On This Day

August 1917 in History

Events in History

  • Aug 1 Frank Little, IWW organizer, lynched in Butte, Montana
  • Aug 4 Pravda calls for the killing of all capitalists, priests and officers
  • Aug 5 British troops attack canal of Ypres in Boesinghe, Belgium
  • Aug 5 The entire US National Guard is taken into national service, subject to presidential rather than state control
  • Aug 6 World War I: Battle of Mărăşeşti between the Romanian and German armies begins
  • Aug 9 Canadian Parliament passes the Compulsory Military Act which is opposed by many French Canadians from Québec
  • Aug 13 A revolt in Catalonia, the province in northeast Spain that has long seen itself as independent
  • Aug 14 China declares war on Germany & Austria

Event of Interest

Aug 15 Poets Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon first met at Craiglockhart War Hospital, Edinburgh, go on to have an profound influence on each other's work (actual date 15-19 Aug)

Wilfred Owen
Poet Wilfred Owen
  • Aug 17 Italy declares war on Turkey
  • Aug 18 A Great Fire in Thessaloniki, Greece destroys 32% of the city leaving 70,000 individuals homeless.
  • Aug 18 Dutch Naval Air Force forms (MLD)

Event of Interest

Aug 18 The Queen's Hospital opens to provide pioneering plastic surgery for WWI soldiers, led by Harold Gillies in Sidcup, England

Harold Gillies
Father of Modern Plastic Surgery Harold Gillies
  • Aug 23 Race riot in Houston Texas (2 blacks & 11 whites killed)
  • Aug 27 Indians set club record by stealing eight bases in a game
  • Aug 28 Ten suffragists arrested as they picket the White House

Election of Interest

Aug 31 In China, Sun Yat-sen and his supporters' 'rump' parliament establishes a military government and elects Sun Yat-sen as commander-in-Chief

Sun Yat-sen
Father of Modern China Sun Yat-sen

Birthdays in History

  • Aug 1 Benjamin Roberts, British industrial relations expert (London School of Economics), born in Leeds, England (d. 2011)
  • Aug 11 Dik Browne, American cartoonist (Hi & Lois, Hagar the Horrible), born in New York City (d. 1989)

Jack LynchJack Lynch (1917-1999)

Aug 15 Irish politician and Taoiseach (1966-73 and 1977-79), born in Shandon, Cork, Ireland

Jack Lynch
  • Aug 15 Oscar Romero, El Salvador Roman catholic priest who was murdered, born in Ciudad Barrios, El Salvador (d. 1980)
  • Aug 17 Safa Khulusi, Iraqi writer and historian, born in Baghdad (d. 1995)
  • Aug 18 Casper Weinberger, American politician and businessman (US Secretary of Defense under Reagan 1981-87), born in San Francisco, California (d. 2006)
  • Aug 26 William French Smith, American lawyer and US Attorney General (1981-85), born in Wilton, New Hampshire (d. 1990)

Jack KirbyJack Kirby (1917-1994)

Aug 28 American cartoonist (X-Men; Spider-Man; Hulk; Captain America), born in NYC, New York

Jack Kirby
  • Aug 29 John King, Baron King of Wartnaby, British businessman and CEO of British Airways after its privatization, born in Brentford, Middlesex, England (d. 2005)
  • Aug 30 Denis Healey, English politician (Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer), born in London, (d. 2015)

Deaths in History

  • Aug 1 Frank Little, American labor organizer (lynched) (b. 1879)
  • Aug 3 Ferdinand Georg Frobenius, German mathematician (Frobenius–Stickelberger formulae), dies at 67
  • Aug 7 Squadron Commander E.H. Dunning, first pilot to land his aircraft on a moving ship. (b. 1891)
  • Aug 15 Thomas J. Higgins, Union Army soldier during the American Civil War, recipient of America's highest military decoration (Medal of Honor), dies at 86
  • Aug 20 JFW Adolf Ritter von Baeyer, German chemist (Nobel 1905), dies
  • Aug 22 Matthijs Maris [Thijs], Dutch painter and etcher influenced by Pre-Raphaelites, dies at 78
  • Aug 30 Uritsky, leader of Petrogradse Czech, dies

Historical Figures

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