Today In History...

In 1704 Great Britain takes Gibraltar from Spain.

In 1847 Mormon leader Brigham Young and followers arrive in Salt Lake City.

In 1862 Martin Van Buren, the 8th U.S. president, dies in Kinderhook, NY.

In 1866 Tennessee is the first Confederate state readmitted to Union after the Civil War.

In 1923 The Treaty of Lausanne, which settled the boundaries of modern Turkey, is concluded in Switzerland.

In 1929 President Hoover proclaims the Kellogg-Briand Pact, which renounced war as an instrument of foreign policy.

In 1936 Two states hit record highs with Alton, Kansas, recording 121 degrees and Las Vegas, Nevada, experiences a city high of 117.

In 1937 Alabama drops charges against 5 black men accused of raping two white women in the "Scottsboro Case."

In 1952 President Truman announces a settlement in a 53-day steel strike.

In 1952 "High Noon" starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly opens in U.S. movie theaters. Cooper won an Oscar as Best Actor for the role.

In 1959 During a visit to the Soviet Union, Vice President Richard Nixon argues with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev on the merits of capitalism versus communism, in what becomes known as the
"Kitchen Debate."

In 1967 French President Charles de Gaulle creates a controversy during a visit to Montreal, Canada, when he declares, "Vive le Quebuc libre!" (Long live free Quebec!)

In 1969 The Apollo XI astronauts, two of whom had been the first men to walk on the moon, splash down in the Pacific.

In 1974 The Supreme Court orders President Nixon to surrender subpoenaed White House tapes to the Watergate special prosecutor.

In 1975 Apollo XVIII splashes down in the Pacific, completing a mission which included the first-ever docking with a Soyuz capsule from the Soviet Union.

In 1979 A Miami jury convicts former law student Theodore Bundy of first-degree murder in the slayings of FSU sorority sisters Margaret Bowman and Lisa Levy.

In 1981 A cease-fire between Israel and the PLO goes into effect along the Israeli–Lebanese border.

In 1985 About 100 Lebanese released from an Israeli military prison cross the border into Lebanon; it was the second group of prisoners to be freed by the Israelis since a TWA jetliner was hijacked by Shiite Muslim extremists.

In 1986 A federal jury in San Francisco convicts former Navy radioman Jerry A. Whitworth of espionage for his role in a Soviet spy ring.

In 1987 The re-flagged Kuwaiti supertanker Bridgeton is damaged after hitting a mine in the Persian Gulf.

In 1987 Hulda Crooks, a 91-year-old mountaineer from California, becomes the oldest woman to conquer Mount Fuji, Japan's highest peak.

In 1988 Sammy Duvall makes a record 205-foot waterski jump.

In 1990 Iraq, accusing Kuwait of conspiring to harm its economy through oil overproduction, masses tens of thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks along the Iraqi-Kuwaiti border.

In 1991 Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev announces a final agreement on a treaty designed to preserve the Soviet federation while giving more power to the republics.

In 1991 Nobel Prize-winning author Isaac Bashevis Singer dies at age 87.

In 1992 Members of POW-MIA families disrupt a speech by President Bush, prompting Bush to snap, "Would you please shut up and sit down?"

In 1993 The Russian government announces it would invalidate billions of pre-1993 rubles.

In 1994 Rwandan refugees begin trickling home after Zaire reopened the border between the two countries.

In 1994 Miguel Indurain wins his fourth consecutive Tour de France victory.

In 1995 A suicide bomb rips through a crowded commuter bus in the heart of Tel Aviv, killing six people.

In 1996 Two bombs blamed on Tamil separatists rip through a commuter train near Colombo, Sri Lanka, killing 64 and wounding more than 400.

In 1997 Retired Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan dies at age 91.

In 1998 A gunman bursts into the U.S. Capitol and opens fire, killing two police officers.

In 1998 A South Carolina jury awards $37.8 million to a church in the trial of the Ku Klux Klan charged with inciting to burn the rural black church in 1995.

In 2001 A Chinese court sentences two U.S. residents to 10 years in prison on charges of spying for Taiwan. (China released Gao Zhan and Qin Guangguang two days later.)

In 2004 Former Nixon administration official Fred LaRue, who served a prison term for Watergate, dies at age 75.

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