[Aung San Suu Kyi is one of the foremost opponents of tyranny in the world today, seemingly having resisted the junta (which in June 1989 changed the name of Burma to Myanmar) ever since her father - Aung San, the 'father of modern Burma' - was assassinated in July 1947, when she was just 2. Since handily winning parliamentary elections in 1990, despite being under house arrest at the time, Dr. Suu Kyi is the rightful Prime Minister of Burma;
she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991.]
1540 - The Society of Jesus - an organization better known as the Jesuits, founded by Ignatius of Loyola in August 1534 - received its charter from Pope Paul III in the form of the papal bull Regimini militantis ecclesiae, which initially limited the society's membership to 60.
1590 - Pope Urban VII died just 13 days after his elevation to the papacy, making his the shortest papal reign in history.
1787 - The US Constitution was delivered to the states for ratification.
1821 - With the establishment of the First Mexican Empire - under its newly elected Emperor Agustín de Iturbide - Mexico's independence from Spain was recognized, having first been declared in September 1810 by Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla.
1822 - Jean-François Champollion announced that he'd deciphered the Rosetta Stone, which had been 'discovered' by Pierre-Francois Bouchard in July 1799; Champollion's findings were published the following year.
1825 - The Stockton and Darlington Railway opened, beginning operations as the world's first service of locomotive-hauled passenger trains.
1854 - The side-wheeler steamship SS Arctic sank off Newfoundland's Cape Race after colliding with the French vessel SS Vesta, marking the first great civilian maritime disaster in the Atlantic Ocean; lost in the sinking were 92 of her 153 officers and men and all her women and children passengers - including the wife, the only daughter, and the youngest son of Collins Line manager Edward Knight Collins.
1903 - The Wreck of the Old 97 - a train crash made famous by the railroad ballad of the same name - occurred near Danville, Virginia while the train was en route from Monroe, Virginia to Spencer, North Carolina.
1908 - The first Ford Model T automobile rolled off the assembly line at the Piquette Plant in Detroit.
1916 - Iyasu was proclaimed deposed as ruler of Ethiopia in a palace coup; he was succeeded by his aunt Zauditu.
1922 - King Constantine I of Greece abdicated in favour of his eldest son, who became King George II.
1937 - The last Balinese tiger - an adult female - was killed at Sumbar Kima.
1938 - The ocean liner RMS Queen Elizabeth - named for the then Queen Consort of England, Queen Elizabeth - was launched in Glasgow.
1940 - Germany, Italy, and Japan signed the Tripartite Pact in Berlin, thus solidifying the unity of the Axis powers.
1954 - The Tonight Show made its debut as Tonight! starring Steve Allen; the show was originally 105 minutes in length, and broadcast live from New York City.
1964 - The Warren Commission released its report on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy; some of us are still waiting for the non-fiction version... The commission's name came from its chairman, US Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren.
1968 - The stage musical Hair opened at London's Shaftesbury Theatre, where it played 1,998 performances until literally bringing the roof down in July 1973.
1988 - Burma's National League for Democracy was founded by Aung San Suu Kyi.
2001 - Friedrich Leibacher went on a shooting rampage, killing 14 and injuring 18 others in the parliament house of the Swiss canton of Zug before turning the gun on himself.
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