• 1508 - Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, is defeated in Friulia by Venetian forces; he's forced to sign a three-year truce and cede several territories to Venice.
• 1513 - Italian Wars: Battle of Novara. Swiss troops defeat the French under Louis de la Tremoille, forcing the French to abandon Milan. Duke Massimiliano Sforza is restored.
• 1523 - Gustav Vasa is elected King of Sweden, marking the end of the Kalmar Union.
• 1644 - the Qing Dynasty Manchu forces led by the Shunzhi Emperor capture Beijing during the collapse of the Ming Dynasty. The Manchus would rule China until 1912 when the Republic of China was established.
• 1654 - Charles X succeeds his abdicated cousin Queen Christina to the Swedish throne.
• 1683 - The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, England, opens as the world's first university museum.
• 1752 - A devastating fire destroys one-third of Moscow, including 18,000 homes.
• 1808 - Napoleon's brother, Joseph Bonaparte is crowned King of Spain.
• 1809 - Sweden promulgates a new Constitution, which restores political power to the Riksdag of the Estates after 20 years of Enlightened absolutism.
• 1813 - War of 1812: Battle of Stoney Creek - A British force of 700 under John Vincent defeat an American force three times its size under William Winder and John Chandler.
• 1832 - The barricades fall and the Paris student uprisings of 1832 end.
• 1833 - U.S. President Andrew Jackson becomes the first President to ride a train.
• 1844 - The Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) is founded in London.
• 1857 - Sophia of Nassau marries the future King Oscar II of Sweden-Norway.
• 1859 - Australia: Queensland is established as a separate colony from New South Wales (Queensland Day).
• 1862 - American Civil War: Battle of Memphis - Union forces capture Memphis, Tennessee, from the Confederates.
• 1882 - More than 100,000 inhabitants of Bombay are killed as a cyclone in the Arabian Sea pushes huge waves into the harbour.
• 1882 - The Shewan forces of Menelik defeat the Gojjame army in the Battle of Embabo. The Shewans capture Negus Tekle Haymanot of Gojjam, and their victory leads to a Shewan hegemony over the territories south of the Abay River.
• 1889 - The Great Seattle Fire destroys the entirety of downtown Seattle, Washington.
• 1894 - Governor Davis H. Waite orders the Colorado state militia to protect and support the miners engaged in the Cripple Creek miners' strike.
• 1906 - Paris Métro Line 5 is inaugurated with a first section from Place d'Italie to the Gare d'Orléans (today known as Gare d'Austerlitz).
• 1912 - Eruption of Novarupta in Alaska begins. Second largest volcanic eruption in historic time.
• 1918 - Battle of Belleau Wood begins.
• 1921 - Southwark Bridge in London, is opened for traffic by King George V and Queen Mary.
• 1925 - The Chrysler Corporation is founded by Walter Percy Chrysler.
• 1932 - The Revenue Act of 1932 is enacted, creating the first gas tax in the United States, at a rate of 1 cent per US gallon (1/4 ¢/L) sold.
• 1933 - The first drive-in theater opens, in Camden, New Jersey, United States.
• 1934 - New Deal: U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Securities Act of 1933 into law, establishing the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and Judge Joseph Crater was declared dead in absentia.
• 1939 - German dictator Adolf Hitler gives a public address to returning German volunteers who fought as Legion Kondor during the Spanish Civil War.
• 1944 - World War II: Battle of Normandy begins. D-Day, code named Operation Overlord, commences with the landing of 155,000 Allied troops on the beaches of Normandy in France. The allied soldiers quickly break through the Atlantic Wall and push inland in the largest amphibious military operation in history.
• 1944 - Alaska Airlines commenced operations.
• 1946 - The Basketball Association of America is formed in New York City.
• 1946 - Soviet Union established diplomatic relations with Argentina.
• 1950 - Turkey: The Adhan in Arabic is legalized.
• 1956 - David Marshall, Singapore's first Chief Minister, resigns.
• 1964 - Under a temporary order, the rocket launches at Cuxhaven, Germany, are terminated, though they never resume.
• 1966 - James Meredith, civil rights activist, is shot while trying to march across Mississippi.
• 1968- Don Drysdale, Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher throws record 58th consecutive inning shutout, a major league record.
• 1969 - The first Internet connection was created when network control protocol packets were sent from the data port of one IMP to another.
• 1971 - Soyuz program: Soyuz 11 launches.
• 1971 - A midair collision between a Hughes Airwest Douglas DC-9 jetliner and a U.S. Marine Corps McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II jet fighter near Duarte, California claims 50 lives.
• 1974 - A new Instrument of Government is promulgated making Sweden a parliamentary monarchy.
• 1981 - A passenger train travelling between Mansi and Saharsa, India, jumps the tracks at a bridge crossing the Bagmati river. The government places the official death toll at 268 plus another 300 missing; however, it's generally believed that the actual figure is closer to 1,000 killed.
• 1982 - 1982 Lebanon War begins: Forces under Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon invade southern Lebanon in their "Operation Peace for the Galilee," eventually reaching as far north as the capital Beirut.
• 1984 - The Indian Army attacks the Golden Temple in Amritsar in an effort to flush out terrorists, following an order from Indira Gandhi. Official casualties are 576 combatants killed and 335 wounded; independent observers estimate that thousands of unarmed Sikh civilians are also killed in the crossfire. A total death count adds up to almost 2000.
• 1985 - The grave of "Wolfgang Gerhard" is exhumed in Embu, Brazil; the remains found are later proven to be those of Josef Mengele, Auschwitz's "Angel of Death". Mengele is thought to have drowned while swimming in February 1979.
• 1990 - U.S. District court judge Jose Gonzales rules that the rap album As Nasty As They Wanna Be by the 2 Live Crew violates Florida's obscenity law; he declares that the predominant subject matter of the record is "directed to the 'dirty' thoughts and the loins, not to the intellect and the mind."
• 1993 - Mongolia holds its first direct presidential elections.
• 1999 - In Australian Rules Football, Tony Lockett breaks the record for career goals, previously 1299 by Gordon Coventry and which had stood since 1937.
• 1999 - At the Putim maximum security prison in Brazil, 345 prisoners run from the main gate in the largest jailbreak in Brazilian history, marking the 10th escape for the three-year-old facility. In the ensuing manhunt, two fugitives are killed and five innocent bystanders are accidentally jailed.
• 2002 - Eastern Mediterranean Event. A near-Earth asteroid estimated at 10 metres diameter explodes over the Mediterranean Sea between Greece and Libya. The resulting explosion is estimated to have a force of 26 kilotons, slightly more powerful than the Nagasaki atomic bomb.
• 2004 - Tamil was established as a Classical language by the President of India, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam in a joint sitting of the two houses of the Indian Parliament.
• 2005 - the United States Supreme Court votes to ban medical marijuana in Gonzales v. Raich.

Births