1472 – Orkney and Shetland are pawned by Norway to Scotland in lieu of a dowry for Margaret of Denmark

1547 – Edward VI of England is crowned King of England at Westminster Abbey.

1673 – The first recorded wine auction took place in London

1792 – The Postal Service Act, establishing the United States Post Office Department, is signed by United States President George Washington.

1798 – Louis-Alexandre Berthier removes Pope Pius VI from power.

1846 – Polish insurgents lead an uprising in Kraków to incite a fight for national independence.

1872 – In New York City the Metropolitan Museum of Art opens.

1909 – Publication of the Futurist Manifesto in the French journal Le Figaro.

1921 – The Young Communist League of Czechoslovakia is founded.

1933 – The Congress of the United States proposes the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution that will end Prohibition in the United States.

1935 – Caroline Mikkelsen becomes the first woman to set foot in Antarctica.

1943 – American movie studio executives agree to allow the Office of War Information to censor movies

1952 – Emmett Ashford becomes the first African-American umpire in organized baseball by being authorized to be a substitute umpire in the Southwestern International League.

1962 – Mercury program: While aboard Friendship 7, John Glenn becomes the first American to orbit the earth, making three orbits in four hours, 55 minutes.

1965 – Ranger 8 crashes into the Moon after a successful mission of photographing possible landing sites for the Apollo program astronauts.

1986 – The Soviet Union launches its Mir spacecraft. Remaining in orbit for 15 years, it is occupied for ten of those years.

2009 – Two Tamil Tigers aircraft packed with C4 explosives en route to the national airforce headquarters are shot down by the Sri Lankan military before reaching their target, in a kamikaze style attack.

2013 – The smallest extrasolar planet, Kepler-37b is discovered.