1934 - Karlis Ulmanis seized power in a coup in Latvia.
1940 - Nylon stockings were sold for the first time in the United States.
1955 - The Vienna Treaty, signed by Britain, France, the United States, and the Soviet Union, restored Austrian sovereignty.
1957 - Britain dropped its first hydrogen bomb on Christmas Island in the Pacific.
1990 - Vincent van Gogh's painting "Portrait of Dr. Gachet" was sold for a record amount of $82.5 million at Christie's in New York.
1991 - President François Mitterrand appointed Édith Cresson, known for her candor, as the first woman to serve as Prime Minister of France, who was replaced less than a year later.
1996 - Atal Bihari Vajpayee became the first Hindu nationalist Prime Minister of India after his party, the Bharatiya Janata Party, emerged as the largest single group in a hung parliament.
2001 - After nearly eight years of marriage, it was confirmed that Japanese Princess Masako was pregnant with a potential heir to the Chrysanthemum Throne, the oldest monarchy in the world.
2002 - Former Yugoslav Army General Mile Markovic and former Croatian rebel leader Milan Martić arrived in The Hague to surrender to the war crimes tribunal.
2007 - Canadian publishing company Thomson Corporation agreed to acquire Reuters for approximately £8.7 billion ($17.2 billion), supported by Reuters Founders Share, which had the power to prevent changes in the ownership of the 156-year-old company.
2010 - Australian Jessica Watson became the youngest person to sail solo around the world unassisted.
