On Sept. 14, 1847, U.S. forces under Gen. Winfield Scott took control of Mexico City.
In 1901 President William McKinley died in Buffalo of gunshot wounds inflicted by an assassin. (Vice President Theodore Roosevelt succeeded him.)
In 1940 Congress passed the Selective Service Act, providing for the first peacetime draft in U.S. history.
In 1959 the Soviet space probe Luna 2 became the first manmade object to reach the moon.
In 1963 Mary Ann Fischer of Aberdeen, S.D., gave birth to the first surviving quintuplets in the United States.
In 1991 the government of South Africa, the African National Congress and the Inkatha Freedom Party signed a national peace pact.
In 1993 Israel and Jordan signed a framework for negotiations, a day after the signing of a PLO-Israeli peace accord.
In 1996 Bosnians went to the polls in their first national elections since the 3 1/2 -year civil war that had ravaged the Balkan republic.
In 1998 10 people were charged in what prosecutors said was the largest Cuban spy ring uncovered in the United States since Fidel Castro came to power.
In 1999 Indonesian soldiers looted the abandoned UN mission in East Timor, just hours after 110 UN personnel and 1,300 East Timorese were evacuated and flown to safety to end a 10-day siege.
In 2002 President George W. Bush said the United States was willing to take Iraq on alone if the United Nations failed to “show some backbone” by confronting Saddam Hussein.
In 2003 Swedes rejected adopting the European common currency, the euro, in a referendum overshadowed by the killing of Foreign Minister Anna Lindh, an ardent euro supporter.
