1999—NRA president Charlton Heston says that to honor those massacred at Columbine the day before, the gun lobby’s Denver convention will be shortened by one whole day.
1992—Robert Alton Harris is strapped into San Quentin’s gas chamber at 3:00 a.m. Twelve minutes later he’s taken back out amid legal wrangling. At 6:00 a.m., he’s put back in and successfully gassed to death.
1980—Ronald Reagan says ’Nam veterans can’t get the GI Bill because their war wasn’t declared. It’s not true.
1975—South Vietnam’s last president, Nguyen Van Thieu, calls it quits.
1971—Vietnam Veterans Against the War defy the Supreme Court and stay on the National Mall. Park police decline to arrest. Tomorrow’s headline: “Vets Overrule Supreme Court.”
1967—A military coup makes Greece the first European country with a CIA agent [Papadopoulos] for a Premier.
1964—Failing to orbit, a U.S. satellite burns on re-entry; the amount of plutonium in the atmosphere triples.
1930—Ohio National Guardsmen with machine guns and bayonets prevent escape as the State Pen burns; 322 inmates die, 230 are hospitalized.
1910—Train robber Frank Grigware busts out of Leavenworth with a pistol carved from wood, and makes his getaway on a stolen steam train.
1836—Sam Houston catches Santa Anna literally napping at San Jacinto; his Texians slaughter 650 trying to flee.