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History archives contain over 200,000 events, birthdays and deaths from 6,000 years of history. Here is a roundup of a few of them:

EVENTS

1461 – Battle of Towton: Edward of York defeats Queen Margaret to become King Edward IV of England, bringing a temporary stop to the Wars of the Roses.

1806 – Construction is authorized of the Great National Pike, better known as the Cumberland Road, becoming the first United States federal highway.

1847 – Mexican–American War: United States forces led by General Winfield Scott take Veracruz after a siege.

1867 – Queen Victoria gives Royal Assent to the British North America Act which establishes Canada on July 1.

1871 – Royal Albert Hall is opened by Queen Victoria.

1882 – The Knights of Columbus is established.

1941 – The North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement goes into effect at 03:00 local time.

1951 – Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage.

1957 – The New York, Ontario and Western Railway makes its final run, the first major U.S. railroad to be abandoned in its entirety.

1961 – The Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, allowing residents of Washington, D.C., to vote in presidential elections.

1973 – Vietnam War: The last United States combat soldiers leave South Vietnam.

1974 – NASA's Mariner 10 becomes the first space probe to fly by Mercury.

1984 – The Baltimore Colts load its possessions onto fifteen Mayflower moving trucks in the early morning hours and transfer its operations to Indianapolis.

1999 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above the 10,000 mark (10,006.78) for the first time, during the height of the dot-com bubble.

BIRTHS

1602 – John Lightfoot, English priest, scholar, and academic (d. 1675)

1769 – Jean-de-Dieu Soult, French general and politician, 12th Prime Minister of France (d. 1851)

1790 – John Tyler, American lawyer and politician, 10th President of the United States (d. 1862)

1867 – Cy Young, American baseball player and manager (d. 1955)

1889 – Howard Lindsay, American producer, playwright, librettist, director and actor (d. 1968)

1908 – Arthur O'Connell, American actor (d. 1981)

1909 – Moon Mullican, American singer-songwriter and pianist (d. 1967)

1918 – Pearl Bailey, American actress and singer (d. 1990)

1918 – Sam Walton, American businessman, founded Walmart and Sam's Club (d. 1992)

1919 – Eileen Heckart, American actress (d. 2001)

1927 – John Vane, English pharmacologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2004)

1943 – Vangelis, Greek keyboard player and songwriter (d. 2022)

1943 – Eric Idle, English actor, comedian, musician and writer

1968 – Lucy Lawless, New Zealand actress

DEATHS

1788 – Charles Wesley, English missionary and poet (b. 1707)

1891 – Georges Seurat, French painter (b. 1859)

1992 – Paul Henreid, American actor (b. 1908)

1994 – Bill Travers, English actor, director, and screenwriter (b. 1922)

2014 – Marc Platt, American actor and dancer (b. 1913)

2016 – Patty Duke, American actress (b. 1946)

2020 – Joe Diffie, American country music singer (b. 1958)

2022 – Jennifer Wilson, English actress (b. 1932)

2024 – Louis Gossett Jr., American actor (b. 1936)

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