THURSDAY, MARCH 15, 2012

Today is Thursday, March 15, the 75th day of 2012. There are 291 days left in the year.

1493 ― Christopher Columbus returns to Spain after first new world voyage

1892 ― First escalator patented by inventor Jesse W. Reno (New York City)

1907 ― Finland is first European country to give women the right to vote

1908 ― First performance of Maurice Ravel's ``Rapsodie Espagnole"

1912 ― Pitcher Cy Young retires from baseball with 511 wins

1937 ― First blood bank is established (Chicago, Ill.)

1957 ― Third nation to explode a nuclear bomb (Britain)

1964 ― Liz Taylor's fifth marriage (Richard Burton)

1968 ― LIFE magazine calls Jimi Hendrix ``most spectacular guitarist in the world"

1969 ― Violent Chinese-Russian border dispute (hundreds dead)

1988 ― NASA reports accelerated breakdown of ozone layer by CFK

1999 ― Pluto again becomes outermost planet