On this date in history:

In 1789, George Washington of Virginia, the commander of the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War, was elected the first president of the United States by all 69 presidential electors who cast votes. John Adams of Massachusetts was elected vice president.

In 1792, George Washington was unanimously elected to a second term as U.S. president in a vote of the Electoral College.

In 1861, the 25-year period of conflict known as the Apache War began at Apache Pass, Ariz., with the arrest of American-Indian leader Cochise for raiding a ranch. Cochise escaped his U.S. Army captors and declared war.

In 1938, Adolf Hitler seized control of the German army and put Nazi officers in key posts as part of a plan that led to World War II.

In 1945, the U.S. Army liberated the Santo Tomas Internment Camp in the Philippines from Japanese command. Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin, the Big Three, meet at Yalta to discuss unconditional surrender terms for Germany.

In 1974, urban guerrillas calling themselves the Symbionese Liberation Army abducted Patricia Hearst, the 19-year-old daughter of publisher Randolph Hearst, from her apartment in Berkeley, Calif. Hearst was arrested as a fugitive in September of 1975. She said she had been forced to join her captors and was charged with participating in bank robberies.

In 1976, a magnitude-7.5 earthquake struck the Guatemala City region in Guatemala, killing an estimated 23,000 people and injuring tens of thousands.

In 1983, singer Karen Carpenter died after battling anorexia nervosa for years. The condition weakened her heart and she died of heart failure.

In 1997, a jury in a civil trial in Santa Monica, Calif., found O.J. Simpson liable in the killings of his former wife and her friend and he was ordered to pay a total of $33.5 million to the families. Simpson had been acquitted in his murder trial.

In 2004, Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook from his Harvard College dorm room. The social media network would grow to include some 2 billion users.

In 2004, Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan, considered the key figure in his country's nuclear weaponry development, admitted he leaked that technology to other countries.

In 2006, widespread Muslim protests of caricatures depicting Muhammad in a negative way turned violent. Angry demonstrators smashed windows, set fires and burned flags. Syrian mobs burned Danish and Norwegian embassies because newspapers in those countries published the drawings.

In 2012, Russia and China vetoed an effort by the U.N. Security Council to end the violence in Syria with an Arab League peace plan.

In 2014, Microsoft announced the appointment of Satya Nadella as the company's chief executive officer, succeeding Steve Ballmer, and said Bill Gates would step down as board chairman.

Copyright 2018 by United Press International