a U.S. State Department convoy in Baghdad opened fire on civilian vehicles, mistakenly believing they were under attack; 14 Iraqis died.

O.J. Simpson was arrested in the alleged armed robbery of sports memorabilia collectors in Las Vegas.

2009

Mary Travers, 72, part of the folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary, died in Danbury, Connecticut.