238 – The Praetorian Guard storm the palace and capture Pupienus and Balbinus. They are dragged through the streets of Rome and executed. On the same day, Gordian III, age 13, is proclaimed emperor, the sixth emperor of the year.
1565 – The widowed Mary, Queen of Scots marries Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, Duke of Albany, at Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh, Scotland.
1818 – French physicist Augustin Fresnel submits his prizewinning “Memoir on the Diffraction of Light”, precisely accounting for the limited extent to which light spreads into shadows, and thereby demolishing the oldest objection to the wave theory of light.
1836 – Inauguration of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, France.
1871 – The Connecticut Valley Railroad opens between Old Saybrook, Connecticut and Hartford, Connecticut in the United States.
1932 – Great Depression: In Washington, D.C., troops disperse the last of the “Bonus Army” of World War I veterans.
1958 – President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs into law the National Aeronautics and Space Act, which creates the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
1976 – In New York City, David Berkowitz (a.k.a. the “Son of Sam”) kills one person and seriously wounds another in the first of a series of attacks.
Births
869 – Muhammad al-Mahdi, Iraqi 12th Imam (d. 941)
996 – Fujiwara no Norimichi, Japanese nobleman (d. 1075)
1867 – Berthold Oppenheim, Moravian rabbi (d. 1942)
1883 – Benito Mussolini, fascist revolutionary and27th Prime Minister of Italy
1904 – J. R. D. Tata, French-Indian pilot and businessman, founded Tata Motors and Tata Global Beverages (d. 1993)
1905 – Dag Hammarskjцld, Swedish economist and diplomat, 2nd Secretary-General of the United Nations, Nobel Prize Laureate (d. 1961)
Deaths
1099 – Pope Urban II (b. 1042)
1108 – Philip I of France (b. 1052)
1890 – Vincent van Gogh, Dutch painter and illustrator (b. 1853)
1973 – Roger Williamson, English race car driver (b. 1948)
1974 – Cass Elliot, American singer (b. 1941)
1981 – Robert Moses, American urban planner, designed the Northern State Parkway and Southern State Parkway (b. 1888)
1983 – David Niven, English military officer and actor (b. 1910)
Edited from various sources including Wikipedia,and other media outlets
from mainstream to extreme.