Today is the 214th day of 2018. There are 151 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

1934: Germany’s President Paul von Hindenburg dies at age 87, and Adolf Hitler assumes the title of “Der Fuehrer”.

OTHER EVENTS

1610: During his fourth voyage to the Western Hemisphere, English explorer Henry Hudson sails into what is now known as Hudson Bay.

1637: Dutch expel Portuguese from Gold Coast in Africa.

1776: – Members of the Continental Congress begin adding their signatures to the US Declaration of Independence.

1824: Turkey captures island of Psara from Greeks.

1830: France’s King Charles X abdicates after July Revolution against his conservative policies.

1876: Frontiersman “Wild Bill” Hickok is shot and killed while playing poker at a saloon in Deadwood, Dakota Territory, by Jack McCall, who is later hanged.

1903: Macedonians take up arms to free themselves from Turkish rule. The rebellion is crushed in 11 days.

1909: The original Lincoln “wheat” penny first goes into circulation, replacing the “Indian Head” cent.

1923: The 29th president of the United States, Warren G Harding, dies in San Francisco; Vice President Calvin Coolidge becomes president.

1928: Italy signs 20-year treaty of friendship with Ethiopia.

1935: Britain passes the Government of India Act, separating Burma and Aden from India and granting self-government with a central legislature in New Delhi.

1939: Scientist Albert Einstein says in letter to US President Franklin D Roosevelt that America should start an atomic research programme. US President Roosevelt signed the Hatch Act, which prohibited civil service employees from taking an active part in political campaigns.

1940: Hermann Goering, Germany’s chief of the Luftwaffe, gives the “Eagle Day” directive to destroy British air power and start to invade Britain.

1943: A US Navy patrol torpedo boat, PT-109, commanded by Lieutenant John F Kennedy, sinks after being hit by a Japanese destroyer off the Solomon Islands. Kennedy is credited with saving members of the crew.

1951: In an effort to slow down the influx of illegal immigrants to the United States, a Mexican-US migrant labor treaty is signed, bringing 300,000 Mexicans to work on US harvests.

1959: The US military discloses it has successfully tested heat-seeking missiles to be used by infantrymen targeting low-flying planes.

1962: North Vietnamese patrol boats fire on US destroyer Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin, prompting the US Congress to authorise intervention in Vietnam.

1963: The United States the tells United Nations it will halt all sales of military equipment to South Africa because of its apartheid policy.

1974: Former White House counsel John W Dean III is sentenced to one to four years in prison for obstruction of justice in the Watergate cover-up. (Dean ends up serving four months.)

1977: North Korea creates a “military sea boundary” off its coastline and says foreign military, civilian ships and planes need permission to enter the zone.

1980: A bomb explodes at the train station in Bologna, Italy, killing 85 people.

1985: Some 137 people are killed when Delta Air Lines Flight 191, a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar, crashed while attempting to land at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.

1990: Iraqi tanks and infantry overrun Kuwait in a pre-dawn strike; Kuwaiti royal family flees to Saudi Arabia.

1992: Security forces arrest 50 armed Islamic extremists and seize an arms cache containing 130 bombs in Algiers.

1993: Serb gunners destroy a vital bridge in Croatia, severing the only land link between the southern Dalmatian coast and the rest of the country.

1995: King Fahd replaces his oil and finance ministers in Saudi Arabia’s most significant leadership shake-up since he came to power in 1982.

1996: The first 1,700 Rwandan refugees begin returning home, despite fear of reprisals from the new Tutsi Government.

1997: The United States ends a 20-year-old ban on the sale of most advanced weapons to Latin America.

1999: In India, 226 people die when two trains crash head-on in the predawn darkness near Gaisal, about 500 kilometres (310 miles) north of Calcutta.

2000: In Kashmir, Islamic guerrillas open fire on a crowd of unarmed Hindu pilgrims and Muslim porters during supper; the 24-hour wave of violence that follows leaves 101 dead. Republicans award Texas Governor George W Bush their 2000 presidential nomination at the party’s convention in Philadelphia and ratify Dick Cheney as his running mate.

2001: Muslim extremists seize 36 Filipinos on the southern Philippine island of Basilan; at least four are beheaded.

2002: Kazakh authorities sentence Galymzhan Zhakiyanov, founding member of the reform movement Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan, to seven years in prison for corruption and abuse of power.

2003: The US State Department suspends two programmes that allowed foreign air travellers on certain routes to enter the country without a visa.

2005: Snipers and soldiers in green berets keep watch as King Fahd, one of the world’s wealthiest monarchs, is laid to rest in Riyadh, Saudia Arabia.

2006: Ukrainian President Viktor Yushcheno says that he is nominating his former Orange Revolution foe, Viktor Yanukovych, to become prime minister.

2007: An overnight train derails in central Congo after its brakes failed, killing about 100 people.

2008:Two French humanitarian aid workers kidnapped on July 18 in Afghanistan are released. Police in southern Afghanistan report a bus carrying a wedding party strikes a mine, killing 10 people, including the bride and groom.

2009: Nigerian government forces hunt for surviving members of a radical Islamist sect after heavy fighting leaves at least 700 people dead and buildings and cars scorched.

2010: President Barack Obama hails this month’s planned withdrawal of all US combat troops from Iraq — “as promised and on schedule” — as a major success despite deep doubts about the Iraqis’ ability to police and govern their country.

2011: Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, 83 and ailing, goes on trial on charges of corruption and ordering the killing of protesters during the 18-day uprising that toppled him, and many Egyptians are celebrating the chance at retribution against a long-time authoritarian ruler.

2013: The United States issues an extraordinary global travel warning to Americans about the threat of an al-Qaeda attack and closed down 21 embassies and consulates across the Muslim world for the weekend.

2017: Former Notre Dame football coach Ara Parseghian dies at his home in Granger, Indiana, at the age of 94. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above 22,000 for the first time, after stocks spent five months gradually moving higher.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Edward A Freeman, English historian (1823-1892); Romulo Gallegos, Venezuelan president and novelist (1884-1969); Myrna Loy, US actress (1905-1993); James Baldwin, US author (1924-1987); Peter O’Toole, British actor (1932-2013); Isabel Allende, Chilean author (1942- ); Joanna Cassidy, US actress (1945- )

— AP