TUESDAY, May 20, 2025

1498-Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama arrives at Calicut, India becoming the first European to reach India by sea

1609-William Shakespeare's Sonnets are first published in London, perhaps illicitly, by publisher Thomas Thorpe

1862-U.S. President Abraham Lincoln signs into law the Homestead Act to provide cheap land for the settlement of the American West (80 million acres by 1900)

1910-Funeral for Britain's King Edward VII held in Westminster Abbey, has one of the largest assemblages of European royalty

1927-Treaty of Jeddah is signed between the United Kingdom and Ibn Saud recognizing the independence of the Kingdom of Hejaz and Nejd, the forerunner of Saudi Arabia

1954-Chiang Kai-shek becomes president of Nationalist China

1990-Hubble Space Telescope sends its 1st photographs from space

1992-India launches its 1st satellite independently

1997-U.S. President Clinton signs an executive order barring new US investment in Burma (also known as Myanmar), effective May 21 and renewable annually