TODAY IN HISTORY

Saturday, March  02, 2013 AP Highlight in History:  On March 2, 1877, Republican Rutherford B. Hayes was declared winner of the 1876 presidential election over Democrat Samuel J. Tilden, even though Tilden had won the popular vote.   AP Photo
On this date in: 1807 Congress outlawed the importation of slaves to the United States, effective the following year. 1836 Texas declared its independence from Mexico. 1917 Puerto Ricans were granted U.S. citizenship. 1939 Roman Catholic Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli was elected pope and took the name Pius XII. AP Photo 1959 Jazz trumpeter Miles Davis held the first of two recording sessions that yielded the album "Kind of Blue." 1962 Wilt Chamberlain of the Philadelphia Warriors scored 100 points in a game against the New York Knicks, an NBA record that still stands. AP Photo/Paul Vathis 1965 The movie version of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical "The Sound of Music" had its world premiere in New York. 1985 The federal government approved a screening test for AIDS that detected antibodies to the virus, allowing possibly contaminated blood to be excluded from the blood supply. 2004 A series of coordinated blasts in Iraq killed 181 people at shrines in Karbala and Baghdad as thousands of Shiite Muslim pilgrims gathered for a religious festival. 2008 Dmitry Medvedev, Vladimir Putin's hand-picked successor, scored a crushing victory in Russia's presidential election. 2011 The Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that members of the fundamentalist Westboro Baptist Church have a First Amendment right to picket the funeral of a Marine.		Video HIGHLIGHTS OF THIS DAY IN HISTORY Today's Birthdays: Rock musician Jon Bon Jovi turns 51 years old today. AP Photo/Evan Agostini Name Profession Age John Cullum Actor ("Northern Exposure") 83 Tom Wolfe Author 83 Mikhail Gorbachev Former Soviet president 82 John Irving Author 71 Laraine Newman Actress, comedian ("Saturday Night Live") 61 Russ Feingold Former U.S. senator, D-Wis. 60 Jay Osmond Singer 58 Ken Salazar Secretary of the interior 58 John Cowsill Pop musician (The Cowsills) 57 Daniel Craig Actor 45 Chris Martin Rock singer (Coldplay) 36 Heather McComb Actress ("Party of Five") 36 Bryce Dallas Howard Actress 32 Ben Roethlisberger Football player 31 Reggie Bush Football player 28 Robert Iler Actor ("The Sopranos") 28 Rock musician Lou Reed turns 71 years old today. AP Photo/Evan Agostini