Thoroughbred racehorse Secretariat becomes the first U.S. Triple Crown champion in twenty-five years when he wins the Belmont Stakes. During his triple crown campaign, he sets new records in two of the three events (times that still stand today), and wins the Belmont in an astonishing thirty-one lengths.

African-American baseball player Leroy Robert "Satchel" Paige, whose pitching in the Negro leagues and Major League Baseball made him a legend in his own lifetime, dies of a heart attack in his Kansas City home during a power outage. He had been elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1971, becoming the first Negro League player to earn that distinction. In 2008, he is honored by the Hall again, this time posthumously, when a statue of him is erected on the premises.

American poet and satirist Dorothy Parker, who was known for her wit and wisecracks, and was a charter member of famed Algonquin Round Table, dies of a heart attack at age seventy-three. In her will, she bequeaths her estate to the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. foundation. Following King's death, her estate is passed on to the NAACP.