- 1863 – Eighteen countries meet in Geneva and agree to form the International Red Cross
- 1901 – Leon Czolgosz, the assassin of President William McKinley, is executed by electrocution.
- 1929 – The New York Stock Exchange crashes in what is come to be known as “Black Tuesday,” beginning the Great Depression.
- 1960 – In Louisville, Kentucky, Cassius Clay (who later takes the name Muhammad Ali) wins his first professional fight.
- 1969 – The first-ever computer-to-computer link is established on ARPANET, the precursor to the Internet.
- 1994 – A Colorado man was arrested after he sprayed the White House with bullets from an assault rifle. President Bill Clinton was inside at the time but no one was injured. The gunman was sentenced to 40 years in prison.
