Today in History: May 24, the Uvalde school shooting

On May 24, 2022, an 18-year-old gunman opened fire at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, killing 19 children and two teachers. The gunman, Salvador Ramos, a former student at the school, was also killed. It was the deadliest shooting at a U.S. elementary school since the 2012 attack on Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.

Also on this date:

In 1844, Samuel F.B. Morse transmitted the message “What hath God wrought” from Washington to Baltimore as he formally opened America’s first telegraph line.

In 1883, New York’s Brooklyn Bridge, at the time the world’s longest suspension bridge, opened to traffic.

In 1935, the first Major League Baseball game to be played at night took place at Cincinnati’s Crosley Field as the Reds beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 2-1.

In 1937, in a pair of rulings, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Social Security Act of 1935.

In 1941, during World War II, the German battleship Bismarck sank the British battle cruiser HMS Hood in the North Atlantic, killing all but three of the 1,418 men on board. (The Bismarck would be sunk by British battleships three days later.)

In 1962, astronaut Scott Carpenter became the second American to orbit the Earth as he flew aboard the Aurora 7 Mercury spacecraft.

In 1974, American jazz composer and bandleader Duke Ellington, 75, died in New York.

In 1994, four Islamic extremists convicted of bombing New York’s World Trade Center in 1993 were each sentenced to 240 years in prison.

In 2021, the European Union agreed to impose sanctions on Belarus over the forced diversion of a Ryanair jetliner flying from Greece to Lithuania to arrest journalist Raman Pratasevich, a key foe of authoritarian Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.

Today’s Birthdays: Comedian Tommy Chong is 88. Musician Bob Dylan is 85. Actor Gary Burghoff (M(asterisk)A(asterisk)S(asterisk)H) is 83. Singer Patti LaBelle is 82. Actor Priscilla Presley is 81. Actor Jim Broadbent is 77. Cinematographer Roger Deakins is 77. Actor Alfred Molina is 73. Musician Rosanne Cash is 71. Actor Kristin Scott Thomas is 66. Author Michael Chabon is 63. Basketball Hall of Famer Joe Dumars is 63. Actor John C. Reilly is 61. Basketball Hall of Famer Tracy McGrady is 47. Dancer-choreographer Mark Ballas is 40. Country singer Billy Gilman is 38. Rapper G-Eazy is 37. Actor Brianne Howey is 37. Actor Daisy Edgar-Jones is 28.