1498: Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama arrives in Calicut, India, becoming the first European to reach India by sea

1609: William Shakespeare’s Sonnets are first published in London, perhaps illicitly, by publisher Thomas Thorpe

1862: US President Abraham Lincoln signs into law the Homestead Act to provide cheap land for the settlement of the American West (80 million acres by 1900)

1910: Funeral for Britain’s King Edward VII is held in Westminster Abbey, attended by one of the largest assemblies of European royalty

1927: At 7:40 AM, Charles Lindbergh takes off from New York to cross the Atlantic for Paris aboard the Spirit of St. Louis in the first solo nonstop transatlantic flight

1927: Treaty of Jeddah is signed between the United Kingdom and Ibn Saud, recognizing the independence of the Kingdom of Hejaz and Nejd, the forerunner of Saudi Arabia

1990: Hubble Space Telescope sends its first photographs from space

Source: Onthisday.com