1415: Henry the Navigator, the prince of Portugal, embarked on an expedition to Africa.
1777: The Marquis de Lafayette arrived in the American colonies to help with their rebellion against the British.
1789: Ice cream was served to General George Washington by Mrs. Alexander Hamilton.
1825: Walter Hunt patented the safety pin. Hunt then then sold the rights for $400.
1866: The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was passed by the U.S. Congress. It was ratified on July 9, 1868. The amendment was designed to grant citizenship to and protect the civil liberties of recently freed slaves. It did this by prohibiting states from denying or abridging the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, depriving any person of his life, liberty, or property without due process of law, or denying to any person within their jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
1886: King Ludwig II of Bavaria drowned in Lake Starnberg.
1888: The U.S. Congress created the Department of Labor.
1898: The Canadian Yukon Territory was organized.
1900: China's Boxer Rebellion against foreigners and Chinese Christians erupted into violence.
1912: Captain Albert Berry made the first successful parachute jump from an airplane in Jefferson, Mississippi.
1913: Ralph Edwards, the host of "This is Your Life" and "Truth or Consequences" was born. Ronald Reagan was the only person to ever substitute for him.
1920: The U.S. Post Office Department ruled that children may not be sent by parcel post.
1922: Charlie Osborne started the longest attack on hiccups. He hiccuped over 435 million times before stopping. He died in 1991, 11 months after his hiccups ended.
1923: The French set a trade barrier between the occupied Ruhr and the rest of Germany.
1927: Charles Lindbergh was honored with a ticker-tape parade in New York City.
1927: For the first time an American Flag was displayed from the right hand of the Statue of Liberty.
1940: Paris was evacuated before the German advance on the city.
1943: German spies landed on Long Island, New York. They were soon captured.
1944: Germany launched 10 of its new V1 rockets against Britain from a position near the Channel coast. Of the 10 rockets only 5 landed in Britain and only one managed to kill (6 people in London).
1944: Marvin Camras patented the wire recorder.
1949: Bao Dai entered Saigon to rule Vietnam. He had been installed by the French.
1951: U.N. troops seized Pyongyang, North Korea.
1966: The landmark "Miranda vs. Arizona" decision was issued by the U.S. Supreme Court. The decision ruled that criminal suspects had to be informed of their constitutional rights before being questioned by police.
1967: Solicitor General Thurgood Marshall was nominated by President Lyndon B. Johnson to become the first black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
1971: The New York Times began publishing the "Pentagon Papers". The articles were a secret study of America's involvement in Vietnam.
1977: James Earl Ray was recaptured after his escape from prison 3 days earlier.
1978: Israelis withdrew the last of their invading forces from Lebanon.
1979: Sioux Indians were awarded $105 million in compensation for the U.S. seizure in 1877 of their Black Hills in South Dakota.
1981: At a parade in London a teen-ager fired six-blank shots at Queen Elizabeth II.
1983: The unmanned U.S. space probe Pioneer 10 became the first spacecraft to leave the solar system. It was launched in March 1972. The first up-close images of the planet Jupiter were provided by Pioneer 10.
1988: The Liggett Group, a cigarette manufacturer, was found liable for a lung-cancer death. They were, however, found innocent by the federal jury of misrepresenting the risks of smoking.
1989: The Detroit Pistons won their first National Basketball Association title. They beat the L.A. Lakers in four games.
1989: U.S. President George H.W. Bush exercised his first Presidential veto on a bill dealing with minimum wage.
1991: In the first round of the U.S. Open golf tournament a spectator was killed when lightning struck.
1992: Future U.S. President Bill Clinton criticized rap singer Sister Souljah for making remarks "filled with hatred" towards whites.
1994: A jury in Anchorage, Alaska, found Exxon Corp. and Captain Joseph Hazelwood to be reckless in the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
1994: O.J. Simpson was questioned by Los Angeles police concerning the deaths of his ex-wife and her friend, Ronald Goldman.
1995: France announced that they would conduct eight more nuclear tests in the South Pacific.
1996: In Montana, the 81-day standoff between the Freemen and the FBI ended when the anti-government group surrendered.
1997: The same Denver jury that convicted Timothy McVeigh of the 1995 bombing of a federal building in Oklahama City recommended the death penalty for his crime.
2000: Julius "Dr. J." Erving issued a public appeal for help finding his 19-year-old son, Cory. Cory had been missing since May 28, 2000. His body was found July 6, 2000.
2000: In Pyongyang, North Korea's leader Kim Jong Il welcomed South Korea's President Kim Dae for a three-day summit. It was the first such meeting between the leaders of North and South Korea.
