May 26

1872: A fire extinguisher was patented by Thomas J. Martin. 1874: Henri Farman, the airplane designer who invented ailerons, was born. 1888: Ascanio Sobrero, who discovered nitroglycerine, died. 1908: The first major Middle East oil strike was made in Persia (now Iraq). 1939: Charles Mayo, co-founder of the Mayo Clinic, died. 1946: A patent was filed in the U.S. for an H-bomb. 1951: Sally Ride, the first American woman to orbit the earth when she flew aboard Space Shuttle Challenger, was born. 1959: The word "Frisbee" became a registered trademark of Wham-O. 1961: A U.S. Air Force bomber flew across the Atlantic in a record time of just over three hours. 1969: The "Apollo 10" astronauts returned to Earth after a successful 8-day dress rehearsal for the first manned moon landing. 1977: "Star Wars" debuted. 1981: Satya Pal Asija received the first U.S. patent for computer software. 1994: President Clinton announced his administration would no longer link China's trade status with its human rights record. 2003: English astronomer Gerald Hawkins, who first identified Stonehenge as an astronomical observatory, died. 2007: Homer Stewart, an early pioneer of rocket research who helped develop the first successful U.S. satellite, Explorer I, died.