1502 – Christopher Columbus set sail from Spain on his fourth and final voyage to the New World.
1887 – Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show opens in London.
1926 – Admiral Richard E. Byrd and Floyd Bennett claim to have flown over the North Pole.
1945 – The final German Instrument of Surrender is signed at the Soviet headquarters in Berlin.
1974 – The House Judiciary Committee opens formal impeachment hearings against President Richard Nixon.
1979 – The U.S. and Soviet Union reached a basic accord on the SALT II nuclear arms treaty. The agreement was signed in June but never went into effect.
