June 30th
 

1817 ~ Birthday of Joseph Dalton Hooker, Botanist.

1864 ~ President Lincoln granted Yosemite Valley to California for "public use, resort and recreation".

1908 ~ Tunguska impact event occurred in Siberia.

1917 ~ Birthday of Lena Horne, Actress & Singer.

1934 ~ Night of the Long Knives in Germany.

1934 ~ Death of Ernst Röhm, Nazi government official.

1936 ~ ”Gone with the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell published.

1943 ~ Birthday of Florence Ballard, Singer & member of the Supremes.

1966 ~ Birthday of Mike Tyson, World Champion Boxer.

1971 ~ Crew of Soyuz 11 spacecraft killed when air supply escaped through faulty valve.

July 1st
 

1646 ~ Birthday of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Mathematician & Philosopher.

1863 ~ Battle of Gettysburg in the American Civil War began.

1872 ~ Birthday of Louis Blériot, first man to fly across the English Channel.

1881 ~ World's first international telephone call, between St. Stephen, New Brunswick and Calais, Maine

1916 ~ First day of the First Battle of the Somme. On this first day, 20,000 soldiers of the British Army were killed, and 40,000 wounded.

1925 ~ Death of Erik Satie, Composer.

1961 ~ Birthday of Diana, Princess of Wales.

1962 ~ Independence of Rwanda and Burundi.

2000 ~ Death of Walter Matthau, Actor.

2004 ~ Saturn Orbit Insertion of Cassini-Huygens begins at 01:12 UT and ends at 02:48 UT.

July 2nd
 

1679 ~ Europeans first visit Minnesota and see headwaters of Mississippi - led by Daniel Greysolon de Du Luth.

1714 ~ Birthday of Christoph Willibald Gluck, Composer.

1839 ~ 53 African slaves led by Joseph Cinqué took over the slave ship Amistad.

1877 ~ Birthday of Hermann Hesse, Writer

1900 ~ First Zeppelin flight on Lake Constance near Friedrichshafen, Germany

1906 ~ Birthday of Hans Bethe, Nobel-winning nuclear physicist.

1925 ~ Birthday of Patrice Lumumba, Prime Minister of Congo.

1937 ~ Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan disappeared over the Pacific Ocean while attempting to make the first round-the-world flight at the equator

1942 ~ Birthday of Vicente Fox, president of Mexico.

1976 ~ North and South Vietnam united to form the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

July 3rd
 

323 ~ Battle of Adrianople: Constantine the Great defeated Licinius, who fled to Byzantium.

1608 ~ Quebec City founded by Samuel de Champlain.

1844 ~ The last pair of Great Auks was killed.

1854 ~ Birthday of Leos Janacek, Composer.

1883 ~ Birthday of Franz Kafka, Author.

1890 ~ Idaho was admitted as the 43rd U.S. state.

1935 ~ Death of André Citroën, automobile pioneer.

1938 ~ World record for a steam railway locomotive was set in England, by the "Mallard", which reached a speed of 126 mph.

1964 ~ President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited racial segregation in public places.

1998 ~ Death of Danielle Bunten Berry, a.k.a. Dan Bunten, software developer.

July 4th
 

1054 ~ A supernova was observed by the Chinese and American Indians near the star ζ Tauri. For several months it remained bright enough to be seen during the day. Its remnants form the Crab Nebula.

1776 ~ The Continental Congress of the British colonies in America approved a Declaration of Independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain, forming the United States of America.

1807 ~ Birthday of Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italian patriot.

1826 ~ Death of John Adams, 2nd president of the United States and Thomas Jefferson, 3rd president of the United States. In a remarkable coincidence, both of these framers of the United States Declaration of Independence died on the 50th anniversary of its adoption.

1865 ~ “Alice's Adventures in Wonderland” is published.

1883 ~ Birthday of Rube Goldberg, Cartoonist.

1918 ~ Birthday of Ann Landers, advice columnist.

1924 ~ Birthday of Eva Marie Saint, Actress: “North by Northwest”, “On the Waterfront”.

1946 ~ After over 400 years, the Philippines achieved full independence.

1976 ~ Israeli commandos raided Entebbe airport in Uganda, rescuing most passengers and crew of an Air France jetliner seized by pro-Palestinian hijackers.

July 5th
 

1687 ~ Isaac Newton's “Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica” published.

1781 ~ Birthday of Sir Stamford Raffles, founder of Singapore.

1830 ~ France invaded Algeria.

1853 ~ Birthday of Cecil Rhodes, South African politician.

1951 ~ William Shockley invented the junction transistor.

1880 ~ Birthday of Jan Kubelík, violinist.

1962 ~ Algeria became independent from France.

1909 ~ Birthday of Andrei Gromyko, president of the Soviet Union.

1971 ~ The voting age in the United States was reduced to 18 from 21.

1996 ~ Birthday of Dolly the sheep, the world's first cloned mammal.

July 6th
 

1483 ~ Richard III crowned king of England.

1885 ~ Louis Pasteur successfully tested his vaccine against rabies.

1917 ~ Arabian troops led by T.E. Lawrence captured Aqaba from the Turks.

1923 ~ Birthday of Nancy Reagan, Actress, former US First Lady.

1964 ~ ”A Hard Day's Night”, the first Beatles film, premieres.

1935 ~ Birthday of Tenzin Gyatso, (Lhamo Dhondrup) fourteenth and current Dalai Lama.

1937 ~ Birthday of Vladimir Ashkenazy, Pianist & Conductor.

1946 ~ Birthday of Sylvester Stallone, Actor.

1946 ~ Birthday of George W. Bush, US President.

1974 ~ The radio program “A Prairie Home Companion” made its first live broadcast.

2004 ~ PixiesPace mourns the loss of one of their own, skipthisone. He was only 31.

July 7th
 

1534 ~ First known exchange between Europeans and natives of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, in New Brunswick.

1887 ~ Birthday of Marc Chagall, Painter.

1898 ~ US President William McKinley signed the Newlands Resolution annexing Hawaii as a territory of the United States.

1907 ~ Birthday of Robert Heinlein, Science Fiction Writer.

1915 ~ Birthday of Yul Brynner, Actor.

1922 ~ Birthday of Pierre Cardin, Fashion Designer.

1940 ~ Birthday of Ringo Starr, Drummer and Singer.

1946 ~ Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini became the first American to be canonized.

1969 ~ French was made equal to English throughout the Canadian national government.

1978 ~ The Solomon Islands became independent from the United Kingdom.

Today is also ironically "The Day the Clowns Cried"

http://www.historybuff.com/library/reffire.html

July 8th
 

1099 ~ First Crusade: 15,000 starving Christian soldiers marched around Jerusalem as its Muslim defenders mocked them.

1663 ~ Charles II of England granted John Clarke a Royal Charter to Rhode Island.

1695 ~ Death of Christiaan Huygens, Dutch scientist and namesake of Saturn satellite probes.

1758 ~ French and Indian War: French forces held Fort Carillon against British at Ticonderoga, New York.

1822 ~ Death of Percy Bysshe Shelley, Poet ("Ozymandias", "Ode to the West Wind”, …).

1838 ~ Birthday of Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin, inventor of rigid dirigibles.

1839 ~ Birthday of John D. Rockefeller, founder of Standard Oil.

1889 ~ The first issue of the Wall Street Journal was published.

1933 ~ Birthday of Marty Feldman, Comedian & Actor (“Blazing Saddles”, “Young Frankenstein”,…).

1997 ~ Mayo Clinic researchers warned that the dieting-drug "fen-phen" could cause severe heart and lung damage.

July 10th
 

48 BC ~ Julius Caesar barely avoided a catastrophic defeat to Pompey at the Battle of Dyrrhachium.

1509 ~ Birthday of John Calvin, Reformer.

1789 ~ Alexander Mackenzie reached Mackenzie River Delta.

1856 ~ Birthday of Nikola Tesla, Physicist, Mathematician, Inventor, and Electrical Engineer.

1903 ~ Birthday of John Wyndham, Author.

1920 ~ Birthday of David Brinkley, television reporter.

1940 ~ The Luftwaffe began to attack British convoys in the English Channel, opening the Battle of Britain.

1962 ~ Telstar, the world's first communications satellite, was launched into orbit.

1985 ~ The Greenpeace vessel, the Rainbow Warrior was bombed and sunk in Auckland Harbor by French DGSE agents.

1989 ~ Death of Mel Blanc, Voice Actor.

July 11th
 

1302 ~ Battle of the Golden Spurs - the Flemish cities beat the French army. The battle showed that mounted knights were not invincible and so marked the beginning of their decline in European warfare.

1274 ~ Birthday of Robert the Bruce, king of Scotland.

1533 ~ King Henry VIII of England was excommunicated.

1754 ~ Birthday of Thomas Bowdler, Literary Censor.

1798 ~ The United States Marine Corps is established.

1811 ~ Italian scientist Amedeo Avogadro published his memoir about molecular content of gases.

1857 ~ Birthday of Alfred Binet, Psychologist

1899 ~ Birthday of E. B. White, Writer.

1913 ~ Birthday of Cordwainer Smith, Writer.

1995 ~ Bosnian Serbs captured the Muslim city of Srebrenica. Many inhabitants were murdered.

July 12th
 

1690 ~ William of Orange's army won the Battle of the Boyne.

1730 ~ Birthday of Josiah Wedgwood, Potter.

1812 ~ Americans invaded Canada at Windsor, Ontario.

1817 ~ Birthday of Henry David Thoreau, Writer, Philosopher.

1901 ~ Birthday of Sir William Osler, Physician, Author, Professor of Medicine.

1908 ~ Birthday of Milton Berle, Comedian.

1934 ~ Birthday of Van Cliburn, Pianist.

1937 ~ Birthday of Bill Cosby, Comedian, Actor, Educator.

1967 ~ Four days of race riots began in Newark, New Jersey that claimed the lives of 27 people.

1998 ~ KDE 1.0 released.

July 13th
 

100 BC ~ Birthday of Julius Caesar, statesman and military leader.

1793 ~ Death of Jean Paul Marat, French revolutionary.

1864 ~ Birthday of John Jacob Astor IV, entrepreneur.

1908 ~ Women competed in modern Olympics for the first time.

1909 ~ Gold discovered near Cochrane, Ontario.

1942 ~ Birthday of Harrison Ford, Actor

1946 ~ Birthday of Cheech Marin, Actor, Comedian.

1951 ~ Death of Arnold Schoenberg, Composer.

1977 ~ The New York City Blackout of 1977 lasted for 25 hours and resulted in looting and other disorder.

1982 ~ Montreal hosted the first baseball All-Star Game outside the United States.

July 14th
 

1602 ~ Birthday of Jules Mazarin, Statesman and Cardinal.

1789 ~ French Revolution: Parisians stormed the Bastille Prison in Paris and freed seven political prisoners.

1881 ~ Death of Billy the Kid

1904 ~ Birthday of Isaac Bashevis Singer, author

1904 ~ Death of Anton Chekhov - Russian playwright and short story writer.

1913 ~ Birthday of Gerald Ford, American president.

1933 ~ In Germany, all political parties were outlawed except the Nazi Party.

1965 ~ Mariner 4 flyby of Mars.

1965 ~ Death of Adlai Stevenson, US presidential candidate.

2002 ~ During Bastille Day celebrations, Jacques Chirac escaped an assassination attempt.

July 15th
 

1099 ~ Crusaders took the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem after a difficult siege during First Crusade.

1207 ~ John of England expeled Canterbury monks for supporting Archbishop of Canterbury Stephen Langton.

1573 ~ Birthday of Inigo Jones, Architect.

1606 ~ Birthday of Rembrandt, (Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn) Artist

1779 ~ Birthday of Clement Moore, Author, Poet.

1796 ~ Birthday of Thomas Bulfinch, mythologist, author “Bulfinch's Mythology”

1799 ~ In the Egyptian village of Rosette, French Captain Pierre Bouchard found the Rosetta Stone.

1815 ~ Napoléon Bonaparte surrendered from aboard HMS Bellerophon.

1911 ~ Birthday of Edward Shackleton, Explorer.

1916 ~ In Seattle, Washington, William Boeing incorporated Pacific Aero Products (later renamed Boeing).

July 16th
 

622 ~ Beginning of the Islamic calendar by Caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab.

1783 ~ Following the American War of Independence, grants of land in Canada to American loyalists announced.

1872 ~ Birthday of Roald Amundsen, explorer, first to reach the South Pole.

1911 ~ Birthday of Ginger Rogers, Actress & Dancer.

1942 ~ On orders from the Vichy France government headed by Pierre Laval, French police officers rounded up 13,000-20,000 Jews and imprisoned them.

1945 ~ The US successfully detonateed a test nuclear weapon at the Trinity site near Alamogordo, New Mexico.

1969 ~ Apollo 11 launched from Cape Kennedy, Florida to become the first manned space mission to land on the moon.

1981 ~ Death of Harry Chapin, Singer & Songwriter.

1999 ~ Birthday of John F. Kennedy Jr.

2001 ~ The FBI arrested Dmitry Sklyarov at a convention in Las Vegas, Nevada for violating a provision of the DMCA.

July 17th
 

180 ~ Twelve inhabitants of Scillium in North Africa were executed for being Christians. This is the earliest record of Christianity in that part of the world.

1674 ~ Birthday of Isaac Watts, English hymnwriter.

1762 ~ Catherine the Great became empress of Russia after the murder of Peter III.

1787 ~ Birthday of Friedrich Krupp, Industrialist.

1790 ~ Death of Adam Smith, Scottish economist.

1897 ~ The Klondike gold rush began when the first successful prospectors arrived in Seattle, Washington.

1918 ~ Tsar Nicholas II, Tsarina Alexandra, their children and staff were murdered by Bolsheviks.

1945 ~ World War II: Potsdam Conference - At Potsdam, the three main Allied leaders began their final summit of the war.

1955 ~ Disneyland opened in Anaheim, California.

1997 ~ The F.W. Woolworth Company closed after 117 years in business.

July 18th
 

64 ~ Great fire of Rome: A fire began to burn in the merchant area of Rome and burned out of control while Emperor Nero reportedly played his lyre and sung while watching the blaze from a safe distance.

1635 ~ Birthday of Robert Hooke, Scientist.

1853 ~ Birthday of Hendrik Lorentz, Dutch Physicist and Nobel laureate.

1898 ~ Marie and Pierre Curie announced the discovery of a new element and proposed to call it polonium.

1918 ~ Birthday of Nelson Mandela, South African Revolutionary & President.

1921 ~ Birthday of John Glenn, Astronaut and Politician.

1922 ~ Birthday of Thomas Kuhn, Philosopher of Science.

1925 ~ Adolf Hitler published his personal manifesto “Mein Kampf”.

1976 ~ Gymnast Nadia Comaneci, aged 14, scored first ever perfect 10 at Olympics.

1994 ~ In Buenos Aires, an explosion destroyed a building housing several Jewish organizations killing 96 and injuring many more.

July 19th
 

1533 ~ Lady Jane Grey was replaced by Mary I as Queen of England after having that title for just nine days.

1814 ~ Birthday of Samuel Colt, Inventor.

1834 ~ Birthday of Edgar Degas, Impressionist Painter.

1873 ~ William Gosse became the first European to discover Ayers Rock and named it in honor of South Australian Premier Sir Henry Ayers.

1898 ~ Birthday of Herbert Marcuse, Communist Philosopher.

1922 ~ Birthday of George McGovern, WWII Bomber pilot & sometime Presidential Candidate.

1942 ~ World War II: Battle of the Atlantic - German Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz ordered the last U-boats to withdraw from their United States Atlantic coast positions in response to an effective American convoy system.

1976 ~ Sagarmatha National Park in Nepal was created.

1985 ~ Death of Janusz A. Zajdel, Polish science fiction writer.

1989 ~ A Douglas DC-10 carrying United Airlines flight 232 crashed in Sioux City, Iowa killing 112 but due to extraordinary efforts by the pilot and his crew, 184 on board survive. *** There is an interesting article on this in the current issue of Scientific American. ***

July 20th
 

1871 ~ British Columbia joined the confederation of Canada.

1919 ~ Birthday of Sir Edmund Hillary, mountain climber.

1923 ~ Death of Pancho Villa, Revolutionary.

1938 ~ Birthday of Natalie Wood, actress: From Here to Eternity, Rebel Without a Cause, West Side Story.

1938 ~ Birthday of Dame Diana Rigg, actress: Mrs. Peel.

1940 ~ Billboard magazine published its first "Music Popularity Chart."

1944 ~ Adolf Hitler survived the “July 20 Plot” assassination attempt led by Claus von Stauffenberg.

1960 ~ Ceylon elected Sirimavo Bandaranaike Prime Minister, the world's first female head of government.

1969 ~ Apollo 11 landed on the Moon and Neil Armstrong and "Buzz" Aldrin become the first humans to walk on its surface.

1974 ~ Turkey invaded Cyprus

July 21st
 

1865 ~ In the market square of Springfield, Missouri, Wild Bill Hickok shot Dave Tutt in what is regarded as the first true western showdown.

1870 ~ Death of Josef Strauss, Composer.

1899 ~ Birthday of Ernest Hemingway, Author.

1920 ~ Birthday of Isaac Stern, Violinist.

1925 ~ High school biology teacher John T. Scopes was found guilty of teaching evolution in class and fined $100.

1948 ~ Birthday of Garry Trudeau, Cartoonist.

1954 ~ The Geneva Conference partitioned Vietnam into North Vietnam and South Vietnam.

1967 ~ Death of Basil Rathbone, Actor.

1970 ~ After 11 years of construction, the Aswan High Dam in Egypt was completed.

2004 ~ In an interview broadcast in Australia, filmmaker Michael Moore described Australian Prime Minister John Howard as "someone with half a brain".

July 22nd
 

1793 ~ Alexander Mackenzie reached the Pacific Ocean becoming the first European to complete a transcontinental crossing north of Mexico.

1796 ~ Surveyors of the Connecticut Land Company named an area in Ohio "Cleveland" after Gen. Moses Cleaveland, the superintendent of the surveying party.

1822 ~ Birthday of Gregor Mendel, pioneering Geneticist.

1887 ~ Birthday of Gustav Ludwig Hertz, quantum physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physics.

1898 ~ Birthday of Alexander Calder, Artist.

1933 ~ Wiley Post became the first man to fly solo around the world traveling 15,596 miles in 7 days, 18 hours and 45 minutes.

1934 ~ Death of John Dillinger, bank robber, shot at the Biograph Theater in Chicago.

1967 ~ Death of Carl Sandburg, Poet.

1992 ~ Colombian drug boss Pablo Escobar escaped from his luxury prison in Medellín, fearing extradition to the United States.

2003 ~ Saddam Hussein's sons Uday and Qusay killed.

July 23rd
 

1829 ~ William Burt patented the first “typewriter”.

1892 ~ Birthday of Haile Selassie, emperor of Ethiopia.

1926 ~ Fox Film bought the patents of the Movietone sound system for recording sound onto film.

1962 ~ Telstar relayed the first live trans-Atlantic television signal.

1972 ~ Landsat 1 launched, first Earth-resources satellite.

1982 ~ The International Whaling Commission voted to end commercial whaling by 1985-86.

1973 ~ Birthday of Monica Lewinsky, Congressional intern.

1983 ~ Gimli Glider: Air Canada flight 143 crash-landed in Gimli, Manitoba.

2004 ~ International Whaling Commission: The beginning of the end of the whaling ban.

July 24th
 

1701 ~ Detroit, Michigan founded.

1783 ~ Birthday of Simón Bolívar, South American liberator.

1802 ~ Birthday of Alexandre Dumas, Playwright & Novelist.

1847 ~ Brigham Young lead 148 Mormon pioneers into Salt Lake Valley, resulting in the establishment of Salt Lake City.

1898 ~ Birthday of Amelia Earhart, Aviator.

1910 ~ James MacGillivray published first account of Paul Bunyan in the Detroit News.

1943 ~ World War II: Operation Gomorrah began: British and Canadian aeroplanes bombed Hamburg by night, those of the Americans by day. By the end of the operation in November, 9,000 tons of bombs killed more than 30,000 people and destroyed 280,000 buildings.

1969 ~ Apollo program: Apollo 11 splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean.

1980 ~ Death of Peter Sellers, Actor.

1991 ~ Death of Isaac Bashevis Singer, Author, Nobel Prize for Literature in 1978.

July 25th
 

306 ~ Constantine I proclaimed Roman emperor by his troops.

1799 ~ At Aboukir in Egypt, Napoleon I of France defeated 10,000 Ottomans under Mustafa Pasha.

1834 ~ Death of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Poet.

1848 ~ Birthday of Arthur Balfour, UK Prime Minister.

1907 ~ Korea became a protectorate of Japan.

1909 ~ Louis Bleriot made the first flight across the English Channel in a heavier-than-air machine (Calais to Dover in 37 minutes).

1920 ~ Birthday of Rosalind Franklin, Scientist.

1917 ~ Sir Thomas Whyte introduced the first income tax in Canada as a "temporary" measure.

1978 ~ Birthday of first test-tube baby, Louise Brown.

1997 ~ Death of Ben Hogan, one of the world's best known golfers.

July 26th
 

1469 ~ The Wars of the Roses: Rebel victory at the Battle of Edgecote Moor

1856 ~ Birthday of George Bernard Shaw, Author & Playwright, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature 1925.

1887 ~ L. L. Zamenhof published "Dr. Esperanto's International Language".

1895 ~ Birthday of Aldous Huxley, Author.

1908 ~ Birthday of Salvador Allende, President of Chile.

1928 ~ Birthday of Stanley Kubrick, movie director.

1943 ~ Birthday of Mick Jagger, Musician.

1947 ~ Cold War: U.S. President Harry S. Truman signed the National Security Act into United States law creating the Central Intelligence Agency, Department of Defense, Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the National Security Council.

It seems that a new set up is on the way.

1956 ~ Egypt seizes Suez Canal

1991 ~ Paul Reubens, better known as Pee Wee Herman, was arrested for masturbating at a Sarasota, Florida adult theatre.

July 27th
 

1694 ~ A Royal Charter was granted to the Bank of England.

1794 ~ French Revolution: Maximilien Robespierre was arrested after encouraging the execution of more than 17,000 "enemies of the Revolution".

1844 ~ Death of John Dalton, English chemist.

1866 ~ An Atlantic cable was successfully laid, allowing transatlantic telegraph communication for the first time.

1904 ~ Birthday of Isaac Bashevis Singer, writer, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature 1978.

1940 ~ Bugs Bunny makes his official debut in the animated cartoon “A Wild Hare”.

1955 ~ The Allied occupation of Austria stemming from World War II, ends (started on May 9, 1945).

2003 ~ Death of Bob Hope.

July 28th
 

1540 ~ Thomas Cromwell was executed on order from the king on charges of treason. A great-great grand nephew, Oliver, also became involved in politics.

1741 ~ Death of Antonio Vivaldi, Composer.

1750 ~ Death of Johann Sebastian Bach, Composer.

1794 ~ Maximilien Robespierre was guillotined in front of a cheering crowd, for sending thousands of others to a similar fate during the French Revolution.

1817 ~ Death of Jane Austen, Author.

1866 ~ Birthday of Beatrix Potter, Author.

1929 ~ Birthday of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis.

1914 ~ World War I begins: Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia.

1965 ~ Vietnam War: US President Lyndon B. Johnson announced his order to increase the number of United States troops in South Vietnam from 75,000 to 125,000.

1996 ~ Kennewick Man, the remains of a prehistoric man, was discovered near Kennewick, Washington.

July 29th
 

1588 ~ Battle of Gravelines: The Spanish Armada was defeated by the English navy off the coast of Gravelines, France.

1793 ~ John Graves Simcoe decided to build a fort and settlement at Toronto, having sailed into the bay there.

1856 ~ Death of Robert Schumann, Composer.

1871 ~ Birthday of Grigori Rasputin, Russian Spiritualist.

1907 ~ Sir Robert Baden-Powell founded the Boy Scouts movement with the first scout camp at Brownsea Island.

1883 ~ Birthday of Benito Mussolini, Italian Dictator.

1890 ~ Death of Vincent van Gogh, Dutch painter.

1954 ~ First part of The Lord of the Rings was published in the UK.

1958 ~ The United States Congress formally created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

1981 ~ Lady Diana Spencer married Charles, Prince of Wales.

July 28th
 

1818 ~ Birthday of Emily Brontë, English novelist

1863 ~ Birthday of Henry Ford, American industrialist

1898 ~ Death of Otto von Bismarck, German chancellor.

1930 ~ In Montevideo, Uruguay won the first Football World Cup.

1945 ~ World War II: A Japanese submarine sank the USS Indianapolis, killing 883 seamen in the worst single loss in the history of the United States Navy.

1947 ~ Birthday of Arnold Schwarzenegger, actor, 38th Governor of California

1966 ~ At Wembley Stadium, host England won the first televised Football World Cup, beating Germany 4 to 2.

1971 ~ Apollo 15 landed on the Moon.

1975 ~ Death of James Blish, science fiction author.

2003 ~ In Mexico, the last 'old style' Volkswagen Beetle rolled off the assembly line.

July 31st
 

1498 ~ On his third voyage to the New World, Christopher Columbus became the first European to discover the island of Trinidad.

1556 ~ Death of Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Jesuits

1703 ~ Daniel Defoe was placed in a pillory for the crime of seditious libel after publishing a politically satirical pamphlet.

1803 ~ Birthday of John Ericsson, Swedish inventor and engineer.

1886 ~ Death of Franz Liszt, Composer.

1912 ~ Birthday of Milton Friedman, recipient of the 1976 Nobel Prize in economics

1917 ~ The Third Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele) started in Flanders. With casualties from both sides exceeding 550,000, the name Passcheddaele has come to be used as a synonym for pointless slaughter.

"...I died in Hell
(they called it Passchendaele) my wound was slight
and I was hobbling back; and then a shell
burst slick upon the duckboards; so I fell
into the bottomless mud, and lost the light"
Siegfried Sassoon

1945 ~ Pierre Laval, fugitive former leader of Vichy France, surrendered to Allied soldiers in Austria.

1971 ~ Apollo program: Apollo 15 astronauts became the first to ride in a lunar rover.

2001 ~ Death of Poul Anderson, science fiction author.

August 1st
 

1492 ~ Ferdinand and Isabella drove the Jews out of Spain.

1619 ~ First Black slaves landed in Jamestown, Virginia.

1744 ~ Birthday of Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, Scientist.

1779 ~ Birthday of Francis Scott Key, Composer of "The Star-Spangled Banner"

1790 ~ The first census of the United States was completed. The total population of the thirteen states was 3,929,214.

1819 ~ Birthday of Herman Melville, writer

1932 ~ Birthday of Meir Kahane, founder of the Jewish Defense League

1944 ~ Warsaw Uprising against the Nazi occupation began in Warsaw, Poland.

1990 ~ Iraq invades Kuwait.

1992 ~ Death of Mikhail Tal, world chess champion.

August 2nd
 

338 BC ~ Philip of Macedon crushed Athens and Thebes in the Battle of Chaeronea.

216 BC ~ Battle of Cannae: Hannibal destroyed the Roman army of Lucius Aemilius Paulus and Publius Terentius Varro in what is considered one of the great masterpieces of tactics.

1754 ~ Birthday of Pierre Charles L'Enfant, Architect & City Planner.

1870 ~ Tower Subway, the world's first underground tube railway opened in London.

1921 ~ Death of Enrico Caruso, Tenor.

1932 ~ Birthday of Peter O'Toole, Actor.

1934 ~ Adolf Hitler became Führer of Germany.

1951 ~ Birthday of Lance Ito, Judge

1976 ~ Death of Fritz Lang, Film Director.

1997 ~ Australian ski instructor Stuart Diver was rescued as the sole survivor from the Thredbo landslide in New South Wales, Australia, in which 18 lives were lost.

August 3rd
 

1492 ~ Christopher Columbus set sail from Palos de la Frontera, Spain.

1887 ~ Birthday of Rupert Brooke, Poet.

1900 ~ Birthday of John T. Scopes, defendant in the Monkey Trial.

1904 ~ Birthday of Clifford D. Simak, Science Fiction Author.

1914 ~ First World War: Germany declared war against France.

1924 ~ Death of Joseph Conrad, Writer.

1941 ~ Birthday of Martha Stewart, Home Economist.

1948 ~ Whittaker Chambers accused Alger Hiss of being a communist and a spy for the Soviet Union.

1958 ~ Nuclear submarine USS Nautilus traveled beneath the Arctic ice cap.

2000 ~ George W. Bush accepted the Republican presidential nomination at the party's convention in Philadelphia.

August 4th
 

1735 ~ Freedom of the press: New York Weekly Journal writer John Peter Zenger was acquitted of seditious libel against the royal governor of New York, on the basis that what he published was true.

1789 ~ The feudal system was abolished in France.

1792 ~ Birthday of Percy Bysshe Shelley, Poet

1840 ~ Birthday of Richard von Krafft-Ebing, Sexologist.

1875 ~ Death of Hans Christian Andersen, Writer.

1901 ~ Birthday of Louis Armstrong, Jazz Musician.

1914 ~ World War I: The United Kingdom declared war on Germany and the United States proclaimed neutrality.

1929 ~ Birthday of Yasser Arafat, Chairman of the PLO.

1944 ~ A tip from a Dutch informer lead the Gestapo to a sealed-off area in an Amsterdam warehouse where they found Jewish diarist Anne Frank and her family.

1987 ~ The Federal Communications Commission rescinded the Fairness Doctrine which had required radio and television stations to "fairly" present controversial issues.

August 5th
 

1305 ~ William Wallace, who led Scottish resistance to England, was captured by the English near Glasgow and transported to London for trial and execution.

1583 ~ Sir Humphrey Gilbert established first English colony in North America, at what is now St John's, Newfoundland.

1861 ~ American Civil War: In order to help pay for the war effort, the United States government issued the first income tax as part of the Revenue Act of 1861 (3% of all incomes over US $800; rescinded in 1872).

1884 ~ The cornerstone for the Statue of Liberty was laid on Bedloe's Island in New York Harbor.

1895 ~ Death of Friedrich Engels, Socialist Philosopher.

1930 ~ Birthday of Neil Armstrong, Astronaut.

1962 ~ Death of Marilyn Monroe, Actress.

1984 ~ Death of Sir Richard Burton, Actor.

1963 ~ United States, United Kingdom, and Soviet Union signed a nuclear test ban treaty.

2000 ~ Death of Sir Alec Guinness, Actor.

August 6th
 

1776 ~ Birthday of Amedeo Avogadro, Chemist.

1806 ~ Francis I, the last Holy Roman Emperor, abdicated, thus ending the Holy Roman Empire.

1809 ~ Birthday of Alfred Lord Tennyson, Poet.

1881 ~ Birthday of Alexander Fleming, scientist.

1911 ~ Birthday of Lucille Ball, Actress, Comedienne.

1926 ~ Gertrude Ederle became first woman to swim the English Channel.

1945 ~ World War II: An nuclear bomb codenamed Little Boy was dropped by the American B-29 Enola Gay on the city of Hiroshima in Japan at 8:16 a.m., killing 80,000.

1943 ~ Birthday of Jon Postel, creator of DNS.

1962 ~ Jamaica became independent.

1991 ~ Tim Berners-Lee released his idea for the "World Wide Web"

August 7th
 

1516 ~ Birthday of Elizabeth Bathory, serial killer.

1742 ~ Birthday of Nathanael Greene, American Revolutionary War general.

1782 ~ George Washington ordered the creation of the Badge of Military Merit to honor soldiers wounded in battle. It is later renamed to the more poetic "Purple Heart".

1816 ~ Simón Bolívar triumphed over Spain in the Battle of Boyacá.

1876 ~ Birthday of Mata Hari (Margaretha Zelle), spy.

1942 ~ Birthday of Garrison Keillor, radio host.

1944 ~ IBM dedicated the first program-controlled calculator, the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator (known best as the Harvard Mark I).

1947 ~ Thor Heyerdahl's balsa wood raft the Kon-Tiki, grounded on the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotu Islands after a 101 day 4,300 mile journey across the Pacific Ocean, proving that pre-historic peoples could have traveled from South America.

1957 ~ Death of Oliver Hardy, Comedian, & Actor

1998 ~ Bombing of the United States embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya killed 224 people and injures over 4,500.

August 8th
 

1879 ~ Birthday of Emiliano Zapata, Mexican Revolutionary.

1902 ~ Birthday of Paul Dirac, Physicist.

1918 ~ World War I: Battle of Amiens - Canadian troops, backed by Australians, began a string of almost continuous victories with a push through the German front lines. German General Erich Ludendorff will later call this the "black day of the German army".

1929 ~ The German airship Graf Zeppelin began a round-the-world flight (ended on August 29).

1930 ~ Birthday of Andy Warhol, Painter.

1931 ~ Birthday of Sir Roger Penrose, Mathematical Physicist.

1937 ~ Birthday of Dustin Hoffman, Actor.

1945 ~ The United Nations Charter is ratified by the United States, and that nation became the first to join the new international organization.

1963 ~ Great Train Robbery: In England, a gang of 15 train robbers stole 2.6 million pounds in bank notes.

1974 ~ US President Richard Nixon announced his resignation (effective August 9).