ON THIS DATE - Shared from Wikipedia

1900 – The Scofield mine disaster kills over 200 men in Scofield, Utah in what is to date the fifth-worst mining accident in United States history.

1901 – The Pan-American Exposition opens in Buffalo, New York.

1915 – The RMS Lusitania departs from New York City on her two hundred and second, and final, crossing of the North Atlantic. Six days later, the ship is torpedoed off the coast of Ireland with the loss of 1,198 lives, including 128 Americans, rousing American sentiment against Germany.

1925 – The All-China Federation of Trade Unions is officially founded. Today it is the largest trade union in the world, with 134 million members.

1925 – The first Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer was held at the University of Toronto, Canada.

1927 – The first cooked meals on a scheduled flight are introduced on an Imperial Airways flight from London to Paris.

1927 – The Union Labor Life Insurance Company is founded by the American Federation of Labor.

1930 – The dwarf planet Pluto is officially named.

1931 – The Empire State Building is dedicated in New York City.

1940 – The 1940 Summer Olympics are cancelled due to war.

1941 – World War II: German forces launch a major attack on Tobruk.

1945 – World War II: A German newsreader officially announces that Adolf Hitler has "fallen at his command post in the Reich Chancellery fighting to the last breath against Bolshevism and for Germany".

1945 – The Yugoslav partisans free Trieste.

1946 – Start of 3 year Pilbara strike of Indigenous Australians.

1946 – The Paris Peace Conference concludes that the islands of the Dodecanese should be returned to Greece by Italy.

1947 – Portella della Ginestra massacre against May Day celebrations in Sicily by the bandit and separatist leader Salvatore Giuliano; 11 persons were killed and 33 wounded.

1948 – The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) is established, with Kim Il-sung as leader.

1950 – Guam is organized as a United States commonwealth.

1956 – The polio vaccine developed by Jonas Salk is made available to the public.

1956 – A doctor in Japan reports an "epidemic of an unknown disease of the central nervous system", marking the official discovery of Minamata disease.

1957 – 34 of 35 people aboard were killed when a Vickers Viking airliner crashed in Hampshire England.

1960 – Formation of the western Indian states of Gujarat and Maharashtra.

1960 – Cold War: U-2 incident – Francis Gary Powers, in a Lockheed U-2 spyplane, is shot down over the Soviet Union, sparking a diplomatic crisis.

1961 – The Prime Minister of Cuba, Fidel Castro, proclaims Cuba a socialist nation and abolishes elections.

1965 – Battle of Dong-Yin, a naval conflict between ROC and PRC, takes place.

1970 – Protests erupt in Seattle, Washington, following the announcement by U.S. President Richard Nixon that U.S. Forces in Vietnam would pursue enemy troops into Cambodia, a neutral country.

1971 – Amtrak (the National Railroad Passenger Corporation) is formed to take over U.S. passenger rail service.

1977 – 36 people are killed in Taksim Square, Istanbul, during the Labour Day celebrations.

1978 – Japan's Naomi Uemura, travelling by dog sled, becomes the first person to reach the North Pole alone.

1982 – The 1982 World's Fair opens in Knoxville, Tennessee.

1982 – Operation Black Buck: The Royal Air Force attacks the Argentine Air Force during Falklands War.

1983 – Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis is awarded the Lenin Peace Prize.

1987 – Pope John Paul II beatifies Edith Stein, a Jewish-born Carmelite nun who was gassed in the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz.

1989 – Disney-MGM Studios opens at Walt Disney World near Orlando, Florida, United States.

1990 – The former Philippine Episcopal Church (supervised by the Episcopal Church of the United States of America) was granted full autonomy and raised to the status of an Autocephalous Anglican Province and renamed the Episcopal Church of the Philippines.

1991 – Rickey Henderson of the Oakland Athletics steals his 939th base, making him the all-time leader in this category. However, his accomplishment is overshadowed later that evening by Nolan Ryan of the Texas Rangers, when he pitches his seventh career no-hitter, breaking his own record.

1994 – Three-time Formula One world champion Ayrton Senna is killed in an accident during the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola.

1995 – Croatian forces launch Operation Flash during the Croatian War of Independence.

2001 – Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo declares the existence of "a state of rebellion", hours after thousands of supporters of her arrested predecessor, Joseph Estrada, storm towards the presidential palace at the height of the EDSA III rebellion.

2003 – 2003 invasion of Iraq: In what becomes known as the "Mission Accomplished" speech, on board the USS Abraham Lincoln (off the coast of California), U.S. President George W. Bush declares that "major combat operations in Iraq have ended".

2004 – Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia join the European Union, celebrated at the residence of the Irish President in Dublin.

2006 – The Puerto Rican government closes the Department of Education and 42 other government agencies due to significant shortages in cash flow.

2007 – the Los Angeles May Day mêlée occurs, in which the Los Angeles Police Department's response to a May Day pro-immigration rally become a matter of controversy.

2008 – The London Agreement on translation of European patents, concluded in 2000, enters into force in 14 of the 34 Contracting States to the European Patent Convention.

2009 – Same-sex marriage is legalized in Sweden