Today in History

1618   Johann Kepler discovers the third Law of Planetary Motion.  
1702   Queen Ann becomes the monarch of England upon the death of William III.  
1790   George Washington delivers the first State of the Union address.
1853   The first bronze statue of Andrew Jackson is unveiled in Washington, D.C.  
1855   The first train crosses Niagara Falls on a suspension bridge.  
1862   On the second day of the Battle of Pea Ridge, Confederate forces, including some Indian troops, under General Earl Van Dorn surprise Union troops, but the Union troops win the battle.    
1862   The Confederate ironclad C.S.S. Virginia (formerly U.S.S. Merrimack) is launched.
1880   President Rutherford B. Hays declares that the United States will have jurisdiction over any canal built across the isthmus of Panama.  
1904   The Bundestag in Germany lifts the ban on the Jesuit order of priests.  
1908   The House of Commons, London, turns down the women's suffrage bill.  
1909   Pope Pius X lifts the church ban on interfaith marriages in Hungary.  
1910   Baroness de Laroche becomes the first woman to obtain a pilot's license in France.  
1921   Spanish Premier Eduardo Dato is assassinated while leaving Parliament in Madrid.  
1921   French troops occupy Dusseldorf.  
1941   Martial law is proclaimed in Holland in order to extinguish any anti-Nazi protests.  
1942   Japanese troops capture Rangoon, Burma.  
1943   Japanese forces attack American troops on Hill 700 in Bougainville. The battle will last five days.  
1945   Phyllis Mae Daley recieves a commission in the U.S. Navy Nurse Corps. She will become the first African-American nurse to serve duty in World War II.
1948   The U.S. Supreme Court rules that religious instruction in public schools is unconstitutional.  
1954   France and Vietnam open talks in Paris on a treaty to form the state of Indochina.  
1961   Max Conrad circles the globe in a record time of eight days, 18 hours and 49 minutes in Piper Aztec.   
1965   More than 4,000 Marines land at Da Nang in South Vietnam and become the first U.S. combat troops in Vietnam.  
1966   Australia announces that it will triple the number of troops in Vietnam.  
1970   The Nixon administration discloses the deaths of 27 Americans in Laos.  
1973   Two bombs explode near Trafalgar Square in Great Britain injuring 234 people.
1982   The United States accuses the Soviets of killing 3,000 Afghans with poison gas.  
1985  Thomas Creighton dies after having three heart transplants in a 46-hour period.