1959 – In New York City, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum opens to the public.

1940 – The first edition of the Ernest Hemingway novel For Whom the Bell Tolls is published.

1973 – Watergate scandal: "Saturday Night Massacre": United States President Richard Nixon fires U.S. Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus after they refuse to fire special prosecutor Archibald Cox, who is finally fired by Solicitor General Robert Bork.

1961 – The Soviet Navy performs the first armed test of a submarine-launched ballistic missile, launching an R-13 from a Golf-class submarine.

1947 – Cold War: The House Un-American Activities Committee begins its investigation into Communist infiltration of the Hollywood film industry, resulting in a blacklist that prevents some from working in the industry for years.

1953 – Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 is published.

1943 – Streptomycin, the first antibiotic remedy for tuberculosis, is isolated by researchers at Rutgers University.

1900 – Max Planck discovers Planck's law of black-body radiation.

1847 – The novel Jane Eyre is published in London.

1954 – Texas Instruments announces the Regency TR-1, the first mass-produced transistor radio.

1945 – The USSR's nuclear program receives plans for the United States plutonium bomb from Klaus Fuchs at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

1929 – The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council overrules the Supreme Court of Canada in Edwards v. Canada when it declares that women are considered "Persons" under Canadian law.

1922 – The British Broadcasting Company (later Corporation) is founded by a consortium, to establish a nationwide network of radio transmitters to provide a national broadcasting service.

1851 – Herman Melville's Moby-Dick is first published as The Whale by Richard Bentley of London.

1648 – Boston shoemakers form the first American labor organization.

1956 – The first commercial nuclear power station is officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II in Sellafield, England.

1933 – Albert Einstein flees Nazi Germany and moves to the United States.

1907 – Marconi begins the first commercial transatlantic wireless service.

1814 – Eight people die in the London Beer Flood.

1995 – The Million Man March takes place in Washington, D.C. About 837,000 attend.