On this day in 1502, master navigator and admiral Christopher Columbus, long considered the “discoverer” of the New World, set sail from Cádiz, Spain, on his fourth and final voyage, hoping to find a passage to Asia.
| 1974: | | The U.S. House Judiciary Committee launched a formal impeachment investigation of President Richard M. Nixon. |
|
| 1960: | | The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the first birth-control pill. |
|
| 1939: | | | American track-and-field athlete Ralph Boston, the first man to jump more than 27 feet (8.23 metres), was born in Laurel, Mississippi. |
|
| 1936: | | | Seven months after invading Ethiopia and driving Emperor Haile Selassie I into exile, Italy annexed Ethiopia as part of Italian East Africa. |
|
| 1860: | | | Dramatist Sir James Barrie, the creator of Peter Pan, was born in Kirriemuir, Angus, Scotland. |
|
| 1800: | | American abolitionist John Brown was born in Torrington, Connecticut. |
|