EVENTS
- 951 – The City of Paris is founded.
- 1497 – Vasco da Gama sets sail on the first direct European voyage to India.
Vasco da Gama - 1776 – The first public reading of the Declaration of Independence occurred as Colonel John Nixon read it to an assembled crowd in Philadelphia.
- 1777 – Vermont abolishes slavery. Vermont adopted its constitution that abolished slavery, becoming the first region in the now United States to abolish slavery. The constitution was adopted after Vermont declared independence from the British empire.
- 1889 – The first issue of the ‘Wall Street Journal’ is published.
- 1943 – During the Nazi occupation of France, Resistance leader Jean Moulin died following his arrest and subsequent torture by the Gestapo. He had been sent by the Allies into France in 1942 to unite the fledgling Underground movement. In June of 1943, he was arrested in Lyon, tortured for eleven days but betrayed no one. He died aboard a train while being transferred to a concentration camp.
- 1969 – U.S. troop withdrawal begins in Vietnam during the Vietnam War.
- 1994 – Kim Jong-il takes office as the Supreme Leader of North Korea. Popularly known as “Dear Leader” in his country, Kim Jong-il took North Korea’s highest office after the death of his father, Kim Il-sung. He ruled the country with an iron fist until his death in 2011, when his son, Kim Jong-un took his place. Kim Jong-il’s tenure was marred by widespread human rights violations and severe famine in the country.
- 2011 – Space Shuttle Atlantis is launched for the last time. It was also the last flight of NASA’s 30-year long and successful Space Shuttle program. STS-135, as this final mission was called, was the program’s 135th flight.
BIRTHDAYS
- 1836 – Joseph Chamberlain (British politician)
- 1838 – Ferdinand von Zeppelin (German general, businessman)
- 1839 – John D. Rockefeller (Businessman)
- 1857 – Alfred Binet (French psychologist)
- 1907 – George W. Romney (American businessman, politician)
- 1908 – Nelson Rockefeller (1908-1979) was born in Bar Harbor, Maine
- 1949 – Wolfgang Puck (Chef)
Wolfgang Puck - 1958 – Kevin Bacon (Actor)
- 1961 – Toby Keith (Country singer)
- 1948 – Raffi (Children’s music singer)
- 1982 – Sophia Bush (Actress)
- 1998 – Jaden Smith (Actor and rapper)
DEATHS
- 1695 – Christiaan Huygens (Dutch mathematician, astronomer, physicist)
- 1822 – Percy Bysshe Shelley (English poet)
- 1967 – Vivien Leigh (English actress)
Vivien Leigh - 1973 – Wilfred Rhodes (English cricketer)
- 2011 – Betty Ford (American wife of Gerald R. Ford, 40th First Lady of the United States)
