1520 – Moctezuma II, Aztec emperor (1502-20), killed either by the Spanish or stoned by his own people
1559 – King Henry II of France is mortally wounded in a jousting match against Gabriel de Montgomery.
1688 – The Immortal Seven issue the Invitation to William (continuing the English rebellion from Rome), which would culminate in the Glorious Revolution.
1704 – John Quelch, a pirate was hanged (b. 1665)
1794 – Native American forces under Blue Jacket attack Fort Recovery.
1805 – The U.S. Congress organizes the Michigan Territory.
1860 – The 1860 Oxford evolution debate at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History takes place.
1864 – U.S. President Abraham Lincoln grants Yosemite Valley to California for “public use, resort and recreation”.
1882 – Charles J. Guiteau is hanged in Washington, D.C. for the assassination of U.S. President James Garfield. The body was sent to the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Maryland, which preserved Guiteau’s brain as well as his enlarged spleen discovered at autopsy and bleached the skeleton. These were placed in storage by the museum. Part of Guiteau’s brain remains on display at the Mütter Museum in Philadelphia.
1886 – The first transcontinental train trip across Canada departs from Montreal. It arrives in Port Moody, British Columbia on July 4.
1892 – The Homestead Strike begins near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
1905 – Albert Einstein publishes the article On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies, in which he introduces special relativity.
1906 – The United States Congress passes the Meat Inspection Act and Pure Food and Drug Act.
1908 – The Tunguska event occurs in remote Siberia.
1917 – World War I: Greece declares war on the Central Powers.
1921 – U.S. President Warren G. Harding appoints former President William Howard Taft Chief Justice of the United States.
1922 – In Washington D.C., U.S. Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes and Dominican Ambassador Francisco J. Peynado sign the Hughes-Peynado agreement, which ends the United States occupation of the Dominican Republic.
1934 – The Night of the Long Knives, Adolf Hitler’s violent purge of his political rivals in Germany, takes place. An estimate of least 200 people were killed and more than 1,000 were arrested
1934 – Karl Ernst, German soldier (b. 1904) shot by a firing squad. It has been suggested that it was he who, with a small party of stormtroopers, passed through a passage from the Palace of the President of the Reichstag, and set the Reichstag building on fire on the night of February 27, 1933.
1934 – Erich Klausener, German politician (b. 1885) died. He criticized the violence and repression that had taken place since Hitler became chancellor. A squad of SS men, apparently acting on the orders of Göring and Reinhard Heydrich, entered Klausener’s office at the transportation ministry and shot him dead at his desk.
1934 – Gustav Ritter von Kahr, German politician, Minister-President of Bavaria (b. 1862) died. He was instrumental in the collapse and suppression of Adolf Hitler’s Beer Hall Putsch in 1923. He was abducted in Munich and murdered – hacked to death with axes by SS members – and his body thrown into a swamp near Dachau.
1934 – Gregor Strasser, German politician (b. 1892) died. He was shot once in his main artery from behind in his cell, but did not die immediately. On the orders of SS general Reinhard Heydrich, Strasser was left to bleed to death which took almost an hour.
1934 – Kurt von Schleicher, German general and politician, 23rd Chancellor of Germany (b. 1882) died. While in his house, he was gunned down.
1934 – Elisabeth von Schleicher, wife of Kurt von Schleicher. She was shot after coming into the room after her husband was shot.
1934 – Herbert von Bose, (b. 1893), was head of the press division of the Vice Chancellery (Reichsvizekanzlei) in Germany under Vice Chancellor Franz von Papen. Bose was conducted into a conference room – allegedly to be interrogated – and shot from behind ten times as he took a seat.
1934 – Ferdinand von Bredow (b. 1884) died. Bredow was tied to a chair and shot five times in the chest.
1934 – Fritz Gerlich (b. 1883), German journalist and historian died. . He was arrested and later killed at the Dachau concentration camp.
1934 – Edmund Heines (b. 1897), Nazi Party leader and Ernst Röhm’s deputy in the Sturmabteilung or SA. Hitler’s chauffeur Erich Kempka claimed in a 1946 interview that Edmund Heines was caught in bed with an unidentified 18-year-old male when he was arrested during the Night of the Long Knives, although Kempka did not actually witness it. According to Kempka, Heines refused to cooperate and get dressed. When the SS detectives reported this to Hitler, he went to Heines’s room and ordered him to get dressed within five minutes or risk being shot. After five minutes had passed by, Heines still had not complied with the order. As a result, Hitler became so furious that he ordered some SS men to take Heines and the boy outside to be executed.
1934 – Hans-Adam Otto von Heydebreck (b. 1889) German Freikorps- and SA leader, member of the Reichstag and a national socialist died. He was brought to Stadelheim Prison and killed by the SS.
1934 – Willi Schmid (b. 1893) German music critic, and an accidental victim of the Night of the Long Knives in a case of mistaken identity.
1934 – Bernhard Stempfle (b. 1882) Catholic priest and journalist. He helped Adolf Hitler in the writing of Mein Kampf died. It is considered possible that he was regarded as having too much information about Hitler’s past and personal life, and especially about the death of Hitler’s niece, Geli Raubal. He was deported to the Dachau concentration camp. His death is attributed by some accounts to a broken neck and by others to shots in the heart “while trying to escape”.
1937 – The world’s first emergency telephone number, 999, is introduced in London
1943 – Florence Ballard, American singer (The Supremes) (d. 1976) was born.
1942 – Robert Ballard, explorer/geologist/author/discoverer (Titanic in 1985) Born
1944 – Glenn Shorrock, Australian rock vocalist (Little River Band), born in Sydney, New South Wales
1944 – World War II: The Battle of Cherbourg ends with the fall of the strategically valuable port to American forces.
1944 – Terry Funk, American wrestler and actor was born.
1953 – Hal Lindes, American-English singer-songwriter and guitarist (Dire Straits) was born.
1956 – Adrian Wright, Sheffield, rock vocalist (Human League-Only Human) Born
1956 – David Alan Grier, comedian (In Living Color, Boomerang) Born
1963 – Yngwie J. Malmsteen, Swedish guitarist, Born
1963 – Ciaculli massacre: a car bomb, intended for Mafia boss Salvatore Greco, kills seven police officers and military personnel near Palermo.
1966 – The National Organization for Women, the United States’ largest feminist organization, is founded.
1966 – Mike Tyson, American boxer and actor was born.
1968 – Phil Anselmo, American singer-songwriter and producer (Pantera, Arson Anthem, Down, and Superjoint Ritual) was born.
1971 – Crew of Soyu
1971 – Georgi T Dobrovolsky, Soviet cosmonaut (Soyuz 11-land accident), dies at 43
1971 – Vladislav Nikolayevich Volkov, cosmonaut (Soyuz 7, 11), dies at 35
1971 – Ohio ratifies the 26th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, reducing the voting age to 18, thereby putting the amendment into effect.
1974 – Alberta King, mother of Martin Luther King Jr., assassinated in church
1979 – Faisal Shahzad, Pakistani-American terrorist, Allegedly! attempted the Times Square bombing was birthed.
1982 – Andy Knowles, British musician (Franz Ferdinand) Born
1985 – Michael Phelps, American swimmer (16 Olympic medals), born in Baltimore, Maryland
1986 – The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Bowers v. Hardwick that states can outlaw homosexual acts between consenting adults.
1990 – East Germany and West Germany merge their economies.
1993 – George “Spanky” McFarland, child actor (Our Gang), dies at age 65
1995 – Phyllis Hyman, R&B/Jazz singer (Prime of My Life), suicide at 45
1996 – Margaux Hemingway, model/actress (Lipstick), commits suicide at 41
1997 – The United Kingdom transfers sovereignty over Hong Kong to the People’s Republic of China.
2001 – Chet Atkins, American country guitar player and producer (b. 1924) Dies
2003 – Buddy Hackett, American comic (b. 1924) Dies
2014 – Bob Hastings, American actor (b. 1925) died.
2014 – Paul Mazursky, American film director and screenwriter, dies from pulmonary cardiac arrest at 84