On May 16th...

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1527 Florence became a republic.

1568 Mary Queen of Scots fled to England.

1605 Camillo Borghese was elected to succeed Pope Leo XI; he became Paul V.

1703 Author Charles Perrault died.

1785 The State of Franklin applied for admission to the Union.

1792 Denmark outlawed the slave trade.

1796 The Lombardian Republic was formed.

1801 American statesman William Seward was born.

1817 Steamboat service on the Mississippi River began.

1828 Inventor William Congreve died.

1842 The first organized wagon train set out on the Oregon Trail.

1860 Abraham Lincoln became the Republican Party candidate for President.

1862 The U.S. Department of Agriculture was established.

1863 The Battle of Champion's Hill (Mississippi) was fought.

1866 Charles Hires invented "Hires Root Beer."

1868 The U.S. Senate failed to impeach President Andrew Johnson, by one vote.

1875 An earthquake killed 16,000 people in Venezuela and Colombia.

1881 The world's first electric tram went into service in Lichterfelder, Germany (near Berlin).

1882 Babe Hurd rode Apollo to victory in the Kentucky Derby.

1884 Isaac Murphy rode Buchanan to victory in the Kentucky Derby.

1891 George A. Hormel established Geo. A. Hormel & Co.

1905 Actor Henry Fonda was born.

1910 The U.S. Bureau of Mines was created.

1911 The remains of a Neanderthal Man were found on the island of Jersey.

1914 The American Horseshoe Pitchers Association was organized.

1912 Author Studs Terkel was born.

1913 Jazz musician Woody Herman was born.

1918 The Sedition Act of 1918 was passed by the U.S. Congress.

1919 Entertainer Liberace was born.

1920 Joan of Arc was canonized.
1920 American politician Levi P. Morton died.

1925 Earl Sande rode Flying Ebony to victory in the Kentucky Derby.

1927 The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that bootleggers must pay income tax.

1928 Billy Martin, five-time manager of the New York Yankees, was born.

1929 The first Academy Awards* were handed out at a banquet held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel.

1931 Charley Kurtsinger rode Twenty Grand to victory in the Kentucky Derby.

1938 Fire in the Terminal Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia, killed 38 persons.
1938 Joseph Strauss, designer of the Golden Gate Bridge, died.

1939 The first U.S. food stamps were issued.

1942 The world's first bazooka was produced.
1942 Anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski died.

1943 Royal Air Force Squadron 617 used "bouncing bombs" on the Möhne and Eder dams in the Ruhr Valley.

1946 The Irving Berlin musical Annie Get Your Gun debuted on Broadway.

1948 Chaim Weizmann was elected the first President of Israel.

1951 Actor Pierce Brosnan was born.

1955 Rocky Marciano TKO'd Don Cockell in the 9th round for the heavyweight boxing title.
1955 Gymnast Olga Korbut was born.
1955 Actress Debra Winger was born.
1955 Poet James Agee died.

1957 The Walt Whitman Bridge was opened.
1957 The Skate, the third U.S. nuclear-powered submarine, was launched at Groton, Connecticut.
1957 The Territorial Assembly of French Cameroun elected André Marie M'Bida as the first Prime Minister under the new self-government statute.
1957 A tornado that struck the Silverton, Texas, area killed a reported 21 persons and injured 58.
1957 Eliot Ness, Treasury Agent made famous by The Untouchables, died.

1958 An F-104 set a world speed record of 1,404 miles per hour.

1959 Sam Snead shot a world record 59 at The Greenbrier Club.

1960 The confederation of Chad, Congo, and Central African Republic as the Union of Central African Republics was announced.
1960 U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower arrived in Paris, France, for a "Big Four Summit."
1960 Theodore Maiman operated the first optical laser, at Hughes Research Laboratories in Malibu, California.

1963 Amintore Fanfani resigned as Premier of Italy.
1963 Fire destroyed the village of Abyadeya, Egypt, and killed 17 persons.

1965 The Campbell Soup Company introduced Spaghetti-O's.

1966 Singer Janet Jackson was born.
1966 Football player Thurman Thomas was born.

1969 Actor David Boreanaz was born.

1972 John B. Connally, Jr., resigned as U.S. Secretary of the Treasury.

1973 Actress Tori Spelling was born.

1975 India annexed the Principality of Sikkim.
1975 Junko Tabei became the first woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest.
1975 Muhammad Ali TKO's Ron Lyle in the 11th round for the heavyweight boxing title.

1976 The Montreal Canadiens defeated the Philadelphia Flyers to win the Stanley Cup.

1980 The Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Philadelphia 76ers for the NBA Championship.

1982 The New York Islanders defeated the Vancouver Canucks to win the Stanley Cup.

1984 Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Steve Carlton hit a grand slam home run.
1984 Comedian Andy Kaufman died.

1985 Actress Margaret Hamilton died.

1986 Bobby Ewing (Patrick Duffy) came back from the dead on "Dallas."

1987 A barge carrying 3,200 tons of garbage set sail from New York City, New York, to search for a dumping site.

1988 The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that trash may be searched without a warrant.

1989 Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping met in Beijing, China.

1990 Entertainer Sammy Davis, Jr. died.
1990 Muppet creator Jim Henson died.

1991 Queen Elizabeth II became the first British monarch to address the U.S. Congress.

1992 America Team USA defeated Il Moro di Venezia in San Diego, California, to win the America's Cup.

1997 Brook Mehealani Lee (Miss USA) was crowned Miss Universe.

2003 Terrorist attacks in Casablanca, Morocco, killed 33 persons and injured more than 100 others.

2005 The Kuwait National Assembly approved women's suffrage.

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This page was last updated on August 26, 2018.