Today is Friday, the 163rd day of 2009. There are 202 days left in the year.
1665 _ English rename New Amsterdam, New York, after Dutch pull out
1792 _ George Vancouver discovers site of Vancouver, B.C.
1812 _ Napoleon's invasion of Russia begins
1839 _ First baseball game played in America
1849 _ Gas mask patented by Lewis Haslett, Louisville, Ky.
1867 _ Austro-Hungarian Empire forms
1898 _ Philippine nationalists declares independence from Spain to U.S. control
1964 _ South Africa sentences Nelson Mandela to life imprisonment
1967 _ Israel wins Six-Day war
1967 _ Supreme Court unanimously ends laws against interracial marriages