Using a 13-inch (33-cm) telescope at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, Clyde W. Tombaugh, a 24-year-old American with no formal training in astronomy, discovered the planet Pluto this day in 1930.
| 2001: | | American stock-car racer Dale Earnhardt, Sr., died from injuries suffered during a crash in the final lap of the Daytona 500. |
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| 1975: | | REA Express, Inc., at one time the largest delivery service in the United States, filed for bankruptcy. |
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| 1960: | | Seven nations established the Latin American Free Trade Association (LAFTA), predecessor to the Latin American Integration Association. |
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| 1861: | | | Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as provisional president of the Confederate States of America. |
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| 1848: | | Louis Comfort Tiffany—an American designer internationally recognized as one of the greatest proponents of Art Nouveau, particularly in the art of glassmaking—was born. |
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| 1546: | | | Martin Luther, leader of the Protestant Reformation, died at age 62 in Eisleben, Saxony. |
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