Discover What Happened Today in History
The last remaining American combat troops departed South Vietnam, marking the end of direct U.S. military involvement in the Vietnam War. This followed the signing of the Paris Peace Accords in January of the same year.
For roughly 30 hours, the mighty Niagara Falls stopped flowing. An ice jam in the Niagara River upstream caused water to be blocked, allowing people to walk on the riverbed and explore the normally submerged cliff.
A U.S. federal court convicted Ethel and Julius Rosenberg of conspiracy to commit espionage for passing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. Their trial and subsequent execution became a defining controversy of the early Cold War era.
NASA's Mariner 10 spacecraft made its first flyby of the planet Mercury, becoming the first probe to visit the innermost planet. It transmitted the first close-up images of Mercury's cratered surface.
Pharmacist Dr. John Pemberton brewed the first batch of Coca-Cola syrup in a backyard in Atlanta, Georgia. Initially marketed as a patent medicine, it would become one of the world's most iconic cultural and commercial brands.