1847 – US Post Office Department is authorized to issue postage stamps.
1877 – Rutherford B. Hayes takes the oath of office privately as official inauguration day falls on a Sunday.
1903 – North Carolina becomes first state requiring registration of nurses.
1910 – John D. Rockefeller Jr. announces his retirement from managing his businesses so that he can be devoted full time to being a philanthropist at the Rockefeller Foundation.
1919 – First international air mail service from United States, Seattle to Victoria, British Columbia.
1931 – “The Star-Spangled Banner” officially becomes US national anthem by congressional resolution, lyrics by Francis Scott Key in 1814, set to John Stafford Smith’s 16th century tune “The Anacreontic Song”
1943 – Battle of the Bismarck Sea: Australian and American air forces devastate a Japanese Navy convoy.
1950 – National-American Football League reverts to calling itself the NFL after 3 months.
1956 – 3rd ACC Men’s Basketball Tournament: NC State beats Wake Forest 76-64.
1960 – 9th largest snowfall in New York City history (14.5 inches)
1966 – Twister hits Jackson Mississippi, three minutes after first sighting, 57 die.
1969 – Apollo 9 launched for 151 Earth orbits in 10 days.
1979 – 26th ACC Men’s Basketball Tournament: North Carolina beats Duke 71-63.
1985 – Bill Shoemaker becomes first jockey to win $100 million.
1992 – President George H.W. Bush apologizes for raising taxes after pledging not to.
1998 – Bill Gates testifies at the Senate Judiciary Committee about Microsoft’s dominant position in the software industry.
2005 – Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly an airplane around the world solo without any stops without refueling – a journey of 25,000 miles completed in 67 hours and 2 minutes.
2019 – Multiple tornadoes tear through Georgia and Alabama killing at least 23.
2020 – US Federal Reserve makes its lowest target rate cut in a decade, cutting short-term interest rates by 0.5% to 1.0% protect the economy against COVID-19.
2021 – President Joe Biden criticizes lifting of COVID-19 restrictions by Texas and Mississippi as “Neanderthal thinking.”
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