In 1776,

British forces evacuated Boston during the Revolutionary War.

In 1860,

the Kanrin Maru became the first official Japanese ship to reach U.S. soil as it arrived in San Francisco. (The ship arrived 12 days ahead of the USS Powhatan, which was carrying a Japanese embassy delegation.)

In 1906,

President Theodore Roosevelt first likened crusading journalists to a man with "the muckrake in his hand" in a speech to the Gridiron Club in Washington.