TODAY IN HISTORY

MONDAY AUG 16, 2021 1977

Elvis Presley died at his Graceland estate in Memphis, Tennessee, at age 42.

1777

American forces won the Battle of Bennington in what was considered a turning point of the Revolutionary War.

1812

Detroit fell to British and Native American forces in the War of 1812.

1861

President Abraham Lincoln issued Proclamation 86, which prohibited the states of the Union from engaging in commercial trade with states that were in rebellion — i.e., the Confederacy.

1954

Sports Illustrated was first published by Time Inc.

1962

The Beatles fired their original drummer, Pete Best, replacing him with Ringo Starr.

1977

A judge in New York ruled that Renee Richards, a male-to-female transgender, had the right to compete in the U.S. Open without having to pass a sex chromosome test..

1978

James Earl Ray, convicted assassin of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., told a Capitol Hill hearing he did not commit the crime, saying he’d been set up by a mysterious man called “Raoul.”

1987

156 people were killed when Northwest Airlines Flight 255crashed while trying to take off from Detroit; the sole survivor was 4-year-old Cecelia Cichan.

1991

Pope John Paul II began the first-ever papal visit to Hungary.

2002

Terrorist mastermind Abu Nidal reportedly was found shot to death in Baghdad, Iraq; he was 65.

2014

Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency and imposed a curfew in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, where police and protesters repeatedly clashed in the week since a Black teenager was shot to death by a white police officer.