Today:
1640: A nationalist revolution in Portugal led to the country’s independence from Spain after 60 years of Spanish rule.
1822: Dom Pedro, the founder of the Brazilian Empire, was crowned as the first Emperor of Brazil in Rio de Janeiro.
1865: Shaw University, the first historically black university in the Southern United States, was founded in Raleigh, North Carolina.
1878: The first telephone was installed in the White House, during the presidency of Rutherford B. Hayes.
1913: The Ford Motor Company introduced the first moving assembly line for the mass production of the Model T in Highland Park, Michigan.
1919: Lady Nancy Astor became the first woman to take her seat as a Member of Parliament (MP) in the British House of Commons.
1925: The Locarno Treaties, a series of agreements to guarantee peace in Western Europe following World War I, were signed in London by representatives from Germany, France, Belgium, Great Britain, and Italy.
1942: Nationwide gasoline rationing went into effect in the United States during World War II, limiting fuel purchases for civilian use.
1955: Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat to a white man on a municipal bus, sparking the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
1959: The Antarctic Treaty was signed by 12 nations in Washington, D.C., setting aside Antarctica as a scientific preserve and banning military activity.