| | 363 - Roman Emperor Julian is killed during the retreat from the Sassanid Empire. General Jovian is proclaimed Emperor by the troops on the battlefield. |
| | 684 - Benedict II becomes Pope. |
| | 1284 - According to legend, the Pied Piper lures 130 children of Hamelin away. |
| | 1409 - Western Schism: The Roman Catholic church is led into a double schism as Petros Philargos is crowned Pope Alexander V after the Council of Pisa, joining Pope Gregory XII in Rome and Pope Benedict XII in Avignon. |
| | 1483 - Richard III becomes king of England. |
| | 1541 - Francisco Pizarro is assassinated in Lima by the son of his former companion and later antagonist, Diego Almagro the younger. Diego is later caught and executed. |
| | 1718 - Peter the Great's son, Aleksi, mysteriously dies after being sentenced to death by his father for plotting against him. |
| | 1723 - After a lasting siege and firing from the cannons Baku surrendered to Russians. |
| | 1807 - Lightning hits a warehouse in Luxembourg, killing 230 people. |
| | 1819 - The bicycle is patented. |
| | 1848 - End of the June Days Uprising in Paris. |
| | 1857 - The first investiture of the Victoria Cross in Hyde Park, London. |
| | 1870 - The Christian holiday of Christmas is declared a federal holiday in the United States. |
| | 1918 - World War I Western Front: Battle for Belleau Wood - Allied Forces under John J. Pershing & James Harbord defeat Imperial German Forces under Wilhelm, German Crown Prince. |
| | 1924 - American occupying forces leave the Dominican Republic. |
| | 1934 - President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Federal Credit Union Act, which establishes credit unions. |
| | 1934 - Initial flight of the Focke-Wulf Fw 61, the first practical helicopter. |
| | 1940 - World War II: Under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Union presents an ultimatum to Romania requiring it to cede Bessarabia and northern part of Bukovina. |
| | 1945 - The United Nations Charter is signed in San Francisco. |
| | 1948 - The Western allies start an airlift to Berlin after the Soviet Union has blockaded West Berlin. |
| | 1959 - The Saint Lawrence Seaway opens, opening North America's Great Lakes to ocean-going ships. |
| | 1960 - Former British Protectorate of Somaliland British Somaliland gains its independence |
| | 1963 - John F. Kennedy speaks the famous words "Ich bin ein Berliner" on a visit to West Berlin. |
| | 1973 - On Plesetsk Cosmodrome 9 persons are killed in an explosion of a Cosmos 3-M rocket. |
| | 1974 - The Universal Product Code is scanned for the first time to sell a package of Wrigley's chewing gum at the Marsh Supermarket in Troy, Ohio |
| | 1975 - Indira Gandhi establishes authoritarian rule in India. |
| | 1975 - FBI agents Ronald Williams and Jack Coler and American Indian Movement member Joseph Stuntz were killed in a shootout on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in Oglala, South Dakota. |
| | 1976 - The CN Tower, the tallest free-standing structure on land in the world, was opened. |
| | 1977 - The Yorkshire Ripper kills 16 year old shop assistant Jayne MacDonald in Leeds, changing public perception of the killer as she was the first victim who was not a prostitute. |
| | 1978 - Air Canada Flight 189 to Toronto overran the runway and crashed into the Etobicoke Creek ravine. Two of 107 passengers onboard died. |
| | 1993 - The U.S. launches a missile attack targeting Baghdad intelligence headquarters in retaliation for a thwarted assassination attempt against former President George H.W. Bush in April in Kuwait. |
| | 1996 - Irish Journalist Veronica Guerin is shot in her car while in traffic in the outskirts of Dublin |
| | 1997 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules that the Communications Decency Act violates the First Amendment. |
| | 2003 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules that gender-based sodomy laws are unconstitutional in Lawrence v. Texas. |
| | 2006 - The Republic of Montenegro becomes the 192nd member of the United Nations. |