On This Day in History

The Sound of Music, a musical by Rodgers and Hammerstein based on The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, opened on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre.

Aeroflot Flight 2230 crashed after takeoff from Koltsovo Airport, Russia, killing all 107 people aboard.

U.S. president Richard Nixon signed an act authorizing the construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline to transport oil from the Beaufort Sea to the Gulf of Alaska.

About 30 million people watched the fictional couple Luke Spencer and Laura Webber wed on the television show General Hospital in the highest-rated hour in American soap opera history.

In Suffolk, England, a local man found the largest hoard of Roman silver and gold in Britain (sample pictured), including the largest collection of 4th- and 5th-century gold and silver coins ever discovered within the former Roman Empire.

Chinese dissident Wei Jingsheng, released on ostensibly medical grounds after spending eighteen years in prison, was deported to the United States.

The first case of SARS, a zoonotic respiratory coronavirus disease, was recorded in Guangdong, China.

The El Dorado Fire in California, United States, was extinguished after 71 days, having destroyed 20 structures and killed one firefighter.