Highlights in history on this date:
1792 - Kentucky becomes the 15th American state to join the union.
1802 - Aboriginal warrior Pemulwuy, described by Governor Philip King as "a terrible pest to the colony", is shot dead, probably by Henry Hacking. Pemulwuy's head is cut off and sent to England.
1880 - The first telephone box for public use goes into service in the US. It is installed by the Connecticut Telephone Co in its office in New Haven.
1850 - The first transported convicts arrive in Western Australia when 75 prisoners disembark from the Scindian. On board is 10-year-old George Throssell, the son of a guard, who is destined to become the second premier of Western Australia.
1918 - First use of aircraft in combat by ships of the Royal Australian Navy in the Heligoland Bight. Aircraft are launched from the HMAS Sydney and HMAS Melbourne to intercept two German aircraft.
1943 - A passenger flight from Lisbon to London is shot down by the Germans during World War II, killing all aboard including actor Leslie Howard.
1944 - BBC Radio broadcasts coded message to warn French Resistance that D-Day invasion is imminent.
1958 - Charles de Gaulle becomes prime minister of France.
1959 - Australian Migration Act comes into force, substituting an entry permit for the dictation test which had been used in previous years to keep out the unwelcome.
1967 - The Beatles release their landmark album, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
1968 - Death of author-lecturer Helen Keller, who earned a college degree despite being blind and deaf most of her life.
1979 - The former British colony of Rhodesia becomes Zimbabwe-Rhodesia. Bishop Abel Muzorewa becomes its first black prime minister, ending 89 years of white rule.
1980 - Cable News Network (CNN) makes its debut in the US.
1985 - A campaign to improve the manners of West Australians is launched by the West Australian Tourism Industry Association before the 1987 America's Cup.
1987 - Lebanon's Prime Minister Rashid Karami is killed when a time bomb planted in a case explodes in his lap aboard a helicopter.
1994 - South Africa rejoins the Commonwealth after an absence of 33 years.
1998 - After 38 hours and 33 minutes, Australian distance swimmer Susie Maroney completes a 197km crossing from Mexico to Cuba.
1999 - El Salvador swears in its youngest-ever president, 39-year-old Francisco Flores.
2000 - A UN tribunal for Rwanda's 1994 genocide sentences a Belgian-born radio journalist to 12 years in prison for broadcasts that encouraged the slaughter.
2001 - Nepal's crown prince Dipendra shoots and kills his parents, Lạc Sơn Đại Phật King Birendra and Queen Aiswarya, a prince, princess and four other royal family members before shooting himself.
2002 - Queen Elizabeth II celebrates 50 years on the throne by opening Buckingham Palace to 12,000 guests for a four-day national part.
2004 - Australia's Jennifer Hawkins wins the Miss Universe contest, being held in Quito, Ecuador. The pageant's co-owner, Donald Trump, calls her "the most beautiful Miss Universe I have seen in many, many years".
2006 - The US Army Corps of Engineers takes responsibility for the flooding of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, saying the levees failed because they were built in a disjointed fashion using outdated data.
2009 - An Air France jet carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro to Paris runs into a towering wall of thunderstorms and disappears over the Atlantic Ocean.
2010 - Al-Qaeda announces that its No. 3 official, Mustafa al-Yazid, has been killed along with members of his family in perhaps one of the most severe blows to the terror movement since the US campaign against al-Qaeda began.
2011 - Images of children tortured and killed in a government crackdown circulate widely among Syrians on YouTube, Al-Jazeera and Facebook, stoking even more fury against the regime of President Bashar Assad.
2012 - A South African court jails Australian Shumsheer Singh Ghumman for nine years for fire-bombing the Cape Town home of a woman he was obsessed with, after trying to hire a hitman to kill her father.
2013 - Two drone strikes kill at least seven suspected al-Qaeda militants in the Abyan Governorate of Yemen.
2015 - Caitlyn Jenner, one-time Olympic decathlon champion formerly known as Bruce, unveils her new name and look on the cover of US magazine Vanity Fair.
2017 - Vincent O'Dempsey and Gary Dubois are sentenced to life in jail for the murder of Brisbane mother Barbara McCulkin and her two daughters Vicki and Leanne in 1974.
2018 - Socialist Pedro Sanchez becomes the prime minister of Spain after Mariano Rajoy is voted out in a no-confidence motion.
2019 - Funding from a group of philanthropists including Bill Gates green lights clinical trials of a cheap and easy eye test to detect Alzheimer's disease before symptoms appear.
Today's Birthdays:
Dante, Italian writer and philosopher (1265-1321); Brigham Young, US Mormon leader (1801-1877); John Masefield, English poet (1878-1967); Marilyn Monroe, US actress (1926-1962); Edward Woodward, British actor (1930-2009); Pat Boone, US singer (1934-); Colleen McCullough, Australian author (1937-2015); Morgan Freeman, US actor (1937-); Rene Auberjonois, US actor (1940-); Ronnie Wood, rock guitarist, The Rolling Stones (1947-); Jason Donovan, Australian actor-singer (1968-); Heidi Klum, German supermodel (1973-); Adam Garcia, Australian actor, singer and dancer (1973-); Alanis Morissette, Canadian singer (1974-); Justine Henin, Belgian tennis player (1982-).
Thought For Today:
Peace without justice is tyranny - Allen White, American writer and newspaper editor (1868-1944).
1792 - Kentucky becomes the 15th American state to join the union.
1802 - Aboriginal warrior Pemulwuy, described by Governor Philip King as "a terrible pest to the colony", is shot dead, probably by Henry Hacking. Pemulwuy's head is cut off and sent to England.
1880 - The first telephone box for public use goes into service in the US. It is installed by the Connecticut Telephone Co in its office in New Haven.
1850 - The first transported convicts arrive in Western Australia when 75 prisoners disembark from the Scindian. On board is 10-year-old George Throssell, the son of a guard, who is destined to become the second premier of Western Australia.
1918 - First use of aircraft in combat by ships of the Royal Australian Navy in the Heligoland Bight. Aircraft are launched from the HMAS Sydney and HMAS Melbourne to intercept two German aircraft.
1943 - A passenger flight from Lisbon to London is shot down by the Germans during World War II, killing all aboard including actor Leslie Howard.
1944 - BBC Radio broadcasts coded message to warn French Resistance that D-Day invasion is imminent.
1958 - Charles de Gaulle becomes prime minister of France.
1959 - Australian Migration Act comes into force, substituting an entry permit for the dictation test which had been used in previous years to keep out the unwelcome.
1967 - The Beatles release their landmark album, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
1968 - Death of author-lecturer Helen Keller, who earned a college degree despite being blind and deaf most of her life.
1979 - The former British colony of Rhodesia becomes Zimbabwe-Rhodesia. Bishop Abel Muzorewa becomes its first black prime minister, ending 89 years of white rule.
1980 - Cable News Network (CNN) makes its debut in the US.
1985 - A campaign to improve the manners of West Australians is launched by the West Australian Tourism Industry Association before the 1987 America's Cup.
1987 - Lebanon's Prime Minister Rashid Karami is killed when a time bomb planted in a case explodes in his lap aboard a helicopter.
1994 - South Africa rejoins the Commonwealth after an absence of 33 years.
1998 - After 38 hours and 33 minutes, Australian distance swimmer Susie Maroney completes a 197km crossing from Mexico to Cuba.
1999 - El Salvador swears in its youngest-ever president, 39-year-old Francisco Flores.
2000 - A UN tribunal for Rwanda's 1994 genocide sentences a Belgian-born radio journalist to 12 years in prison for broadcasts that encouraged the slaughter.
2001 - Nepal's crown prince Dipendra shoots and kills his parents, Lạc Sơn Đại Phật King Birendra and Queen Aiswarya, a prince, princess and four other royal family members before shooting himself.
2002 - Queen Elizabeth II celebrates 50 years on the throne by opening Buckingham Palace to 12,000 guests for a four-day national part.
2004 - Australia's Jennifer Hawkins wins the Miss Universe contest, being held in Quito, Ecuador. The pageant's co-owner, Donald Trump, calls her "the most beautiful Miss Universe I have seen in many, many years".
2006 - The US Army Corps of Engineers takes responsibility for the flooding of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, saying the levees failed because they were built in a disjointed fashion using outdated data.
2009 - An Air France jet carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro to Paris runs into a towering wall of thunderstorms and disappears over the Atlantic Ocean.
2010 - Al-Qaeda announces that its No. 3 official, Mustafa al-Yazid, has been killed along with members of his family in perhaps one of the most severe blows to the terror movement since the US campaign against al-Qaeda began.
2011 - Images of children tortured and killed in a government crackdown circulate widely among Syrians on YouTube, Al-Jazeera and Facebook, stoking even more fury against the regime of President Bashar Assad.
2012 - A South African court jails Australian Shumsheer Singh Ghumman for nine years for fire-bombing the Cape Town home of a woman he was obsessed with, after trying to hire a hitman to kill her father.
2013 - Two drone strikes kill at least seven suspected al-Qaeda militants in the Abyan Governorate of Yemen.
2015 - Caitlyn Jenner, one-time Olympic decathlon champion formerly known as Bruce, unveils her new name and look on the cover of US magazine Vanity Fair.
2017 - Vincent O'Dempsey and Gary Dubois are sentenced to life in jail for the murder of Brisbane mother Barbara McCulkin and her two daughters Vicki and Leanne in 1974.
2018 - Socialist Pedro Sanchez becomes the prime minister of Spain after Mariano Rajoy is voted out in a no-confidence motion.
2019 - Funding from a group of philanthropists including Bill Gates green lights clinical trials of a cheap and easy eye test to detect Alzheimer's disease before symptoms appear.
Today's Birthdays:
Dante, Italian writer and philosopher (1265-1321); Brigham Young, US Mormon leader (1801-1877); John Masefield, English poet (1878-1967); Marilyn Monroe, US actress (1926-1962); Edward Woodward, British actor (1930-2009); Pat Boone, US singer (1934-); Colleen McCullough, Australian author (1937-2015); Morgan Freeman, US actor (1937-); Rene Auberjonois, US actor (1940-); Ronnie Wood, rock guitarist, The Rolling Stones (1947-); Jason Donovan, Australian actor-singer (1968-); Heidi Klum, German supermodel (1973-); Adam Garcia, Australian actor, singer and dancer (1973-); Alanis Morissette, Canadian singer (1974-); Justine Henin, Belgian tennis player (1982-).
Thought For Today:
Peace without justice is tyranny - Allen White, American writer and newspaper editor (1868-1944).
