Wednesday, the Dow fell 79.22 points (0.29%) to 27,269.97, the NASDAQ closed 70.10 points (0.85%) higher at 8,321.50, and the S&P 500 climbed 14.09 points (0.47%) to 3,019.56. The Russell 2000 was up 25.46 points (1.64%) at 1,580.42, and the Wilshire 5000 gained 197.58 points (0.64%) to close at 31,086.13.

ON THIS DATE: In 1850, in Worcester, Massachusetts, Harvard and Yale University freshmen met in the first intercollegiate billiards match. In 1861, the Crittenden Resolution, which called for the American Civil War to be fought to preserve the Union and not for slavery, was passed by Congress. In 1866, Ulysses S. Grant was named General of the Army. He was the first American officer to hold the rank. In 1868, Congress passed an act creating the Wyoming Territory. In 1946, the U.S. detonated an atomic bomb at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific. It was the first underwater test of the device. In 1952, Puerto Rico became a self-governing commonwealth of the U.S. In 1978, Louise Joy Brown, the first test-tube baby, was born in Oldham, England. She had been conceived through in-vitro fertilization. In 1984, Soviet cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya became the first woman to walk in space. She was aboard the orbiting space station Salyut 7. In 1994, Israel and Jordan formally ended the state of war that had existed between them since 1948. In 1998, the USS Harry S. Truman was commissioned and put into service by the Navy. In 2010, WikiLeaks leaked to the public more than 90,000 internal reports involving the U.S.-led War in Afghanistan from 2004 to 2010.