Events, Births and Deaths Happening on this Date

1860

The legendary Pony Express began service between St. Joseph, Mo., and Sacramento, Calif. (It lasted only 1 1/2 years before giving way to the transcontinental telegraph.)

1865

Union forces occupied the Confederate capital of Richmond, Va.

1882

Outlaw Jesse James was shot to death in St. Joseph, Mo., by Robert Ford, a member of his gang.

1936

Bruno Hauptmann was electrocuted in Trenton, N.J., for the kidnap-murder of the Lindbergh baby.

1946

Lt. General Masaharu Homma, the Japanese commander responsible for the Bataan Death March, was executed in the Philippines.

1948

President Truman signed the Marshall Plan, which allocated more than $5 billion in aid for 16 European countries.

1968

Less than 24 hours before he was assassinated in Memphis, Tenn., civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his famous ''mountaintop'' speech to a rally of striking sanitation workers.

1968

North Vietnam agreed to meet with U.S. representatives to set up preliminary peace talks.

1996

An Air Force jetliner carrying Commerce Secretary Ron Brown crashed in Croatia, killing all 35 people aboard.

1996

Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski was arrested.

1998

The Dow Jones industrial average climbed above 9,000 for the first time.

1999

NATO missiles struck downtown Belgrade for the first time, destroying the headquarters of security forces accused of waging a campaign against Kosovo Albanians.

2000

A federal judge in Washington ruled that Microsoft Corp. had violated U.S. antitrust laws by keeping ''an oppressive thumb'' on competitors during the race to link Americans to the Internet.

1990

Jazz singer Sarah Vaughan died in suburban Los Angeles at age 66.

1996

Former Cleveland Mayor Carl Stokes, the first black elected mayor of a major U.S. city, died at age 68.