1980—Responding to a surge in the number of skyjackings, the FAA announces an increase in sky marshals on commercial flights.
1977—Ohio State’s Big Ear radio telescope records a 72-second burst suggesting there may be intelligent life…out there, somewhere.
1971—His budget busted by Vietnam, R. Nixon reneges on the U.S.’s promise to redeem dollars with gold.
1969—Half a million half-naked, drugged-up baby boomers begin a three-day mud wallow in Bethel, N.Y.
1966—The New York Herald Tribune, founded as the Tribune by N.H.-born Horace Greeley 125 years earlier, succumbs to a strike called by a labor union also founded by Greeley.
1953—TR’s grandson Kermit sends Iran’s Imperial Guard to arrest the Prime Minister, but they’re captured by his guards. The Shah flees to Rome.
1945—To celebrate the end of WW II, San Franciscans conduct a riot.
1943—About 35,000 Allied forces land on Kiska, one of the Rat Islands in the Aleutians. Though unopposed—the Japanese had evacuated two weeks earlier—300 end up missing in action or killed by friendly fire.
1935—Wiley Post and Will Rogers perish in a plane crash at Point Barrow, Alaska.
1908—The Illinois state militia subdues a mob of rioting whites. Seven people are dead; the Black part of Springfield is a smoking ruin.