1586 – English colonists leave Roanoke Island, after failing to establish England’s first permanent settlement in North America.
1846 – The first officially recorded, organized baseball game is played under Alexander Cartwright’s rules on Hoboken, New Jersey’s Elysian Fields with the New York Base Ball Club defeating the Knickerbockers 23-1.
1856 – The first Republican national convention ended in Philadelphia with the nomination of explorer John Fremont of California for president. James Buchanan, a Federalist nominated by the Democrats, was elected.
1862 – Congress prohibits slavery in United States territories, nullifying Dred Scott v. Sandford.
1953 – Convicted spies Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were executed by electric chair at Sing Sing Correctional facility in New York.
1964 – The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is approved after surviving an 83-day filibuster in the Senate.
1987 – The Supreme Court struck down a Louisiana law requiring schools to teach the creationist theory of human origin espoused by fundamentalist Christians.
1991 – Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar surrendered to police.
2000 – The Supreme Court ruled prayers led by students at public high school football games aren’t permitted under the constitutional separation of church and state.
