| On this date in: |
| 1609 |
English explorer Henry Hudson sailed into the river that now bears his name. |
| 1880 |
Journalist and critic H.L. Mencken was born in Baltimore. |
| 1938 |
In a speech in Nuremberg, Adolf Hitler demanded self-determination for the Sudeten Germans in Czechoslovakia. |
| 1943 |
German paratroopers rescued former Italian dictator Benito Mussolini from the hotel where he was being held prisoner by his own government. |
| 1944 |
U.S. Army troops entered Germany for the first time during World War II, near Trier. |
| 1953 |
Massachusetts Sen. John F. Kennedy married Jacqueline Lee Bouvier in Newport, R.I. |
| 1954 |
“Lassie” made its TV debut on CBS. |
| 1959 |
“Bonanza” premiered on NBC. |
| 1974 |
Emperor Haile Selassie was deposed by Ethiopia’s military after ruling for 58 years. |
| 1977 |
South African black student leader Steven Biko died while in police custody, triggering an international outcry. |
| 2000 |
Dutch lawmakers gave same-sex couples the right to marry and adopt children. |
| 2002 |
President George W. Bush told the United Nations to confront the “grave and gathering danger” of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq or stand aside as the United States acted. |
| 2003 |
Country musician Johnny Cash died at age 71. |
| 2005 |
Federal Emergency Management Agency director Michael Brown resigned, three days after losing his onsite command of the Hurricane Katrina relief effort. |
| 2006 |
In a speech in his native Germany, Pope Benedict XVI quoted from an obscure medieval text that characterized some teachings of Islam’s founder as “evil and inhuman,” unleashing a torrent of rage across the Islamic world. |
| 2008 |
A commuter train engineer ran a red light while text messaging on his cell phone and struck a freight train head-on in Los Angeles, killing himself and 24 other people. |
