On this day in history ...

• 2003 The Human Genome Project is completed

  The project dedicated to mapping the genes of the human genome was started in October 1990.
  

• 1988 The Soviet Union agrees to withdraw from Afghanistan

  Soviet troops had invaded the country in 1979 to support the communist rulers. They were defeated primarily by the Mujahideen, who were groups of militant Islamists sponsored by the CIA.
  

• 1986 The heaviest hailstones ever recorded hit Bangladesh

  The lumps of ice weighed about 1 kg (2.2 lb). At total of 92 people reportedly died as a result.
  

• 1912 Doomed passenger liner RMS Titanic hits an iceberg in the North Atlantic

  The subsequent sinking of the world's largest ocean liner of the time resulted in more than 1500 deaths. It was one of the worst peacetime maritime disasters in history.
  

• 1865 U.S. President Abraham Lincoln is shot

  The assassin, John Wilkes Booth, wanted to revive the Confederate cause, mere days after their surrender to the Union Army, bringing the American Civil War to an end. Lincoln died the next day
  

• 1994 The World Trade Organization is founded

  The WTO coordinates and strives to liberalize international trade. It has been criticized for ignoring and escalating the negative social and environmental side-effects of globalization.
  

• 1989 A small group of students initiates pro-democracy protest on Tiananmen Square in Beijing

  The death of reformer Hu Yaobang triggered the demonstrations, which grew in size and were brutally dispersed in the Tiananmen Square Massacre on June 4.
  

• 1986 The United States launches retaliatory air strikes against Libya

  Around 40 Libyans died in Operation El Dorado Canyon, including an infant girl. The attack was the United States' response to the bombing of a Berlin discotheque on April 5, in which 3 people had died.
  

• 1945 The German concentration camp Bergen-Belsen is liberated

  British and Canadian troops found about 53,000 prisoners inside the camp. Tens of thousands died before and after the liberation.
  

• 1935 The Eastman Kodak Company launches Kodachrome

  The photographic film was one of the most popular media used by professional and hobby photographers around the world. The product was discontinued in 2009 because of the advent of digital photography.
  

• 2012 The trial of Anders Behring Breivik begins in Oslo

  The right-wing extremist had killed 77 people, mostly teenagers, in Oslo with a car bomb and at a youth camp on Utøya island. After doubts about his mental health emerged before the trial, he was sentenced to 21 years in prison.
  

• 2003 Ten new member states are admitted to the European Union

  The Treaty of Accession admitted countries including Poland, Cyprus, and the Czech Republic to the EU. Its original title contains 99 words.
  

• 1964 The Rolling Stones release their debut album

  The album The Rolling Stones, released in the United States with the added title “England's Newest Hit Makers”, topped the UK charts for twelve weeks.
  

• 1917 Vladimir Lenin returns to Russia from exile

  The communist revolutionary became leader of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (SFSR) later that year. From 1922, he was the first Premier of the Soviet Union.
  

• 1912 Harriet Quimby flies across the English Channel

  The U.S. aviator was the first woman who achieved this feat. She died at the age of 37 when her plane crashed in Massachusetts.
  

• 1986 The world's longest war ends without a single shot having been fired

  The state of war between the Netherlands and the Isles of Scilly had been extended for a total of 335 years by the lack of a peace treaty. Some historians doubt that war had ever been declared.
  

• 1978 Mir Akbar Khyber's assassination triggers a communist coup in Afghanistan

  The Communists introduced a series of reforms, such as equal rights for women and universal education. These achievements were undone soon after by the outbreak of several wars.
  

• 1975 Phnom Penh falls to the Khmer Rouge

  The regime under “Brother number 1” Pol Pot tortured and killed several million people. Amongst the communists' perceived enemies were intellectuals, anyone with a connection to the former government, and several ethnic minorities.
  

• 1961 A CIA-sponsored paramilitary group attempts to invade Cuba

  The Bay of Pigs invasion was a failed attempt to overthrow the Cuban government. The United States government had ordered the CIA to plan Fidel Castro's overthrow.
  

• 1521 Martin Luther faces charges for his revolutionary religious writings

  The German monk was a leading figure of the Protestant Reformation. As a result of the hearing before the Diet of Worms, he was excommunicated and declared an outlaw.
  

• 1956 Rainier III marries Grace Kelly

  The wedding celebrations for the Prince of Monaco and the glamorous U.S. actress were broadcast around the world and enthused the population of war-torn Europe.
  

• 1951 The European Coal and Steel Community, a precursor of the European Union, is established

  The Treaty of Paris was signed by France, West Germany, Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.
  

• 1949 Ireland becomes an independent republic

  Six counties in the northern part of the island remained in the Commonwealth, leading to a decades-long ethno-nationalist conflict that culminated in The Troubles.
  

• 1906 A massive earthquake destroys San Francisco

  About 3000 people died in the disaster. Over 80 percent of the city was destroyed by the quake and resulting fires.
  

• 1995 168 die in the Oklahoma City bombing

  Timothy McVeigh, the mastermind behind the attack, was executed on June 11, 2001. The motives for the bombing, which also killed 19 babies and children, remain somewhat unclear.
  

• 1987 The first installment of The Simpsons is aired

  The hugely popular animated sitcom debuted on the Tracey Ullman Show in the form of one-minute shorts.
  

• 1971 The Soviet Union launches the world's first manned space station

  Salyut 1 was 23 meters long and offered 100 cubic meters of pressurized space.
  

• 1919 Leslie Irvin makes the world's first free-fall parachute jump

  The jump was executed to test a new kind of parachute, which was also the first featuring a ripcord. The Hollywood stuntman broke a leg on landing.
  

• 2010 The Deepwater Horizon oil rig explodes

  The explosion of the British Petroleum (BP) platform operated by Transocean killed 11 workers and led to the largest accidental marine oil spill in history.
  

• 1978 Soviet air defense shoots down Korean Air Lines Flight 902

  The Boeing 707's crew had miscalculated their route, taking them into Soviet airspace at the height of the Cold War. The jet made an emergency landing on a frozen lake. Two passengers were killed in the incident.
  

• 1951 A human organ is surgically replaced for the first time

  Romanian surgeon Dan Gavriliu used a section of the stomach to bypass the esophagus.
  

• 1902 Pierre and Marie Curie discover the radioactive element radium

  In 1903, the French couple received the Nobel Prize in Physics for their pioneering research.
  

• 1992 The first exoplanets are discovered

  Polish astronomer Aleksander Wolszczan announced that he found two planets orbiting the pulsar PSR 1257+12.
  

• 1967 Dictator Georgios Papadopoulos assumes power in Greece

  During his six-year reign, thousands of political opponents were incarcerated and tortured.
  

• 1934 The Surgeon's photo, allegedly showing the Loch Ness Monster, is published in the Daily Mail

  In reality, the famous image depicts a toy submarine with a head and neck made of wood putty.
  

• 1918 The Red Baron is killed

  Manfred von Richthofen was a legendary German fighter pilot. He earned his renown and nickname by achieving 80 air combat victories in World War I. He was shot down and killed during combat at the age of 25.
  

• 1509 Henry VIII is crowned King of England

  In popular culture, the monarch is known mainly for his six marriages, two of which ended with the wife's execution.
  

• 1997 The Japanese embassy hostage crisis ends after 126 days

  The hero status of the Peruvian troops involved in the successful raid was later called into question when evidence of summary executions of captured insurgents emerged.
  

• 1992 A series of massive explosions destroys parts of Guadalajara

  The disaster in the downtown district of Analco occurred after gasoline had leaked into the sewer system. At least 206 people died, nearly 500 were injured, and about 15,000 were left homeless.
  

• 1977 Optical fiber is used for telephone transmissions for the first time

  Fiber-optic technology allows sending information over long distances by means of light pulses. It has played an important role in the development of modern-day global communications.
  

• 1945 Adolf Hitler admits defeat

  The German dictator announced in the underground Führerbunker that he plans to commit suicide after learning that Soviet forces had entered Berlin.
  

• 1906 The 1906 Olympic Games begin in Athens

  While the meet in practice was the second Olympic Games of the modern era, it is not recognized as such by the International Olympic Committee.
  

• 2005 The first YouTube video is posted

  The 18-second clip “Me at the zoo” shows co-founder Jawed Karim at San Diego Zoo. It has been viewed more than 13 million times (2014).
  

• 1988 Kanellos Kanellopoulos flies across the Aegean Sea in a human-powered aircraft

  The Greek Olympic cyclist flew a record-breaking 115 km (71 mi) from Crete to Santorini in the MIT Daedalus aircraft, which was named after the mythological inventor of aviation.
  

• 1985 Coca-Cola releases New Coke

  The new formula was so unpopular that the original Coke was re-introduced as Coca-Cola Classic soon afterward.
  

• 1984 The discovery of the virus causing AIDS is announced

  French virologists Luc Montagnier and Françoise Barré-Sinoussi were awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine for the discovery of the HIV virus.
  

• 1971 The Rolling Stones release Sticky Fingers

  The album is often considered one of the British rock band's best. It includes hits like “Brown Sugar” and ”Wild Horses”.
  

• 2013 1129 people die in Bangladesh in the worst building collapse disaster in modern history

  The building was used by clothing factories producing garments for western markets, highlighting the disastrous working conditions in the industry.
  

• 2005 Joseph Ratzinger is inaugurated as Pope Benedict XVI

  The German was considered a particularly conservative Pope - quite unlike his successor, Pope Francis.
  

• 1957 The Suez Canal reopens after the Suez Crisis

  The conflict between Egypt on the one hand and France, the United Kingdom and Israel on the other, erupted in October 1956 when Egypt announced that the canal will be nationalized.
  

• 1915 The Ottoman Empire begins its systematic extermination of Armenians

  An estimated 1 million people were killed in the Armenian Massacres during and after World War I. The event is considered one of the first genocides in modern history.
  

• 2011 The largest tornado outbreak ever recorded hits the U.S.

  348 people in six states were killed during the outbreak, which encompassed a total of 358 confirmed tornadoes.
  

• 1983 The German news magazine, Stern, announces discovery of Hitler's diaries

  The documents were later exposed as forgeries, triggering one of the most spectacular media scandals in history. Experts believe that Hitler never kept a diary.
  

• 1974 In Portugal, the fascist Estado Novo is overthrown in a bloodless coup

  The leftist Carnation Revolution was led by military officers and supported by widespread civil resistance.
  

• 1953 The double helix structure of DNA described for the first time

  Francis Crick and James D. Watson published their groundbreaking findings about the molecule containing genetic information was in Nature that day.
  

• 1859 Construction of the Suez Canal begins

  The waterway connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea became the shortest sea link between Europe and Asia.
  

• 2005 Syria ends its military occupation of Lebanon after 29 years

  Syria buckled to domestic and international pressure following the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri on February 14 of the same year.
  

• 1994 Germany makes Holocaust denial illegal

  The far-right party NPD had sought legitimation by Germany's Federal Constitutional Court for expressing the view that the Nazis' genocide of six million Jews never occurred. The court ruled against them.
  

• 1989 The deadliest tornado in history kills about 1300 people

  The Daulatpur–Saturia Tornado devastated everything in its 50-mile long path across central Bangladesh.
  

• 1986 The worst nuclear disaster in history occurs in Chernobyl

  Large parts of Europe were contaminated when reactor 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded. Although the number of deaths attributable to the disaster is difficult to determine, experts anticipate tens of thousands of deaths across Europe in the coming decades due to cancer caused by the radioactive fallout.
  

• 1925 Franz Kafka publishes his landmark novel The Trial

  The text, which was initially published as Der Process, is a nightmarish account of a man being arrested and prosecuted by a faceless authority for an unknown crime.
  

• 2005 The Airbus A380 takes to the skies for the first time

  The double-deck airliner is the world's largest commercial jet.
  

• 1994 South African citizens of all races are allowed to vote in a general election for the first time

  The 1994 general election was held precisely 44 years after Apartheid was formalized by the government with the passing of the Group Areas Act.
  

• 1992 For the first time in its 700-year history, the British House of Commons is presided over by a female Speaker

  Betty Boothroyd served as Speaker of the House of Commons from 1992 to 2000.
  

• 1810 Ludwig van Beethoven composes “Für Elise”

  “Bagatelle No. 25” for solo piano is one of the German composer's most popular works and one of the most recognized melodies in the history of music.
  

• 2004 The first Abu Ghraib torture pictures are published

  The images aired in a 60 Minutes II report showed gross human rights violations, including torture and murder, committed by U.S. soldiers and CIA personnel in the Baghdad prison.
  

• 2001 Dennis Tito becomes the first space tourist in history

  A Russian rocket transported the Californian billionaire to the International Space Station (ISS).
  

• 1994 Former CIA officer Aldrich Ames admits he forwarded U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union

  Ames was sentenced to life imprisonment for his activities which amounted to one of the most damaging spy cases in U.S. history.
  

• 1969 Charles de Gaulle resigns as President of France

  De Gaulle founded the French Fifth Republic in 1958 and became its first President a year later.
  

• 1947 Thor Heyerdahl begins his legendary journey on Kon-Tiki

  The Norwegian explorer and his crew set out on the 101-day journey on the self-built raft to prove that South Americans could have reached and settled Polynesia in pre-Columbian times.
  

• 1997 The Chemical Weapons Convention becomes effective

  The arms control treaty prohibits the production, storage, and use of chemical weapons. It has so far been ratified by some 190 countries.
  

• 1992 Deadly riots erupt in Los Angeles

  53 people died in the riots, which started after the acquittal of the 4 Los Angeles police officers accused of the brutal beating of Rodney King.
  

• 1975 Hubert van Es takes the famous picture of a helicopter airlift from a Saigon rooftop

  The image shows South Vietnamese civilians employed by the U.S. trying to escape Saigon on the day before the city's fall. It came to symbolize the American defeat in Vietnam.
  

• 1968 The musical Hair goes to Broadway

  As a portrait of the 1960s hippie counterculture and sexual revolution, it was highly controversial at the time. Some of the musical's songs became anthems of the peace movement during the Vietnam War.
  

• 1945 A day before committing suicide, Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun marry

  On the same day, U.S. troops liberated the Dachau concentration camp near Munich.
  

• 1993 CERN announces that World Wide Web protocols will remain free

  By offering the software required to operate a web server with an open license, the European organization ensured its dissemination, and the WWW flourished.
  

• 1993 Tennis ace Monica Seles is stabbed by an obsessed fan

  Although the stab wound proved to be relatively harmless, the psychological ramifications meant that Seles did not play any tournaments for over two years.
  

• 1975 The fall of Saigon marks the end of the Vietnam War

  As Communist forces gained control of Saigon, South Vietnamese President Duong Van Minh, who had only been in office for 2 days, surrendered unconditionally.
  

• 1916 Germany and its World War I allies become the first countries to use daylight saving time (DST)

  The rationale was to save energy to aid the war effort. Other European countries, such as the United Kingdom, first introduced DST later that year.
  

• 1789 George Washington becomes the first U.S. President

  Washington took the oath of office on the balcony of Federal Hall in New York City. In the United States, he is venerated as one of the country's founding fathers.
  

• 1978 Naomi Uemura becomes of the first person to reach the North Pole alone

  The Japanese adventurer is also credited with the first solo ascent of Mount McKinley and the first solo rafting of the Amazon river. He disappeared in 1984 during a winter ascent of Mount McKinley.
  

• 1961 Fidel Castro declares Cuba a socialist nation and bans elections

  A month after Cuban troops had fought off a U.S. backed military invasion at the Bay of Pigs, Castro announces that “The revolution has no time for elections.”
  

• 1945 Adolf Hitler's death is announced on German radio

  As the Soviet flag is raised over the Reich Chancellery, the German people are informed that “our leader, Adolf Hitler, has fallen for Germany, fighting to his last breath against Bolshevism.”
  

• 1925 The world's largest trade union is founded

  The All-China Federation of Trade Unions has a total of 134 million members.
  

• 1840 The world's first adhesive postage stamp is issued in the United Kingdom

  The Penny Black shows a portrait of Queen Victoria. Despite its historical significance, the stamp can be bought for around £25 as over 68 million copied were distributed.
  

• 2011 Osama bin Laden is killed by a U.S. commando

  Bin Laden was the founder of al-Qaeda, a militant group that claimed responsibility for a series of terrorist attacks on U.S. targets on September 11, 2001.
  

• 1997 Tony Blair becomes British Prime Minister, ending 18 years of Conservative Party reign

  Blair's Labor Party achieved a landslide victory in the general elections. Many of his early fans were bitterly disappointed when he supported the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.
  

• 1989 The Iron Curtain begins to crumble as Hungary dismantles its border fence

  By gradually opening its border to Austria, Hungary facilitated the escape of hundreds of East Germans in the months before the Berlin Wall fell.
  

• 1982 The British Royal Navy sinks the Argentinian cruiser General Belgrano

  323 lives were lost in the attack, more than half of the total number of Argentinian casualties during the Falklands War.. The British Sun tabloid newspaper commented the controversial attack with one of its most notorious headlines: “Gotcha”.
  

• 1952 The jet age begins with the first scheduled flight of the De Havilland Comet 1

  Precisely one year after the maiden flight from London to Johannesburg, a Comet 1 crashed due to structural problems, killing 43 people. A series of similar accidents soon led to the grounding of the entire Comet fleet.
  

What Happened On This Day – 3 May

• 1999 A tornado produces the highest wind speeds ever recorded

  The F5 tornado hitting parts of Oklahoma City caused the record wind speed of about 301 mph (484 km/h). 45 people were killed, 665 injured.
  

• 1979 Margaret Thatcher is elected British Prime Minister

  The conservative politician was the first female head of state in Europe. During her 11-year reign, her sweeping economic reforms polarized the British public and her toughness earning her the nickname The Iron Lady.
  

• 1978 The Digital Equipment Corporation sends the world's first spam email

  A representative sent out 600 emails and sold computers for $12 million. Unsolicited bulk emails have since become a scourge of the digital age as spammers attempt to achieve a similar success.
  

• 1958 Truman Capote's book Breakfast at Tiffany's is published

  The novella is one of the U.S. author's most popular works. he 1961 film of the same name starring Audrey Hepburn is classic in its genre.
  

• 1913 The first Indian full-length feature film is premiered

  The release of Raja Harishchandra marked the birth of the Indian film industry, the world's largest in terms of films produced and ticket sales.
  

What Happened On This Day – 4 May

• 1994 Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat sign a peace accord to ensure Palestinian self-rule in Gaza and Jericho

  Together with Shimon Peres, the two leaders received the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize. A year later, Rabin was assassinated by a Jewish extremist.
  

• 1959 The Grammy is presented for the first time

  It is one of the most prestigious awards in the music industry. Winners of the first edition included Ella Fitzgerald, Henry Mancini, and Frank Sinatra.
  

• 1953 Ernest Hemingway wins the Pulitzer Prize

  The American author was awarded the prestigious accolade for his novel The Old Man and the Sea. The story about a fisherman and his battle with a large marlin also earned him the Nobel Prize for Literature.
  

• 1904 The United States takes over the construction of the Panama Canal

  French engineers had begun digging a waterway between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans in 1881, but they had to abandon the project after about 22,000 lives had been lost to accidents and disease.
  

• 1675 King Charles II of England commissions the Royal Observatory in Greenwich

  The observatory was built on the prime meridian. The mean solar time at this location is the basis for Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).
  

• 1980 The British Special Air Service (SAS) terminate the Iranian Embassy siege in London

  Six gunmen had held 26 people hostage for six days, demanding the release of Iranian Arab prisoners. Two of the hostages were killed.
  

• 1955 West Germany regains full sovereignty after World War II

  The Federal Republic of Germany had been established in 1949. Its provisional capital was Bonn. After the 1990 reunification of East and West Germany, Berlin was declared the country's capital.
  

• 1949 The Council of Europe is founded

  The organization was the first to work for European integration. It has 47 member countries and is a completely separate entity from the European Union (EU).
  

• 1934 The first Three Stooges film is released

  The comedy trio soon became famous, especially in the U.S., for their short films featuring slapstick humor.
  

• 1904 Cy Young pitches the first perfect game in modern major league baseball

  A game is considered perfect when none of the opposing players reaches the first base. Young's team, the Boston Americans, won 3-0 over the Philadelphia Athletics
  

• 2000 Vladimir Putin becomes President of Russia

  The former KGB officer enjoys high approval ratings in his country as living standards in Russia have improved drastically under his rule. Internationally, he has been criticized for his authoritarian style of government.
  

• 1946 Sony is founded

  The company started as Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering. It is now one of the leading manufacturers of electronic products.
  

• 1945 Germany's Nazi regime surrenders unconditionally

  The capitulation ended World War II, one of the bloodiest conflicts of all time. According to estimates, between 40 and 71 million people died in the war and the Holocaust initiated by Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime.
  

• 1915 A German U-Boat sinks the RMS Lusitania

  1198 lives were lost in the attack, making it the deadliest shipwreck during World War I. The fact that some of the dead were U.S. citizens influenced the country's decision to enter the war in 1917.
  

• 1895 Alexander Popov demonstrates the world's first radio receiver

  The Russian physicist had initially built the device as a lightning detector. He achieved the first radio transmission between two buildings the following year.
  

• 1984 Moscow announces that the USSR will not take part in the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles

  Several other countries, such as Cuba, Afghanistan, Bulgaria, Ethiopia, Eastern Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Vietnam joined the boycott. 4 years earlier, the United States had not sent any athletes to the Summer Olympics in Moscow.
  

• 1978 Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler climb Mount Everest without oxygen supply

  Prior to the Italian and Austrian mountaineers' ascent, it was thought to be impossible to conquer the world's highest mountain without supplemental oxygen.
  

• 1970 The Beatles release the album Let It Be

  The recording was the last studio album ever released by the legendary English rock band.
  

• 1927 The White Bird and its crew mysteriously disappear

  French aviators, Charles Nungesser and François Coli, had taken off from Paris in their Levasseur PL.8 biplane in an attempt to make the first non-stop transatlantic flight. Their disappearance remains a mystery. Charles Lindbergh succeeded two weeks later.
  

• 1886 Coca-Cola is invented

  According to legend, Dr. John Styth Pemberton, an Atlanta pharmacist, produced the syrup in a brass pot in his backyard. It was first intended as a patent medicine. Today, Coca-Cola is one of the world's most popular soft drinks and one of the most recognized trademarks.
  

• 2012 The brand-new Sukhoi Superjet 100 plane crashes

  The regional jet was the first airliner produced in Russia since the end of the USSR in 1991. The doomed flight was a demonstration tour carrying potential customers. All 45 people on board perished in the crash, which was caused by pilot error.
  

• 1997 Pete Peterson becomes the first U.S. ambassador to visit Vietnam after the end of the war

  Peterson, a Vietnam veteran, devoted himself to promoting reconciliation between the two countries. About 2.5 million Vietnamese, most of them civilians, were killed during the war.
  

• 1979 Iranian Jewish businessman Habib Elghanian is executed

  An Islamic revolutionary tribunal had convicted him of “contacts with Israel and Zionism” and “friendship with the enemies of God”. His execution triggered a Jewish mass exodus from Iran.
  

• 1969 Carlos Lamarca begins his fight against Brazil's military dictatorship

  Lamarca was a member of the communist organization Vanguardia Popular Revolucionária (VPR) and is well known for his urban guerilla actions. Brazilian forces killed him in 1971.
  

• 1960 The first birth control pill is approved

  The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced that it would add birth control as a new indication for the drug “Enovid”.
  

• 1954 Bill Haley releases “Rock Around the Clock”

  It was the first rock song to top the Billboard charts and has become a classic of the early rock era.
  

• 1941 Adolf Hitler's deputy, Rudolf Hess, parachutes into Scotland to broker a peace agreement

  Hess was captured and interrogated. He was the last in a long line of prominent figures to be incarcerated in the Tower of London. Hitler characterized his peace mission four years before the end of World War II as treason.
  

• 1933 Nazis ceremonially burn about 25,000 allegedly “un-German” books

  The book burnings were part of the right-wing German Student Union's Action against the Un-German Spirit. Among the burnt books were works by Albert Einstein, Bertolt Brecht, Sigmund Freud, and Franz Kafka.
  

• 1869 In the United States, the first coast to coast railroad is completed

  The Central Pacific and Union Pacific railroad systems were joined at Promontory Summit in Utah, using a “Golden Spike”. This last spike is now housed in the Cantor Arts Museum at Stanford University.
  

• 1998 India executes a series of nuclear weapons tests

  The detonations raised fears of a nuclear conflict in the area and sparked international protests. On May 13, 1998, India officially declared itself a nuclear power.
  

• 1996 ValuJet flight 592 crashes into the Florida Everglades shortly after takeoff

  All 110 people on board lost their lives in the crash that was caused by a fire in the cargo compartment.
  

• 1985 56 football fans die in a stadium fire

  During a match against Lincoln City, the wooden stands at Valley Parade football ground went up in flames. The exits were locked. A burning cigarette thrown into a waste bin has been determined as the probable cause of the disaster.
  

• 1981 The musical Cats is premiered

  The piece sparked a musical craze around the world and catapulted the composer Andrew Lloyd Webber to stardom.
  

• 868 The earliest surviving dated printed book is produced in China

  The “Diamond Sutra” is one of the most important texts in Mahayana Buddhism. The British Library in London presently houses the copy.
  

• 2008 A massive earthquake rocks China

  The magnitude 7.9 quake left some 69,000 people dead, 18,000 missing, and 4.8 million homeless. It was the deadliest earthquake in China since 1976 when the Tangshan earthquake killed over 240,000 people.
  

• 1998 Violent clashes follow the killing of four protesters in Jakarta, Indonesia

  The riots eventually led to the resignation of President Suharto.
  

• 1994 The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict ends

  With the signing of the Bishkek Protocol a week earlier, Armenian and Azerbaijani diplomats had formalized the ceasefire that went into effect on May 12. The conflict itself remains unsolved.
  

• 1982 A Spanish priest attempts to assassinate Pope John Paul II

  Juan María Fernández y Krohn opposed the reforms initiated by the Second Vatican Council and believed that the Pope was a Communist agent. John Paul II escaped with minor injuries.
  

• 1941 The world's first programmable, fully automatic computer is presented

  The Z3 was designed by German inventor, Konrad Zuse. The original machine was destroyed in an air raid. A replica can be seen at the Deutsches Museum in Munich.
  

• 1989 Thousands of students begin a hunger strike on Tiananmen Square in Beijing

  The non-violent occupation of the square was part of anti-corruption and pro-democracy demonstrations. Some 3000 unarmed civilians were killed when the army cracked down on the protesters on June 3-4, 1989.
  

• 1981 Pope John Paul II survives an assassination attempt

  Turkish right-wing extremist Mehmet Ali Ağca fired two shots at John Paul II on St. Peter's Square. The Pope was seriously wounded but survived thanks to a 5-hour operation and went on to visit his attacker in prison.
  

• 1950 The first Formula One World Championship season kicks off

  Giuseppe Farina won the first FIA World Championship of Drivers for the Alfa Romeo team.
  

• 1940 Igor Sikorsky pilots his VS-300 helicopter's maiden flight

  The helicopter was the first successful model to use the single vertical tail rotor that most helicopters feature today.
  

• 1909 The Giro d'Italia cycle race is held for the first time

  The Giro is considered one of the world's most important cycle races. Luigi Ganna won the first edition, which went from Milan to Naples and back.
  

• 1973 Skylab blasts off into orbit

  The United States' first space station crashed back to Earth on July 11, 1979, four years ahead of schedule. In its six years of service, the laboratory was used for many biomedical and technological experiments.
  

• 1970 The Red Army Faction (RAF) begins operations

  The German left-wing activist group grew out of the peace and anti-imperialist movement of the 1960s. In reaction to the violent oppression by the German state, they later began operating as a terrorist cell and are responsible for several murders.
  

• 1955 The Warsaw Pact is established

  Eight communist bloc countries signed the mutual defense treaty, which played an important role during the Cold War as an antagonist of NATO.
  

• 1948 Israel becomes an independent state

  The announcement by Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, triggered a 10-month armed conflict known as the Arab-Israeli War of 1948. It started the day after the proclamation as troops of Egypt, Syria, Transjordan and Iraq invaded the young nation.
  

• 1796 The first smallpox vaccination is administered

  The British physician, Edward Jenner, successfully inoculated an 8-year-old smallpox patient using material from a cowpox lesion. The word “vaccine” is derived from the Latin word for cow (vacca).
  

• 1948 Egypt, Syria, Transjordan and Iraq invade Israel

  The First Arab-Israeli War was initiated by Israel's proclamation of independence on the day before the invasion. It lasted nearly 10 months and caused thousands of casualties on both sides.
  

• 1940 The first McDonald's fast food restaurant opens

  Maurice “Mac” and Richard “Dick” McDonald opened McDonald's Bar-B-Q in San Bernardino. Today, McDonald's is the world's largest fast food chain.
  

• 1930 The first airline stewardess goes on duty

  Ellen Church and her team served snacks on a United Airlines flight from Oakland to Chicago. The flight attendants were also responsible for refueling the aircraft, handling luggage, and checking tickets.
  

• 1928 The first Mickey Mouse film is screened

  The 6-minute film “Plane Crazy” directed by Walt Disney shows Mickey trying to fly an airplane in reference to Charles Lindbergh. Today, Mickey Mouse is one of the world's most recognized cartoon characters and the official mascot of the Walt Disney Company.
  

• 1718 The world's first machine gun is patented

  British lawyer, James Puckle, invented the 25.4 mm caliber “Puckle Gun” for the use on ships. It was designed for two bullet types: round bullets for Christians and (more damaging) square bullets for Turks.
  

• 1975 Junko Tabei becomes the first woman to conquer Mount Everest

  The ascent by the Japanese adventurer came 22 years after Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first to reach the summit.
  

• 1966 In China, the Cultural Revolution begins

  The publication of the May 16 notification marks the beginning of the political campaign, which was initiated by Mao Zedong and lasted ten years. Its objective was to strengthen communism by removing capitalist, traditional and cultural elements from Chinese society.
  

• 1960 Theodore Maiman fires the first functional laser

  The American physicist's invention, an advancement of earlier research by scientists in the U.S. and the Soviet Union, was patented in 1967.
  

• 1929 The Oscars are awarded for the first time

  The first Academy Awards were presented at a private dinner with about 270 attendees. Today, it is the world's most important entertainment awards ceremony.
  

• 1919 Albert Cushing Read takes off on the first transatlantic flight in history

  The crossing from New York State, USA to Lisbon, Portugal on a Curtiss NC-4 flying boat took 19 days.
  

• 1999 Ehud Barak becomes Prime Minister of Israel

  During his tenure, Barak attempted to revive the peace negotiations with the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). However, his efforts were unsuccessful.
  

• 1990 The WHO deletes homosexuality from its list of mental diseases

  Precisely 14 years later, the first same-sex marriages in the United States were performed as Massachusetts became the first state to legalize them.
  

• 1972 Germany ratifies the Treaty of Warsaw

  Chancellor Willy Brandt signed the treaty, by which Germany gives up any territorial claims and guarantees the Oder-Neisse line as the valid border to Poland.
  

• 1954 The U.S. Supreme Court declares racially segregated public schools unconstitutional

  Despite this landmark decision, de facto racial segregation was upheld for years in some areas of the United States.
  

• 1943 The Royal Air Force dambusters wreck three German dams

  The RAF squadron used revolutionary bouncing bombs to avoid the torpedo nets protecting the dams. The audacious air raid was depicted in a 1954 war film.
  

The south face of Lhotse as seen from the climb up to Chukhung Ri

• 2009 The Sri Lankan Civil War ends

  The 25-year conflict between the government and the separatist Tamil Tigers had claimed up to 100,000 lives. It ended with the Tigers' defeat.
  

• 1980 Mount St. Helens erupts

  The eruption killed 57 people. A large part of the previously cone-shaped volcano was replaced by a massive crater; its summit is now some 1300 feet (400 meters) lower than before the eruption.
  

• 1927 45 people die in the United States' worst school massacre

  In the Bath school disaster, a disgruntled school board member set off several bombs at the Bath Consolidated School and other locations in Michigan.
  

• 1848 The first German National Assembly gathers in Frankfurt

  The assembly constituted the first freely elected parliament of Germany. It produced a constitution that provided the basis for today's constitution of Germany (Grundgesetz).
  

• 1804 Napoleon Bonaparte is appointed Emperor of the French

  Even today, the French leader, a native of Corsica, is widely known for his successful military campaigns - and his final defeat at the Battle of Waterloo.
  

• 1963 Martin Luther King's Letter from Birmingham Jail is published

  King used the open letter to defend his nonviolent resistance against racism and segregation. It became one of the central texts for the civil rights movement in the United States.
  

• 1962 Marilyn Monroe performs her famous rendition of Happy Birthday

  Monroe gave her sultry performance, which was to be her last, at a party for U.S. President John F. Kennedy. The two are believed to have been engaged in an affair.
  

• 1959 The North Vietnamese Army begins organizing the Ho Chi Minh trail

  According to the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), the system of supply routes used by the “Vietcong” was “one of the greatest achievements of military engineering of the 20th century.”
  

• 1919 Mustafa Kemal Atatürk sets off the Turkish War of Independence

  The fight against the allies of the Triple Entente ended some four years later. The Republic of Turkey was founded, and Atatürk became its first President.
  

• 1743 Jean-Pierre Christin invents the Celsius thermometer

  The centigrade temperature scale, which is based on the freezing and boiling point of water, is used by most countries around the world. Exceptions include the United State, Belize, and Palau.
  

• 2006 The Three Gorges Dam is officially opened

  The hydroelectric dam is the world's largest power station in terms of installed capacity. Despite its benefits, the project remains controversial because it flooded archeological and cultural sites and displaced some 1.3 million people.
  

• 1983 In South Africa, a car bomb planted by anti-Apartheid activists kills 19

  The Church Street Bombing was carried out by the military wing of the African National Congress (ANC). It was one of the bloodiest chapters in the ANC’s long and difficult struggle against racial segregation and oppression in South Africa.
  

• 1940 The first prisoners arrive at Auschwitz concentration camp

  Auschwitz was the biggest extermination camp during World War II. From 1940 to 1945, the Nazi regime murdered at least 1.1 million people here.
  

• 1927 Charles Lindbergh takes off on the first solo non-stop transatlantic flight

  He departed from Long Island in the United States and arrived in Paris, France at 22:22 on the next day.
  

• 1873 Blue jeans are patented

  Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis invented the garment, which today represents one of the most popular types of trousers worldwide.
  

• 1991 Former Prime Minister of India, Rajiv Gandhi, is assassinated

  The attacker was a woman believed to be linked the Sri Lankan separatist militant organization, the Tamil Tigers. At least 14 people lost their lives in the suicide bombing.
  

• 1979 Violent clashes follow the lenient sentencing for Harvey Milk's murderer

  Milk, the first openly gay U.S. politician, had been shot and killed together with San Francisco Mayor George Moscone. The assassin, Dan White, was convicted of voluntary manslaughter only, triggering the White Night Riots.
  

• 1951 The 9th Street Show opens in New York

  The ground-breaking art exhibition showing works by artists like Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning is considered the birth hour of the artistic avant-garde referred to as the New York School.
  

• 1932 Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic

  The U.S. aviatress' disappearance on an attempted round-the-world flight five years later is one of the most discussed unsolved mysteries in the history of flight.
  

• 1904 FIFA, the world governing body of association football, is founded

  The Fédération Internationale de Football Association is responsible for the organization of the World Cup, which is one of the world's most viewed sporting events.
  

• 2012 The world's tallest tower is opened to the public

  At 643 meters (2080 feet), the Tokyo Skytree in Japan's capital city is also the second tallest structure in the world after Burj Khalifa in Dubai. Its prime purpose is relaying TV and radio signals.
  

• 2010 The worst air crash involving a Boeing 737 kills 158

  Air India Express Flight 812 overshot the runway on landing at Mangalore International Airport. It fell over a cliff and burst into flames. The 737 is the world's most widely flown aircraft.
  

• 1960 The most violent earthquake in recorded history hits Chile

  The Great Chilean Earthquake rated 9.5 on the moment magnitude scale. According to estimates, between 2230 and 6000 people were killed.
  

• 1906 The Wright brothers' flying machine is patented

  The American aviation pioneers are credited with having performed “the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight.” (Fédération Aéronautique Internationale)
  

What Happened On This Day – 23 May

• 1992 The Italian mafia murder Giovanni Falcone

  Falcone, a judge, was the mafia's most prominent adversary. After he, together with his wife and three bodyguards, fell victim to a car bomb, Falcone became a folk hero in Italy.
  

• 1969 The Who release Tommy

  The British rock band's fourth album is considered the first musical work of the rock opera genre.
  

• 1951 Delegates of the Dalai Lama sign the Seventeen Point Agreement

  The contract affirmed Chinese sovereignty over Tibet. According to Tibetan officials, the document was signed under duress and is, therefore, invalid.
  

• 1949 The Federal Republic of Germany is established

  The proclamation of the Grundgesetz, Germany's current constitution, marked the birth hour of the republic. The foundation of West Germany came four years after the demise of the Nazi regime and the end of World War II.
  

• 1844 Siyyid `Alí Muḥammad Shírází founds Bábism

  The Báb, as he called himself, created the religion which was a forerunner of the Bahá'í Faith. His teachings were seen as a threat by the Islamic clergy, and his followers were brutally persecuted by the Persian government.
  

• 2001 23 die in the Jerusalem wedding hall disaster

  Hundreds of wedding guests fell two stories deep when a portion of the third floor collapsed. The tragedy was Israel's worst civil disaster.
  

• 1970 Engineers begin drilling the world's deepest hole

  The Kola Superdeep Borehole had reached the unsurpassed depth of 12,262 meters (40,230 feett) before the project was abandoned due to lack of funding.
  

• 1956 The first Eurovision Song Contest is held

  Lys Assia won the first edition for Switzerland. The ESC is a major song contest in Europe and one of the world's longest-running TV programs. It is held in a different country each year.
  

• 1930 Amy Johnson flies solo from England to Australia

  The English aviatrix was the first woman to achieve this feat. Her 18,000 km (11,000 mi) flight aboard a de Havilland Gypsy Moth aircraft took her from Croydon, U.K. to Darwin, Australia in 19 days.
  

What Happened On This Day – 25 May

• 2002 A China Airlines jumbo jet breaks apart in mid-air

  The Boeing 747 aircraft crashed into the Taiwan Strait, leaving no survivors among the 225 people on board. The accident was caused by improper repairs 22 years earlier, and the airplane was far beyond the serviceable life recommended by Boeing in terms of the number of flights, total hours in the air, and the number of years in service.
  

• 1979 American Airlines flight 191 crashes shortly after takeoff

  The photo showing the lopsided DC-10 hurtling towards the ground at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago is one of the most horrifying images in aviation history. All 258 people on board died.
  

• 1979 Etan Patz disappears

  The disappearance and murder of the 6-year-old boy from New York City and the extensive publicity it received helped spark the missing children's movement.
  

• 1977 The first Star Wars film is released

  George Lucas' epic space opera encompassing seven films is one of the most popular works in movie history.
  

• 1963 32 African countries form a coalition against white rule

  The Organisation of African Unity was founded to promote decolonization and end white minority governments in Africa. The OAU was replaced by the African Union in 2002.
  

• 1972 The Soviet Union and the United States sign the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty

  The ABM Treaty regulated the establishment of anti-ballistic missile shields against nuclear missiles. It was one of the most important treaties between the two superpowers during the Cold War.
  

• 1970 The Tupolev Tu-144 becomes the first commercial transport to exceed Mach 2

  The Russian plane, sometimes nicknamed Concordski, first took to the skies in 1968, two months before the Concorde.
  

• 1923 The 24 Hours of Le Mans is held for the first time

  Only three competitors completed the race in 1923. The winners were André Lagarde and Albert Leonard of France, who covered 2210 kilometers in 24 hours.
  

• 1908 Engineers make the first major oil find in the Middle East

  The discovery in Masjed Soleyman in Iran had a major impact on the country's and the world region's economy and politics. More than half of the world's oil reserves are located in the Middle East.
  

• 1896 The Dow Jones Industrial Average is first published

  The Dow Jones is one of the world's most important stock market indices. Today it comprises data from 30 major U.S. companies.
  

What Happened On This Day – 27 May

• 2006 A massive earthquake devastates parts of Java, Indonesia

  With 5 million people living within 50 km of the quake's epicenter, about 6000 died, and 1.5 million were left homeless.
  

• 1942 Czech resistance fighters kill Reinhard Heydrich

  The high-ranking German Nazi official was one of the main architects of the Holocaust. In retaliation, the Nazis murdered all male inhabitants over 15 years of age in the Czech village of Lidice and deported most of the remaining people to concentration camps.
  

• 1937 The Golden Gate Bridge is opened

  The suspension bridge connecting San Francisco peninsula with Marin County is one of the most recognized works of United States architecture.
  

• 1933 Walt Disney's cartoon Three Little Pigs is released

  The animated short film is one of the best-known cartoons of all time. In 1934, it was awarded the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.
  

• 1851 The world's first chess tournament is held in London

  Adolf Anderssen, a maths teacher from Wrocław, won the tournament, which was held parallel to the 1851 Great Exhibition.
  

• 1998 Pakistan detonates five atom bombs

  The nuclear tests came as a response to India's tests just days earlier. Fearing a devastating conflict between the two nuclear powers, a number of countries, including the U.S. and Japan, imposed economic sanctions.
  

• 1987 Mathias Rust lands on the Red Square in Moscow

  The 19-year old West German amateur pilot illegally landed his Cessna in the heart of the Russian capital at the height of the Cold War.
  

• 1961 Amnesty International is founded

  The publication of Peter Benenson's article “The forgotten prisoners” is commonly considered the organization's birth hour. Amnesty International is one of the world's most influential human rights organizations.
  

• 1937 Volkswagen (VW) is founded

  The automobile manufacturer whose name means “People's Car” in German is one of the world's biggest. It produced classics like the VW Golf and the VW Beetle.
  

• 1936 Alan Turing submits On Computable Numbers for publication

  In this landmark paper, the British computer pioneer described the Turing Machine and defined the inherent limits of computation.
  

What Happened On This Day – 29 May

• 1999 Olusegun Obasanjo wins Nigeria's first free elections in 16 years

  The former Nigerian Army general and military ruler oversaw a democratization process that defines the country's political system to the present day.
  

• 1996 Benjamin Netanyahu becomes Israel's prime minister

  The conservative politician is criticized for hampering the peace process that former prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, had promoted.
  

• 1953 Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay conquer Mount Everest

  The first successful ascent of the world's highest mountain came after Tom Bourdillon and Charles Evans had come within 100 meters of the summit just three days previously.
  

• 1942 Bing Crosby records White Christmas

  Crosby's rendition of Irving Berlin's song became the most successful of his career and the best-selling Christmas single in history.
  

• 1913 Igor Stravinsky's ballet Le Sacre du printemps is premiered

  he performance sparked a riot in the audience as many felt its irregular beat and the percussive character was a sacrilege against music. Today, it is considered one of the key works of 20th-century art music.
  

• 2011 Germany abandons nuclear energy

  The government's decision followed the nuclear meltdown at Japan's Fukushima power plant and years of hands-on protests and activism by Germany powerful anti-nuclear movement.
  

• 1967 The Republic of Biafra is proclaimed

  The short-lived state consisted of Nigeria's Eastern Region. Its secession sparked the Nigerian Civil War, which lasted until 1970 and resulted in the region's re-integration into Nigeria.
  

• 1962 Benjamin Britten's War Requiem is premiered

  The work was performed for the consecration of the new Coventry Cathedral, which had been destroyed in World War II. It juxtaposes the traditional Latin Mass for the Dead with war poems by Wilfred Owen.
  

• 1961 The Dominican dictator, Rafael Trujillo, is assassinated

  El Jefe had been the Dominican Republic's President for 31 years. Despite the assassination, the intended removal of the dictatorship in the Caribbean country failed as the ruler's son, Ramfis Trujillo, soon stepped into his father's shoes.
  

• 1911 The first Indianapolis 500 is held

  Ray Harroun won the first running of the 500-mile automobile race, which is today one of the world's most prestigious sporting events.
  

• 2013 The widest tornado ever recorded hits El Reno, Oklahoma

  The storm had a width of 4.2 km (2.6 mi). Nine people were killed as it swept over rural areas of Central Oklahoma.
  

• 2005 Deep Throat reveals himself

  Former FBI agent Mark Felt admitted that he was the most important informant in the 1970's Watergate scandal which uncovered the dirty tricks of the Nixon administration, ultimately leading to Nixon's resignation.
  

• 1961 South Africa becomes an independent republic

  Following international criticism of the country's Apartheid regime, it had to leave the Commonwealth of Nations. The system of racial segregation was gradually abolished in the early 1990s.
  

• 1879 Werner von Siemens presents the world's first electric locomotive

  Von Siemens' landmark invention was soon used in trams. 1881 saw the introduction of the world's first electric tram in Berlin, Germany.
  

• 1859 The Great Clock housing Big Ben starts keeping time

  The clock at the top of Elizabeth Tower at the north end of the British Houses of Parliament is one of the world's best-known timekeepers.
  

• 2009 Air France flight 447 crashes into the Atlantic

  All 228 people on board died in the crash. It took two years to find and recover the wreckage from the ocean floor.
  

• 1979 Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) ends 90 years of white rule

  In 1980, the Republic of Zimbabwe achieved sovereignty from the United Kingdom.
  

• 1974 The Heimlich maneuver is published

  Henry Heimlich is credited with developing the technique using abdominal thrusts to stop choking.
  

• 1945 The first group of Berlin women start clearing the rubble of World War II

  In Germany, the Trümmerfrauen are a well-known symbol for a new beginning after the total desolation in the aftermath of the war, and for the Wirtschaftswunder, the rapid reconstruction of Germany's economy through hard labor.
  

• 1831 The British explorer James Clark Ross discovers the North Magnetic Pole

  It is the location where the Earth's magnetic field points directly downwards. It lies in the vicinity of the Geographic North Pole.
  

What Happened On This Day – 2 June

• 1979 Pope John Paul II becomes the first pontiff to visit a communist country

  Millions of spectators lined the streets of Warsaw as the Pope began his nine-day tour of his native Poland.
  

• 1967 Benno Ohnesorg is killed

  A police officer shot the unarmed German student at a demonstration against the state visit of the controversial Shah of Iran. It later ruled that the shooting was not an act of self-defense. The event was pivotal for the foundation of the terrorist organization “Movement 2 June”.
  

• 1953 Queen Elizabeth II is crowned

  The coronation in London's Westminster Abbey was the first televised major international event in history. Elizabeth's accession to the throne followed the death of her father, King George VI, 16 months previously.
  

• 1946 Italy becomes a parliamentary republic

  The transition from a monarchy to today's Italian Republic was effected by the favorable outcome of a referendum, in which 89 percent of Italians, also including women for the first time, took part.
  

• 1847 Felix Mendelssohn's Wedding March is used at a wedding for the first time

  Dorothy Carew and Tom Daniel were the first to use the iconic piece for their wedding ceremony. The event that made the work world famous was the wedding of Victoria, Princess Royal and Prince Frederick William of Prussia in 1858.
  

• 2013 The trial against whistleblower Bradley Manning begins

  The American soldier, a trans woman now called Chelsea Manning, was responsible for leaking classified videos documenting U.S. war atrocities during the Iraq War. She was sentenced to 35 years confinement.
  

• 1998 101 people die in the Eschede train disaster

  Traveling at 200 km/h (120 mph), a high-speed ICE train derailed and crashed into a bridge. The accident was caused by a fatigue crack in one of the train's wheels. It was the deadliest high-speed train disaster in history.
  

• 1982 The Israeli ambassador to the U.K. is shot

  Shlomo Argov survived the assassination attempt by a Palestinian terrorist group, but he was permanently paralyzed. The event triggered the 1982 Lebanon War.
  

• 1973 The world's first supersonic airliner crashes

  The Soviet Tupolev Tu-144, sometimes referred to as Concordski, disintegrated in mid-air during the 1973 Paris Air Show. 14 people died.
  

• 1492 Martin Behaim presents the world's first globe

  The German geographer called his terrestrial globe Erdapfel, or Earth Apple. It is kept in a darkened room at the Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremberg, Germany.
  

• 1989 Thousands die in the Tiananmen Square Massacre

  Using assault rifles and tanks, Chinese troops massacred unarmed civilians who had taken part in pro-democracy protests.
  

• 1989 Poland holds the first free elections after World War II

  The landslide victory of the Polish trade union, “Solidarity”, marked the beginning of the Autumn of Nations, a wave of revolutions resulting in the fall of communism.
  

• 1984 Bruce Springsteen releases Born in the U.S.A.

  The album was Springsteen's most successful. It featured hits like “Born in the U.S.A.”, “Dancing in the Dark”, and “I'm on Fire”.
  

• 1917 The first Pulitzer Prize is awarded

  Every year, the prestigious award honors outstanding journalistic achievements. It was established with money bequeathed to Columbia University by publisher Joseph Pulitzer.
  

• 1783 The Montgolfier brothers demonstrate the first hot air balloon

  The flight of the Montgolfière lasted only about 10 minutes, but it secured the French inventors a place in the history books.