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- 1153 Malcolm IV becomes king of Scotland
- 1218 The Fifth Crusade leaves Acre for Egypt.
- 1276 Magnus Laduls crowned King of Sweden in Uppsala Cathedral.
- 1300 King Philip IV occupies Flanders, Earl Gwijde captured
- 1370 Hanzesteden signs peace treaty with Danish king Waldemar IV
- 1487 Imposter Lambert Simnel ceremony crowned as King Edward VI of Dublin
- 1595 Nomenclator of Leiden University Library appears, the first printed catalog of an institutional library.
- 1621 Protestant Union formally dissolved.
- 1626 Peter Minuet buys Manhattan from Indians for trinkets, valued at $24
- 1626 Peter Minuit buys Manhattan.
- 1653 German Parliament selects Ferdinand II king of Austria
- 1658 Battle of Dunes (Spanish-French War) fought
- 1667 French troops attack into Southern Netherlands
- 1689 English Parliament guarantees freedom of religion for Protestants
- 1689 The English Parliament passes the Act of Toleration protecting Protestants (Roman Catholics are intentionally excluded).
- 1726 People's revolt due to increase in gin/brandy tax
- 1738 John Wesley is converted, essentially launching the Methodist movement; the day is celebrated annually by Methodists as Aldersgate Day.
- 1738 Methodist Church is established
- 1787 The Constitutional Convention is convened after a quorum of delegates attends in Philadelphia
- 1809 Dartmoor Prison opens to house French prisoners of war
- 1810 Argentina beings its revolt against Spain
- 1815 George Evans discovers Lachlan River, Australia
- 1818 General Andrew Jackson captures Pensacola FL
- 1822 At Battle of Pichincha, Bolívar secures independence of Quito from Spain
- 1822 Battle of Pichincha: Antonio Jos de Sucre secures the independence of the Presidency of Quito.
- 1824 Pope Leo XII proclaims a universal jubilee
- 1829 Pope Pius VIII issues his program for the pontificate
- 1830 "Mary Had A Little Lamb" is written
- 1830 Mary had a little lamb by Sarah Hale is published.
- 1830 The first U S passenger railroad begins service between Baltimore and Elliott's Mills, Maryland
- 1830 The first revenue trains in the United States begin service on the Baltimore and Ohio Rail Road between Baltimore and Ellicott's Mills.
- 1832 The First Kingdom of Greece is declared in the London Conference.
- 1844 Samuel F B Morse opens America's first telegraph line between Washington, D C and Baltimore, MD with the message "What hath God wrought!"
- 1844 Samuel F. B. Morse sent the message "What hath God wrought" (a Bible quotation, Numbers 23:23) from the Old Supreme Court Chamber in the United States Capitol to his assistant, Alfred Vail, in Baltimore, Maryland.
- 1844 The Baltimore Patriot carries the first-ever telegraphed news dispatch (received from Washington, D C )
- 1854 Anthony Burns, slave, arrested by US Deputy marshals in Boston
- 1854 Lincoln University, Pennsylvania, first Black college in US forms by Prebyts
- 1856 John Brown and his men murder five slavery supporters at Pottawatomie Creek, Kansas.
- 1856 Pottawatomie Massacre took place in Kansas
- 1861 Alexandria VA occupied by Federal troops
- 1861 Major General Benjamin Butler declares slaves "contraband of war"
- 1862 Westminster Bridge across Thames opens
- 1866 Berkeley CA named (for George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne)
- 1870 Memoria of Jackson Kemper, first Missionary Bishop in US
- 1878 CA Parker (Harvard) wins first American bike race, Beacon Park Boston
- 1881 Canadian ferry Princess Victoria sinks near London Ontario, 200 die
- 1881 The Canadian ferry Princess Victoria sinks near London, Ontario, killing 200 passengers
- 1881 Turkey cedes Thessaly and Arta back to Greece.
- 1883 Brooklyn Bridge opened by President Arthur & Governor Cleveland
- 1883 The Brooklyn Bridge in New York is opened to traffic after 14 years of construction.
- 1884 Anti-Monopoly party & Greenback Party form People's Party in the US
- 1887 Sultan Bargash of Zanzibar grants East African Association at East African harbors
- 1890 Caprivi succeeds Bismarck on as chancellor of Germany
- 1890 Geo Train & Sam Wall circle world in record 67 days, Tacoma-Tacoma
- 1890 Tivoli Theater of Varities opens in London
- 1893 The Niagara Falls Park and River Railway opens in Ontario.
- 1895 Henry Irving becomes first theatrical knight
- 1895 Henry Irving becomes the first personage from the theatre to be knighted.
- 1895 Playright Oscar Wilde is convicted on a morals charge in London and sentenced to prison
- 1899 The first auto repair shop opens in Boston
- 1899 The first public parking garage in the United States is opened in Boston, Massachusetts.
- 1900 Australians cross Vaal River in South Africa
- 1900 Britain annexes Orange Free State
- 1900 Second Boer War: The United Kingdom annexes the Orange Free State.
- 1901 78 miners die in Caerphilly pit disaster in South Wales.
- 1902 Empire Day first celebrated in Britain
- 1908 Belgium Catholic socialist/liberal parliamentary election
- 1909 Bristol University granted Royal Charter
- 1911 The New York Public Library opened.
- 1915 Enemy Contracts Annulment Act
- 1915 Formal truce on Gallipoli during which the Turkish dead of the 19 May attacks are buried
- 1915 World War I: Italy declares war on Austria-Hungary.
- 1916 French driven out of Fort Douaumont after 500 killed or injured
- 1916 Last British-Indian contract workers arrive in Suriname
- 1916 US pilot William Thaw shoots down a German Fokker
- 1921 British Legion is formed
- 1921 The first parliament for Northern Ireland elected
- 1921 The trial of Sacco and Vanzetti opens.
- 1922 Record temperature in Netherlands for May (35.6ºC)
- 1922 Russian-Italian trade agreement signed
- 1928 Umberto Nobile flies airship over North Pole again
- 1929 The Cocoanuts, the first film to star the Marx Brothers, opens.
- 1930 Amy Johnson lands in Darwin, Northern Territory, becoming the first woman to fly from England to Australia (she left on May 5 for the 11,000 mile flight).
- 1930 Babe Ruth homers in both games of a doubleheader, giving him 9 in one week
- 1930 Bradman scores 252 Australia vs Surrey, 290 minutes, 29 fours
- 1934 Colombia & Peru sign accord about harbor city Leticia
- 1935 Babe Ruth, in a Boston Braves uniform, hits the 714th and final home run of his career in a game against the Pittsburgh Pirates
- 1935 Crosley Field in Cincinnati, Ohio, hosts major-league baseball's first night game ever as the Cincinnati Reds beat the Philadelphia Phillies 2-1.
- 1935 Swedish princess Ingrid marries Danish crown prince Frederik (IX)
- 1940 Dutch army demobilizes
- 1940 German tanks reach Atrecht France
- 1940 Hitler affirms General von Rundstedts "Stopbevel"
- 1940 Igor Sikorsky performs the first successful single-rotor helicopter flight.
- 1941 Bismarck sinks British battle cruiser HMS Hood, 1,416 die 3 survive
- 1941 The German battleship Bismarck sinks the British dreadnought Hood in the North Atlantic
- 1941 World War II: In the North Atlantic, the German Battleship Bismarck sinks the HMS Hood killing all but three crewmen on what was the pride of the Royal Navy.
- 1943 Admiral Dönitz stops U-boat in Atlantic Ocean
- 1943 Holocaust: Josef Mengele becomes chief medical officer in Auschwitz concentration camp.
- 1943 U-441 shoots Sunderland seaplane down over Gulf of Biskaje
- 1944 Enver Hoxha becomes head of Albania anti fascists
- 1944 Icelandic voters severe all ties with Denmark
- 1944 Major John Keefer Mahony (The Westminister Regiment(Motor)) wins the Victoria Cross at the Melfa River, Italy
- 1946 Transjordan (now known as Jordan) becomes a kingdom, with King Abdulla Ibn Ul-Hussein as the new monarch
- 1949 The Soviet Union ends the 11-month Berlin Blockade.
- 1951 Racial segregation in Washington DC restaurants ruled illegal
- 1951 Willie Mays begins playing for the New York Giants
- 1954 Dr Peter Murray Marshall becomes first black to head an AMA unit
- 1954 German airline Lufthansa forms
- 1954 IBM announces vacuum tube "electronic" brain that could perform 10 million operations an hour
- 1956 Conclusion of the Sixth Buddhist Council on Vesak Day, marking the 2,500 year anniversary after the Lord Buddha's Parinibbna.
- 1956 The first Eurovision Song Contest is held in Lugano, Switzerland and is won by the host nation.
- 1957 Anti American riots breakout in Taipei, Taiwan
- 1958 President Batista opens offensive against Fidel Castro's rebellion
- 1958 UP & International News Service merge into United Press International
- 1958 Visitor posting - Shelby and Joe got married
- 1958 United Press International is formed through a merger of the United Press and the International News Service
- 1959 Empire Day renamed Commonwealth Day in England
- 1959 The first house with built-in bomb shelter exhibited (Pleasant Hills PA)
- 1960 1 millionth Dutch telephone installed
- 1961 27 Freedom Riders arrested in Jackson MS
- 1961 Cyprus enters the Council of Europe.
- 1961 U S President Kennedy asks the nation to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade
- 1962 M Scott Carpenter aboard Aurora 7 launched into earth orbit
- 1962 Number one hit on UK music charts - Elvis Presley - Good Luck Charm
- 1962 Project Mercury: American astronaut Scott Carpenter orbits the Earth three times in the Aurora 7 space capsule.
- 1964 18th Tony Awards: Luther & Hello Dolly win
- 1964 Beatles' 3rd appearance on Ed Sullivan
- 1964 Panic in Lima Peru soccer stadium, kills 300
- 1965 Supreme Court declares federal law allowing post office to intercept communist propaganda is unconstitutional
- 1966 "Mame" opens at Winter Garden Theater NYC for 1508 performances
- 1968 FLQ separatists bomb the U.S. consulate in Quebec City.
- 1968 Haiti closes down shortwave station 4VEH for 40 days
- 1968 Mick Jagger & Marianne Faithfull arrested for drug possession
- 1968 President De Gaulle proposes referendum & students set fire to Paris bourse
- 1968 Students set fire to the Paris bourse.
- 1968 The Gateway Arch, located in St Louis, Missouri, is dedicated
- 1969 Beatles' "Get Back" single goes #1 & stays #1 for 5 weeks
- 1970 Peter Queen quits Fleetwood Mac to join a religious cult
- 1970 The drilling of the Kola Superdeep Borehole begins in the USSR
- 1971 A commuter bus plunges into Panama Canal, killing 38 of 43 aboard
- 1972 Glasgow Rangers wins 12th Europe Cup II at Barcelona
- 1973 Earl Jellicoe resigns as Lord Privy Seal and Leader of the Lords.
- 1974 Dean Martin Show, last airs on NBC-TV
- 1975 A group of 80 reporters and cameramen are the first Westerners allowed to leave Saigon in South Vietnam since it fell to communist forces on April 29.
- 1975 Dutch Government of De Uyl decides to obtain some F-16's
- 1975 Soyuz 18B carries 2 cosmonauts to space station Salyut 4
- 1976 London to Washington, DC Concorde service begins.
- 1976 Muhammad Ali TKOs Richard Dunn in 5 for heavyweight boxing title
- 1976 The first commercial SST flight to North America (Concorde to Washington DC)
- 1977 USSR President Podgorny resigns
- 1978 Dutch Investment bill (WIR) law goes into effect
- 1979 Billy Martin issues a public apology to Reno sportswriter Ray Hagar
- 1980 "Rock Lobster" by B-52's hits #56
- 1980 Iran rejects a call by the World Court in The Hague to release the American hostages
- 1981 Bobby Unser wins, loses, & wins a controversial Indianapolis 500
- 1981 Hostage situation ends at Central Bank in Barcelona Spain
- 1982 Liberation of Khorramshahr, Iranians recapture of the port city of Khorramshahr from the Iraqis during Iran-Iraq War
- 1983 Fred Sinowatz succeeds Bruno Kreisky as chancellor of Austria
- 1983 Supreme Court rules government can deny tax breaks to schools that racially discriminated against students
- 1983 The Brooklyn Bridge, linking the New York boroughs of Brooklyn and Manhattan, opens to traffic
- 1984 Visitor posting - GAIR, CECIL EN MARIE GOT MARRIED IN CENTENARY CHURCH, PE
- 1985 "View to a Kill" premieres in US
- 1985 Cyclone hits Bangladesh; about 10,000 die
- 1986 Country Singer Garth Brooks marries Sandy Mahl
- 1986 Reginald Huffstetler treds water for 985 hours
- 1987 Visitor posting - Artist,Singer, and Revolutionist Marketta Carroll-Neubauer is Born. - USA
- 1987 Al Unser Sr, 47, wins his 4th Indianapolis 500
- 1988 John Moschitta set record for fast talking: 586 words per minute
- 1988 Porntip Nakhirunkanok, 19, of Thailand, crowned 37th Miss Universe
- 1988 Power outage in Boston Garden in NHL's Stanley Cup finals
- 1988 Section 28 is passed as law by Parliament in the United Kingdom.
- 1989 "Indiana Jones & the Last Crusade" premieres
- 1989 AC Milan wins 34th Europe Cup 1 at Barcelona
- 1989 French war criminal Paul Touvier arrested in monastery in Nice
- 1989 NHL's New York Rangers fire general manager & coach Phil Esposito
- 1989 Sonia Sutcliffe, wife of the Yorkshire Ripper, is awarded a six-figure sum in damages after winning a libel action against Private Eye.
- 1989 Weird Al Yankovic records his UHF soundtrack
- 1990 A car carrying American Earth First! activists Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney explodes in Oakland, California, critically injuring both.
- 1990 Visitor posting - May 24 1990 Juanita Jade Green is born
- 1990 Andre Dawson receives a record 5 intentional walks in a game
- 1990 Stanley Cup: Edmonton Oilers beat Boston Bruins, 4 games to 1
- 1991 Israel conducts Operation Solomon, evacuating Ethiopian Jews to Israel.
- 1992 Jay Leno makes his Tonight Show debut as permanent host, succeeding Johnny Carson
- 1992 The last Thai dictator, General Suchinda Kraprayoon, resigns following pro-democracy protests.
- 1993 Eritrea achieved independence from Ethiopia after 30-year civil war
- 1993 Eritrea gains its independence from Ethiopia.
- 1993 Kim Basinger files for bankruptcy to avoid paying $7.4 million settlement
- 1993 Kurd rebellion kills 33 soldiers & 5 citizens in Turkey
- 1993 Visitor posting - Crysta Rae LaVonne Robinson is born to Mardy and Wes Robinson, Havre MT
- 1993 Microsoft unveils Windows NT.
- 1994 Four men convicted of bombing New York's World Trade Center in 1993 are each sentenced to 240 years in prison.
- 1994 Visitor posting - Lawrence Allen McSorley's Birthday - USA
- 1994 Poison singer Bret Michaels gets into a car crash
- 1995 Visitor posting - Brenna Michelle was born in Watertown, SD
- 1995 Visitor posting - Mikaela Edwards was born on the 24th of May. In Chandler Arizona. - USA
- 1995 Visitor posting - Zebbie Warren born - USA
- 1996 "Spy Hard" starring Leslie Nielsen is released
- 1997 Actor Tim Allen arrested for drunk driving in Michigan
- 1999 Venezuela enters the Antarctic Treaty System.
- 2000 Israeli troops withdraw from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation.
- 2001 Mountain climbing: 15-year-old Sherpa Temba Tsheri becomes the youngest person to climb to the top of Mount Everest.
- 2001 The Democrats gain control of the U.S. Senate for the first time since 1994 when Senator James Jeffords of Vermont abandons the Republican Party and declares himself an independent.
- 2001 The Versailles wedding hall collapse in Jerusalem, Israel, kills 23 and injures over 200 in Israel's worst-ever civil disaster.
- 2002 Russia and the United States sign the Moscow Treaty.
- 2010 Visitor posting - Alexander Murphy turns 16. what now Ricky - USA
- 2010 Tribal gunmen have kidnapped two American tourists along with their driver and translator, and are demanding the release of their jailed tribesman for the pair, - Yemen
- 2010 China Soccer rocked by corruption scandals. Players and officials from China and Hong Kong arrested on suspicion of taking bribes from gambling syndicates for match fixing.
- 2010 Visitor posting - Julie Walker turns 27! - USA
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