- 1780 – Alexander Hamilton marries Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton at the Schuyler Mansion in Albany, New York.
- 1799 – Former President George Washington died at his Mount Vernon home in Virginia.
- 1819 – Alabama becomes the 22nd state.
- 1911 – Roald Amundsen’s team becomes the first to reach the South Pole.
- 1940 – Plutonium is first isolated at Berkeley, California.
- 1972 – Apollo 17 commander Eugene Cernan re-entered the lunar lander — the last man to walk on the moon.
- 2012 – A gunman killed 27 people, including 20 children at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., then killed himself.
