Today in History

Today is Friday, March 18, the 78th day of 2016. There are 288 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On March 18, 1766, Britain repealed the Stamp Act of 1765.

On this date:

In 1837, the 22nd and 24th president of the United States, Grover Cleveland, was born in Caldwell, New Jersey.

In 1910, the first filmed adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel "Frankenstein," a silent short produced by Thomas Edison's New York movie studio, was released.

In 1925, the Tri-State Tornado struck southeastern Missouri, southern Illinois and southwestern Indiana, resulting in some 700 deaths.

In 1937, some 300 people, mostly children, were killed in a gas explosion at a school in New London, Texas.

In 1940, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini met at the Brenner Pass, where the Italian dictator agreed to join Germany's war against France and Britain.

In 1959, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Hawaii statehood bill. (Hawaii became a state on Aug. 21, 1959.)

In 1962, France and Algerian rebels signed the Evian Accords, a cease-fire agreement which took effect the next day, ending the Algerian War.

In 1965, the first spacewalk took place as Soviet cosmonaut Alexei Leonov went outside his Voskhod 2 capsule, secured by a tether. Farouk I, the former king of Egypt, died in exile in Rome.

In 1974, most of the Arab oil-producing nations ended their 5-month-old embargo against the United States that had been sparked by American support for Israel in the Yom Kippur War.

In 1980, Frank Gotti, the 12-year-old youngest son of mobster John Gotti, was struck and killed by a car driven by John Favara, a neighbor in Queens, New York. (The following July, Favara vanished, the apparent victim of a gang hit.)

In 1990, thieves made off with 13 works of art from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston (the crime remains unsolved).

In 1996, rejecting an insanity defense, a jury in Dedham, Massachusetts, convicted John C. Salvi III of murdering two women in attacks at two Boston-area abortion clinics in Dec. 1994. (Salvi later committed suicide in his prison cell.)

Ten years ago: Thousands of anti-war protesters took to the streets around the world, marking the third anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Students and activists clashed with police in Paris as demonstrations against a government plan to loosen job protections spread across France. Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was laid to rest in his hometown of Pozarevac in Serbia-Montenegro.

Five years ago: President Barack Obama demanded that Moammar Gadhafi halt all military attacks on civilians and said that if the Libyan leader did not stand down, the United States would join other nations in launching military action against him. At a massive demonstration against Yemen's government, snipers fired on protesters and police blocked an escape route; dozens were killed, including children. Former Secretary of State Warren M. Christopher died in Los Angeles at 85. Princess Antoinette of Monaco, the late Prince Rainier III's oldest sister and a prominent advocate for animal rights, died at 90.

One year ago: Militants opened fire at a museum in Tunisia's capital, killing 22 people, most of them foreign tourists. Serbia arrested eight men accused of taking part in the massacre of some 1,300 people at a warehouse on the outskirts of Srebrenica in 1995. Lindsey Vonn won the World Cup downhill title for the seventh time, winning the last race in the discipline at the World Cup finals in Meribel, France.

Today's Birthdays: Composer John Kander is 89. Country singer Charley Pride is 82. Nobel peace laureate and former South African president F.W. de Klerk is 80. Country singer Margie Bowes is 75. Actor Kevin Dobson is 73. Actor Brad Dourif is 66. Jazz musician Bill Frisell is 65. Singer Irene Cara is 57. Movie writer-director Luc Besson is 57. Actor Geoffrey Owens is 55. Actor Thomas Ian Griffith is 54. Singer-songwriter James McMurtry is 54. TV personality Mike Rowe (TV: "Dirty Jobs") is 54. Singer-actress Vanessa L. Williams is 53. Olympic gold medal speedskater Bonnie Blair is 52. Country musician Scott Saunders (Sons of the Desert) is 52. Actor David Cubitt is 51. Rock musician Jerry Cantrell (Alice in Chains) is 50. Rock singer-musician Miki Berenyi is 49. Actor Michael Bergin is 47. Rapper-actress-talk show host Queen Latifah is 46. Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus is 44. Actor-comedian Dane Cook is 44. Country singer Philip Sweet (Little Big Town) is 42. Rock musician Stuart Zender is 42. Singers Evan and Jaron Lowenstein are 42. Actress-singer-dancer Sutton Foster is 41. Singer Devin Lima (LFO) is 39. Rock singer Adam Levine (Maroon 5) is 37. Rock musician Daren Taylor (Airborne Toxic Event) is 36. Olympic gold medal figure skater Alexei Yagudin is 36. Actor Adam Pally is 34. Actor Cornelius Smith Jr. is 34. Actress-dancer Julia Goldani Telles is 21. Actress Ciara Bravo is 19. Actor Blake Garrett Rosenthal is 12.

Thought for Today: "No man has a right in America to treat any other man tolerantly, for tolerance is the assumption of superiority." -- Wendell Willkie, American politician (1892-1944).