• 1077 - Walk to Canossa: The excommunication of Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor is lifted.
• 1521 - The Diet of Worms begins, lasting until May 25.
• 1547 - Henry VIII dies. His nine year old son, Edward VI becomes King, and the first Protestant ruler of England.
• 1573 - Articles of Warsaw Confederation are signed, sanctioning freedom of religion in Poland.
• 1754 - Horace Walpole, in a letter to Horace Mann, coins the word serendipity.
• 1624 - Sir Thomas Warner founds the first British colony in the Caribbean, on Saint Kitts.
• 1724 - The Russian Academy of Sciences was founded in St. Petersburg by Peter the Great, and implemented in the Senate decree. It was called St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences until 1917.
• 1760 - Pownal, Vermont created by Benning Wentworth as one of the New Hampshire Grants.
• 1813 - Pride and Prejudice is first published in the United Kingdom.
• 1820 - Russian expedition led by Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen and Mikhail Petrovich Lazarev discovered the Antarctic continent approaching the Antarctic coast.
• 1846 - Battle of Aliwal, India won by British troops commanded by Sir Harry Smith.
• 1855 - The first locomotive runs from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean on the Panama Railway.
• 1871 - Franco-Prussian War: Siege of Paris ends in French defeat and an armistice.
• 1878 - Yale Daily News becomes the first daily, college newspaper in the United States.
• 1887 - In a snowstorm at Fort Keogh, Montana, the world's largest snowflakes are reported, being 15 inches (38 cm) wide and 8 inches (20 cm) thick.
• 1902 - The Carnegie Institution is founded in Washington, DC with a $10 million gift from Andrew Carnegie.
• 1909 - United States troops leave Cuba with the exception of Guantanamo Bay Naval Base after being there since the Spanish-American War.
• 1915 - An act of the U.S. Congress creates the United States Coast Guard.
• 1916 - Louis D. Brandeis becomes the first Jew appointed to the United States Supreme Court.
• 1917 - Municipally owned streetcars take to the streets of San Francisco, California.
• 1918 - Finnish Civil War: Rebels seized control of the capital, Helsinki, and members of the Senate of Finland go underground.
• 1921 - A symbolic Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is installed beneath the Arc de Triomphe in Paris to honor the unknown dead of World War I.
• 1922 - Knickerbocker Storm, Washington D.C.'s biggest snowfall, causes the city's greatest loss of life when the roof of the Knickerbocker Theater collapses.
• 1932 - Japanese forces attack Shanghai.
• 1933 - The name Pakistan is coined by Choudhary Rehmat Ali Khan and is accepted by the Indian Muslims who then thereby adopted it further for the Pakistan Movement seeking independence.
• 1934 - The first ski tow in the United States begins operation in Vermont.
• 1935 - Iceland becomes the first Western country to legalize therapeutic abortion.
• 1938 - The World Land Speed Record on a public road is broken by driver Rudolf Caracciola in the Mercedes-Benz W195.
• 1945 - World War II: Supplies begin to reach the Republic of China over the newly reopened Burma Road.
• 1958 - The Lego company patented their design of Lego bricks, still compatible with bricks produced today.
• 1980 - USCGC Blackthorn (WLB-391) collides with the tanker Capricorn while leaving Tampa Florida and capsizes killing 23 Coast Guard crewmembers.
• 1981 - Ronald Reagan lifts remaining domestic petroleum price and allocation controls in the United States helping to end the 1979 energy crisis and begin the 1980s oil glut.
• 1982 - US Army general James L. Dozier is rescued by Italian anti-terrorism forces from captivity under the Red Brigades.
• 1986 - Space Shuttle program: STS-51-L mission (Space Shuttle Challenger disaster) - Space Shuttle Challenger breaks apart after liftoff killing all seven astronauts onboard.
• 2002 - TAME Flight 120, a Boeing 727-100 crashes in the Andes mountains in southern Colombia killing 92.
• 2004 - Lord Hutton publishes his report into the death of U.N. weapons inspector Dr. David Kelly.

Births