Associated Press

On July 2, 1881, President James A. Garfield was shot by Charles J. Guiteau at the Washington railroad station; Garfield died the following September.

In 1937, aviator Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan disappeared over the Pacific Ocean while attempting to make the first round-the-world flight along the equator.

In 1962, the first Walmart store opened in Rogers, Arkansas.

In 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law a sweeping civil rights bill passed by Congress prohibiting discrimination and segregation based on race, color, sex, religion or national origin.

In 1976, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Gregg v. Georgia, ruled 7-2 that the death penalty was not inherently cruel or unusual.

In 2002, Steve Fossett became the first person to complete a solo nonstop balloon flight of the world.