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Today is Monday, March 25, the 84th day of 2002. There are 281 days left in the year. 

Today’s Highlight in History: 

On March 25, 1911, in a tragedy that galvanized America’s labor movement, 146 immigrant workers were killed when fire broke out at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company in New York. 

On this date: 

In A.D. 752, Pope Stephen II died, only two days after his election. 

In 1634, Maryland was founded by English colonists sent by the second Lord Baltimore. 

In 1894, Jacob S. Coxey began leading an “army” of unemployed from Massillon, Ohio, to Washington D.C., to demand help from the federal government. 

In 1913, the home of vaudeville, the Palace Theatre, opened in New York City. 

In 1947, a coal mine explosion in Centralia, Ill., claimed 111 lives. 

In 1957, the Treaty of Rome established the European Economic Community. 

In 1965, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. led 25,000 marchers to the state capitol in Montgomery, Ala., to protest the denial of voting rights to blacks. 

In 1975, King Faisal of Saudi Arabia was shot to death by a nephew with a history of mental illness. (The nephew was beheaded the following June.) 

In 1990, 87 people, most of them Honduran and Dominican immigrants, were killed when fire raced through an illegal social club in New York City. 

In 1996, the redesigned $100 bill went into circulation. 

Ten years ago: Libyan leader Colonel Moammar Gadhafi backed away from an offer to turn over two suspects in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 to the Arab League. Soviet cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev, who’d spent 10 months aboard the orbiting Mir space station, thereby missing the upheaval in his homeland, finally returned to Earth. 

Five years ago: The Federal Reserve nudged interest rates higher for the first time in two years, hoping to stifle any threat of rising inflation. Georgia Gov. Zell Miller signed into law a ban on a controversial form of late-term abortion. Former President George Bush, 73, parachuted from a plane over the Arizona desert. 

One year ago: At the 73rd Academy Awards, “Gladiator” won for best picture; its star, Russell Crowe, won best actor; Julia Roberts won best actress for “Erin Brockovich”; Steven Soderbergh won best director for “Traffic.” 

Today’s Birthdays  

Modeling agency founder Eileen Ford is 80. Former astronaut James Lovell is 74. Movie reviewer Gene Shalit is 70. Feminist author Gloria Steinem is 68. Singer Anita Bryant is 62. Singer Aretha Franklin is 60. Actor Paul Michael Glaser is 59. Singer Elton John is 55. Actress Bonnie Bedelia is 54. Singer Nick Lowe is 53. Actress-comedian Mary Gross is 49. Actor James McDaniel is 44. Actor-writer-director John Stockwell is 41. Actress Lisa Gay Hamilton is 38. Actress Sarah Jessica Parker is 37. Singer-musician Jeff Healey is 36. Olympic bronze medal figure skater Debi Thomas is 35. Singer Melanie Blatt (All Saints) is 27.