Discover What Happened Today in History
Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan, sailing for Spain, reached the islands of the Philippines. This marked the first European contact with the archipelago, a crucial step in the first circumnavigation of the globe.
The United States Military Academy was established by an act of Congress signed by President Thomas Jefferson. Located at West Point, New York, it became the nation's premier institution for training army officers.
Robert H. Goddard successfully launched the world's first liquid-fueled rocket in Auburn, Massachusetts. This pioneering test, though modest in altitude, laid the essential groundwork for modern rocketry and spaceflight.
U.S. Army soldiers killed between 347 and 504 unarmed South Vietnamese civilians in the hamlet of My Lai during the Vietnam War. The event, initially covered up, became a defining symbol of the war's brutality and a turning point in American public opinion.
The oil tanker Amoco Cadiz ran aground off the coast of Brittany, France, spilling its entire cargo of 1.6 million barrels of crude oil. It was the largest oil spill from a tanker in history at the time, causing massive environmental damage.