July 26

920 – During the Reconquista, the armies of the alliance of Navarre and Léon lose in battle against the moslem army of the Emir of Córdoba at Valdejunquera.

1139 – During the Reconquista, the day after defeating the moslem army of Ali ibn Yusuf, Prince Afonso Henriques is proclaimed Afonso o Conquistador, King of Portugal.

1529 – Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro is appointed governor of Peru.

1758 – During the French and Indian War, British forces are victorious in their siege of the French Fortress of Louisbourg on Nova Scotia and complete taking control of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence.

1579 – English explorer Francis Drake, on his voyage of circumnavigation, discovers a major bay on the coast of California -modern day San Francisco Bay.

1775 – Benjamin Franklin takes office as Postmaster General as the United States Post Office is established by the Second Continental Congress.

1788 – New York ratifies the U.S. Constitution.

1861 – General George B. McClellan assumes command of the Army of the Potomac following a disastrous defeat at the First Battle of Bull Run.

1863 – At Salineville, Ohio, Confederate cavalry under the command of General John Hunt Morgan are captured by Union forces.

1908 – Attorney General Charles Bonaparte issues an order to immediately staff the Office of the Chief Examiner, later to be renamed the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

1941 – In response to the Japanese occupation of French Indochina, the United States, Britain and the Netherlands freeze all Japanese assets and cut off oil shipments.

1945 – The Potsdam Declaration defining the terms of surrender required of Imperial Japan – basically unconditional – is signed in Germany by the leaders of the U.S., the UK and China. The USS Indianapolis arrives at Tinian island with the components for the Little Boy nuclear bomb.

1947 – President Truman signs the National Security Act of 1947 into United States law creating the Central Intelligence Agency, United States Department of Defense, United States Air Force, Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the United States National Security Council.

1948 – President Truman signs Executive Order 9981, desegregating the military of the United States.

1953 – Fidel Castro leads an unsuccessful attack on the Moncada Barracks, starting the Cuban Revolution.

1963 – NASA’s communications satellite, Syncom 2 is launched from Cape Canaveral to become the world’s first geosynchronous satellite.

1971 – Apollo 15 is launched as the first Apollo “J-Mission”, with the first Lunar Roving Vehicle stowed aboard the LM Falcon. 

1990 – The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 is signed into law by President Bush.

2005 – Shuttle Discovery is launched on mission STS-114 as the first flight after the Columbia Disaster in 2003.

2016 – Hillary Clinton becomes the first female nominee for President  by a major political party at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
Solar Impulse 2, piloted alternately by André Borschberg and Bertrand Piccard,  becomes the first solar-powered aircraft to circumnavigate the Earth.