In this date in history:

In 1870, Joseph Hayne Rainey of South Carolina was sworn in as the first African-American to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives.

In 1901, Italian physicist and radio pioneer Guglielmo Marconi sent the first radio transmission across the Atlantic Ocean.

In 1913, two years after it was stolen from the Louvre Museum in Paris, Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa was recovered in a Florence, Italy, hotel room.

In 1917, the Rev. Edward J. Flanagan, a 31-year-old Irish priest, opened the doors to Boys Town, a home for troubled and neglected children in Omaha. He lived by the adage, There is no such thing as a bad boy. It graduated its first class of girls in 1983.

In 1968, Arthur Ashe became the first African American to be ranked No. 1 in tennis in the United States.

In 1975, Sara Jane Moore said she willfully tried to kill U.S. President Gerald Ford. She was sentenced to life in prison but released Dec. 31, 2007.

In 1980, a U.S. oil tycoon spent $5 million at auction for a notebook written by Leonardo da Vinci. The 36 pages of notes featured remarkably illegible right-to-left writing and was illustrated with marginal sketches of a technical nature.

In 1985, the crash of Arrow Air Flight 1285, a military charter, on takeoff from Gander, Newfoundland, killed all 256 people aboard, including 248 U.S. soldiers.

In 1988, three trains collided in London, killing 40 people, Britain's worst railway accident in 21 years.

In 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 it was reversing the ruling of the Florida Supreme Court allowing hand recount of votes in Florida, in effect ensuring the Republican Texas Gov. George W. Bush would win the presidency over former Vice President Al Gore.

In 2005, Gibran Tueni, an anti-Syrian member of the Lebanese Parliament and head of a leading Lebanon newspaper, was killed in an explosion that tore through his armored car outside Beirut.

In 2006, a Baghdad suicide bomber, luring unemployed Iraqis to his truck with promises of work, killed at least 70 people and injured more than 220 others.

In 2013, North Korea announced the execution of Jang Song Thaek, an uncle of leader Kim Jong Un, for trying to overthrow the government. Jang, until recently, had been considered one of the most powerful figures in the country.

In 2015, Saudis elected women to municipal councils for the first time in Saudi Arabian history.

In 2016, newly elected Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte admitted he personally killed drug suspects while mayor of Davao City, prompting human rights activists to call for an investigation.

In 2017, Democrat Doug Jones narrowly won Alabama's tightly contested special election over Republican Roy Moore, who was plagued by allegations of sexual misconduct with underage young women when he was in his 30s. Jones replaced Jeff Sessions in the Senate after the latter was made attorney general.

Copyright 2018 by United Press International