Today in History.....January 12

On this day in …

* 1773, the first public museum in America was established, in Charleston, S.C.

* 1932, Hattie W. Caraway of Arkansas became the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate

* 1942, President Roosevelt created the National War Labor Board

* 1945, during World War II, Soviet forces began a huge offensive against the Germans in Eastern Europe.

* 1948, the Supreme Court ruled that states could not discriminate against law-school applicants because of race

* 1966, President Johnson said in his State of the Union address that the U.S. should stay in South Vietnam until Communist aggression there was ended

* 1986, the shuttle Columbia blasted off with a crew that included the first Hispanic-American in space, Dr. Franklin R. Chang-Diaz

* 1999, Mark McGwire's 70th home run ball was sold at auction in New York for $3 million to an anonymous bidder

* 2004, a NASA spacecraft, Deep Impact, blasted off on a mission to smash a hole in a comet and give scientists a glimpse of the frozen primordial ingredients of the solar system. (The probe smashed into Comet Tempel 1 on July 3.) ALSO: Britain's Prince Harry apologized after a newspaper published a photograph of the young royal wearing a Nazi uniform to a costume party