1100: Henry I is crowned King of England in Westminster Abbey.
1305: William Wallace, who led Scottish resistance to England, is captured by the English near Glasgow and transported to London for trial and execution. While it's about as ahistorical as you can get without being 1941 (Edward I neither practiced nor encouraged jus primae noctis, for example) Braveheart is still a cracking good film.1583: Sir Humphrey Gilbert establishes first English colony in North America, at what is now St John's, Newfoundland.
1620: The Mayflower departs Southampton, England.
1858: Cyrus West Field and others complete the first transatlantic telegraph cable after several unsuccessful attempts. It operated for less than a month. If you've ever worked hard on a project, only to have a small detail derail the whole operation at the last minute, say a prayer for poor Cyrus Field. The first attempt at laying the cable failed when the cable broke and was lost to the depths. On the second attempt, the cable broke no less than three times and was salvaged. Once connection was made, it only worked for about a month until an operator overloaded the voltage on the line and burned it out.
1861: In order to help pay for the Civil War, the United States government issues the first income tax as part of the Revenue Act of 1861 (3% of all incomes over US $800; rescinded in 1872).1861: The United States Army abolishes flogging.
1862: Joseph Merrick "The Elephant Man" is born. Modern smart people say that he suffered from Type I Neurofibromatosis.
1884: The cornerstone for the Statue of Liberty is laid on Bedloe's Island (now called Liberty Island) in New York Harbor.
1925: Plaid Cymru is formed with the aim of disseminating knowledge of the Welsh language, which is in danger of dying out.1906: John Houston is born. His movies are a laundry list of the greatest movies ever made: The Maltese Falcon, Treasure of the Sierra Madre, The African Queen and The Man Who Would be King, among others. We can forgive his appearance as The Lawgiver in Battle for the Planet of the Apes because, hey, a guy's gotta pay rent.
1914: In Cleveland, Ohio, the first electric traffic light is installed.
1930: Neil Armstrong is born.
1935: John Saxon is born. Now here's an actor's actor! People of my generation will remember him best as Lt. Thompson (aka the heroine's father) in Nightmare on Elm Street but he's been in more low-budget slasher, exploitation, sci-fi or Italian Dawn of the Dead knockoffs than Keith (but not David) Carradine.1941: Bob Clark is born. He directed an extremely, uh, varied roster of films: the proto-slashers Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things and Black Christmas, the epic Porky's trilogy, A Christmas Story, and Turk 182.
1944: Polish insurgents liberate a German labor camp in Warsaw, freeing 348 Jewish prisoners.1946: Loni Anderson is born.
1957: American Bandstand, debuts on the ABC television network.
1961: Tawney Kitaen is born. She was last seen causing David Coverdale to violate traffic laws (shame!) in the video for "Here I Go Again."
1962: Nelson Mandela is jailed. He would not be released until 1990.
1962: Marilyn Monroe is found dead of an apparent suicide.
1966: The album "Revolver" is released by The Beatles.
Today in History elements mostly cribbed from The History Channel, Wikipedia, The New York Times, The Jewish World Review, The Writer's Almanac and anything else I can dig up.
