This Day in History

In Alaska, in the Nation and the World

In Alaska

• In 1929, Alaska Washington Airways initiated fly-in fishing service by taking a group to Hasselborg Lake on Admiralty Island.

• In 1939, a fire consumed the Haines Power Plant, Post Office and a theater. The Chilkoot Barracks provided emergency electric power to Haines.

In the nation

• In 1861, the Congress of the Confederate States began holding sessions in Richmond, Va.

• In 1917, the draft lottery in World War I went into operation.

• In 1944, President Roosevelt was nominated for an unprecedented fourth term of office at the Democratic convention in Chicago.

• In 1977, a flash flood hit Johnstown, Pa., killing more than 80 people and causing $350 million in damage.

• In 1988, Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis received the Democratic presidential nomination at the party's convention in Atlanta.

• In 1998, a smoky fire broke out aboard the cruise ship Ecstasy just 2 miles from the Florida shore, forcing the ship's return to port.

• In 2003, President Bush welcomed Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi to his Texas ranch for a two-day visit.

• In 2007, President Bush signed an executive order prohibiting cruel and inhuman treatment, including humiliation or denigration of religious beliefs, in the detention and interrogation of terrorism suspects.

In the world

• In 1810, Colombia declared independence from Spain.

• In 1871, British Columbia entered Confederation as a Canadian province.

• In 1944, an attempt by a group of German officials to assassinate Adolf Hitler with a bomb failed as the explosion at Hitler's Rastenburg headquarters only wounded the Nazi leader.

• In 1969, Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin became the first men to walk on the moon as they stepped out of their lunar module.

• In 1976, America's Viking 1 robot spacecraft made a successful, first-ever landing on Mars.