Gerald Ford becomes vice president after Agnew resigns (1973), and Columbus reaches the island he calls Hispaniola (1492). Born on this day: Suga Yoshihide, Peter Handke and Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac. Died: Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, Jefferson Davis and Clement VI.
31 events, 89 births and 62 deaths on this date.
Ford was the first person picked for the job under the Twenty-fifth Amendment, the rule for filling a vacant vice presidency. It came two months after Spiro Agnew stepped down, and he later became president himself when Nixon resigned.
David Hume Kennerly · Public domainColumbus had searched Cuba for gold, still convinced it was Japan, before sailing on to this island. Today the island is divided between Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Roosevelt said the United States could act as an international police force in the Western Hemisphere, extending the Monroe Doctrine, which had warned European powers off the Americas. The claim gave Washington grounds to intervene in Latin American affairs for decades.
Adam Cuerden · Public domain
The national legislature left New York City for Philadelphia, which served as the seat of government while the permanent capital was being built on the Potomac. The move kept Congress in a city already familiar as a centre of the young republic's politics.
On this day, London began licensing taxicabs, a first for any city in the world. Taxis, vehicles for hire that carry passengers on demand, were now formally regulated in the capital.
Fourteen-year-old swimmer Sandra Morgan won gold in Melbourne, becoming the youngest Olympic champion Australia has produced. It was a home win at Games that were the first ever staged in the Southern Hemisphere.
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Raised in rural Akita Prefecture by strawberry growers, Suga Yoshihide later won a seat in Yokohama's assembly and became Prime Minister of Japan in 2020. He is best known for his year as prime minister, which followed the longest stint ever as Chief Cabinet Secretary.
内閣官房内閣広報室 · CC BY 4.0
Austrian novelist and playwright known for deadpan, highly objective novels and for his 2019 Nobel Prize in Literature. He also wrote screenplays for Wim Wenders, including Wings of Desire.
"Wild + Team Agentur - UNI Salzburg" · CC BY-SA 3.0
Gay-Lussac worked out, with Alexander von Humboldt, that water combines two parts hydrogen to one of oxygen by volume. He also formulated two laws governing gases, and his studies of spirit and water blends gave us the alcohol-strength scale still used in many countries.
François-Séraphin Delpech · Public domain
Ambedkar chaired the committee that drafted India's Constitution, and spent his career campaigning for the rights of Dalits. Earlier in 1956 he converted to Buddhism, inspiring a Dalit Buddhist movement.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
Jefferson Davis led the Confederate States during the American Civil War, the only man to hold its presidency. Before that he had served as a senator and as United States secretary of war.
Mathew Benjamin Brady · Public domain
Clement VI was the fourth pope to rule from Avignon rather than Rome. He is remembered for issuing a pardon for sins to anyone who died of the Black Death, and for drawing French composers into his court.
Matteo Giovanetti · Public domain
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