Special Olympics founder Eunice Kennedy Shriver overlooks Soldier Field in Chicago at the 1968 games, the first to be held. Photo courtesy Special Olympics | License Photo

UPI White House reporter Helen Thomas (C) represented all the regular White House reporters during a boycott of a White House news briefing on October 18, 1982. The briefing by Morton Collins, of the National Venture Capital Association, came after Collins presented President Ronald Reagan with a golden egg award, but the reporters were not permitted to view the presentation. Thomas died July 20, 2013. File Photo by Don Rypka/UPI | License Photo

Accused movie theater shooter James Holmes (L) makes his first court appearance at the Arapahoe County Courthouse with his public defender Tamara Brady on July 23, 2012, in Centennial, Colo. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. File Photo by RJ Sangosti/Pool | License Photo

A resident leaves flowers while visiting a makeshift memorial for the Century 16 movie theater victims near the crime scene in Aurora, Colo., on July 21, 2012. File Photo by Gary C. Caskey/UPI | License Photo

Fourteen movie goers were shot and killed, and 58 others injured at the Century 16 movie theaters at the Aurora Mall in Aurora, Colo., on July 20, 2012. File Photo by Gary C. Caskey/UPI | License Photo

July 20 (UPI) -- On this date in history:

In 1859, American baseball fans were charged an admission fee for the first time. About 1,500 spectators each paid 50 cents to see Brooklyn play New York.


In 1881, five years after U.S. Army Gen. George A. Custer's defeat at the Battle of Little Bighorn, Sioux leader Sitting Bull surrendered to the Army, which promised amnesty for him and his followers.

In 1940, Billboard magazine published its first "Music Popularity Chart," topped by "I'll Never Smile Again" by the Tommy Dorsey orchestra with Frank Sinatra.

In 1945, the U.S. flag was raised over Berlin as the first U.S. troops moved in to take part in the post-World War II occupation.

In 1951, while entering a mosque in the Jordanian sector of east Jerusalem, King Abdullah of Jordan was assassinated by a Palestinian nationalist.

In 1968, the first Special Olympics Games were contested at Soldier Field in Chicago.

In 1969, U.S. Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin became the first men to set foot on the moon -- Armstrong first and Aldrin about 20 minutes later.

In 1976, the Viking 1 lander, an unmanned U.S. planetary probe, became the first spacecraft to successfully land on the surface of Mars.

In 1985, treasure hunter Mel Fisher located a Spanish galleon sunk by a 1622 hurricane off Key West, Fla. It contained $400 million worth of treasure.

In 1989, U.S. President George H.W. Bush called for the United States to organize a long-range space program to support an orbiting space station, a moon base and a manned mission to Mars.

In 1993, White House Deputy Counsel Vince Foster was found shot to death in a park in northern Virginia. His death was ruled a suicide.

In 2005, the U.S. Justice Department activated its online National Sex Offender Public Registry, linking the registries of 22 states.

In 2011, International Tribunal officials announced the arrest of Goran Hadzic, the last Serbian leader wanted for war crimes.

In 2012, a gunman set off tear gas grenades and opened fire at a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises at a theater in Aurora, Colo., killing 12 people and wounding 58. The accused killer, James E. Holmes, later pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. In 2015, he was convicted on multiple counts of murder.

In 2013, Helen Thomas, UPI White House reporter through the administrations of 10 presidents, died at age 92. President Bill Clinton called Thomas "a symbol of everything American journalism can and should be -- the embodiment of fearless integrity, fierce commitment to accuracy, the insistence of holding government accountable." Thomas left the news agency in 2000 and became a columnist for Hearst Newspapers.

In 2015, Cuba and the United States restored full diplomatic relations, with the reopening of reciprocal embassies in Havana and Washington.