Today is Thursday, March 26, the 85th day of 2009. There are 280 days left in the year.
1668 _ England takes control of Bombay India
1780 _ First British Sunday newspaper appears (British Gazette & Sunday Monitor)
1824 _ First performance of Beethoven's ``Missa Solemnis"
1871 _ Paris Commune founded
1872 _ Thomas J. Martin patents fire extinguisher
1885 _ Eastman Film Co. manufactures first commercial motion picture film
1945 _ Japanese resistance ends on Iwo Jima
1974 _ Romanian communist party names party leader Nicolae Ceausescu President
1975 _ ``Tommy" premieres in London
1989 _ First free elections in USSR: 190 million votes cast, Boris Yeltsin wins