Today in History

Today is Monday, July 22, the 203rd day of 2019. There are 162 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On July 22, 1991, police in Milwaukee arrested Jeffrey Dahmer, who later confessed to murdering 17 men and boys (Dahmer ended up being beaten to death by a fellow prison inmate).

On this date:

In 1587, an English colony fated to vanish under mysterious circumstances was established on Roanoke Island off North Carolina.

In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln presented to his Cabinet a preliminary draft of the Emancipation Proclamation.

In 1934, bank robber John Dillinger was shot to death by federal agents outside Chicago's Biograph Theater, where he had just seen the Clark Gable movie "Manhattan Melodrama."

In 1937, the U.S. Senate rejected President Franklin D. Roosevelt's proposal to add more justices to the Supreme Court.

In 1942, the Nazis began transporting Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto to the Treblinka concentration camp. Gasoline rationing involving the use of coupons began along the Atlantic seaboard.

In 1943, American forces led by Gen. George S. Patton captured Palermo, Sicily, during World War II.

In 1946, the militant Zionist group Irgun blew up a wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing 91 people.

In 1975, the House of Representatives joined the Senate in voting to restore the American citizenship of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

In 1992, Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar escaped from his luxury prison near Medellin. (He was slain by security forces in December 1993.)

In 2005, a labor agreement ended an NHL lockout that canceled the previous hockey season.

In 2008, actress Estelle Getty died in Los Angeles at age 84.

In 2011, Anders Breivik, a self-described "militant nationalist," massacred 69 people at a Norwegian island youth retreat after detonating a bomb in nearby Oslo that killed eight others in the nation's worst violence since World War II.

Ten years ago: President Barack Obama told a prime-time press conference that Cambridge, Massachusetts, police had acted "stupidly" in the arrest of prominent black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., and that despite racial progress, blacks and Hispanics were still singled out unfairly for arrest. Earlier, the president met at the White House with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Millions of Asians witnessed the longest solar eclipse of this century; in some areas, totality lasted as long as six minutes and 39 seconds.

Five years ago: A Hamas rocket exploded near Israel's main airport, prompting a ban on flights from the U.S. and many from Europe and Canada. Johann Breyer, an 89-year-old Nazi war crimes suspect, died at a Philadelphia hospital hours before a U.S. ruling that he should be extradited to Germany to face trial.

One year ago: A man walking along a Toronto street fired a handgun into restaurants and cafes, killing two people and wounding 13 others; authorities said Faisal Hussain, described as an emotionally disturbed loner, fatally shot himself after the rampage. The 17 people killed when a tourist boat sank in a Missouri lake three days earlier were remembered at a service attended by hundreds in the tourism community of Branson. For the first time in nine years, Tiger Woods took the lead in the final round of a major golf tournament before finishing in a tie for sixth at the British Open; the event was won by Francesco Molinari in the first-ever major golf championship for an Italian.

Today's Birthdays: Former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, R-Kan., is 96. Actor-comedian Orson Bean is 91. Author Tom Robbins is 87. Actress Louise Fletcher is 85. Rhythm-and-blues singer Chuck Jackson is 82. Actor Terence Stamp is 81. Game show host Alex Trebek is 79. Singer George Clinton is 78. Actor-singer Bobby Sherman is 76. Former Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, is 76. Movie writer-director Paul Schrader is 73. Actor Danny Glover is 73. Singer Mireille Mathieu is 73. Actor-comedian-director Albert Brooks is 72. Rock singer Don Henley is 72. Movie composer Alan Menken is 70. Singer-actress Lonette McKee is 66. Jazz musician Al Di Meola is 65. Actor Willem Dafoe is 64. Rhythm-and-blues singer Keith Sweat is 58. Actress Joanna Going is 56. Actor Rob Estes is 56. Folk singer Emily Saliers (Indigo Girls) is 56. Actor John Leguizamo is 55. Actor-comedian David Spade is 55. Actor Patrick Labyorteaux is 54. Rock musician Pat Badger is 52. Actress Irene Bedard is 52. Actor Rhys Ifans is 52. Actress Diana Maria Riva is 50. Actor Colin Ferguson is 47. Actor/singer Jaime Camil is 46. Retired NFL player Keyshawn Johnson is 47. Rock musician Daniel Jones is 46. Singer Rufus Wainwright is 46. Actress Franka Potente is 45. Actress Parisa Fitz-Henley is 42. Actress A.J. Cook is 41. Actor Keegan Allen is 32. Actress Camila Banus is 29. Actress Selena Gomez is 27. Britain's Prince George of Cambridge is six.

Thought for Today: "Life is the art of drawing without an eraser." -- John W. Gardner, American government official (1912-2002).