… in 79, Mount Vesuvius erupted, burying Pompeii, Herculaneum and Stabiae in volcanic ash
… in 1215, Pope Innocent III declared the Magna Carta invalid
… The Gutenberg Bible is completed in 1456
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… in 1682, William Penn receives the area now known as Delaware, and adds it to the colony of Pennsylvania
… in 1814, British troops invade Washington, D.C. and burn down the White House
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… The Treaty of St. Louis was signed in 1816 in St. Louis, MO
… in 1831, Charles Darwin is asked to travel on the HMS Beagle
… Thomas Edison patented the motion picture camera in 1891
… Concrete is poured for the Panama Canal in 1909
… in 1912, Alaska becomes a U.S. territory
… Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly across the U.S. non-stop from L.A. to Newark, NJ in 1932
… in 1967, Abbie Hoffman and the Youth International Party disrupted trading at the New York Stock Exchange by throwing dollar bills from the viewing gallery
… John Lennon’s murderer, Mark David Chapman, is sentenced to 20 years to life in prison in 1981
… in 1989, Pete Rose is banned from baseball for gambling
… Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as head of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1991
… Ukraine became independent from the Soviet Union in 1991
… The Category 5 Hurricane Andrew hit South Florida in 1992
… Windows 95 is released by Microsoft in 1995
… Pluto is renamed a Dwarf Planet by the International Astronomical Union in 2006
… American Mafioso Carlo Gambino was born in 1902 … Nobel Peace Prize winner and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was born in 1929 … pro wrestling promoter and WWE CEO Vince McMahon was born in 1945 … actress Anne Archer was born in 1947 … politician Mike Huckabee was born in 1955 … actor Steve Guttenberg was born in 1958 … baseball player Cal Ripken Jr. was born in 1960 … TV host Craig Kilborn was born in 1962 … actor David Koechner was born in 1962 … actress Marlee Matlin was born in 1965 … comedian Dave Chappelle was born in 1973 … actor Rupert Grint was born in 1988 …
… Pliny the Elder, a Roman writer, died in 79 …
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