Today in History

Today is Monday, March 17, the 76th day of 2014. There are 289 days left in the year. This is St. Patrick's Day.

Today's Highlight in History:

On March 17, 1776, British forces evacuated Boston during the Revolutionary War.

On this date:

In 1762, New York's first St. Patrick's Day parade took place.

In 1861, Victor Emmanuel II was proclaimed the first king of a united Italy.

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.

In 1912, the Camp Fire Girls organization was incorporated in Washington, D.C., two years to the day after it was founded in Thetford, Vt. (The group is now known as Camp Fire USA.)

In 1943, the Taoiseach of Ireland, Eamon de Valera, delivered a radio speech about "The Ireland That We Dreamed Of."

In 1950, scientists at the University of California at Berkeley announced they had created a new radioactive element, "californium."

In 1959, the Dalai Lama fled Tibet for India in the wake of a failed uprising by Tibetans against Chinese rule.

In 1966, a U.S. midget submarine located a missing hydrogen bomb which had fallen from an American bomber into the Mediterranean off Spain.

In 1969, Golda Meir became prime minister of Israel.

In 1970, the United States cast its first veto in the U.N. Security Council. (The U.S. killed a resolution that would have condemned Britain for failure to use force to overthrow the white-ruled government of Rhodesia.)

In 1973, U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Robert L. Stirm, a freed prisoner of the Vietnam War, was joyously greeted by his family at Travis Air Force Base in California in a scene captured in a Pulitzer Prize-winning AP photograph.

In 1988, Avianca Flight 410, a Boeing 727, crashed after takeoff into a mountain in Colombia, killing all 143 people on board.

Ten years ago: A car bomb tore apart the five-story Mount Lebanon Hotel catering to foreigners in the heart of Baghdad, killing seven people. Charles A. McCoy Jr., suspected in a series of highway shootings in central Ohio, was arrested in Las Vegas. (McCoy later pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter in the death of Gail Knisley plus 10 other charges and was sentenced to 27 years in prison.) Former MTV personality John "J.J." Jackson died in Los Angeles at age 62.

Five years ago: U.S. journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee were detained by North Korea while reporting on North Korean refugees living across the border in China. (Both were convicted of entering North Korea illegally and were sentenced to 12 years of hard labor; both were freed in August 2009 after former President Bill Clinton met with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.) The Seattle Post-Intelligencer published its final print edition.

One year ago: Two members of Steubenville, Ohio's celebrated high school football team were found guilty of raping a drunken 16-year-old girl and sentenced to at least a year in juvenile prison in a case that rocked the Rust Belt city of 18,000. Former Oklahoma quarterback Steve Davis, 60, who'd led the Sooners to back-to-back national championships in the 1970s, was killed in a private plane crash in northern Indiana. Louisville earned the top overall seed in the NCAA tournament after a topsy-turvy season in college basketball.

Today's Birthdays: Actor Gabriele Ferzetti is 89. Jazz/New Age musician Paul Horn is 84. The former national chairwoman of the NAACP, Myrlie Evers-Williams, is 81. Former NASA astronaut Ken Mattingly is 78. Rock musician Paul Kantner is 73. Singer-songwriter Jim Weatherly is 71. Singer-songwriter John Sebastian (The Lovin' Spoonful) is 70. Former NSA Director and former CIA Director Michael Hayden is 69. Rock musician Harold Brown (War; Lowrider Band) is 68. Actor Patrick Duffy is 65. Actor Kurt Russell is 63. Country singer Susie Allanson is 62. Actress Lesley-Anne Down is 60. Actor Mark Boone Jr. is 59. Country singer Paul Overstreet is 59. Actor Gary Sinise is 59. Actor Christian Clemenson is 56. Former basketball and baseball player Danny Ainge is 55. Actor Arye Gross is 54. Actress Vicki Lewis is 54. Actor Casey Siemaszko is 53. Writer-director Rob Sitch is 52. Actor Rob Lowe is 50. Rock singer Billy Corgan is 47. Rock musician Van Conner (Screaming Trees) is 47. Actor Mathew St. Patrick is 46. Actor Yanic Truesdale is 45. Rock musician Melissa Auf der Maur is 42. Soccer player Mia Hamm is 42. Rock musician Caroline Corr (The Corrs) is 41. Actress Amelia Heinle is 41. Country singer Keifer Thompson (Thompson Square) is 41. Actress Marisa Coughlan is 40. Rapper Swifty (D12) is 39. Actress Natalie Zea is 39. Actress Brittany Daniel is 38. Actress Eliza Hope Bennett is 22.

Thought for Today: "Television is a device that permits people who haven't anything to do to watch people who can't do anything." -- Fred Allen, American comedian (born 1894, died this date in 1956).

Copyright 2014, The Associated Press. All rights reserved.