331 BC – Alexander the Great defeats Darius III of Persia in the Battle of Gaugamela.
366 – Pope Damasus I is elected.
959 – Edgar the Peaceful becomes king of all England.
965 – Pope John XIII is elected.
1553 – Coronation of Queen Mary I of England.
1588 – Coronation of Shah Abbas I of Persia.
1730 – Ahmed III was forced to give up the throne.
1787 – Russians under Alexander Suvorov defeat the Turks at Kinburn.
1791 – First session of the French Legislative Assembly.
1795 – The Austrian Netherlands (present-day Belgium) annexed by Revolutionary France
1800 – Spain cedes Louisiana to France via the Third Treaty of San Ildefonso.
1814 – Opening of the Congress of Vienna, intended to redraw Europe's political map after the defeat of Napoleon the previous spring.
1827 – Russo-Persian War: The Russian army under Ivan Paskevich storms Yerevan, ending a millennium of Muslim domination of Armenia.
1829 – South African College is founded in Cape Town, South Africa; it will later separate into the University of Cape Town and the South African College Schools.
1832 – Texian political delegates convened at San Felipe de Austin to petition for changes in the governance of Mexican Texas
1843 – The News of the World tabloid begins publication in London.
1854 – The watch company founded in 1850 in Roxbury by Aaron Lufkin Dennison relocates to Waltham, Massachusetts, to become the Waltham Watch Company, a pioneer in the American system of watch manufacturing.
1861 – Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management is published, going on to sell 60,000 copies in its first year and remaining in print until the present day
1880 – First electric lamp factory is opened by Thomas Edison.
1887 – Balochistan is conquered by the British Empire.
1890 – Yosemite National Park is established by the U.S. Congress.
1891 – Stanford University opens its doors in California.
1898 – The Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration is founded under the name k.u.k. Exportakademie.
1903 – Baseball: The Boston Americans play the Pittsburgh Pirates in the first game of the modern World Series.
1908 – Ford puts the Model T car on the market at a price of US$825.
1910 – Los Angeles Times bombing: A large bomb destroys the Los Angeles Times building in downtown Los Angeles, killing 21.
1918 – World War I: Arab forces under T. E. Lawrence, also known as "Lawrence of Arabia", capture Damascus.
1918 – Sayid Abdullah became last Khan of Khiva.
1920 – Sir Percy Cox lands in Basra to assume his responsibilities as High Commissioner in Iraq.
1928 – The Soviet Union introduces its First five-year plan.
1931 – The George Washington Bridge linking New Jersey and New York opens.
1931 – Spain adopted women's suffrage.
1936 – Francisco Franco is named head of the Nationalist government of Spain.
1937 – The Japanese city Handa is founded in Aichi Prefecture.
1938 – Germany annexes the Sudetenland.
1939 – After a one-month Siege of Warsaw, hostile Nazi forces enter the city.
1940 – The Pennsylvania Turnpike, often considered the first superhighway in the United States, opens to traffic.
1942 – World War II: USS Grouper torpedoes Lisbon Maru not knowing she is carrying British PoWs from Hong Kong
1943 – World War II: Naples falls to Allied soldiers.
1946 – Nazi leaders are sentenced at Nuremberg trials.
1946 – Daegu October Incident occurs in Allied occupied Korea.
1947 – The North American F-86 Sabre flies for the first time.
1949 – The People's Republic of China is established and declared by Mao Zedong.
1955 – Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region was established.
1957 – First appearance of In God we trust on U.S. paper currency.
1958 – NASA is created to replace NACA.
1960 – Nigeria gains independence from the United Kingdom.
1961 – The United States Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) is formed, becoming the country's first centralized military espionage organization.
1961 – East and West Cameroon merge to form the Federal Republic of Cameroon.
1962 – First broadcast of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.
1964 – The Free Speech Movement is launched on the campus of University of California, Berkeley.
1964 – Japanese Shinkansen ("bullet trains") begin high-speed rail service from Tokyo to Osaka.
1965 – General Suharto puts down an apparent coup attempt by the 30 September Movement in Indonesia.
1966 – West Coast Airlines Flight 956 crashes with eighteen fatalities and no survivors 5.5 miles south of Wemme, Oregon. This accident marks the first loss of a DC-9.
1968 – The Guyanese government takes over the British Guiana Broadcasting Service (BGBS).
1969 – Concorde breaks the sound barrier for the first time.
1971 – Walt Disney World opens near Orlando, Florida, United States.
1971 – The first brain-scan using x-ray computed tomography (CT or CAT scan) is performed at Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon, London.
1975 – The Seychelles gain internal self-government. The Ellice Islands split from Gilbert Islands and take the name Tuvalu.
1975 – Thrilla in Manila: Muhammad Ali defeats Joe Frazier in a boxing match in Manila, Philippines.
1975 – Al Jackson, Jr. (Booker T. & the M.G.'s), was shot fatally five times in the back in his own home.
1978 – Tuvalu gains independence from the United Kingdom.
1978 – The Voltaic Revolutionary Communist Party is founded.
1979 – Pope John Paul II begins his first pastoral visit to the United States.
1979 – The MTR, the rapid transit railway system in Hong Kong, opens.
1979 – The United States returns sovereignty of the Panama Canal to Panama.
1982 – Helmut Kohl replaces Helmut Schmidt as Chancellor of Germany through a constructive vote of no confidence.
1982 – Epcot opens at Walt Disney World near Orlando, Florida, United States.
1982 – Sony launches the first consumer compact disc player (model CDP-101).
1983 – One man is killed and 26 people injured when multiple bombs destroyed the American, Soviet and Algerian pavilions at an international trade fair in Marseilles. ASALA took responsibility for the attack.
1985 – The Israeli Air Force bombs Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) headquarters in Tunis.
1987 – The 5.9 Mw Whittier Narrows earthquake shakes the San Gabriel Valley with a Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe), killing eight and injuring 200.
1989 – Denmark introduces the world's first legal modern same-sex civil union called "registered partnership".
1991 – The Siege of Dubrovnik begins.
1992 – Cartoon Network launched.
1994 – Palau gains independence from the United Nations (trusteeship administered by the United States of America).
2001 – Militants attack the state legislature building in Srinagar, Kashmir, killing 38.
2009 – The Supreme Court of the United Kingdom takes over the judicial functions of the House of Lords.
2009 – Thorbjørn Jagland became Secretary General of the Council of Europe.
2012 – A ferry collision off the coast of Hong Kong kills 38 people and injures 102 others.
2014 – A series of explosions at a gunpowder plant in the village of Gorni Lom in Northwestern Bulgaria completely destroys the factory, killing 15 people.
2015 – Umpqua Community College shooting: A gunman killed nine people at a community college in Roseburg, Oregon.
2015 – Heavy rains triggered a major landslide in the village of El Cambray Dos within Santa Catarina Pinula, killing 280 people.
2016 – The Western Bulldogs win their first Australian Football League grand final in 62 years.
