Today’s Highlights

On March 6, 1857, the U.S. Supreme Court, in the Dred Scott v. Sandford decision, ruled 7-2 that Scott, an enslaved person, was not an American citizen and therefore could not sue for his freedom in Federal court; it also ruled that slavery could not be banned from any Federal territory. On this date

1820: President James Monroe signed the Missouri Compromise, which allowed Missouri to join the Union as a slave state and Maine to join as a free state.

1836: The Alamo in San Antonio, Texas, fell as Mexican forces led by General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna stormed the fortress after a 13-day siege.

1869: Chemist Dmitri Mendeleev introduced his concept of a periodic table of elements at a meeting of the Russian Chemical Society in St. Petersburg.

1912: Oreo cookies were first introduced by the National Biscuit Company.

1964: Heavyweight boxing champion Cassius Clay took a new name given to him by Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammed: Muhammad Ali.

1970: A bomb being built inside a Greenwich Village townhouse in New York by members of the Weather Underground militant leftist group accidentally exploded.

Today’s birthdays

Former FBI and CIA director William Webster is 101. Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan is 99. Former Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova is 88. Opera singer Kiri Te Kanawa is 81.

Rock musician David Gilmour is 79. Filmmaker-actor Rob Reiner is 78.