Today In History...

In 1798 Napoleon captures Alexandria, Egypt.
In 1829 William Austin Burt of Mt. Vernon, MI, receives a patent for his "typographer," the forerunner of the typewriter.
In 1885 Ulysses S. Grant, the 18th U.S. president, dies at the age of 63.
In 1886 New York saloonkeeper Steve Brodie supposedly makes a daredevil plunge from the Brooklyn Bridge into the East River.
In 1904 By some accounts, the first ice-cream cone is made by Charles E. Menches during the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis, MO.
In 1914 Austria-Hungary issues an ultimatum to Serbia following the killing of Archduke Francis Ferdinand by an assassin. The dispute leads to World War I.
In 1937 Isolation of the pituitary hormone is announced.
In 1945 French Marshal Henri Petain, head of the Vichy government during World War II, goes on trial and is condemned to death.
In 1947 The first air squadron of jets is formed in Quonset Point, RI, by the U.S. Navy.
In 1952 Egyptian military officers led by Gamal Abdel Nasser overthrow King Farouk I.
In 1958 Britain's Queen Elizabeth names the first four women to peerage in the House Of Lords.
In 1962 The Telestar communications satellite is launched.
In 1967 43 are killed when one of America's worst related riots begins in Detroit, as police raid a black-owned nightspot.
In 1968 The PLO hijacks an El Al plane for the first time.
In 1972 ERTS 1 (Earth Resources Technology Satellite), later called LANSAT, is launched to begin its multi-spectral scans of Earth.
In 1977 A jury in Washington, DC, convicts 12 Hanafi Muslims of charges stemming from the hostage siege at 3 buildings the previous March.
In 1980 Soyuz 37 transports 2 cosmonauts (1 Vietnamese) to Salyut 6.
In 1982 Actor Vic Morrow and two children are killed when a helicopter crashes on top of them during the filming of "The Twilight Zone: The Movie."
In 1984 Vanessa Williams becomes the first Miss America to resign her title, because of nude photographs of her that were published in Penthouse.
In 1985 President Reagan, just out of the hospital for cancer surgery, meets with Chinese President Li Xiannian at the White House, where they approved the signing of a nuclear cooperation agreement.
In 1985 U.S. Navy officer John Walker is convicted of espionage on behalf of the Soviets.
In 1985 After 11 years, the sitcom "The Jeffersons" airs on CBS-TV for the last time.
In 1986 Britain's Prince Andrew marries Sarah Ferguson at Westminster Abbey in London.
In 1990 President Bush announces his choice of Judge David Souter of New Hampshire to succeed retiring Justice William J. Brennan on the U.S. Supreme Court.
In 1991 The Senate votes to impose a long list of strict new conditions on renewal of China's normal trade status in 1992. However, President Bush vetoes the measure.
In 1992 During a tour of the Middle East, Secretary of State James Baker makes a secret visit to Lebanon.
In 1993 White House deputy counsel Vincent W. Foster Jr. is buried near Hope, AR, 3 days after taking his own life in a Virginia park.
In 1994 The space shuttle Columbia returns to earth after a 15-day mission which included experiments on the effects of weightlessness on aquatic animals.
In 1995 In a new get-tough approach, the UN orders the first combat unit from its rapid reaction force to Sarejevo to take out any rebel Serb guns that fired at UN peacekeepers.
In 1996 At the Atlanta Olympics, Kerri Strug makes a final vault despite torn ligaments in her left ankle, helping the U.S. women gymnasts clinch their first-ever Olympic team gold medal.
In 1997 Police find the body of Andrew Cunanan, the suspected killer of designer Gianni Versace and others, on a houseboat in Miami, an apparent suicide.
In 1998 U.S. scientists announce they had cloned more than 50 mice.
In 1999 Members of the Kennedy family gather in New York for a private memorial Mass a week after John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, Carolyn, and her sister, Lauren Bessette, died in a plane crash.
In 1999 Space shuttle Columbia blasts off with the world's most powerful X-ray telescope and Eileen Collins, the first woman to command a U.S. space flight.
In 1999 Morocco's King Hassan II dies at age 70.
In 2000 Lance Armstrong clinches his second straight victory in the Tour de France.
In 2000 Tiger Woods, at 24, becomes the youngest player to win the career Grand Slam with a record-breaking performance in the British Open.
In 2001 During their first meeting ever (in Castel Gandolfo, Italy), Pope John Paul II urges President Bush to bar creation of human embryos for medical research.
In 2001 Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Eudora Welty dies at age 92.
In 2002 Pope John Paul II arrives in Toronto at the start of an 11-day trip that also took him to Guatemala and Mexico.

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