On Dec. 12, 1870, Joseph H. Rainey of South Carolina became the first Black lawmaker sworn into the U.S. House of Representatives.

In 1985, 248 American soldiers and eight crew members were killed when an Arrow Air charter crashed after takeoff from Gander, Newfoundland.

In 2010, the inflatable roof of the Minneapolis Metrodome collapsed following a snowstorm that had dumped 17 inches on the city.

In 2015, nearly 200 nations meeting in Paris adopted the first global pact to fight climate change, calling on the world to collectively cut greenhouse gas emissions but imposing no sanctions on countries that didn’t do so.

In 2018, Michael Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison for crimes that included arranging the payment of hush money to conceal Trump’s alleged sexual affairs.