Today in History - History - May 21st

1944Hitler begins attack on British/US "terror pilots"

1930NY Yankee Babe Ruth hits 3 consecutive homers

1725The Order of St. Alexander Nevsky is instituted in Russia by the empress Catherine I. It would later be discontinued and then reinstated by the Soviet government in 1942 as the Order of Alexander Nevsky.

1881American Red Cross founded by Clara Barton

1854Frederic Mistral, Joseph Roumanille, and five other Provencal poets found Félibrige, a literary and cultural association

1996Red Sox pitcher Roger Clemens beats Yankees for his 200th win

1988"Fat" by Weird Al Yankovic hits #99

198935th Mazda LPGA Championship won by Nancy Lopez

1972Michelangelo's Pietà in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome is damaged by a vandal.

1978Nancy Lopez wins LPGA Coca-Cola Golf Classic

1960Jeffrey Dahmer, West Allis Wisconsin, American serial killer (Milwaukee Cannibal)

120 BCAurelia Cotta, mother of Julius Caesar

1940Tony Sheridan, Norwich, Norfolk, singer-songwriter and guitarist, (d. 2013)

1904Fats Waller, [Thomas Wright], jazz singer/composer (Ain't Misbehavin')

1921Andrei Sakharov, Moscow, physicist, human rights worker (Nobel '75)

1780Elizabeth Fry, Quaker minister/prison reformer/nurse

1952Mr. T, [Lawrence Tureaud], Chicago, American actor (A-Team, Rocky III, T & T)

1688Alexander Pope, London, English poet (Rape of the Lock, translation of Homer) (d.1744)

1945Director Akira Kurosawa (35) weds actress Yoko Yaguchi (23)

1944Actor Burgess Meredith (36) weds actress Paulette Goddard (33) at David O Selznick's Beverly Hills home

1994ABC Sports President Roone Arledge (62) weds third wife Gigi Shaw

1999NFL legend Deion Sanders (31) weds model Pilar Biggers in Paradise Island, Bahamas

1935Jane Addams, a founder of ACLU (Nobel 1973), dies at 65

1542Hernando de Soto, dies while searching for gold, near Mississippi River