May 26

1135 – During the Reconquista, Alfonso VII of León and Castile is crowned in León Cathedral as Imperator Totius Hispaniae (Emperor of all of Spain).

1538 – Geneva expels John Calvin and his followers from the city. Calvin lives in exile in Strasbourg for the next 3 years.

1783 – A Great Jubilee Day is held at North Stratford, Connecticut, celebrated the end of fighting in the American Revolution.

1857 – Dred Scott and family are emancipated by the Blow family, his original owners.

1864 – Montana is organized as a U.S. territory.

1865 – Confederate General Edmund Kirby Smith, commander of the Confederate Trans-Mississippi division, is the last general of the Confederate Army to surrender, at Galveston, Texas.

1868 – On a second vote at the impeachment of Andrew Johnson, the Senate again fails to convict by one vote, ending the trial with his acquittal.

1869 – Boston University is chartered by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

1896 – Charles Dow publishes the first edition of the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

1897 – The original manuscript of William Bradford’s history, Of Plymouth Plantation, is returned to the Governor of Massachusetts by the Bishop of London after being taken during the American Revolutionary War.

1900 – During the Thousand Days’ War, the Colombian Conservative Party turns the tide of war in their favor with victory against the Colombian Liberal Party in the Battle of Palonegro.

1908 – The first major commercial oil strike in the Middle East is made at Masjed Soleyman in southwest Persia.

1917 – Several powerful tornadoes rip through east central Illinois, killing 64 people and injuring 467 in the city of Mattoon and killing 34 and injuring 182 in Charleston.

1927 – The last Ford Model T rolls off the assembly line after a production run of 15,007,003 vehicles.

1940 – The Siege of Calais ends with the surrender of the British and French garrison and British and Allied forces begin Operation Dynamo, the evacuation of Dunkirk during World War II.

1948 – The U.S. Congress passes Public Law 80-557, which permanently establishes the Civil Air Patrol as an auxiliary of the United States Air Force.

1969 –  Apollo 10 returns to Earth after a successful 8 day mission testing all the components needed for the first manned moon landing.

1972 – The United States and the Soviet Union sign the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

1981 – An EA-6B Prowler crashes on the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz, killing 14 crewmen and injuring 45 others.

1998 – In the case of New Jersey v New York, the Supreme Court rules that due to the language of the original colonial land grant, Ellis Island, the gateway for immigrants, is mainly in the state of New Jersey, with a small area of New York state nearly surrounded by the other state.

2002 – The captain of the tugboat Robert Y. Love passes out due to a heart problem, losing control of the craft and causing the barges he towed to collide with the Interstate 40 bridge over the Arkansas River, causing it to collapse, killing 14 people and injuring 11 others

2004 – Terry Nichols is found guilty of 161 state murder charges for committing the Murrah federal building bombing.

2021 – A disgruntled employee of the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority shoots and kills 9 other employees at a company rail yard in San Jose, California before committing suicide.