| 2005 | Washington governor Christine Gregoire signs a bill naming the Orca as the state marine mammal.
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| 1991 | The last round of US troop withdrawals from southern Iraq begins, as Operation Desert Storm winds down.
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| 1944 | An explosion in the Bombay, India harbor kills 700 people.
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| 1939 | John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath is published.
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| 1927 | The first series-produced Volvo automobile, the wood-frame ÖV4, leaves the factory in Lundby, Sweden.
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| 1917 | Switzerland declares its neutrality during WWI.
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| 1912 | After colliding with an iceberg, the "unsinkable" Titanic begins sinking.
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| 1906 | The cornerstone for the House of Representatives Office Building is laid in Washington, DC.
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| 1902 | The first J.C. Penney store opens in Kemmerer, WY.
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| 1865 | US president Abraham Lincoln is shot and mortally wounded by John Wilkes Booth at the Ford Theater in Washington, DC.
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| 1828 | The first edition of Noah Webster's American Dictionary of the English Language is published.
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1789 | 
Retired general George Washington receives word that he has been unanimously elected
as the first US president. (The election occurred February 4, with votes tallied April 6.)
(photo credit: NARA)
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| 1775 | Ben Franklin and the Quakers establish the first abolitionist society.
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