1813 – Oliver Perry sent the message, “We have met the enemy, and they are ours,” after an American naval force defeated the British in the Battle of Lake Erie in the War of 1812.
1846 – Elias Howe received a patent for the sewing machine.
1963 – 20 black students entered the white public schools of Birmingham, Tuskegee and Mobile in Alabama after President John. F. Kennedy federalized the state’s National Guard.
1989 – Hungary stopped enforcing East German visa restrictions and opened its borders, beginning a flood of emigration that led to the fall of the Berlin Wall two months later.
2009 – U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) shouted “You lie!” during President Barack Obama’s address on healthcare reform to a joint session of Congress.
