This Day in History
In Alaska
• In 1775, Capt. Hecata found Bucareli Bay near Craig.
• In 1826, Sir John Franklin "discovered" Prudhoe Bay.
• In 1884, the USS Pinta arrived in Sitka, where she was to be stationed for the next 13 years.
• In 1919, Walter Hickel, Alaska's governor from 1966 to 1969 and 1990 to 1994, was born.
• In 1959, the North Star Creamery Plant in Anchorage began operation.
• In 1979, Joe Reddington Sr., Susan Butcher, and their pilot Vern Lawton were found safe after their plane went down two days before, 90 miles west of McGrath.
• In 1979, the Dempster Highway, from Dawson, in Canada's Yukon, to Inuvik, in Canada's Northwest Territory, was officially opened for public traffic.
In the nation
• In 1587, Virginia Dare became the first child of English parents to be born on American soil, on what is now Roanoke Island, N.C.
• In 1846, U.S. forces led by Gen. Stephen W. Kearny captured Santa Fe, N.M.
• In 1894, Congress established the Bureau of Immigration.
• In 1914, President Wilson issued his "Proclamation of Neutrality," aimed at keeping the United States out of World War I.
• In 1920, Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, which guaranteed the right of all American women to vote.
• In 1938, President Franklin Roosevelt dedicated the Thousand Islands Bridge connecting the United States and Canada in northern New York.
• In 1954, during the Eisenhower administration, Assistant Secretary of Labor James E. Wilkins became the first black official to attend a meeting of a president's Cabinet as he sat in for Labor Secretary James P. Mitchell.
• In 1963, James Meredith became the first black to graduate from the University of Mississippi.
• In 1982, for the first time, volume on the New York Stock exchange topped the 100 million level as 132.69 million shares were traded.
• In 1983, Hurricane Alicia slammed into the Texas coast, leaving 22 dead and causing more than $1 billion worth of damage.
• In 1995, Shannon Faulkner, who'd won a 2 1/2-year legal battle to become the first female cadet at The Citadel, quit the South Carolina military college after less than a week, most of it spent in the infirmary.
• In 2000, fresh from the Democratic National Convention, Al Gore and Joseph Lieberman shoved off from the banks of the Mississippi on a riverboat cruise to stir excitement for their freshly launched White House campaign.
In the world
• In 1958, the novel "Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov was published.
• In 2004, in Athens, Paul Hamm won the men's gymnastics all-around Olympic gold medal by the closest margin ever in the event; controversy followed after it was discovered a scoring error might have cost Yang Tae-young of South Korea the title.