1. On July 21, 1861, the First Battle of Bull Run took place in Manassas, Virginia, marking the first major battle of the American Civil War. It was a Confederate victory and resulted in a shock to Union belief that the war would be swiftly won.

2. In 1932, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly solo across the United States, completing her journey in Culpeper, Virginia on July 21 of that year.

3. On July 21, 1973, Governor Mills E. Godwin Jr. signed legislation creating the Virginia Lottery, with the first tickets going on sale in September of that year. The Virginia Lottery has since raised billions of dollars for the state's public schools.

4. The National D-Day Memorial in Bedford, Virginia was dedicated on July 21, 2001, to honor the soldiers who died in the Normandy landings during World War II. Bedford was chosen as the site of the memorial because it lost more soldiers per capita than any other American town during the invasion of Normandy.

5. On July 21, 1958, the Commonwealth of Virginia executed a man named Germán López for murder. López's execution, by electrocution, was the first to be carried out under Virginia's new electric chair law.