In 1520, Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan reached the Pacific Ocean after passing through the South American strait that now bears his name.

In 1861, the Confederate Congress admitted Missouri as the 12th state of the Confederacy after Missouri’s disputed secession from the Union.

In 1905, Sinn Fein was founded in Dublin.

In 1922, Captain Cyril Turner of the Royal Air Force gave the first public skywriting exhibition, spelling out, “Hello USA. Call Vanderbilt 7200” over New York’s Times Square; about 47,000 calls in less than three hours resulted.

In 1942, nearly 500 people died in a fire that destroyed the Cocoanut Grove nightclub in Boston.

In 1958, Chad, Gabon and Middle Congo became autonomous republics within the French community.

In 1964, the United States launched the space probe Mariner 4 on a course toward Mars, which it flew past in July 1965, sending back pictures of the red planet.

In 1975, President Gerald R. Ford nominated federal judge John Paul Stevens to the U.S. Supreme Court seat vacated by William O. Douglas.

In 1979, an Air New Zealand DC- 10 en route to the South Pole crashed into a mountain in Antarctica, killing all 257 people aboard.

In 1987, a South African Airways Boeing 747 crashed into the Indian Ocean with the loss of all 159 people aboard.

In 1990, Margaret Thatcher resigned as British prime minister during an audience with Queen Elizabeth II, who then conferred the premiership on John Major.

In 1994, serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer was slain in a Wisconsin prison by a fellow inmate. Sixties war protester Jerry Rubin died in Los Angeles, two weeks after being hit by a car; he was 56.

Ten years ago: At the opening of a NATO summit in Latvia, President George W. Bush rejected suggestions Iraq had fallen into civil war and vowed not to pull U.S. troops out “until the mission is complete.” The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to extend for a year the mandate of the 160,000- strong multinational force in Iraq.

The Associated Press