On May 12, 1820, Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing, was born in Florence, Italy.
In 1907 actress Katharine Hepburn was born in Hartford, Conn.
In 1925 baseball player and manager Yogi Berra was born Lawrence Peter Berra in St. Louis.
In 1928 composer Burt Bacharach was born in Kansas City, Mo.
In 1932 the body of the kidnapped son of Charles and Anne Lindbergh was found in a wooded area of Hopewell, N.J.
In 1937 Britain’s King George VI was crowned at Westminster Abbey.
In 1943, during World War II, Axis forces in North Africa surrendered.
In 1949 the Soviet Union announced an end to the Berlin Blockade.
In 1970 the Senate voted unanimously to confirm Harry Blackmun as a Supreme Court justice.
In 1975 the White House announced the new Cambodian government had seized an American merchant ship, the Mayaguez, in international waters.
In 1978 the Commerce Department said hurricanes no longer would be given female names exclusively.
In 1985 Illinois Gov. James Thompson commuted the sentence of Gary Dotson, who had served 6 years in prison for a rape that the alleged victim later said never happened.
In 2000 Adam Petty, 19, the fourth-generation driver of NASCAR’s most famous family, died in a crash during practice for the Busch 200 at New Hampshire International Speedway.
