Today:
1775: Patrick Henry delivered his “Give me liberty, or give me death!” speech at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Richmond, Virginia.
1801: Tsar Paul I of Russia was assassinated in his bedroom at St. Michael’s Castle in Saint Petersburg.
1806: After reaching the Pacific Ocean, explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark began their overland journey back to the eastern United States.
1839: The first recorded use of the expression “OK” (as an abbreviation for “oll korrect”) appeared in the Boston Morning Post.
1857: Elisha Otis installed the first modern commercial passenger elevator at a department store in New York City.
1868: The University of California was founded in Oakland after the Organic Act was signed into law.
1919: Benito Mussolini founded the Fasci di Combattimento (the Fascist Party) in Milan, Italy.
1933: The German Reichstag passed the Enabling Act, which effectively granted Adolf Hitler dictatorial legislative powers.
1956: Pakistan became the first Islamic republic in the world, a date now celebrated as Pakistan Day.
2001: The Russian space station Mir was decommissioned and broke up in the Earth’s atmosphere over the southern Pacific Ocean.