| On this date in: |
| 1831 |
Belgium became independent as Leopold I was proclaimed King of the Belgians. |
| 1861 |
The first Battle of Bull Run was fought at Manassas, Va., during the Civil War, resulting in a Confederate victory. |
| 1899 |
Author Ernest Hemingway was born in Oak Park, Ill. |
| 1944 |
The Democratic National Convention in Chicago nominated Sen. Harry S. Truman to be vice president. |
| 1949 |
The U.S. Senate ratified the North Atlantic Treaty. |
| 1954 |
France surrendered North Vietnam to the Communists. |
| 1961 |
Capt. Virgil “Gus” Grissom became the second American to rocket into a sub-orbital pattern around the Earth, flying on the Liberty Bell 7. |
| 1969 |
Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin blasted off from the moon aboard the lunar module. |
| 1988 |
Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis accepted the Democratic presidential nomination at the party’s convention in Atlanta. |
| 1998 |
Astronaut Alan Shepard died at age 74. |
| 2002 |
Telecommunications giant WorldCom Inc. filed for bankruptcy protection after disclosing it had inflated profits by nearly $4 billion through deceptive accounting. |
| 2007 |
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” the final volume in the book series by J.K. Rowling, went on sale. |
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| AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth |
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| 2008 |
Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, one of the world’s top war crimes fugitives, was arrested in a Belgrade suburb by Serbian security forces. |
| 2010 |
President Barack Obama signed into law the most sweeping overhaul of U.S. lending and high finance rules since the 1930s. |
| 2011 |
The space shuttle program came to an end after 30 years as Atlantis landed at Cape Canaveral, Fla.. |
