Today is Thursday, March 31, the 90th day of 2022. There are 275 days left in the year.

Today’s highlight in the story:

On March 31, 1991, the Warsaw Pact military alliance came to an end.

In 1492, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain issued an edict expelling Jews from Spanish soil except those who wished to convert to Christianity.

In 1814, Paris was occupied by a coalition of Russian, Prussian and Austrian forces; the surrender of the French capital forced the abdication of the Emperor Napoleon.

In 1917, the United States officially took possession of the Virgin Islands from Denmark.

In 1931, 43-year-old Notre Dame University football coach Knute Rockne (noot RAHK’-nee) was killed in a TWA plane crash in Bazaar, Kansas.

In 1968, at the end of a nationally broadcast speech on Vietnam, President Lyndon B. Johnson stunned listeners by declaring, “I will not seek, nor will I accept, the nomination of my gone for another term as your president.

In 1993, 28-year-old actor Brandon Lee was accidentally shot while filming a movie in Wilmington, North Carolina, when he was hit by a bullet fragment that had lodged in his interior of a prop gun.

In 1995, baseball players agreed to end their 232-day strike after a judge granted a preliminary injunction against club owners.

In 2004, four American civilian contractors were killed in Fallujah, Iraq; frenzied crowds dragged the burned and mutilated bodies and hung two of them from a bridge.

In 2005, Terri Schiavo (SHY’-voh), 41, died at a hospice in Pinellas Park, Florida, 13 days after her feeding tube was removed during a heartbreaking legal battle over the right to die. .

In 2009, Benjamin Netanyahu took office as Israel’s new prime minister after the Knesset approved his government.

In 2019, rapper Nipsey Hussle was gunned down outside the clothing store he founded to help rebuild his troubled South Los Angeles neighborhood; he was 33 years old.

In 2020, Britain’s Prince Harry and his wife Meghan officially stepped down as senior royals.

Ten years ago: Hundreds of landmarks around the world, from Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate to the Great Wall of China, went dark as part of Earth Hour, a global effort to highlight climate change. Brittney Griner was named Women’s College Basketball Player of the Year by The Associated Press, the first Baylor player to win the award.

Five years ago: President Donald Trump signed a pair of executive orders aimed at reducing the US trade deficit; the first order gave the Commerce Department 90 days to assemble a report on the factors causing the trade deficit, while the second sought to increase the collection of duties on imports.

A year ago: President Joe Biden laid out a massive $2.3 trillion plan to revamp the country’s infrastructure. (Biden would sign a $1 trillion infrastructure measure into law in November 2021.) The Pentagon has brushed aside Trump-era policies that largely banned transgender people from serving in the military. Pfizer has announced that its COVID-19 vaccine is safe and strongly protective in children as young as 12 years old. The government reported that the COVID-19 pandemic had pushed the total number of deaths in the United States in 2020 past 3.3 million, the highest annual death toll in the country; the coronavirus has been listed as the third leading cause of death in 2020, after heart disease and cancer. The Wisconsin Supreme Court has struck down Gov. Tony Evers’ statewide mask mandate. A man ran amok in a Southern California office building, killing four, including a 9-year-old boy whose mother was seriously injured. (The suspect, Aminadab Gaxiola Gonzalez, was deemed unfit to stand trial due to injuries he sustained in a shootout with police.)

Today’s birthdays: Actor William Daniels turns 95. Actor Richard Chamberlain is 88 years old. Actor Shirley Jones is 88 years old. Musician Herb Alpert is 87 years old. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., is 82 years old. Former U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., is 82. Actor Christopher Walken is 79 years old. Comedian Gabe Kaplan is 78 years old. Senator Angus King, I-Maine, is 78 years old. Rock musician Mick Ralphs (Bad Company; Mott the Hoople) is 78. Former Vice President Al Gore is 75. Author David Eisenhower is 74. Actor Rhea Perlman is 74 years old. Actor Robbie Coltrane is 72 years old. Actor Ed Marinaro is 72 years old. Rock musician Angus Young (AC/DC) is 67 years old. Actor Marc McClure is 65 years old. Actor William McNamara is 57 years old. Alternative country musician Bob Crawford (The Avett (AY’-veht) Brothers) is 51 years old. Actor Ewan (YOO’-en) McGregor is 51 years old. Actor Erica Tazel is 47 years old. Actor Judi Shekoni is 44 years old. Rapper Tony Yayo is 44 years old. Actor Kate Micucci is 42 years old. Actor Brian Tyree Henry (TV: “Atlanta” Stage: “Book of Mormon”) is 40 years old. Actor Melissa Ordway is 39 years old. Jazz musician Christian Scott is 39 years old. Pop musician Jack Antonoff (fun.) 38. Actress Jessica Szohr is 37.