Today in History

In Africa, Rwandan troops kill thousands of Hutu refugees in Kibeho.

Barbara Walters becomes the first female nightly news anchor on network television.

Congress orders all U.S. coins to bear the motto “In God We Trust.”

The Senate Army-McCarthy hearings begin. They are broadcast on television.

Allies launch major attack against the Japanese in Hollandia, New Guinea.

Louise Gluck, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet.

Egypt signs treaty of friendship with Iraq.

Charles Mingus, jazz bassist.

Robert Wadlow, the world’s tallest man (8’11.1″).

Yehudi Menuhin, violinist.

At the Second Battle of Ypres, the Germans use poison gas for the first time.

J. Robert Oppenheimer, physicist, director of the Manhattan Project.

Vladimir Nabokov, Russian novelist (Lolita).

In the first action of the Spanish-American War, the USS Nashville, takes on a Spanish ship.

The Oklahoma land rush officially starts at noon as thousands of Americans race for new, unclaimed land.

Ole Edvart Rolvaag, novelist (Giants in the Earth).

Ellen Glasgow, American novelist.

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (Vladimir Ilich Ulyanov), leader of the Bolshevik Revolution (1917) and first head of the U.S.S.R.

Robert E. Lee is named commander of Virginia forces.

President George Washington proclaims American neutrality in the war in Europe.

The Peace of Fussen is signed.

Immanuel Kant, German philosopher.

Henry Fielding, English novelist (Tom Jones).

Spain and Portugal divide the eastern hemisphere in the Treaty of Saragossa.

Henry VIII ascends to the throne of England upon the death of his father, Henry VII.

Pedro Alvarez Cabral discovers Brazil.

Isabella I of Castile, Queen of Spain, patron of Christopher Columbus.

St. Agapitus I ends his reign as Catholic Pope.

St. Gaius ends his reign as Catholic Pope.