1859, Author Arthur Conan Doyle (he created Sherlock Holmes) is born. He dies in 1930.
1872, President Ulysses S. Grant signed the Amnesty Act, restoring civil rights to the citizens of the South after the Civil War.
1885 Author Victor Hugo (Les Miserables, The Hunchback Of Notre Dame) dies at age 83.
1907, Actor Laurence Olivier (Spartacus, Marathon Man, The Boys From Brazil) is born. He dies in 1989.
1930, American politician and civil rights activist Harvey Milk was born today. He was killed in 1978.
1939, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini signed a “Pact Of Steel” committing Germany and Italy to a military alliance.
1947, the Truman Doctrine was approved by Congress, giving military and economic aid to Greece and Turkey in an effort to contain communism.
1954, Robert Zimmerman celebrates his Bar Mitzvah. A few years later, he will change his name to Bob Dylan.
1958, Jerry Lee Lewis announced that he’d married his 13-year-old cousin Myra. The controversy almost ended his career.
1964, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson announces the goals of his Great Society social reforms to bring an “end to poverty and racial injustice” in America.
1972, Richard Nixon became the first U.S. president to visit the Soviet Union.
1992, Johnny Carson stepped down as host of The Tonight Show, with a final show that featured flashbacks from his nearly 30 years on the late night program.
1997, Kelly Flinn, the Air Force’s first female bomber pilot certified for combat, avoided a court-martial and accepted a general discharge for adultery, lying, and disobeying an order.
1998, a federal judge ruled that members of the Secret Service could be required to testify before a grand jury investigating President Bill Clinton‘s relationship with Monica Lewinsky.
2002, the remains of Chandra Levy were found in a Washington, D.C., park a little over a year after the 24-year-old former federal intern disappeared. During the investigation, it had been revealed that Levy had had an affair with Congressman Gary Condit of California and suspicions fell on him, although he was never named as a suspect by police.