1493 - Christopher Columbus becomes the first European to go ashore on an island he only saw for the first time the day before. He names it San Juan Bautista (later renamed Puerto Rico).
1881 - A meteorite struck earth near the village of Großliebenthal, a few kilometers southwest of Odessa, Ukraine.
1900-1999
1916 - Samuel Goldfish (later renamed Samuel Goldwyn) and Edgar Selwyn establish Goldwyn Company (the company later became one of the most successful independent filmmakers.)
1944 - World War II: US President Franklin D. Roosevelt announces the 6th War Loan Drive , aimed at selling US$14 billion in war bonds to help pay for the war effort.
1973 - American football player Lance Rentzel is arrested for exposing himself to a ten year old girl; he is later sentenced to five years' probation.
1977 - Egyptian President Anwar Sadat becomes the first Arab leader to officially visit Israel when he meets with Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin and speaks before the Knesset in Jerusalem, seeking a permanent peace settlement (much of the Arab world was outraged by the visit).
1984 - A series of explosions at the PEMEX petroleum storage facility at San Juan Ixhuatepec in Mexico City ignites a major fire and kills about 500 people.
1985 - Pennzoil wins a US$10.53 billion verdict from Texaco in the largest civil verdict in US history (Texaco established a signed contract to buy Getty Oil after Pennzoil entered into an unsigned, yet still binding, buyout contract with Getty.)
1990 - Pop group Milli Vanilli was stripped of their Grammy Award because the duo did not sing at all on the “Girl You Know It’s True” album. Session musicians had provided all the vocals.
1994 - In Britain, the first National Lottery draw was held. A £1 ticket gave a one-in-14-million chance of correctly guessing the winning six out of 49 numbers.
1997 - In Carlisle, Iowa, Bobbi McCaughey gives birth to septuplets in the second known case where all seven babies were born alive.
