1953: Rosenbergs executed for espionage.After the failure of two years of court appeals and of a worldwide campaign for mercy, husband and wife Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were put to death this day, becoming the first American civilians to be executed for espionage. Ethel's brother, a machinist assigned to the Manhattan Project, provided information on nuclear weapons that the Rosenbergs passed on to the Soviet Union. For years after the execution, there was debate about the Rosenbergs' guilt, but this controversy was largely resolved in the early 1990s when Soviet intelligence documents confirmed their involvement in espionage.More events on this day1963:Soviet cosmonaut Valentina V. Tereshkova, the first woman to travel in space, returned to Earth in the spacecraft Vostok 6. |
1961:Great Britain recognized Kuwait's independence. |
1944:On this day and the next during World War II, the Japanese Combined Fleet and the U.S. 5th Fleet engaged in a major air-and-sea battle, the Battle of the Philippine Sea, which ended in U.S. victory. |
1934:The Federal Communications Commission was organized in the United States. |
1867:The emperor of Mexico, Maximilian, was executed by a firing squad. |
1846:Alexander Joy Cartwright arranged a baseball game between the New York Knickerbockers and the New York Nine at Hoboken, New Jersey—the first baseball game to use the set of rules on which today's game is based. |
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