A Baghdad market bombing kills at least 135 people and injures a further 339.

Cavalese cable-car disaster: a United States Military pilot causes the death of 20 people when his low-flying plane cuts the cable of a cable-car near Trento, Italy.

Karla Faye Tucker is executed in Texas becoming the first woman executed in the United States since 1984.

The Lijiang earthquake in Lijiang, Yunnan, China.

After a stroke, P.W. Botha resigns party leadership and the presidency of South Africa.

A military coup overthrows Alfredo Stroessner, dictator of Paraguay since 1954.

Iran-Contra Affair: The United States House of Representatives rejects President Ronald Reagan's request for $36.25 million to aid Nicaraguan Contras.

Space Shuttle program: STS-41-B is launched using Space Shuttle Challenger.

John Buster and the research team at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center announce history's first embryo transfer, from one woman to another resulting in a live birth.

New York Police Officer Frank Serpico is shot during a drug bust in Brooklyn and survives to later testify against police corruption. Many believe the incident proves that NYPD officers tried to kill him.

In Cairo, Yasser Arafat is appointed Palestine Liberation Organization leader at the Palestinian National Congress.

Ronald Ryan, the last person to be executed in Australia, is hanged in Pentridge Prison, Melbourne.

The unmanned Soviet Luna 9 spacecraft makes the first controlled rocket-assisted landing on the Moon.

British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan speaks of the "a wind of change" of increasing national consciousness blowing through colonial Africa, signalling that his Government was likely to support decolonisation.

A plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa kills Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, The Big Bopper, and pilot Roger Peterson and the incident becomes known as The Day the Music Died.

Founding of the Benelux Economic Union, creating a testing ground for a later European Economic Community.

Senegalese political party Democratic Rally merges into the Senegalese Party of Socialist Action (PSAS).

The lowest temperature in North America is recorded in Snag, Yukon.

World War II: As part of Operation Thunderclap, 1,000 B-17s of the Eighth Air Force bomb Berlin, a raid which kills between 2,500 to 3,000 and dehouses another 120,000.

World War II: During the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign, U.S. Army and Marine forces seize Kwajalein Atoll from the defending Japanese garrison.

The Hawke's Bay earthquake, New Zealand's worst natural disaster, kills 258.

The Communist Party of Vietnam is established.

The Twin Peaks Tunnel in San Francisco, California begins service as the longest streetcar tunnel in the world at 11,920 feet (3,633 meters) long.

World War I: The United States breaks off diplomatic relations with Germany a day after the latter announced a new policy of unrestricted submarine warfare.

Parliament buildings in Ottawa, Canada burn down.

The Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, authorizing the Federal government to impose and collect an income tax.

Gubernatorial candidate William Goebel is assassinated in Frankfort, Kentucky.

The Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, guaranteeing voting rights to citizens regardless of race.

Emperor Meiji becomes the 122nd emperor of Japan.

The Battle of Caseros marks the end of the hegemony of Buenos Aires Province Governor Juan Manuel de Rosas over the Argentine Confederation.

Wake Forest University is established.

The sovereignty of Greece is confirmed in a London Protocol.

The Battle of San Lorenzo takes place. It is the first military action of José de San Martín's cavalry élite unit ''Granaderos a Caballo'' at the Argentine War of Independence.

The Illinois Territory is created.

A British military force, under Brigadier-General Sir Samuel Auchmuty captures the city of Montevideo, then part of the Spanish Empire now the capital of Uruguay.

Shays' Rebellion is crushed.

American Revolutionary War: Spain recognizes United States independence.

During the Battle of Fraustadt Swedish forces defeat a superior Saxon-Polish-Russian force by deploying a double envelopment.

The colony of Massachusetts issues the first paper money in America.

Tulip mania collapses in the United Provinces (now the Netherlands) by government order.

The Irish rebel Silken Thomas is executed by the order of Henry VIII in London, England.

The Battle of Diu, between Portugal and the Ottoman Empire takes place in Diu, India.

Bartolomeu Dias of Portugal lands in Mossel Bay after rounding the Cape of Good Hope, becoming the first known European to travel so far south.

Sultan Mehmed II inherits the throne of the Ottoman Empire.

More than 2,000 people of the Italian city of Cesena are slaughtered by Papal Troops (Cesena Bloodbath).

Ramon Berenguer III of Barcelona and Douce I of Provence marry, uniting the fortunes of those two states.