History Events on May 18

Alonso de Ojeda sets sail from Cádiz on his voyage to what is now Venezuela.

#Alonso_de_Ojeda

Emperor Constantine the Great announces free distributions of food to the citizens in Constantinople.

#Constantine_the_Great

Rhode Island passes the first law in English-speaking North America making slavery illegal.

#Rhode_Island

World War I: The Selective Service Act of 1917 is passed, giving the President of the United States the power of conscription.

#World_War_I

Jackie Cochran becomes the first woman to break the sound barrier.

#Jacqueline_Cochran

First Crusade: Around 800 Jews are massacred in Worms, Germany.

#First_Crusade

Operation Passage to Freedom, the evacuation of 310,000 Vietnamese civilians, soldiers and non-Vietnamese members of the French Army from communist North Vietnam to South Vietnam following the end of the First Indochina War, ends.

#Operation_Passage_to_Freedom

Israeli troops finish withdrawing from the Gaza Strip, ceding the area to the Palestinian National Authority to govern.

#Gaza_Strip

Evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson disappears in Venice, California.

#Evangelism

Northern Somalia declares independence from the rest of Somalia as the Republic of Somaliland but is not recognized by the international community.

#Somalia

Aeroflot Flight 109 is hijacked mid-flight and the aircraft is subsequently destroyed when the hijacker's bomb explodes, killing all 82 people on board.

#Aeroflot_Flight_109

Apollo program: Apollo 10 is launched.

#Apollo_program

John Bellingham is found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging for the assassination of British Prime Minister Spencer Perceval.

#John_Bellingham

Nuclear weapons testing: Under project Smiling Buddha, India successfully detonates its first nuclear weapon becoming the sixth nation to do so.

#Nuclear_weapons_testing

New Deal: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs an act creating the Tennessee Valley Authority.

#New_Deal

The first Indian film, Shree Pundalik by Dadasaheb Torne, is released in Mumbai.

#Cinema_of_India

The Seven Years' War begins when Great Britain declares war on France.

#Seven_Years'_War

A school shooting at Santa Fe High School in Texas kills 10 people.

#Santa_Fe_High_School_shooting

Louis II of Italy is crowned for the second time as Roman Emperor at Rome, at the age of 47. His first coronation was 28 years earlier, in 844, during the reign of his father Lothair I.

#Louis_II_of_Italy

World War II: Battle of Monte Cassino: Conclusion after seven days of the fourth battle as German paratroopers evacuate Monte Cassino.

#World_War_II

The Principality of Antioch, a crusader state, falls to the Mamluk Sultan Baibars in the Siege of Antioch.

#Principality_of_Antioch

The Great Siege of Malta begins, in which Ottoman forces attempt and fail to conquer Malta.

#Great_Siege_of_Malta

Israeli spy Eli Cohen is hanged in Damascus, Syria.

#Eli_Cohen

Abraham Lincoln wins the Republican Party presidential nomination over William H. Seward, who later becomes the United States Secretary of State.

#Abraham_Lincoln

The Disruption in Edinburgh of the Free Church of Scotland from the Church of Scotland.

#Disruption_of_1843

At least 78 people die in a landslide caused by heavy rains in the Colombian town of Salgar.

#2015_Colombian_landslide

Riots in Nørrebro, Copenhagen, caused by the approval of the four Danish exceptions in the Maastricht Treaty referendum. Police open fire against civilians for the first time since World War II and injure 11 demonstrators.

#Nørrebro

Deportation of Crimean Tatars by the Soviet Union government.

#Deportation_of_the_Crimean_Tatars

Napoleon Bonaparte is proclaimed Emperor of the French by the French Senate.

#Napoleon

In France, a modified TGV train achieves a new rail world speed record of 515.3 km/h (320.2 mph).

#TGV

A second photo from the Hubble Space Telescope confirms that Pluto has two additional moons, Nix and Hydra.

#Hubble_Space_Telescope

The First Legislative Yuan of the Republic of China officially convenes in Nanking.

#Legislative_Yuan

American Civil War: The Siege of Vicksburg begins.

#American_Civil_War

The Bath School disaster: Forty-five people, including many children, are killed by bombs planted by a disgruntled school-board member in Michigan.

#Bath_School_disaster

Mount St. Helens erupts in Washington, United States, killing 57 people and causing $3 billion in damage.

#Mount_St._Helens

Battle of Las Piedras: The first great military triumph of the revolution of the Río de la Plata in Uruguay led by José Artigas.

#Battle_of_Las_Piedras_(1811)

The future Henry II of England marries Eleanor of Aquitaine. He would become king 2 years later, after the death of his cousin once removed King Stephen of England.

#Henry_II_of_England

Napoleonic Wars: The United Kingdom revokes the Treaty of Amiens and declares war on France.

#Napoleonic_Wars

Battle of Tourcoing during the Flanders Campaign of the War of the First Coalition.

#Battle_of_Tourcoing

The LTTE are defeated by the Sri Lankan government, ending almost 26 years of fighting between the two sides.

The post Loktantra Andolan government passes a landmark bill curtailing the power of the monarchy and making Nepal a secular country.

Students in Gwangju, South Korea begin demonstrations calling for democratic reforms.

Likud party wins the 1977 Israeli legislative election, with Menachem Begin, its founder, as the sixth Prime Minister of Israel.

After being founded for 20 years, the Government of the Republic of China approves Tongji University to be among the first national universities of the Republic of China.

The United Kingdom proclaims a protectorate over Tonga.

Khodynka Tragedy: A mass panic on Khodynka Field in Moscow during the festivities of the coronation of Russian Tsar Nicholas II results in the deaths of 1,389 people.

The United States Supreme Court rules in Plessy v. Ferguson that the "separate but equal" doctrine is constitutional.

Opening of the first German National Assembly (Nationalversammlung) in Frankfurt, Germany.

First United Empire Loyalists reach Parrtown (later called Saint John, New Brunswick), Canada, after leaving the United States.

In Dorchester, Massachusetts, John Winthrop takes the oath of office and becomes the first Governor of Massachusetts.

Playwright Thomas Kyd's accusations of heresy lead to an arrest warrant for Christopher Marlowe.

During the Battle of Buyur Lake, General Lan Yu leads a Chinese army forward to crush the Mongol hordes of Tögüs Temür, the Khan of Northern Yuan.

Bruges Matins, the nocturnal massacre of the French garrison in Bruges by members of the local Flemish militia.

Fall of Acre, the end of Crusader presence in the Holy Land.