From Historynet: Today in History December 6

1492                       Christopher Columbus lands on the island of Santo Domingo in search of gold.

1776                       Phi Beta Kappa, the first scholastic fraternity, is founded at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg.

1812                       The majority of Napoleon Bonaparte's Grand Armeé staggers into Vilna, Lithuania, ending the failed Russian campaign.

1861                       Union General George G. Meade leads a foraging expedition to Gunnell's farm near Dranesville, Virginia.

1862                       President Abraham Lincoln orders the hanging of 39 of the 303 convicted Indians who participated in the Sioux Uprising in Minnesota. They are to be hanged on December 26.

1863                       The monitor Weehawken sinks in Charleston Harbor.

1865                       The 13th Amendment is ratified, abolishing slavery.

1876                       Jack McCall is convicted for the murder of Wild Bill Hickok and sentenced to hang.

1877                       Thomas A. Edison makes the first sound recording when he recites "Mary had a Little Lamb" into his phonograph machine.

1906                       Lieutenant Thomas E. Selfridge flies a powered, man-carrying kite that carries him 168 feet in the air for seven minutes at Baddeck, Nova Scotia.

1917                       The Bolsheviks imprison Czar Nicholas II and his family in Tobolsk.

1921                       Ireland's 26 southern counties become independent from Britain forming the Irish Free State.

1922                       Benito Mussolini threatens Italian newspapers with censorship if they keep reporting "false" information.

1934                       American Ambassador Davis says Japan is a grave security threat in the Pacific.

1938                       France and Germany sign a treaty of friendship.

1939                       Britain agrees to send arms to Finland, which is fighting off a Soviet invasion.

1941                       President Franklin D. Roosevelt issues a personal appeal to Emperor Hirohito to use his influence to avoid war.

1945                       The United States extends a $3 billion loan to Great Britain to help compensate for the termination of the Lend-Lease agreement.

1947                       Florida's Everglades National Park is established.

1948                       The "Pumpkin Spy Papers" are found on the Maryland farm of Whittaker Chambers. They become evidence that State Department employee Alger Hiss is spying for the Soviet Union.

1957                       Vanguard TV3 explodes on the launchpad, thwarting the first US attempt to launch a satellite into Earth's orbit.

1967                       Adrian Kantrowitz performs first human heart transplant in the US.

1969                       Hells Angels, hired to provide security at a Rolling Stones concert at the Altamont Speedway in California, beat to death concert-goer Meredith Hunter.

1971                       Pakistan severs diplomatic relations with India after New Delhi recognizes the state of Bangladesh.

1973                       US House of Representatives confirms Gerald Ford as Vice-President of the United States, 387–35.

1975                       A Provisional IRA unit takes a couple hostage in Balcombe Street, London, and a 6-day siege begins.

1976                       Democrat Tip O'Neill is elected speaker of the House of Representatives. He will serve the longest consecutive term as speaker.

1992                       The Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, India, is destroyed during a riot that started as a political protest.

2006                       NASA reveals photographs from Mars Global Surveyor that suggest the presence of water on the red planet.