Today:
1. 1184 BC: According to calculations by Eratosthenes, Troy was sacked and burned on this date.
2. 1509: Henry VIII of England married Catherine of Aragon, his first wife.
3. 1770: British explorer Captain James Cook ran aground on the Great Barrier Reef.
4. 1776: The Continental Congress appointed a committee to write a Declaration of Independence.
5. 1935: Inventor Edwin Armstrong gave the first public demonstration of FM broadcasting in the United States.
6. 1963: Buddhist monk Thích Quảng Đức self-immolated in Saigon, South Vietnam, to protest the persecution of Buddhists.
7. 1963: Alabama Governor George Wallace stood in the doorway of Foster Auditorium to block the entry of two African-American students at the University of Alabama, an event known as the “Stand in the Schoolhouse Door.”
8. 1979: Actor John Wayne, known as “The Duke,” passed away.
9. 1987: Margaret Thatcher became the first British Prime Minister in 160 years to win a third consecutive term.
10. 2002: The first open-heart surgery in Nepal was performed successfully at the Shahid Gangalal National Heart Centre.