1471 – In England, the Yorkists defeated the Landcastrians at the battle of Tewkesbury in the War of the Roses.
1493 – Alexander VI divided non-Christian world between Spain and Portugal.
1626 – Dutch explorer Peter Minuit landed on Manhattan Island. Native Americans later sold the island (20,000 acres) for $24 in cloth and buttons.
1715 – A French manufacturer debuted the first folding umbrella.
1776 – Rhode Island declared its freedom from England two months before the Declaration of Independence was adopted.
1814 – Napoleon Bonaparte disembarked at Portoferraio on the island of Elba in the Mediterranean.
1863 – The Battle of Chancellorsville ended when the Union Army retreated.
1886 – A bomb exploded on the fourth day of a workers’ strike in Chicago, IL. Eight people died in the violence during violence that day.
1886 – Chichester Bell and Charles S. Tainter patented the gramophone. It was the first practical phonograph.
1904 – U.S. Army engineers began work on the Panama Canal.
1905 – Belmont Park opened in suburban Long Island. It opened as the largest race track in the world.
1916 – Germany agreed to limit its submarine warfare after a demand from U.S. President Wilson.
1942 – The Battle of the Coral Sea commenced as American and Japanese carriers launched their attacks at each other.
1942 – The United States began food rationing.
1954 – The first intercollegiate court tennis match was played in the U.S. It was between Yale and Princeton.
1961 – Thirteen civil rights activists, dubbed “Freedom Riders,” began a bus trip through the South.
1964 – “Another World” premiered on NBC-TV.
1970 – The Ohio National Guardsmen opened fire on students during an anti-Vietnam war protest at Kent State University. Four students were killed and nine others were wounded.
1979 – Margaret Thatcher became Britain’s first woman prime minister.
1981 – The Federal Reserve Board raised its discount rate to 14%.
1987 – Live models were used for the first time in Playtex bra ads.
1994 – Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO leader Yasser Arafat signed a historic accord on Palestinian autonomy that granted self-rule in the Gaza Strip and Jericho.
2000 – The citizens of London elected their mayor for the first time.
2003 – Idaho Gem was born. He was the first member of the horse family to be cloned.
2010 – Pablo Picasso’s “Nude, Green Leaves and Bust” sold for $106.5 million.