[The Human Be-In expressed the highest ideals of the 1960s counterculture - ideals that would soon enough be undone by the highest members of the movement's leadership; still, people like artist Michael Bowen and poet Allen Ginsberg were definitely on to something... For liberating people unsuited to the treadmill of the bourgeoisie (myself included) they and their ilk will forever be considered heroes, at least by me.]
1301 - King Andrew III died, ending the Arpad dynasty in Hungary; he was succeeded there by Wenceslas III of Bohemia, who took the throne as Ladislaus V, and in Croatia by Charles I.
1639 - The Fundamental Orders, the first written constitution that created a government in Western history, was adopted by the council of the Connecticut Colony; to this day Connecticut is known as the Constitution State for this singular contribution to democracy.
1724 - Spain's King Philip V abdicated, only to be restored seven months later in August when his son and successor Louis died of smallpox six days after his 17th birthday.
1761 - The Third Battle of Panipat was fought in India between the Afghans under Ahmad Shah Durrani and the French-supplied Marathas; the Afghan victory changed the course of Indian history by allowing the British to gain a military advantage in the Subcontinent over the Marathas, who sustained heavy casualties.
1832 - Edgar Allan Poe published his first short story, Metzengerstein.
1858 - Emperor Napoleon III of France and his wife Eugénie escaped assassination while on their way to the opera in Paris; the botched attempt was plotted by Italian nationalist Felice Orsini and carried out with the assistance of Giuseppe Pieri, Antonio Gomez and Carlo di Rudio. While the royal couple were unhurt by the trio of bomb blasts, eight others were killed and 142 were injured in the attempt, including Orsini himself.
1939 - Norway claimed Queen Maud Land in Antarctica; this claim has never been universally recognized, and is subject to the Antarctic Treaty System.
1942 - The US government began its internment of Japanese-Americans; Japanese-Canadians experienced a similar atrocity on the same day in British Columbia.
1943 - US President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill met at the Casablanca Conference to discuss strategy and study the next phase of World War II.
1952 - The Today Show, the world's first morning/breakfast program, premiered on NBC.
1953 - Marshal Josip Broz Tito was elected President of Yugoslavia, replacing Ivan Ribar.
1954 - The Hudson Motor Car Company merged with Nash-Kelvinator Corporation to form the American Motors Corporation.
1967 - Between 20,000 and 30,000 people attended the Human Be-In in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, the event which launched that year's Summer of Love.
1972 - Queen Margrethe II ascended the throne of Denmark following the death of her father Frederick IX, thanks to a referendum in May 1953 which changed the rules of succession; not only was she the first queen regnant in that country since Margrethe I died in October 1412, she was the first Danish monarch not named Frederick or Christian since the death of King John in February 1513.
1975 - Teenage heiress Lesley Whittle was kidnapped by serial killer Donald Neilson, who was known as the Black Panther; her body was discovered seven weeks later, in March 1975.
1990 - L. Douglas Wilder became the first elected African-American governor when he took office in Richmond, Virginia.
1994 - US President Bill Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed the Kremlin accords; on the same day, England's Duchess of Kent converted to Roman Catholicism, the first member of the Royal Family to do so for 300 years.
2004 - The so-called five cross flag of Georgia (the country, not the state) was restored to official use after a hiatus of some 500 years.
2005 - The European Space Agency's Huygens probe landed near the Xanadu region of Saturn's moon Titan, having been launched in October 1997.
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