• 68 - Roman Emperor Nero commits suicide, imploring his secretary Epaphroditos to slit his throat to evade a Senate-imposed death by flogging.
• 721 - Odo of Aquitaine defeats the Moors in the Battle of Toulouse.
• 1310 - Duccio's Maestà Altarpiece, a seminal artwork of the early Italian Renaissance, is unveiled and installed in the Siena Cathedral in Siena, Italy.
• 1534 - Jacques Cartier is the first European to discover the St. Lawrence River.
• 1650 - The Harvard Corporation, the more powerful of the two administrative boards of Harvard, is established. It was the first legal corporation in the Americas.
• 1667 - The Raid on the Medway by the Dutch fleet starts lasting for five days and resulting in a decisive victory of the Dutch over the English in the Second Anglo-Dutch War and a favourable peace for the Dutch.
• 1732 - James Oglethorpe is granted a royal charter for the colony of Georgia.
• 1772 - British vessel Gaspee is burned off of Rhode Island.
• 1790 - Philadelphia Spelling Book by John Barry becomes the first book to be copyrighted in the United States.
• 1815 - End of the Congress of Vienna: new European political situation is set.
• 1856 - 500 Mormons leave Iowa City, Iowa and head west for Salt Lake City, Utah carrying all their possessions in two-wheeled handcarts.
• 1863 - American Civil War: Battle of Brandy Station, Virginia.
• 1909 - Alice Huyler Ramsey, a 22-year-old housewife and mother from Hackensack, New Jersey, became the first woman to drive across the United States. With three female companions, none of whom could drive a car, for fifty-nine days she drove a Maxwell automobile the 3,800 miles from Manhattan, New York, to San Francisco, California.
• 1915 - U.S. Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan resigns over a disagreement regarding the United States' handling of the RMS Lusitania sinking.
• 1922 - First ringing of the Harkness Memorial Chime at Yale University.
• 1923 - Bulgaria's military takes over the government in a coup.
• 1928 - Charles Kingsford Smith completes the first trans-Pacific flight in a Fokker Trimotor monoplane, the Southern Cross.
• 1930 - Chicago Tribune reporter Jake Lingle is killed at the Illinois Central train station during rush hour by the Leo Vincent Brothers, allegedly over a 100,000 USD gambling debt owed to Al Capone.
• 1934 - Donald Duck debuts in The Wise Little Hen.
• 1935 - Ho-Umezu Agreement: the Republic of China, under KMT administration, recognized Japanese occupations in Northeast China.
• 1944 - World War II: The Soviet Union invades East Karelia and the previously Finnish part of Karelia, since 1941 occupied by Finland.
• 1946 - King Bhumibol Adulyadej ascends to the throne of Thailand. He is currently the world's longest reigning monarch.
• 1953 - Flint-Worcester tornado outbreak sequence: A tornado spawned from the same storm system as the Flint tornado hits in Worcester, Massachusetts killing 94.
• 1954 - McCarthyism: Joseph Welch, special counsel for the United States Army, lashes out at Senator Joseph McCarthy during hearings on whether Communism has infiltrated the Army.
• 1957 - First ascent of Broad Peak (12th highest mountain).
• 1958 - London Gatwick Airport, (LGW), Crawley, West Sussex, UK officially opened by HM Queen Elizabeth II.
• 1959 - The USS George Washington is launched as the first submarine to carry ballistic missiles.
• 1967 - Israel captures the Golan Heights from Syria during the Six-Day War.
• 1968 - President Lyndon B. Johnson declares a national day of mourning following the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy.
• 1973 - Secretariat wins the Triple Crown.
• 1974 - The diplomatic relations between Portugal and the Soviet Union were established.
• 1978 - The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints opens the priesthood to "all worthy men", ending a 148-year-old policy excluding black men.
• 1985 - Thomas Sutherland is kidnapped in Lebanon (he wasn't released until 1991).
• 1986 - The Rogers Commission releases its report on the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.
• 1991 - The congress of the Italian party Proletarian Democracy decides to merge with the Communist Refoundation Party.
• 1999 - Kosovo War: Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and North Atlantic Treaty Organization sign a peace treaty.

Births