1765 - The Stamp Act Congress convened in New York to draw up colonial grievances against England.

1777 - The second Battle of Saratoga began during the American Revolution.

1849 - Author Edgar Allan Poe died in Baltimore at age 40.

1868 - Cornell University was inaugurated in Ithaca, N.Y.

1949 - The Republic of East Germany was formed.

1954 - Marian Anderson became the first black singer hired by the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

1963 - President John F. Kennedy signed the documents of ratification for a nuclear test ban treaty with Britain and the Soviet Union.

1968 - The Motion Picture Association of America adopted its film-rating system.

1981 - Egypt's parliament named Vice President Hosni Mubarak to succeed the assassinated Anwar Sadat.

1982 - The musical Cats opened on Broadway, beginning its record run of 7,485 performances.

1985 - Palestinian gunmen hijacked the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro in the Mediterranean with more than 400 people aboard.

1989 - Hungary's Communist Party renounced Marxism in favor of democratic socialism during a party congress in Budapest.

1999 - American Home Products Corp. agreed to pay up to $4.83 billion to settle claims that the fen-phen diet drug combination caused dangerous heart valve problems.

2001 - The United States and Britain launched air strikes against Taliban positions and Osama bin Laden's training camps in Afghanistan; bin Laden praised God for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in a videotaped statement aired on the Arabic satellite station Al-J

2002 - The Washington-area sniper struck again, shooting and critically wounding a 13-year-old boy as his aunt dropped him off at school in Bowie, Md.

2003 - California voters recalled Gov. Gray Davis and elected Arnold Schwarzenegger their new governor.