Tuesday, August 18th
The 230th day of 2009.
There are 135 days left in the year.
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Today's Highlights in History
On Aug. 18, 1963, James Meredith became the first black to graduate from the University of Mississippi. (Go to article.)
On Aug. 18, 1934, Roberto Clemente, one of major league baseball's top outfielders was born. Following his death on Dec. 31, 1972, his obituary appeared in The Times. (Go to obit. | Other Birthdays)
Editorial Cartoon of the Day
On August 18, 1888, Harper's Weekly featured a cartoon about the presidential election of 1888. (See the cartoon and read an explanation.)
On this date in:
1227 The Mongol conqueror Genghis Khan died.
1587 Virginia Dare became the first child of English parents to be born on American soil, on what is now Roanoke Island, N.C.
1846 U.S. forces led by Gen. Stephen W. Kearny captured Santa Fe, N.M.
1894 Congress established the Bureau of Immigration.
1914 President Woodrow Wilson issued his Proclamation of Neutrality, aimed at keeping the United States out of World War I.
1920 the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees the right of women to vote, was ratified when Tennessee became the 36th state to approve it.
1954 Assistant Secretary of Labor James E. Wilkins became the first African-American to attend a meeting of a president's Cabinet as he sat in for Labor Secretary James P. Mitchell.
1958 The novel "Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov was first published in New York by G.P. Putnam's Sons, almost three years after the book was originally published in Paris.
1969 The Woodstock Music and Art Fair in Bethel, N.Y., concluded with a mid-morning set by Jimi Hendrix.
1983 Hurricane Alicia slammed into the Texas coast, leaving 22 dead and causing more than $1 billion damage.
1988 Indiana Sen. Dan Quayle was nominated as George H.W. Bush's running mate during the Republican National Convention in New Orleans.
1991 Soviet hard-liners launched a coup aimed at toppling President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, who was vacationing in the Crimea.
1997 Virginia Military Institute admitted a female student for the first time in its 158-year history.
2005 A judge in Wichita, Kan., sentenced BTK serial killer Dennis Rader to 10 consecutive life terms.
2005 Pope Benedict XVI began his first foreign trip as pontiff in low-key style, returning to his German homeland.
2008 Pervez Musharraf resigned as the president of Pakistan.
