1451: Sultan Mehmed II, the Conqueror inherits the throne of the Ottoman Empire
1509: Battle of Diu: Portuguese Armada defeats a Mamluk Egyptian fleet in a naval battle at the port of Diu, India, establishing Portuguese trading control in the Indian Ocean
1870: Iowa ratifies the 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution, allowing suffrage for all races and colors
1928: Paleoanthropologist Davidson Black reports his findings on the ancient human fossils found at Zhoukoudian, China, in the journal Nature and declares them to be a new species he names ‘Sinanthropus pekinensis’ (now known as ‘Homo erectus’)
1931: New Zealand’s worst natural disaster, the Hawke’s Bay earthquake, kills 256 and injures thousands, devastating Napier and the Hawke’s Bay region
1966: First soft landing on the Moon, by the Soviet spacecraft Luna 9
Source: Onthisday.com
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