1916 -- The first birth control clinic in the United States was opened by Margaret Sanger in Brooklyn, New York.

1945 -- The UN Food and Agricultural Organization was established with the aims of raising nutrition levels and improving living standards.

1946 -- A number of top German Nazis were hanged at Nuremberg after being found guilty of war crimes. They included former foreign minister Joachim Von Ribbentrop and former field marshal Wilhelm Keitel.

1951 -- Pakistani prime minister Liaquat Ali Khan was shot dead while addressing a public meeting in Rawalpindi.

1959 -- General George C. Marshall, the U.S. army chief of staff during World War II, died. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953.

1963 -- Ludwig Erhard was elected chancellor of West Germany, succeeding the first post-war chancellor, Konrad Adenauer.

1964 -- China exploded its first nuclear bomb at the Lop Nor test site in Xinjiang.

1964 -- Harold Wilson became British prime minister.

1973 -- U.S. secretary of state Henry Kissinger and North Vietnamese peace negotiator Le Duc Tho were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

1978 -- Cardinal Karol Wojtyla of Poland was elected pope, the first non-Italian to hold the post for 456 years, and took the name John Paul II.

1987 -- Nineteen people were killed as winds gusting up to 110mph (170kph) an hour lashed southern Britain.

1996 -- Seventy-eight people were crushed to death at an overcrowded Guatemalan stadium after fans without tickets pushed their way in to see a World Cup soccer qualifying game.

2000 -- Chevron, the number two U.S. oil company, unveiled its plan to buy third-ranked Texaco for $35 billion in stock.