Today:
1517: Martin Luther posts his Ninety-five Theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, sparking the Protestant Reformation.
1864: Nevada is admitted as the 36th U.S. state.
1913: The Lincoln Highway, the first automobile road across the United States, is dedicated.
1922: Benito Mussolini is appointed Prime Minister of Italy, beginning the Fascist era.
1926: Magician and escape artist Harry Houdini dies in Detroit from peritonitis resulting from a ruptured appendix.
1940: The Battle of Britain, an air campaign waged by the Luftwaffe against the United Kingdom, officially concludes with a British victory.
1941: After 14 years of work, carving on the Mount Rushmore National Memorial is completed.
1961: Joseph Stalin’s body is removed from Lenin’s Mausoleum in Moscow as part of the de-Stalinization of the Soviet Union.
1984: Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi is assassinated by two of her bodyguards in New Delhi.
2011: The United Nations Population Fund symbolically designates this date as the “Day of Seven Billion,” marking the estimated day the world’s population reached seven billion.