Tell us your Today In History….
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Life Event e.g. marriage or children? Move cities or countries? Start or finish a job?
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On this day in history…
July 26
1579 Francis Drake leaves San Francisco to cross Pacific Ocean
1656 Dutch painter Rembrandt van Rijn declares he is insolvent
1775 United States Post Office (U.S.P.O.) created in Philadelphia under Benjamin Franklin
1803 The Surrey Iron Railway, arguably the world’s first public railway, opens in south London.
1865 The capital of New Zealand moves from Auckland to Wellington
1916 The US Protests the ‘Blacklist’ issued by the British forbidding trade with some 30 US firms
1945 Physicist Raemer Schreiber and Lieutenant Colonel Peer de Silva depart Kirtland Army Air Field to transport the plutonium core for the Fat Man bomb (bombing of Nagasaki) to the island of Tinian where the bomb is assembled
1952 King Farouk I of Egypt abdicates [Black Saturday]
1963 The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development votes to admit Japan.
1992 Britain honours her dead in the Falklands War
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July 25
1547 Henry II of France is crowned.
1758 Seven Years’ War: the island battery at Fortress Louisbourg in Nova Scotia is silenced and all French warships are destroyed or taken.
1795 The first stone of the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct is laid.
1822 General Agustin de Iturbide crowned Agustin I, 1st Emperor of Mexico
1853 Joaquin Murietta, the famous Californian bandit known as “Robin Hood of El Dorado”, is killed.
1897 Writer Jack London sails to join the Klondike Gold Rush where he will write his first successful stories.
1944 World War II: Operation Spring – one of Canada’s bloodiest days, 18,444 casualties and 5,021 killed
1946 At Club 500 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis stage their first show as a comedy team.
1969 1st performance of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (Fillmore East, NY)
1978 Louise Brown, the world’s first test tube baby is born at Oldham General Hospital in England
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July 24
1411 Battle of Harlaw, one of the bloodiest battles in Scotland, takes place.
1534 Jacques Cartier lands in Canada, claims it for France
1567 Mary Queen of Scots is forced to abdicate; her 1-year-old son becomes King James VI of Scots
1905 Tsar Nicholas II (Russia) and Emperor Wilhelm II (Germany) sign the Björkö Treaty, whereby each country agrees to come to the other’s defense if attacked by European powers
1911 American explorer Hiram Bingham discovers Machu Picchu, the Lost City of the Incas
1938 Instant coffee invented
1959 US VP Nixon argues with Khrushchev, known as “Kitchen Debate”
1985 French DGSE officers Dominique Prieur and Alain Mafart are arrested and charged with murder over the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior
2001 Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the last Tsar of Bulgaria when he was a child, is sworn in as Prime Minister of Bulgaria, becoming the first monarch in history to regain political power through democratic election to a different office.
2002 On 200th anniversary of his birth French author Alexandre Dumas’ (‘The Three Musketeers’) ashes are interred in the Panthéon in Paris in a televised ceremony.
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July 23
1599 Caravaggio’s first public commission for paintings
1798 Napoleon captures Alexandria, Egypt
1827 First US swimming school opens (Boston Mass)
1888 John Boyd Dunlop applies to patent pneumatic tire
1930 Earthquake strikes Ariano Italy, 1,500 killed
1937 Isolation of pituitary hormone announced (Yale University)
1982 International Whaling Commission votes for total ban on commercial whaling (starting 1985)
1995 Comet Hale-Bopp is discovered and becomes visible to the naked eye nearly a year later
2014 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow holds its opening ceremony
2015 NASA’s Kepler mission announces discovery of the most Earth-like planet yet – Kepler-452b, 1,400 light years from Earth
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July 22
1099 First Crusade: Godfrey of Bouillon is elected the first Defender of the Holy Sepulchre of The Kingdom of Jerusalem.
1632 Foundation laid in Madrid for Buen Retiro-palace for king Philip IV
1775 George Washington takes command of the Continental Army
1972 Venera 8 makes soft landing on Venus
1983 Dick Smith makes 1st solo helicopter flight around the world
1992 Colombia drug lord Pablo Escobar escapes prison
1997 Fire breaks out at Palais de Chaillot in Paris
1999 Woodstock 99 music festival begins Griffiss Park, Rome NY (till 25th) attended by 200,000.
2011 Norway is the victim of twin terror attacks, the first a bomb blast targeting government buildings in central Oslo, second a massacre at a youth camp on island of Utøya
2015 ‘Oldest’ Qur’an fragments discovered in collection of Birmingham University, radiocarbon testing dates to AD568 – AD645
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July 21
356 BC Herostratus sets fire to the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, one of the Seven Wonders of the World.
1588 First engagement between the English fleet and the Spanish Armada off the Eddystone Rocks
1865 In the market square of Springfield, Missouri, Wild Bill Hickok shoots and kills Davis Tutt in what is regarded as the first true western showdown.
1866 Cholera epidemic kills hundreds in London
1904 After 13 years, the 4,607-mile Trans-Siberian railway is completed
1955 USS Seawolf launched, first submarine powered by liquid metal cooled nuclear reactor
1960 In Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) Sirima Bandaranaike is world’s first woman PM
1969 Neil Armstrong becomes the first person to step on the Moon at 2:56:15 AM (GMT)
1978 World’s strongest dog, 80-kg St Bernard, pulls 2909-kg load 27 m
2013 100th Tour de France won by Chris Froome of Great Britain
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July 20
1304 Wars of Scottish Independence: Fall of Stirling Castle – King Edward I of England takes the last rebel stronghold of the war.
1712 The Riot Act takes effect in Great Britain.
1837 Euston railway station opens in London as the terminus of the London and Birmingham Railway (L&BR), the city’s 1st intercity railway station
1917 Pact of Corfu signed: Serbs, Croats & Slovenes form Yugoslavia
1926 A convention of the Methodist Church votes to allow women to become priests.
1951 King Abdullah I of Jordan is assassinated by a Palestinian while attending Friday prayers in Jerusalem.
1960 USSR recovered two dogs; first living organisms to return from space
1963 Riots break out at Mt Eden Prison, Auckland, New Zealand
1969 1st Moon Landing: Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin from Apollo 11, 530 million watch live global broadcast
1985 Divers find wreck of Spanish galleon Atocha
2001 The London Stock Exchange goes public.
2005 Canada becomes the fourth country in the world to legalise same-sex marriage, after the bill C-38 receives its Royal Assent.
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July 19
1524 Peasants’ War begins in Germany’s Black Forest
1545 King Henry VIII’s flagship Mary Rose sinks at Portsmouth; 73 die
1553 15-year-old Lady Jane Grey deposed as England’s Queen after nine days
1595 Astronomer Johannes Kepler has an epiphany and develops his theory of the geometrical basis of the universe
1843 Brunel’s steamship the SS Great Britain is launched, becomes first ocean-going craft with an iron hull or screw propeller and the largest vessel afloat in the world
1903 First Tour de France won by Maurice Garin of France
1955 Yarkon Water Project opens to supply water to Negev desert in Israel
1969 Apollo 11 goes into Moon orbit
1983 The first three-dimensional reconstruction of a human head in a CT is published.
2001 Michael Brunet discovers the skull of Sahelanthropus tchadensis, thought to be the oldest known species in the human family tree, in the Djurab Desert, Chad. It lived 6-7 million years ago, about the same time as the last common ancestor to apes and humans.
2015 World Health Organisation puts world’s Ebola death toll at 11,284
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July 18
64 Great Fire of Rome begins under the Emperor Nero
1334 The bishop of Florence blesses the first foundation stone for the new campanile (bell tower) of the Florence Cathedral, designed by the artist Giotto di Bondone.
1853 Completion of Grand Trunk Line, trains begin running over 1st North American railroad between Portland, Maine & Montreal
1872 The Ballot Act introduces the secret ballot in elections in Britain; previously votes were made openly.
1925 Adolf Hitler publishes Mein Kampf (original title was the “Four and a Half Years (of Struggle) Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice”)
1986 Videotapes released showing Titanic’s sunken remains
1994 Crayola announces introduction of scented crayons
1995 “Dreams from My Father”, a memoir by Barack Obama is published by Times Books
2012 Kim Jong-un is officially appointed Supreme Leader of North Korea and given the rank of Marshal in the Korean People’s Army
2015 “The Sun” newspaper in Britain controversially publishes old picture and video of Queen Elizabeth giving Nazi salute in 1933
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July 17
1054 Emperor Henry III crowns his son Henry IV king
1717 George Frideric Handel’s “Water Music” premieres on the river Thames in London
1762 Catherine II becomes tsarina of Russia upon the murder of Peter III
1863 Māori forces are defeated by British troops at Koheroa, Waikato, in the New Zealand Wars between Maori tribes and British colonials
1902 Lord Tennyson, son of the poet, is named to succeed Lord Hopetown, first governor general of Australia
1917 Royal Proclamation by King George V changes name of British Royal family from German Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to Windsor
1955 Disneyland televises its grand opening in Anaheim, California.
1976 21st modern Olympic games opens in Montreal: 25 African teams (later rising to 33 nations) boycott the games due to New Zealand playing rugby in apartheid South Africa
1988 4 Billion tv-viewers watch Mandela’s 70th Birthday Tribute
1998 Russia buries Tsar Nicholas II & family, 80 years after they died
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July 16
1429 French Army and Joan of Arc enter Reims
1845 NY Yacht Club holds its 1st regatta
1926 National Geographic takes first natural-colour undersea photos
1951 King Leopold III, of Belgium, abdicates
1951 Novel “Catcher in Rye” by J. D. Salinger published by Little Brown and Company
1956 Last Ringling Bros, Barnum & Bailey Circus under a canvas tent
1965 Mount Blanc Road tunnel between France & Italy open
1969 Apollo 11, carrying 1st men to land on Moon, launched
1979 Premier/pres al-Bakr of Iraq is succeeded by Saddam Hussein
1990 NYC’s Empire State Building catches fire
1999 John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, and sister-in-law Lauren Bessette are killed in a plane crash off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard. The Piper Saratoga aircraft was piloted by Kennedy.
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July 15
1099 City of Jerusalem is captured and plundered by Christian forces during the First Crusade
1381 John Ball, a leader in the Peasants’ Revolt, is hung, drawn and quartered in the presence of Richard II of England.
1662 King Charles II charters Royal Society in London
1795 “Marseillaise” becomes French national anthem
1799 The Rosetta Stone is found in the Egyptian village of Rosetta by French Captain Pierre-François Bouchard during Napoleon’s Egyptian Campaign.
1869 Margarine is patented by Hippolye Méga-Mouriès for use by French Navy
1898 Camillo Golgi discovers the Golgi Apparatus (a delicate network inside cells essential for the transmission and reception of information between cells)
1934 Continental Airlines commences operations.
1941 Florey & Heatley present freeze dried mold cultures (Penicillin)
1948 Alcoholic Anonymous founded in Britain
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July 14
1682 Henry Purcell appointed organist of Chapel Royal, London
1789 Bastille Day-French Revolution begins with the fall of Bastille
1853 New Zealand holds its first general election
1946 Dr Benjamin Spock’s “Common Sense Book of Baby & Child Care” published
1969 The United States $500, $1,000, $5,000 and $10,000 bills are officially withdrawn from circulation.
1969 A 67-year-old Catholic civilian dies after being attacked by RUC officers in Dungiven; many consider this the first death of ‘the Troubles’
1992 386BSD is released by Lynne Jolitz and William Jolitz, starting the open source operating system revolution. Linus Torvalds release “Linux” soon afterwards.
2014 The Church of England votes in favor of allowing women to become bishops
2014 The death toll from the West African Ebola outbreak passes 500
2015 Scientists from the Large Hadron Collider announce the discovery of a new particle called the pentaquark
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July 13
1568 Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral perfects a way to bottle beer
1645 Aleksei Romanov succeeds his father Michael as Tsar of Russia
1772 Captain James Cook begins his second voyage aboard the Resolution to the South Seas to search for Terra Australis (Southern continent)
1832 Source of Mississippi River discovered by American geographer Henry Schoolcraft
1837 Queen Victoria is the first monarch to live in present Buckingham Palace
1923 The Hollywood Sign is officially dedicated in the hills above Hollywood, Los Angeles. It originally reads “Hollywoodland ” but the four last letters are dropped after renovation in 1949.
1939 Frank Sinatra makes his recording debut
1955 The last execution of a woman in Britain, Ruth Ellis, takes place at Holloway Prison, London.
1985 “Live Aid” concert held both at Wembley Stadium (London) and John F. Kennedy Stadium (Philadelphia) raises over $70 million for African famine relief
2014 FIFA World Cup Awards: Lionel Messi (golden ball), James Rodriguez (golden boot) and Manuel Neuer (Golden gloves)
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July 12
1191 English King Richard I / the Lionheart & Crusaders defeat Saracens in Palestine
1580 Ostrog Bible, the first printed Bible in a Slavic language, is published.
1630 New Amsterdam’s governor buys Gull Island from Indians for cargo, renames it Oyster Island, it is later known as Ellis Island
1863 In New Zealand, British forces invade Waikato, home of the Maori King Movement, beginning a new phase of the wars between Maori and Colonial British
1902 Australian parliament agrees to female suffrage
1928 First televised tennis match
1957 US Surgeon General Leroy Burney connects smoking with lung cancer
1970 Thor Heyerdahl crosses Atlantic on raft Ra II, arrives in Barbados from Morocco in 57 days
1998 Pres. Nelson Mandela accompanies Queen Elizabeth II on a coach drive through the streets of London
2013 Malala Yousafzai addresses the United Nations and calls for worldwide access to education
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July 11
1302 Battle of the Golden Spurs (Guldensporenslag in Dutch) near Kortrijk, Belgium. Flemish coalition defeat French army
1533 Pope Clement VII excommunicates England’s King Henry VIII
1735 Mathematical calculations suggest that it was on this day that Pluto moved from the ninth to the eighth most distant planet from the Sun for the last time before 1979.
1801 French astronomer Jean-Louis Pons discovers his first comet
1811 Italian scientist Amedeo Avogadro publishes his memoir about molecular content of gases.
1848 London’s Waterloo Station opens
1877 Kate Edger becomes New Zealand’s first woman graduate and the first woman in the British Empire to earn a Bachelor of Arts
1900 Charlotte Cooper beats Hélène Prévost to become the 1st female Olympic tennis champion and the 1st individual female Olympic champion in any sport
1960 “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee is first published by J. B. Lippincott & Co.
1983 Lorraine Elizabeth Downes, 19, of NZ, crowned 32nd Miss Universe
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July 10
988 The city of Dublin is founded on the banks of the river Liffey
1040 Lady Godiva rides naked on horseback through Coventry, according to legend, to force her husband, the Earl of Mercia, to lower taxes
1460 Wars of Roses: Richard of York defeats King Henry VI at Northampton
1762 Louis-François Roubiliac’s monument to George Frideric Handel is unveiled at Westminster Abbey in London
1925 Meher Baba begins his silence of 44 years. His followers still observe Silence Day on this date in commemoration.
1969 Chilean Association of Librarians created
1980 Alexandra Palace burnt down for a second time.
1985 French agents blow up Greenpeace boat Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour, New Zealand
2002 At a Sotheby’s auction, Peter Paul Rubens’ painting The Massacre of the Innocents is sold for £49.5million (US$76.2 million) to Kenneth, Lord Thomson.
2011 British tabloid News of the World publishes its last edition after 168 years in the wake of a phone hacking scandal.
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July 09
1357 Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor assists laying the foundation stone of Charles Bridge in Prague.
1553 Lady Jane Grey, daughter of the Duke of Suffolk, is proclaimed queen of England in succession to Edward VI, who died three days earlier having proclaimed both his half-sisters illegitimate. She reigned for nine days before being deposed by Mary Tudor, who had Jane executed the following February.
1807 Treaties of Tilsit signed by Napoleon I and Alexander I.
1877 First ever Wimbledon tennis championship begins – first offical lawn tennis tournament – men’s singles only
1893 Daniel Williams performs first successful open heart surgery without anesthesia
1900 The Commonwealth of Australia is established by the British House of Commons
1917 British battleship Vanguard explodes at Scapa Flow (the result of an internal explosion of faulty cordite), killing 804
1947 Engagement of Britain’s Princess Elizabeth & Lt Philip Mountbatten
1951 US President Harry Truman asks Congress to formally end state of war with Germany
1991 South Africa readmitted to Olympics
1997 Mike Tyson is banned from boxing for biting Evander Holyfield’s ear
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July 08
1497 Portuguese navigator Vasco da Gama departs on his first voyage – becomes first European to reach India by sea
1776 Col John Nixon gave first public reading of Decaration of Independence (Philadelphia)
1800 Dr Benjamin Waterhouse gives first cowpox vaccination in the US to his son to prevent smallpox
1944 Japanese kamakize attacks on US lines at Saipan
1947 Reports are broadcast that a UFO has crashed landed in Roswell, New Mexico.
1948 500th anniversary of the Russian Orthodox Church celebrated in Moscow
1963 US bans all monetary transactions with Cuba
1988 Stevie Wonder announces he will run for mayor of Detroit in 1992
2011 Space Shuttle Atlantis is launched in the final mission of the U.S. Space Shuttle program.
2014 FIFA World Cup: Germany defeat Brazil by a record 7-1 in the semi-finals to make it to the final; Miroslav Klose of Germany breaks the World Cup goal scoring record with 16 goals.
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July 07
1456 A retrial verdict acquits Joan of Arc of heresy 25 years after her death
1550 Traditional date Chocolate thought to have been introduced to Europe
1668 Isaac Newton receives MA from Trinity College, Cambridge
1916 The New Zealand Labour party is formed
1928 Sliced bread sold for the first time by the Chillicothe Baking Company, Missouri. Described as the greatest forward step in the baking industry since bread was wrapped.
1974 New Zealand imposes a blanket ban on sports teams from South Africa
1996 Nelson Mandela steps down as President of South Africa
2005 Coordinated terrorist bomb blasts strike London’s public transport system during the morning rush hour killing 52 and injuring 700
2005 Influenced by Live 8, the G8 leaders pledge to double 2004 levels of aid to Africa from US$25 to US$50 billion by the year 2010.
2007 Pope Benedict XVI issues the Apostolic Letter Summorum Pontificum, removing restrictions on celebrating the old Tridentine Mass.
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July 06
1189 Richard the Lionheart is crowned King of England.
1484 Portuguese sea captain Diogo Cão finds the mouth of the Congo River.
1699 Pirate Capt William Kidd is captured in Boston
1776 American Declaration of Independence announced on front page of “PA Evening Gazette”
1858 Lyman Blake patents shoe manufacturing machine
1885 Louis Pasteur successfully tests an anti-rabies vaccine
1886 Horlick’s of Wisconsin offers 1st malted milk to public
1923 Rail crash on New Zealand’s main trunk line; 17 killed and 28 injured
1942 Anne Frank’s family goes into hiding in After House, Amsterdam
1957 John Lennon (16) & Paul McCartney (15) meet for 1st time as Lennon’s rock group Quarrymen perform at a church dinner
1988 North Sea oil platform Piper Alpha explodes, 166 die
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July 05
1295 Scotland and France form an alliance, the beginnings of the Auld Alliance, against England.
1687 Isaac Newton’s great work PRINCIPIA published by Royal Society in England. Outlines his laws of motion and universal gravitation.
1841 Thomas Cook opens first travel agency
1937 Spam, the luncheon meat, was introduced into the market by the Hormel Foods Corporation.
1946 75th British Golf Open: Sam Snead shoots a 290 at St Andrews
1954 The BBC broadcasts its first television news bulletin.
1968 John Lennon sells his psychedelic painted Rolls-Royce
1973 Isle of Man begins issuing its own postage stamps
1985 Premier Robert Mugabe wins Zimbabwe elections
2012 The Shard, the tallest building in Europe, is opened in London, at 309.6 metres (1,016 ft)
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July 04
993 Saint Ulrich of Augsburg is canonized.
1653 English Barebones Parliament goes into session
1776 US Congress proclaims the Declaration of Independence and independence from Britain
1862 Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) creates Alice in Wonderland for Alice Liddell on a family boat trip on the river Isis (Thames) in Oxford
1868 In New Zealand, Maori leader Te Kooti and 300 of his followers captured the schooner Rifleman and sailed for New Zealand; the fugitives landed at Whareongaonga six days later
1960 America’s new 50-star flag honoring Hawaiian statehood unfurled
1996 Hotmail, a free internet E-mail service begins
2004 The cornerstone of the Freedom Tower is laid on the site of the World Trade Centre in New York City. (This was largely a symbolic event; actual construction would not start for several weeks)
2009 The Statue of Liberty’s crown reopens to the public after 8 years, due to security reasons following the World Trade Centre attacks.
2015 Unesco grants World Heritage Status to vineyards in Champagne, France along with Singapore’s Botanical Gardens, Diyarbakir Fortress (Turkey) and Maymand Caves (Iran)
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July 03
324 Battle of Adrianople: Roman Emperor Constantine I defeats his co-emperor Licinius, who flees to Byzantium
1608 Samuel de Champlain founds city of Quebec
1661 Portugal gives Tangier & Bombay to English King Charles II
1754 George Washington surrenders to French, Fort Necessity (7 Years’ War)
1767 Pitcairn Island is discovered by Midshipman Robert Pitcairn on an expeditionary voyage commanded by Philip Carteret.
1767 Norway’s oldest newspaper still in print, Adresseavisen, publishes first edition
1913 Common tern banded in Maine; found dead in 1919 in Africa (first bird known to have crossed the Atlantic)
1963 In New Zealand, a National Airways Corporation Dakota DC-3 crashes in the Kaimai Ranges; all 23 passengers and crew are killed in what is still New Zealand’s worst internal civil aviation accident
1986 President Reagan presided over relighting of renovated Statue of Liberty
1996 British House of Commons annouces Stone of Scone, used in the coronation of Scottish and British monarchs, will be returned to Scotland after 600 years
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July 02
706 Remains of Chinese Emperor Gaozong, his wife Empress Wu Zetian and family members interred in Qianling Mausoleum by Emperor Zhongzong, outside Chang’an on Mount Liangshan
1687 King James II disbands English parliament
1850 Benjamin Lane patents gas mask with a breathing apparatus
1865 One-time Methodist Reform Church minister William Booth and his wife Catherine found the Salvation Army (Army of the Salvation) as the East London Christian Mission
1901 Butch Cassidy & Sundance Kid rob train of $40,000 at Wagner, Montana
1937 Amelia Earhart & Fred Noonan disappear over Pacific Ocean
1940 Hitler orders invasion of Britain (Operation Sealion)
1956 Elvis Presley records “Hound Dog” & “Don’t Be Cruel”
2000 Vicente Fox Quesada is elected the first President of México from an opposition party, the Partido Acción Nacional after more than 70 years of continuous rule by the Partido Revolucionario Institucional.
2002 Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly solo around the world nonstop in a balloon.
2015 BP agrees to compensate US government & gulf states $18.7 billion for the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill
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July 01
70 Roman General Titus and his forces set up battering rams to assault the walls of Jerusalem
1689 Matsuo Basho, zen poet, leaves for 150 days journey on Honshu Japan
1776 1st vote on Declaration of Independence for Britain’s North American colonies
1816 French frigate Medusa wrecked; basis of Géricault’s painting “Raft of the Medusa”
1862 The Russian State Library is founded.
1871 The decimal currency system is made uniform in Canada
1905 Albert Einstein introduces his theory of relativity
1916 Coca-Cola brings current coke formula to the market
1916 First day of the Battle of the Somme: the British Army suffers its worst day, losing 19,240 men (WWI)
1929 US cartoonist Elzie Segar creates “Popeye”
1979 Sony introduces the Walkman.
1988 In New Zealand, Bastion Point land returned to the local Maori iwi (tribe), Ngāti Whātua
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