Today in History

The United States plans to send 20 more advisors and $25 million in military aid to El Salvador.

Czech pilot Vladimir Remek becomes the first non-Russian, non-American in space.

A grand jury in Washington, D.C. concludes that President Nixon was indeed involved in the Watergate cover-up.

Federal forces surround Wounded Knee, South Dakota, which is occupied by members of the militant American Indian Movement who are holding at least 10 hostages.

The siege of Khe Sanh ends in Vietnam, the U.S. Marines stationed there are still in control of the mountain top.

More than 150 U.S. and South Vietnamese planes bomb two bases in North Vietnam in the first of the “Rolling Thunder” raids.

France grants independence to Morocco.

Claudette Colvin refuses to give up her seat in Montgomery, Alabama, nine months before Rosa Parks‘ famous arrest for the same offense.

The U.S. Navy launches the K-1, the first modern submarine designed to hunt enemy submarines.

Ho Chi Minh is elected president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

MacArthur raises the U.S. flag on Corregidor in the Philippines.

The center of Berlin is bombed by the RAF. Some 900 tons of bombs are dropped in a half hour.

John Irving, novelist (The World According to Garp).

Mikhail Gorbachev, Secretary General of the Soviet Union. Responsible for restructuring the Soviet economy (perestroika) and openness and information (glasnost).

Novelist D.H. Lawrence dies of tuberculosis in a sanitarium in Vence, France, at the age of 45.

Doc Watson, singer and guitarist.

Congress passes the Jones Act making Puerto Rico a territory of the United States and makes the inhabitants U.S. citizens.

Gabriel Lippman introduces the new three-dimensional color photography at the Academy of Sciences.

Theodor Seuss Geisel [Dr. Seuss], author of numerous children’s books including The Cat in the Hat and Green Eggs and Ham.

Congress passes the Platt amendment, which limits Cuban autonomy as a condition for withdrawal of U.S. troops.

Kurt Weill, German-born composer (The Threepenny Opera).

Bone Mizell, the famed cowboy of Florida, is sentenced to two years of hard labor in the state pen for cattle rustling. He would only serve a small portion of the sentence.

Congress passes the Indian Appropriations Bill, proclaiming unassigned lands in the public domain; the first step toward the famous Oklahoma Land Rush.

Rutherford B. Hayes is declared president by one vote the day before the inauguration.

The first Reconstruction Act is passed by Congress.

President Abraham Lincoln rejects Confederate General Robert E. Lee‘s plea for peace talks, demanding unconditional surrender.

The Territory of Washington is organized.

Texas declares independence from Mexico on Sam Houston’s 43rd birthday.

Carl Schurz, Civil War general, political reformer and anti-imperialist.

To put an end to robberies by the Barbary pirates, the United States declares war on Algiers.

Leo XIII, 256th Roman Catholic Pope.

The Directory of Great Britain authorizes vessels of war to board and seize neutral vessels, particularly if the ships are American.

Sam Houston, president of Texas, later Texas senator and governor.

Maryland ratifies the Articles of Confederation. She is the last state to sign.

Americans begin shelling British troops in Boston.