Category: Today

August 20

636 – The army of the Rashidun Caliphate defeats the Byzantine army in the final battle near the Yarmouk river, ending Byzantine rule in Syria. This marks the beginning of moslem conquests outside Arabia.

1191 – During the 3rd Crusade, Richard I of England executes several thousand Saracen hostages at Ayyadieh in retaliation for the perfidy of Saladin

1775 – The Spanish establish the Presidio San Augustin del Tucson, modern day Tucson, Arizona.

1794 – United States troops defeat a confederacy of Shawnee, Mingo, Delaware, Wyandot, Miami, Ottawa, Chippewa, and Potawatomi warriors at the Battle of Fallen Timbers, near the Maumee River in northwestern Ohio, during the Northwest Territory Indian War.

1852 – The steamboat Atlantic sinks on Lake Erie after a collision with the steamboat Ogdensburg, with the loss of at least 150 lives.

1866 – President Andrew Johnson formally declares the end of the American Civil War.

1914 – Brussels is captured during the German invasion of Belgium.

1920 – The first commercial radio station, 8MK (now WWJ), begins operations in Detroit.

1938 – New York Yankees’ player Lou Gehrig hits his 23rd career grand slam, a record that stands for 75 years until broken by Yankees’ Alex Rodriguez in 2013.

1940 – Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky is fatally wounded with an ice axe by Ramón Mercader, in Mexico City, dying the next day.

1962 – The U.S. government financed NS Savannah, the world’s first nuclear powered civilian ship, embarks on its maiden voyage.

1968 – Warsaw Pact troops invade Czechoslovakia to stop mass freedom protests in Prague.

1975 – NASA launches the Viking 1 probe to become the first craft to launch a landing probe on Mars.

1977 – NASA launches the Voyager 2 spacecraft to encounter the outer planets and go on into interstellar space.

1986 – In Edmond, Oklahoma, U.S. Postal employee Patrick Sherrill murders 14 of his co-workers and then commits suicide.

1991 –More than 100,000 people rally outside the Soviet Union’s parliament building protesting the coup aiming to depose President Mikhail Gorbachev.

1998 – The United States launches cruise missile attacks against al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan and a suspected chemical weapons plant in Sudan in retaliation for the August 7 bombings of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

2017 – Jerry Lewis dies at his home in Las Vegas, Nevada at age 91.

2020 – Joe Biden accepts the nomination as the 2020 democratic presidential candidate

August 19

43 BC – Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus ‘Octavian’ is elected consul by the Roman Senate.

14 – Emperor Octavian ‘Caesar Augustus’ dies in Nola, Italy.

1153 – The same day his army retakes Ascalon, Baldwin III of Jerusalem takes control of the Kingdom of Jerusalem from his mother Melisende.

1692 –In Salem, Massachusetts, 5 people, 1 woman and 4 men, including a clergyman, are executed after being convicted of witchcraft.

1782 – In the last major engagement of the Revolutionary War, a force of  Loyalists, along with Indians, ambushes and routs a force of Kentucky militiamen near the Licking River in Virginia

1812 – The frigate USS Constitution earns the nickname “Old Ironsides” during battle with the British frigate HMS Guerriere when an American crewmen yells “Her sides are made of iron!” when a shot merely bounces off the oak hull.

1848 – The New York Herald breaks the news to the east coast of the U.S. of the gold strike earlier in the year in California.

1854 – The 1st Sioux War begins near Fort Laramie, Nebraska Territory, when U.S Army soldiers, under the command of John Lawrence Grattan,  mortally wound Lakota Chief Conquering Bear while attempting to arrest one of his tribe and in return are massacred to the last man.

1862 – At the beginning of an indian uprising in Minnesota, called U.S.-Dakota War of 1862, or more commonly ‘Little Crow’s War’, lasting only a few months, Santee Lakota warriors decide not to attack heavily defended Fort Ridgely and instead turn to the settlement of New Ulm, killing white settlers along the way.

1883 – Gabrielle ‘Coco’ Chanel is born in Saumur, France.

1909 – The Indianapolis Motor Speedway opens for automobile racing.

1934 – Adolf Hitler’s appointment as combined head of state  –Der Führer– is approved by a vote of the German people.

1942 – The 2nd Canadian Infantry Division and allied forces begin a near disastrous assault on the French port of Dieppe during World War II.

1944 – Free French and French Resistance forces, with allied troops, begin the assault to liberate Paris from German occupation.

1945 – Viet Minh forces led by Ho Chi Minh take power in Hanoi, Vietnam.

1960 – At trial in Moscow,  U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers is sentenced to 10 years imprisonment for espionage.

1964 – NASA’s Syncom 3, the first geostationary communication satellite, is launched from Cape Canaveral.

1981 – 2 U.S. Navy Grumman F-14 fighters intercept and shoot down 2 Libyan Sukhoi Su-22 fighters over the Gulf of Sidra in the Mediterranean.

1991 – During the dissolution of the Soviet Union, hard line communists attempt a coup d’état against President Mikhail Gorbachev

2009 – In Kandahar, Afghanistan,  U.S. Army Sergeant Paul Dumont Jr. is killed in a vehicle accident.

2010 – Operations Iraqi Freedom and Laser Escort ends, with the last of the U.S. Brigade Combat Teams and certain Special Operations Forces crossing the border back into Kuwait.

2017 – A open water net pen at a fish farm near Cypress Island, Washington state, run by Cooke Aquaculture Pacific, breaks, accidentally releasing into the Pacific Ocean over 300,000 non-native Atlantic salmon.

August 18

1227 – Genghis Khan dies in Yinchuan, China

1487 – The city of Málaga in the Emirate of Granada, Spain falls to the combined forces of Castile and Aragon during the final years of the Reconquista.

1590 – John White, the governor of the Roanoke Colony, returns from a supply trip to England and finds his settlement deserted.

1636 –  The Covenant of the Town of Dedham, Massachusetts is signed.

1774 – Meriwether Lewis is born in Ivy, Virginia.

1826 – British Brevet Major Gordon Laing becomes the first European to enter the city of Timbuktu.

1838 – The United States Exploring Expedition to explore Puget Sound and Antarctica, under the command of Lt Charles Wilkes, weighs anchor at Hampton Roads, Virginia.

1846 – During the Mexican–American War, General Stephen W Kearney’s US forces capture Santa Fe.

1864 – Union forces attempt for the second time to cut the Wilmington & Weldon Railroad supply line into Petersburg, Virginia near the Globe Tavern.

1868 – Pierre Janssen discovers helium.

1920 – The 19th Amendment to the Constitution is ratified

1938 – The Thousand Islands Bridge, connecting Wellesley Island in New York with Ontario, Canada over the Saint Lawrence River, is dedicated by President Roosevelt.

1945 – U.S. Army photographer SGT Anthony J. Marchione is the last American to die in WWII when the B-32 he is flying in over Tokyo is damaged by enemy fire.

1958 –  Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov is published in the United States.

1965 – Operation Starlite, the first major combat ground operation by purely U.S forces begins when U.S. Marines destroy a Viet Cong stronghold on the Van Tuong peninsula.

1976 – While attempting to cut down a tree that blocked the line of sight between a United Nations Command checkpoint and an observation post, in the Joint Security Area in the Korean Demilitarized Zone, North Korean soldiers kill two US Army officers supervising the operation.

1983 – Hurricane Alicia hits the Texas Gulf coast, killing 21 people and causing over US$1 billion in damage.

1989 – Colombian presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galán is assassinated near Bogotá

1993 – American International Airways Cargo Flight 808,  a McDonnell Douglas DC-8, crashes on landing at Leeward Point Field at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, injuring the 3 crew members aboard.

2005 – Dennis Rader is sentenced to 175 years in prison for the BTK (Bind, Torture, Kill) serial killings in Sedgwick County, Kansas.

 

August 17

1386 – Karl Topia, the ruler of the Principality of Albania allies with the Republic of Venice, committing to participate in all wars of the Republic and receiving coastal protection against the moslem Ottomans in return.

1585 – Sent by Sir Walter Raleigh and led by Ralph Lane, a group of English colonists found Roanoke Colony on Roanoke Island, North Carolina

1717 – The 2 month siege to retake Belgrade from the Ottoman empire ends when Austrian troops succeed in capturing the city

1786 – Davy Crockett is born in what is now Greene County, Tennessee

1807 – Robert Fulton’s steamboat North River leaves New York City for Albany, starting the first commercial steamboat service.

1862 – Major General J.E.B. Stuart is assigned command of all the cavalry of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.

1864 – Confederate forces defeat Union troops near Gainesville, Florida.

1915 – A category 4 hurricane hits Galveston, Texas with winds at 135 miles per hour

1942 – U.S. Marines of the 2nd Marine Raider Battalion, under command of Colonel Evans Carlson and Captain James Roosevelt, raid the Japanese held Makin atoll

1943 – The U.S. 7th Army under General George S. Patton arrives in Messina, Sicily several hours ahead of the British 8th Army under Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery

1945 – Animal Farm by George Orwell is published.

1969 – Category 5 Hurricane Camille hits the U.S. Gulf Coast, killing 256 people and causing $1.4 billion in damage.

1978 – Double Eagle II, piloted by Ben Abruzzo, Maxie Anderson and Larry Newman, becomes the first balloon to cross the Atlantic Ocean, landing in Miserey, France

1998 – President Clinton admits in taped testimony that he had an “improper physical relationship” with White House intern Monica Lewinsky; later that same day he admits before the nation that he “misled people” about the relationship.

2008 – American Michael Phelps becomes the first person to win 8 gold medals at one Olympic Games.

2017 –  A moslem terrorist drives a van into pedestrians in Barcelona, Spain, killing 14 and injuring at least 100.

August 16

1777 – U.S. forces led by General John Stark rout British and Brunswick troops under Friedrich Baum at Bennington near Walloomsac, New York.

1780 – British forces under the command of General Cornwallis rout U.S. troops led by General Horatio Gates near Camden, South Carolina

1792 – During the French Revolution, a month after the Storming of the Bastille, Maximilien de Robespierre presents the petition of the Commune of Paris to the Legislative Assembly, demanding the formation of a revolutionary tribunal.

1793 –During the French Revolution, a levée en masse –a general conscription for military service – is decreed by the National Convention.

1812 – During the War of 1812, General William Hull surrenders Fort Detroit to the British Army without a fight.

1841 – President Tyler vetoes a bill which called for the reestablishment of the Second Bank of the United States. Whig Party members riot outside the White House in protest.

1858 – President Buchanan inaugurates the new transatlantic telegraph cable by exchanging greetings with Queen Victoria

1888 – Thomas Edward Lawrence more well known as ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ is born in Snowdon Lodge,  Tremadog, Wales.

1896 – ‘Skookum’ Jim Mason, George Carmack and Dawson Charlie discover gold in a tributary of the Klondike River in Canada

1916 – The Migratory Bird Treaty between Canada and the United States is signed.

1927 – The Dole Air Race begins from Oakland, California, to Honolulu, Hawaii, during which 2 of the 8 starting planes crash on takeoff, 2 are forced to return for repairs, and 2 go missing over the Pacific ocean.

1945 – “The Father of the Kamikazi”, Admiral Takijirō Ōnishi commits seppuku without the assistance of a Kaishakunin – an assistant that immediately cuts off the head of the suicide – taking 15 hours to die.

1954 – The first issue of Sports Illustrated is published.

1959 – Fleet Admiral William Halsey, Jr. USN dies while on holiday on Fishers Island, New York.

1960 – Joseph Kittinger parachutes from a balloon over New Mexico at 102,800 feet. The records stands until 2012.

1966 – The House Un-American Activities Committee begins investigations of Americans who have aided the Viet Cong.

1977 – Elvis Presley dies at age 42 in his Graceland mansion, in Memphis.

1987 – Northwest Airlines Flight 255, a McDonnell Douglas MD-82, crashes after takeoff in Detroit, Michigan, killing 154 of the 155 passengers and crew on board, plus 2 people on the ground.

2008 – The Trump International Hotel and Tower in Chicago is topped off at 1,389 feet, at the time becoming the world’s highest residence above ground level.

2010 – AIRES Flight 8250, a Boeing 737, crashes short of the runway on landing at Gustavo Rojas Pinilla International Airport in San Andrés, San Andrés y Providencia, Colombia, killing 2 of the 131 passengers and crew aboard.

2020 – Lightning strikes ignite the ‘August Complex’ fire in California, eventually burning over one million acres of land.

August 15

636 – The armies of the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius and Rashidun Caliphate engage in their first battle near the Yarmouk river, east of the Sea of Galilee.

717 – An army of the Umayyad Caliphate under Maslama ibn Abd al-Malik finally encircles Constantinople beginning a – literally – year long, second siege of the city.

718 – The Second Arab Siege of Constantinople ends after desertions in the blockading fleet and attacks by Bulgarian forces from the north allow the city to be resupplied.

778 – In retaliation for destroying the city walls of their capital, Pamplona, the army of Charlemagne is attacked by Basque forces at Roncevaux Pass in the Pyrenees mountains and forced to withdraw. The rear guard including its commander, Roland, is killed while covering the retreat.

927 – The Saracens conquer and destroy Taranto, Italy, enslaving and deporting to North Africa all the survivors

982 – The army of Holy Roman Emperor Otto II is defeated by the Saracens at Capo Colonna, Italy.

1096 – Pope Urban II declares the start of the First Crusade.

1237 – During the Reconquista, the army of the Kingdom of Aragon, under Bernat Guillem I d’Entença, is victorious over the army of the Taifa of Valencia under Zayyan ibn Mardanishat near El Puig Spain.

1248 – The foundation stone of Cologne Cathedral, built to house the relics of the Three Wise Men, is laid.

1281 – The Mongolian/Chinese fleet of Kublai Khan is destroyed by a “divine wind” -the Kamikaze- in Hakata Bay, Japan.

1461 – The Empire of Trebizond, the last remaining part of the Byzantine Empire,  surrenders to the forces of Sultan Mehmed II.

1483 – Pope Sixtus IV consecrates the Sistine Chapel in Rome.

1824 – The Marquis de Lafayette returns to the U.S. to begin a tour of the 24 states.

1914 – The Panama Canal opens to traffic with the transit of the cargo ship SS Ancon.

1935 – Will Rogers and Wiley Post are killed after their aircraft, a Lockheed Orion Explorer, develops engine problems and crashes during takeoff in Barrow, Alaska.

1939 – The Wizard of Oz premieres at Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Los Angeles, California.

1944 – The U.S. Army’s VI Corps lands on the beaches of the Côte d’Azur to begin the invasion of southern France

1945 – Even after the Commander of the First Imperial Guards Division, Lieutenant General Takeshi Mori, is killed for refusing to join the conspirators, who then issue false orders in his name, an attempted coup d’état against the Japanese government fails by early morning, when the vast majority of the Imperial Guards remain loyal to Emperor Hirohito.
The leaders of the failed coup commit suicide.
After signing the surrender document the previous night, the Imperial War Minister, General Korechika Anami commits suicide by seppuku.
The recording of Hirohito’s surrender announcement –The Jewel Voice Broadcast– is aired as scheduled.

1947 – India gains Independence from British rule and joins the Commonwealth of Nations.

1948 – The Republic of South Korea is established south of the 38th parallel north.

1969 – The Woodstock Music & Art Fair opens in upstate New York

1971 – President Nixon ends convertibility of the United States dollar into gold

1977 – The Big Ear, a radio telescope operated by Ohio State University as part of the SETI project, receives a radio signal from deep space; the event is named the “Wow! signal” from the notation made by a volunteer on the project.

1995 – Shannon Faulkner becomes the first female cadet matriculated at The Citadel Military College of South Carolina, but drops out less than a week later.

2013 – The Smithsonian announces the discovery of the Olinguito (Bassaricyon neblina), a new species of the raccoon family,  living in mountain forests in the Andes of western Colombia and Ecuador.

2021 – Kabul falls into the hands of the Taliban as Afghan President Ashraf Ghani flees the country, along with local residents and foreign nationals,  effectively reestablishing the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.

August 14

1457 –The Mainz Psalter – a volume containing the Book of Psalms – the second book to be printed on movable type, is published by Johann Fust and Peter Schoeffer

1480 – After falling to a siege by an invading moslem Ottoman army on the 11th of the month, the people of Otranto, Italy who refuse to convert to islam are slaughtered.

1720 – The Spanish military Villasur Expedition is nearly wiped out by Pawnee and Otoe warriors near present day Columbus, Nebraska.

1842 – The Second Seminole War ends, with the Seminoles removed from Florida to the Indian Territory, modern Oklahoma.

1848 – The Oregon Territory is organized by act of Congress.

1851 – John Henry ‘Doc’ Holliday is born in Griffin, Georgia.

1880 – Construction of the Cathedral Church of Saint Peter in Cologne, Germany, begun almost to the day in 1248, is officially completed.

1914 – A French army offensive to recover the province of Moselle from Germany begins

1916 – Romania declares war on Austria-Hungary.

1935 – Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Social Security Act

1936 – Rainey Bethea is hanged in Owensboro, Kentucky in the last known public execution in the United States.

1945 – Emperor Hirohito records the Imperial Rescript on the Termination of the Greater East Asia War and instructs the government to transmit to the Allies the full acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration and surrender of Japan. 
A group of Imperial Army officers begin an attempt at a coup d’état to stop the surrender, confiscate the recording and occupy the Imperial Palace.

1959 – The first official meeting of the American Football League is held in Chicago.

1980 – Lech Wałęsa forms the “Solidarność” – Solidarity – trade union and orders a strike at the shipyards in Gdańsk, Poland.

2003 – A widescale power blackout affects the northeast United States and Canada.

2013 – UPS Airlines cargo flight 1354, an Airbus A300, crashes short of the runway at Birmingham–Shuttlesworth International Airport in Alabama, killing both crew members on board.

2015 – The US Embassy in Havana, Cuba reopens after 54 years of being closed when Cuba–United States relations were broken off.

2021 –  President Biden’s plan to quickly withdraw U.S forces from Afghanistan collapses into chaos, as troops are ordered to abandon large quantities materiel, equipment, arms and numerous U.S. citizens and allied Afghans as they retreat to within the perimeter of the Hamid Karzai airport and are surrounded by Taliban forces entering Kabul.

August 13

1521 – Spanish troops led by conquistador Hernán Cortés capture Emperor Tlatoani Cuauhtémoc and conquer the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan.

1553 – Michael Servetus is arrested by John Calvin in Geneva on charges of heresy.

1624 – Louis XIII appoints Cardinal Armand Jean du Plessis, Duke de Richelieu as prime minister.

1779 – The Royal Navy defeats the Penobscot Expedition in the Penobscot Bay near Castine, Maine, resulting in the most significant loss of United States naval forces prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor.

1806 – Serbian Revolutionary forces under ‘Karađorđe’ Petrović engage and defeat an invading Ottoman army near Mišar, Serbia

1860 – Phoebe ‘Annie Oakley’ Mosey is born at home in Woodland, Ohio

1889 – William Gray of Hartford, Connecticut is granted United States Patent Number 408,709 for a “Coin-controlled apparatus for telephones”

1898 – Spanish and American forces engage in a mock battle for Manila, after which the Spanish commander surrendered in order to keep the city out of Filipino rebel hands.

1918 – Opha May Johnson is the first woman to enlist in the United States Marine Corps

1942 – Major General Eugene Reybold of the Corps of Engineers authorizes the construction of facilities for the “Development of Substitute Materials” (U-235) later named the Manhattan Project.

1945 – American forces resume conventional air raids target in Japan and also drop leaflets describing the Japanese offer of surrender and the Allied response.

1961 – East Germany closes the border between the eastern and western sectors of Berlin and starts construction of the Berlin Wall

1967 – Two park employees, Julie Helgeson and Michele Koons, become the first fatal victims of grizzly bear attacks at Montana’s Glacier National Park since its founding in 1910.

1969 – The Apollo 11 astronauts enjoy a ticker tape parade in New York City and are later awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom

2020 – As part of the Abraham Accords,  mediated by President Trump, for the first time, formal diplomatic relations are established between Israel and the United Arab Emirates.

August 12

30BC – Cleopatra Philopator Antoninus commits suicide purportedly by being bit by an asp.

1099 – The last battle of the First Crusade near Ascalon is a victory for Crusaders under the command of Godfrey of Bouillon over the army of Al-Afdal Shahanshah

1121 – The last battle of the Georgian Crusade near Didgori is a victory for the Georgian army of King David IV over the Seljuk army of Najm ad-Din Ilghazi

1164 – Near Harim Syria, the army of Nur ad-Din Zangi defeats the combined Crusader armies of the County of Tripoli, the Principality of Antioch, the Byzantine Empire, and Armenia.

1492 – Christopher Columbus arrives in the Canary Islands to rest and restock supplies before continuing on his first voyage to the new world.

1499 – The first naval engagement of the Battle of Zanchio begins between Venetian and Ottoman fleets.

1687 – The army of the Holy Roman empire, commanded by Charles of Lorraine defeats the Ottoman army of Sultan Mehmed IV commanded by Sari Süleyman Paşa near Nagyharsány Hill between Mohács and Siklós castle, Hungary.

1851 – Isaac Singer is granted a patent for his sewing machine.

1861 – Eliphalet Remington dies at home in Ilion New York.

1865 – Joseph Lister performs the first surgery under his antiseptic protocols

1881 – Cecil B. DeMille is born in Ashfield, Massachusetts

1898 – The Republic of Hawaii is formally annexed by the United States

1914 – The United Kingdom, and the rest of the British Empire, declares war on Austria-Hungary

1944 – In retaliation for Italian Resistance operations, Waffen SS troops massacre 560 people in Sant’Anna di Stazzema, Italy

1945 – Several officers of the Japanese Imperial Army meet with War Minister Korechika Anami requesting he do whatever he can to prevent acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration. Refusing to confirm he would do so, the officers decide they have no choice but to attempt a coup d’état.
The U.S. announces that it would accept the Japanese surrender, making clear that Hirohito could remain emperor only in a purely ceremonial capacity.

1950 – North Korean Army troops massacre 75 American POWs west of Masan, South Korea

1960 – Echo 1A, manufactured by Bell Labs, NASA’s first successful communications satellite, is launched from Cape Canaveral.

1977 –  Shuttle Enterprise, an unpowered test version, piloted by former astronaut Fred Haise and future astronaut Gordon Fullerton, is separated in flight from the 747 jet carrying it aloft, and is flown on its own for the first time.

1981 – The IBM Personal Computer is released.

1990 –  Air Force SSG John Campisi of the 55th Organizational Maintenance Squadron is struck and killed by a vehicle, becoming the first U.S. service member to die in Operation Desert Shield.

1992 – Canada, Mexico and the United States announce completion of negotiations for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

1994 – Major League Baseball players go on strike, forcing the cancellation of the 1994 World Series.

2014 – American actress Betty “Lauren Bacall” Bogart, dies at her apartment in New York City, age 89

August 11

480BC – Ephialtes betrays his countrymen and guides Persian forces led by Hydarnes over a mountain track to the rear of the Greeks defending Thermopylae from invasion.

106 – The southwestern part of Dacia -modern Romania -becomes a Roman province.

1315 – After the end of the Medieval Warm Period in the previous century, and following bad spring weather, crop failures cause a general famine across Europe lasting for 7 years.

1813 – In what is now modern day Columbia, Juan del Corral declares the independence of Antioquia province from Spain.

1898 – During the Puerto Rico campaign of the Spanish–American War, U.S. troops occupy the city of Mayagüez.

1929 – Babe Ruth becomes the first baseball player to hit 500 home runs in his career with a home run at League Park in Cleveland, Ohio.

1934 – The first civilian prisoners arrive at the Federal prison on Alcatraz Island.

1942 – Actress Hedy Lamarr and composer George Antheil receive a patent for a frequency-hopping spread spectrum radio “Secret Communications System” to be used for secure communications.

1945 – U.S. Secretary of State James F. Byrnes replies to Japan’s offer of a conditional surrender with a refusal to compromise on the demand that the surrender be unconditional. The Soviets also invade South Sakhalin island.

1965 – Race riots begin in the Watts area of Los Angeles, California.

1969 – The Apollo 11 astronauts are released from a 3 week quarantine following their return from the moon.

1972 – The last personnel of the United States Army’s 3rd Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment leaves South Vietnam

1982 – A bomb explodes on Pan Am Flight 830, a Boeing 747, en route from Tokyo, Japan to Honolulu, Hawaii, killing 1 passenger and injuring 16 others.

1984 – While preparing to make his weekly Saturday address on National Public Radio, President Ronald Reagan jokes: “My fellow Americans, I’m pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.”

1992 – The last personnel of the United States Army’s 19th Maintenance Battalion leaves Germany, enroute to their new station at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, in support of the 214th Field Artillery Brigade.

2003 – NATO takes over command of the peacekeeping force in Afghanistan, marking its first major operation outside Europe at the time.

2014 – Actor Robin Williams commits suicide at his home in Paradise Cay, California

August 10

1030 – The army of the Byzantine emperor, Romanos III Argyros is defeated by the forces of  the moslem Mirdasid rulers of Aleppo. near Azaz, Syria.

1519 – Ferdinand Magellan’s five ships set sail from Seville down the mouth of the Guadalquivir River to complete preparations for a westward voyage to the Molucca “Spice Islands”.

1755 – Under the orders of Charles Lawrence, the British Army begins to forcibly deport Acadians from Nova Scotia to the Thirteen Colonies.

1776 – Word that the 2nd Continental Congress of the colonies in America had issued a Declaration of Independence reaches London.

1809 – The city of Quito declares independence from Spain.

1821 – Missouri is admitted as the 24th U.S. state.

1846 – The Smithsonian Institution is chartered by the United States Congress after James Smithson donates $500,000.

1861 – Southwest of Springfield, Missouri around the area where Wilson’s Creek flows through the Oak Hills, a mixed force of Confederate, Missouri State Guard, and Arkansas State troops defeat an attacking Union force, but are unable to consolidate the victory and the Union forces retreat to Springfield.

1897 – German chemist Felix Hoffmann discovers an improved way of synthesizing aspirin.

1920 – Ottoman sultan Mehmed VI’s representatives sign the Treaty of Sèvres that divides up the Ottoman Empire between the victorious Allies.

1944 – U.S. forces secure the island of Guam 20 days after invading to recapture it.

1945 – Emperor Hirohito intervenes in an impasse in his Supreme Council  and orders it to accept the terms of the Potsdam Declaration. The council transmits acceptance with the proviso that it “does not comprise any demand that prejudices the prerogatives of the Emperor as sovereign ruler” to the Japanese ambassadors at Switzerland and Sweden for relay to the Allied powers. President Truman orders a halt to further use of nuclear weapons without his express authority, and negotiations begin on how the surrender will proceed.

1948 – Candid Camera makes its television debut

1954 – The groundbreaking ceremony for the Saint Lawrence Seaway is held at Massena, New York.

1961 – The U.S. Army begins Operation Ranch Hand, spraying an estimated 20 million gallons of defoliants and herbicides over rural areas of South Vietnam in an attempt to deprive the Viet Cong of food and concealment

1969 – A day after murdering Sharon Tate and four others, members of Charles Manson’s cult kill Leno and Rosemary LaBianca.

1977 – In Yonkers, New York, 24 year old postal employee David Berkowitz is arrested for the “Son of Sam” series of murders in the New York City area

1988 – President Reagan signs the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, providing $20,000 payments to Japanese Americans who were either interned in or relocated by the United States during World War II.

1995 – Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols are indicted for the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City

1999 – An neo-Nazi attacking the North Valley Jewish Community Center in Granada Hills, Los Angeles, wounds 5 people and murders a mail carrier as he flees.

2001 – Space Shuttle Discovery is launched on mission STS-105 to the International Space Station, carrying the 3rd relief crew of astronauts.

2018 – Horizon Air employee Richard Russell hijacks and takes off one of the company’s planes from Seattle–Tacoma International Airport, flying it for more than an hour before crashing and killing himself on Ketron Island in Puget Sound.

2020 – A derecho – a straight line wind storm – sweeps through eastern Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Indiana becoming the most costly thunderstorm disaster in U.S. history, killing 3 people in Iowa and 1 in Indiana with damage totaling over $11 billion.

August 9

480BC – The Persian emperor Xerxes receives the response by King Leonidas of Sparta to his demand that the Greeks hand over their arms; Μολων  λαβέ “Come and take them!”.

48 BC – During the last Civil War of the Roman Republic, Julius Caesar decisively defeats Pompey at Pharsalus in central Greece and Pompey flees to Egypt.

1173 – Construction of the campanile of the Cathedral of Pisa is started. It begins leaning almost as soon as it is completed.

1610 – The First Anglo-Powhatan War begins in colonial Virginia.

1814 – The Creek nation signs the Treaty of Fort Jackson, giving up parts of Alabama and Georgia.

1842 – The Webster–Ashburton Treaty is signed, establishing the United States–Canada border east of the Rocky Mountains.

1862 – At Cedar Mountain, Virginia, Confederate General Stonewall Jackson narrowly defeats Union forces under General John Pope.

1892 – Thomas Edison receives a patent for a two way ‘duplex’ telegraph.

1914 – The French Army begins its first offensive against Germany when VII Corps attacks the city of Mulhouse, ceded to Germany at the end of the Franco-Prussian war 43 years earlier.

1918 – Kermit Beahan, the bombardier on B-29 Bockscar is born in Joplin, Missouri.

1936 – Jesse Owens wins his fourth gold medal at the XI Olympiad games in Berlin

1942 – Allied naval forces protecting amphibious forces during the initial stages of the Battle of Guadalcanal are surprised off Savo Island by a  Japanese Navy cruiser force resulting in the loss of the HMAS Canberra, USS Vincennes, USS Quincy  and USS Astoria.

1944 – The United States Forest Service releases posters featuring Smokey Bear

1945 – U.S. Army Air Force Major Charles Sweeney and crew aboard the B29 bomber Bockscar, drops “Fat Man” atomic bomb #F-31 on their secondary target, Nagasaki after the primary target of Kokura is obscured by clouds and smoke

1969 – Followers of Charles Manson murder actress Sharon Tate, coffee heiress Abigail Folger, Polish actor Wojciech Frykowski, men’s hairstylist Jay Sebring and recent high-school graduate Steven Parent.

1974 – President Nixon resigns from office. Vice President Gerald Ford is sworn in to become the 38th President.

2014 – Michael Brown, an 18-year-old black male in Ferguson, Missouri, is shot and killed by a Ferguson police officer after assaulting the officer and attempting to steal his weapon, sparking protests and rioting in the city.

August 8

1264 –  During the Reconquista, moslem mudéjar forces rebel rebel, overrun and occupy the Alcázar Castle of Jerez de la Frontera, in southern Spain, after defeating the Castilian garrison.

1503 – King James IV of Scotland marries Margaret Tudor, daughter of King Henry VII of England. This is what sets up the way for her grandson, James VI to become King of Scotland and England when his cousin Elizabeth dies childless a hundred years later.

1585 – John Davis, chief navigator for Queen Elizabeth, enters Cumberland Sound in Nunavut, north of the Labrador Sea, in search of the Northwest Passage

1794 – Joseph Whidbey, Sailing Master in the Royal Navy, leads an expedition starting from Juneau, Alaska in the search of the Northwest Passage

1831 – The Treaty of Wapakoneta is signed by the Shawnee tribe, exchanging land in Ohio for land west of the Mississippi River.

1863 – Confederate President Jefferson Davis refuses upon receipt, a letter of resignation by General Robert E. Lee after his defeat at Gettysburg.

1876 – Thomas Edison receives a patent for his mimeograph.

1908 – Wilbur Wright makes his first public flight at the racecourse at Le Mans, France.

1918 – The Battle of Amiens begins the Hundred Days Offensive, a string of almost continuous Allied victories through the German front lines

1942 – 6 of the 8 German saboteurs caught after landing on Long Island are executed by electrocution at the Washington D.C. District Jail.

1945 – The London Charter is signed by France, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States, establishing the laws and procedures for the Nuremberg trials.

1946 – The Convair B-36 bomber makes its first flight

1974 – President Nixon announces on nationwide television his resignation from the office of the President effective noon the next day.

1988 – The first night baseball game in the history of Chicago’s Wrigley Field takes place between the Cubs and the Philadelphia Phillies, but the game is rained out in the fourth inning.

1993 – A 7.8 Mw  earthquake hits Guam causing  $250 million in damage and injuring 71 people.

2000 – The Confederate submarine CSS H.L. Hunley is raised to the surface 136 years after sinking

2007 – An EF2 force tornado touches down in Kings County and Richmond County, New York, the most powerful tornado in New York to date and the first in Brooklyn since 1889.

2015 – A deranged man murders his son, the boy’s mother -his former girlfriend – and her current husband and their 5 children at their home in northern Harris County, Texas. The prosecution, conceding the man was mentally disabled, drops pursuing the death penalty and he is sentenced to prison for life without parole.

2022 – The FBI raids former President Donald Trump’s residence in Mar-a-Lago, Florida.

August 7

1679 – The brigantine Le Griffon, commissioned the year before by French explorer René-Robert de La Salle, is towed to the southeastern end of the Niagara River, to become the first ship to sail the upper Great Lakes of North America.

1782 – General Washington orders the creation of the Badge of Military Merit to honor soldiers wounded in battle. It is later renamed the Purple Heart.

1789 – The United States Department of War is established.

1794 – President Washington invokes the Militia Acts of 1792 to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania.

1819 – Simón Bolívar’s army triumphs over Spanish troops near Casa de Teja in what is now the department of Boyacá, Columbia.

1909 – Alice Huyler Ramsey and three friends become the first women to complete a transcontinental auto trip, taking 59 days to travel from New York City to San Francisco.

1927 – The Peace Bridge opens between Fort Erie, Ontario and Buffalo, New York.

1942 – On earlier learning the Japanese Army is building an airfield on the island, U.S. Marines begin invasion landings on Guadalcanal along with Tulagi in the Solomon Islands.

1947 – 101 days after launching from Callao, Peru, Thor Heyerdahl and crew aboard the balsa wood raft Kon-Tiki, ground on the reef at Raroia atoll in the Tuamotu Islands

1959 – NASA launches Explorer 6, a satellite to study the upper atmosphere from the Atlantic Missile Range in Cape Canaveral.

1964 – Congress passes the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution giving President Johnson broad war powers to deal with North Vietnam

1969 – President Nixon appoints Luis R. Bruce, a Mohawk-Oglala Sioux and co-founder of the National Congress of American Indians, as commissioner of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

1978 – President Carter declares a federal emergency at Love Canal, New York due to negligent disposal of toxic waste

1987 – Lynne Cox becomes first person to swim  from the U.S to Russia, crossing the Bering Strait from Little Diomede Island in Alaska to Big Diomede in the Soviet Union. 2 1/4 miles away. Brrrrrrrrr.

1990 – In response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, and the concern that the invading forces will continue on towards the Saudi Arabian oilfields, the first wave of 15,000 U.S. troops arrive in Saudi Arabia.

1997 – Fine Air cargo flight 101, a McDonnell Douglas DC-8, crashes after takeoff from Miami International Airport, killing all 4 crew aboard and 1 person on the ground.

1998 – Bombings at United States embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and Nairobi, Kenya by Islamic Jihad, kill 212 people.

2007 – At AT&T Park, in San Francisco, during the game between his San Francisco Giants against the Washington Nationals, Barry Bonds hits his 756th career home run to surpass Hank Aaron’s 33 year old record.

August 6

1538 – Bogotá Colombia, is founded by Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada

1777 – American forces & allied indians attempting to relieve Fort Stanwix  are ambushed by Loyalist forces & allied indians near Oriskany, New York.

1787 – Sixty proof sheets of the Constitution of the United States are delivered to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia

1862 – The Confederate ironclad CSS Arkansas is scuttled on the Mississippi River after earlier suffering catastrophic engine failure near Baton Rouge

1890 – William Kemmler becomes the first person in the U.S. to be executed by electric chair at Auburn Prison, New York

1912 – The Progressive “Bull Moose”  Party opens its convention at the Chicago Coliseum.

1914 – Serbia declares war on Germany. Austria-Hungary declares war on Russia.

1945 – U.S Army Air Force Colonel Paul Tibbets and crew aboard the B29 bomber Enola Gay, drops “Little Boy” atomic bomb #L-11 on Hiroshima.

1965 – President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act of 1965 into law.

1990 – The United Nations Security Council orders a global trade embargo against Iraq in response to the invasion of Kuwait.

1991 – Tim Berners-Lee of the European Organization for Nuclear Research, inventor of HTML language, the web browser and web server,  publishes on the internet a short summary of the World Wide Web project that had been activated in January.

2011 – A U.S. Army CH-47D helicopter, call sign Extortion 17 is shot down in Maidan Wardak province Afghanistan by Taliban forces, killing 23 U.S Navy SEAL Team-6 operators , 5 U.S. National Guard and Reserve aircrew, 2 U.S. Air Force ParaRescuemen, 1 U.S. Air Force Combat Controller,  a U.S. military working dog, 7 Afghan soldiers, and 1 Afghan civilian.

2012 – NASA’s Curiosity rover lands on the surface of Mars.

August 5

135 – The besieged town of Betar, in Judea falls to Roman forces on Tisha bAv , ending the 3rd Jewish revolt led by Simon bar Kokhba

910 – Danish Vikings on the last major raid on England for nearly a century are defeated at Tettenhall, by the allied forces of King Edward of Wessex and Æthelred, Lord of Mercia.

939 – During the Reconquista, the forces of Ramiro II of León are defeated by forces of Abd ar Rahman III, emir of Córdoba at Zamora, Spain.

1278 – During the Reconquista, the forces of Alphonso X of Castile take the port city of Algeciras, held by the Emir of Granada, under siege for the first time.

1583 – Sir Humphrey Gilbert establishes the first English colony in North America, at St. John’s, Newfoundland.

1620 – The Mayflower departs from Southampton but is forced to dock in Dartmouth when its companion ship, Speedwell, springs a leak.

1763 – During the Pontiac War, British forces led by Henry Bouquet defeat Chief Pontiac’s Indians at Bushy Run.

1816 – The British Admiralty dismisses Francis Ronalds’ new invention of the first working electric telegraph as “wholly unnecessary”

1858 – The Atlantic Telegraph Company led by Cyrus West Field, completes the first transatlantic telegraph cable, which turns out to be barely functional and is accidentally destroyed 3 weeks later in an attempt to increase transmission speed

1861 – The United States levies the first income tax as part of the Revenue Act of 1861 to help pay for the War Between the States.

1862 – Along the Mississippi River near Baton Rouge, Confederate troops attempt to take the city, but are driven back by fire from Union gunboats.

1864 – Admiral David Farragut leads a Union flotilla through Confederate defenses and seals one of the last major Southern ports of Mobile.

1884 – The cornerstone for the Statue of Liberty is laid on Bedloe’s Island

1914 – The first electric traffic light is installed in Cleveland, Ohio. Legend has it that the first traffic ticket for running a red light was written the same day.

1916 – Allied forces, under Archibald Murray, defeat an attacking Ottoman army under Friedrich von Kressenstein, and secure the Suez Canal

1930 – Neil Armstrong is born in Wapakoneta, Ohio,

1944 – Polish insurgents liberate the Gęsiówka labor camp in Warsaw. Nazis begin to massacre civilians and prisoners of war in Wola, Poland.

1957 – American Bandstand debuts on the ABC television network

1962 – American actress Marilyn Monroe is found dead at her home from a drug overdose.

1963 – The United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union sign the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

1964 – Aircraft from carriers USS Ticonderoga and USS Constellation bomb North Vietnam in retaliation for strikes against U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin.

1974 – Congress places a $1 billion limit on military aid to South Vietnam.

1981 – President Reagan fires 11,359 striking air traffic controllers who ignored his order for them to return to work.

2012 – Wade Page enters a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, killing 6 people before committing suicide after being wounded by police.

2015 – Contractors and personnel of the Environmental Protection Agency damage a dam retaining the Gold King Mine waste water containment pool, releasing three million gallons of heavy metal toxin tailings and waste water into the Animas River in Colorado.

August 4

1463 – Patron of many great renaissance artists, Lorenzo de’ Medici is born in Florence, Italy

1693 – Benedictine monk Dom Perignon invents champagne

1704 – Gibraltar is captured from the Spanish by an English and Dutch fleet, commanded by Admiral Sir George Rooke.

1790 – The Revenue Cutter Service, the predecessor to the Coast Guard is created

1834 – English mathematician John Venn, inventor of the Venn Diagram, using circles to denote sets, is born in Yorkshire, England.

1873 – The 7th Cavalry, under Lieutenant Colonel Custer, has its first minor engagement with the Cheyenne and Lakota near the Tongue River in Montana, while protecting a railroad survey party

1889 – The Great Fire of Spokane, Washington destroys 32 blocks of the city, prompting a mass rebuilding project.

1892 – The father and stepmother of Lizzie Borden are found murdered in their Fall River, Massachusetts home

1914 – The Germans invade neutral Belgium. In response Belgium and the British Empire declare war on Germany. The United States declares its neutrality.

1944 – A Dutch informer leads the Gestapo to a sealed off area in an Amsterdam warehouse, where they find and arrest Anne Frank and her family

1964 – U.S. destroyers USS Maddox and USS Turner Joy report coming under attack in the Gulf of Tonkin.

1977 – President Carter signs legislation creating the United States Department of Energy.

1987 – The Federal Communications Commission rescinds the ‘Fairness Doctrine’ which required radio and television stations to present controversial issues “fairly”. (AKA ‘Equal Time’)

2007 – NASA’s Phoenix Mars probe spacecraft is launched.

2019 – Antifa supporter, 24 year old Connor Betts, kills 9 people and wounds another 26 before being engaged, 32 seconds after his first shot, and killed by Police in Dayton, Ohio.

2020 – At least 220 people are killed and over 5,000 are wounded when 2,700 tons of ammonium nitrate explodes in Beirut, Lebanon.

 

August 3

435 – Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople, is deposed and exiled for heresy by Emperor Theodosius II

1342 –  During the Spanish Reconquista, the Castillian forces of Alfonso XI assisted by the fleets of the Kingdom of Aragon and the Republic of Genoa besiege the port city of Algeciras, the main port of the Marinid Sultanate in southern Spain, one of the first engagements where gunpowder weapons are used.

1492 – Christopher Columbus sets sail from Palos de la Frontera, Spain on his first voyage to the new world

1678 – French explorer Robert LaSalle builds the Le Griffon, the first known ship built on the Great Lakes.

1795 – The Treaty of Greenville is signed by the Wyandot and Delaware tribes ending the Northwest Indian War in the Ohio Country.

1829 – The Treaty of Lewistown is signed by the Shawnee and Seneca tribes, exchanging land in Ohio for land west of the Mississippi River.

1900 – The Firestone Tire and Rubber Company is founded.

1907 – Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis fines Standard Oil of Indiana a record $29.4 million for illegal rebating to freight carriers; the conviction and fine are later reversed on appeal.

1914 – Germany declares war against France.

1921 – Major League Baseball Commissioner, retired Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis confirms the ban of the eight Chicago Black Sox, the day after they were acquitted by a Chicago court.

1936 – Jesse Owens wins the 100 meter dash at the Berlin Olympics.

1958 – The nuclear powered submarine, USS Nautilus, becomes the first vessel to complete a submerged transit of the geographical North Pole.

1960 – Niger gains independence from France.

1972 – The U.S. Senate ratifies the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with the Soviet Union

2004 – The pedestal of the Statue of Liberty reopens after being closed since the September 11 attacks.

2008 – Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn dies in Moscow, Russia

2019 – At a WalMart store in El Paso, Texas,  Patrick Crusius opens fire with a rifle, killing 23 people and wounding another 23 before he flees.

 

August 2

338BC – The Macedonian army led by Philip II with him commanding  the left wing and his son Alexander, the right, defeats the numerically superior combined forces of Athens and Thebes near Chaeronea in south central Greece, effectively ending opposition to Phillip’s rule of almost all of Greece.

216BC – The Carthaginian army led by Hannibal defeats the numerically superior Roman army at Cannae

932 – The city of Toledo, Spain, surrenders to the forces of the Caliph of Córdoba, Abd al-Rahman III.

1610 – While on expedition to discover a northwest passage to the Pacific, Henry Hudson discovers a large bay.

1776 – The final ‘engrossed’ copy of the Declaration of Independence is completed and signed.

1790 – The first United States Census is conducted

1869 – Japan’s strict social class system, with the Shogunate as the de facto ruler,  is abolished as part of the Meiji Restoration reforms and begins Japan’s rise as a modern era commercial, industrial and military Asian power

1873 – The Clay Street Hill Railroad begins operating the first cable car in San Francisco

1876 – James Butler “Wild Bill” Hickok is assassinated by Jack McCall while playing poker at the No. 10 saloon in Deadwood, South Dakota.

1914 – The German army invades and occupies neutral Luxembourg during World War I.

1923 – Vice President Coolidge becomes President upon the death of President Harding.

1932 – The antimatter counterpart of the electron, the positron, is discovered by Carl D. Anderson.

1934 – Reichskanzler Adolf Hitler becomes Führer of Germany following the death of President Paul von Hindenburg.

1937 – The Marihuana Tax Act is passed in America, the effect of which renders marijuana and all its by-products illegal.

1939 – Albert Einstein and Leo Szilard write a letter to President Roosevelt, urging him to develop a nuclear weapon.

1943 – Jewish prisoners stage a revolt at the Treblinka death camp.
The Motor Torpedo Boat PT-109 under the command of Lieutenant Junior Grade John Kennedy is rammed and sunk by the Japanese destroyer Amagiri

1985 – Delta Air Lines Flight 191, a Lockheed L-1011 TriStar, crashes at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport killing 136 of the 163 passengers and crew aboard and 1 person on the ground.

1990 – Iraq invades Kuwait

August 1

46 BC – While in the process of creating the calendar system named after him, Julius Caesar adds 2 days to the 8th month Sextilis 

30 BC – After his army deserts him, and Octavian brings Alexandria under the control of Rome, Mark Antony commits suicide rather than be taken prisoner.

8 BC – The Roman Senate renames the month Sextilis in honor of Emperor Augustus.

902 – Taormina, the last Byzantine stronghold in Sicily, is captured by the Aghlabid army, concluding the moslem conquest of Sicily.

1498 – Christopher Columbus becomes the first European to visit what is now Venezuela.

1571 – Famagusta, the last Venetian stronghold in Cyprus, surrenders to the Ottoman army, concluding the moslem conquest of Cyprus.

1620 – The ship Speedwell leaves Delfshaven, England for America with the pilgrims aboard

1664 – Ottoman moslem forces are defeated at the Cistercian monastery of St. Gotthard in Hungary by an Austrian army led by Raimondo Montecuccoli.

1774 – British scientist Joseph Priestley confirms the prior discovery of oxygen, termed Sauerstoff by German chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele.

1779 – Francis Scott Key is born in Carroll County Maryland.

1800 – The Acts of Union 1800 are passed which merge the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

1801 – During the First Barbary War, the American USS Enterprise captures the Tripolitan Tripoli in action off the coast of Libya.

1819 – Herman Melville is born in New York City.

1876 – Colorado is admitted as the 38th U.S. state.

1893 – Henry Perky patents shredded wheat.

1903 – Martha ‘Calamity Jane’ Cannary dies of pneumonia at the Calloway Hotel in Terry, South Dakota.

1911 – Harriet Quimby takes her pilot’s test and becomes the first U.S. woman to earn an Aero Club of America aviator’s certificate.

1914 – The German Empire declares war on the Russian Empire at the opening of World War I.

1936 – The Olympics opened in Berlin with a ceremony presided over by Adolf Hitler.

1944 – The Warsaw Uprising against the Nazi German occupation breaks out in Warsaw, Poland.

1950 –  President Truman signs the Guam Organic Act making the island an  unincorporated territory of the U.S.

1957 – The United States and Canada form the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD).

1961 – Defense Secretary Robert McNamara orders the creation of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the military’s version of the civilian Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

1965 – Frank Herbert’s novel, Dune is published.

1966 – Shooting from the tower of the University of Texas at Austin, Charles Whitman kills 15 people outright and wounds 31 more, before being killed by the police.

1981 – MTV begins broadcasting in the U.S.

1993 – The Great Mississippi and Missouri Rivers Flood of 1993 crests at St. Louis at 49.6 feet, 20 feet above flood stage.

2007 – The I-35W Mississippi River bridge spanning the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, Minnesota, collapses during the evening rush hour, killing 13 people and injuring 145 more.

2008 – On mountain K2, the second-highest mountain on Earth, 11 mountaineers from international expeditions die in an ice avalanche occurring at an area known as “the Bottleneck”. To date, the worst single accident in mountaineering.