- 79 Mt. Vesuvius erupts, burying the cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, Oplontis and Stabiae and killing thousands. New research in 2018 suggests the eruption occurred on or after this date not the previously used 24 August. [1] [2]
- 415 Jewish autonomy in Palestine ended by the Romans and Raban Gamliel forced from office
- 532 Boniface II ends his reign as Catholic Pope
Battle of Interest
1346 Battle of Neville's Cross: King David II of Scotland is captured by Edward III of England at Calais, and imprisoned in the Tower of London for eleven years
Edward III
- 1387 Swells convent Windesheim initiated
- 1404 Cosma de' Migliorati elected Pope Innocentius VII
- 1448 Second Battle of Kosovo, where the mainly Hungarian army led by John Hunyadi were defeated by an Ottoman army led by Sultan Murad II.
- 1456 The University of Greifswald is established, making it the second oldest university in northern continental Europe (also for a period the oldest in Sweden, and Prussia)
- 1483 Tomas de Torquemada appointed inquisitor-general of Spain
- 1556 Ex-emperor Karel departs Netherland for Spain
Event of Interest
1651 Future King Charles II flees from England
Charles II
- 1662 Charles II of Great Britain sells Dunkirk to France for 2.5 million livres (320,000 English pounds)
- 1691 New royal charter for Massachusetts, now including Maine, Plymouth
- 1720 Pierre de Marivaux' "Arlequin Poli Par l'Amour" premieres in Paris
- 1740 Ivan VI becomes Tsar of Russia
- 1777 British General John Burgoyne surrenders at Saratoga during the American Revolutionary War
- 1787 Boston African Americans petition legislature for equal school facilities
- 1797 Peace of Campo Formio: Austrian Dutch possessions & France
- 1800 Dutch colony Curacao transfererd to Great Britain
- 1806 Former leader of the Haitian Revolution, Emperor Jacques I of Haiti is assassinated
- 1808 Political rights of Jews suspended in Duchy of Warsaw
- 1814 A Beer Flood occurs in London killing nine.
- 1829 Delaware River & Chesapeake Bay Canal formally opens
- 1829 1st supposed attack on abandoned German teenager Kaspar Hauser
- 1850 Knickerbocker Engine Co Number 5 organized
- 1854 French and British forces bombard Sevastopol for the first time during the Crimean War
- 1855 Bessemer steelmaking process patented
- 1862 Battle of Leetown & Thoroughfare Gap, VA
- 1868 Constitution of Grand Duchy of Luxembourg comes into effect
- 1871 Great Britain annexes Griqualand, South Africa
Event of Interest
1871 US President Ulysses S. Grant suspends habeas corpus in parts of South Carolina during prosecutions against Ku Klux Klan
Ulysses S. Grant
Event of Interest
1876 Henry Morton Stanley's reaches Lualaba River
Henry Morton Stanley
- 1877 Henry Morton Stanley reaches Boma during trip cross Africa
Election of Interest
1878 After serving as the opposition for five years, John A. Macdonald is re-elected as Prime Minister of Canada
John A. Macdonald
Event of Interest
1904 Bank of Italy (Bank of America) opens its doors in San Francisco, founded by Amadeo Giannini
Amadeo Giannini
Event of Interest
1907 Guglielmo Marconi's company begins the first commercial transatlantic wireless service between Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada and Clifden, Ireland
Guglielmo Marconi
- 1912 Bulgaria, Greece & Serbia declares war on Turkey
- 1916 Dutch women demonstrate for female suffrage
- 1917 1st British bombing of Germany
- 1918 De Kooy airport in Netherlands opens
- 1918 Yugoslavia proclaims itself a republic
- 1919 Radio Corporation of America (RCA) is created as a subsidiary of General Electric
- 1921 Belgium's public library law goes into force
- 1922 Scottish worker begins hunger march from Glasgow on London
- 1923 Catholic University of Nijmegen Neth opens
Event of Interest
1933 Albert Einstein arrives in US as a refugee from Nazi Germany
Albert Einstein
Death Railway Completed
1943 Burma railway completed, built by Allied POWs and Asian laborers for use of the Japanese army
Learn More
Event of Interest
1945 Loyalty Day in Argentina, mass demonstrations held to release Juan Perón
Juan Perón
Event of Interest
1957 Britain's Queen Elizabeth & Prince Philip visit the White House
Prince Philip
- 1957 Dike Marken-Dutch mainland closed
Nobel Prize
1957 French author Albert Camus awarded Nobel Prize in Literature
Albert Camus
- 1957 II Tsjoendrigar becomes premier of Pakistan
Event of Interest
1959 Queen Elizabeth II is fined $140 for withdrawing her race horse
Elizabeth II
Event of Interest
1961 NASA civilian pilot Joseph A. Walker takes X-15 to 33,100 m
Joseph A. Walker
Event of Interest
1961 NY Museum of Modern Art hangs Henri Matisse's "Le Bateau" upside-down It wasn't corrected until December 3rd
Henri Matisse
- 1967 "Hair" premieres on Broadway
Event of Interest
1967 Memorial service for Brian Epstein at New London Synagogue
Brian Epstein
Event of Interest
1970 Anwar Sadat sworn in as the 3rd President of Egypt
Anwar Sadat
- 1971 Cleveland Metroparks' Rocky River Nature Center opens
- 1971 It is estimated today that approximately 16,000 households were withholding rent and rates for council houses as part of the campaign of civil disobedience against internment organised by the Social Democratic and Labour Party, Northern Ireland
- 1972 Bob Randall's "6 Rooms Riv Vu," premieres in NYC
- 1972 The Ulster Defence Association open fire on the British Army in several areas of Belfast
- 1973 OPEC oil ministers use oil as an economic weapon in the Arab-Israeli War, mandating a cut in exports and recommending an embargo against unfriendly states
- 1975 1st Space Shuttle main engine test at National Space Tech Labs, Miss
- 1975 UN passes resolution saying "Zionism is a form of racism"
- 1976 China performs nuclear test at Lop Nor, PRC
- 1977 Canada begins regular live TV coverage of Parliament
- 1977 West German commandos storm hijacked Lufthansa in Mogadishu, Somalia freeing all 86 hostages & killing 3 of 4 hijackers
Event of Interest
1978 President Jimmy Carter signs bill restoring US citizenship to Jefferson Davis
Jimmy Carter
Nobel Prize
1979 Mother Teresa of Calcutta awarded Nobel Peace Prize
Mother Teresa
- 1979 US President Jimmy Carter signs legislation creating Department of Education
- 1980 1st-class debut of Mike Whitney, NSW v Qld (2-52 & 1-39)
- 1982 USSR performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya USSR
- 1983 Nobel Prize in Economics awarded to Gérard Debreu
- 1983 STS-9 vehicle moves to Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center (Florida) due to SRB nozzle problem
Television Debut
1983 Talk show "The Sally Jessy Raphael Show" with Sally Jessy Raphael debuts on KSDK
Sally Jessy Raphael
Event of Interest
1986 Yitzhak Rabin forms Israeli government
Yitzhak Rabin
Event of Interest
1987 US First Lady Nancy Reagan undergoes a modified radical mastectomy
Nancy Reagan
- 1988 31 reported dead as Ugandan jetliner crashes in fog near Rome
- 1988 Lyndon LaRouche pleads innocent to fraud, conspiracy indictment
- 1988 Phillip Morris announces $11 Billion tender offer for Kraft
- 1988 Traveling Wilburys Volume 1 is released
- 1991 News anchor Bree Walker Lampley files an FCC complaint that LA radio KFI-AM personally attacked her by discussing her having a disformed baby
- 1995 Keith Moore sentenced to 6 years for robbing Sting of $9,000,000
- 1998 At Jesse, in the Niger Delta, Nigeria, a petroleum pipeline explodes killing about 1200 villagers, some of whom are scavenging gasoline.
- 2000 Train crash at Hatfield, north of London, leading to collapse of Railtrack
- 2003 Pinnacle fitted on the roof of Taipei 101, a 101-floor skyscraper in Taipei, allowing it to surpass the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur by 50 meters (165 feet) to become World's tallest high-rise
- 2003 Eunuchs in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh float the political party Jiti Jitayi Politics.
- 2006 The United States population reaches 300 million
Event of Interest
2007 The Dalai Lama receives the United States Congressional Gold Medal
Tenzin Gyatso
- 2008 Iran's attempt to create the world's largest sandwich (1,500 metres) fails when crowds eat it before it can be measured
- 2012 Exoplanet Alpha Centauri Bb discovered orbiting Alpha Centauri announced (later thought to be a false finding)
- 2012 Tens of thousands protest against austerity measures in Greece
- 2013 59 people are killed in a wave of attacks on Shia Muslims in Iraq
- 2016 Chinese spacecraft Shenzhou-11 launched from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northern China
- 2017 Islamic State headquarters Raqqa declared under full control of US-led alliance by Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) spokesman Talal Sello after 4 months of fighting
Event of Interest
2017 Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte declares city of Marawi "liberated" from militants
Rodrigo Duterte
- 2017 American short-story writer George Saunders wins the Man Booker Prize for his first novel "Lincoln in the Bardo"
Event of Interest
2017 George Soros announces he has donated $18 billion to his grantmaking network the Open Society Foundations
George Soros
- 2018 India's junior foreign minister MJ Akbar is highest official to resign in #MeToo case after sexual harassment accusations by numerous women
- 2018 Canada legalizes the sale of recreational cannabis, the second country after Uruguay
- 2018 Australian state of Queensland decriminalizes abortion
- 2018 Student shoots and detonates a bomb killing 20 with 40 injured at Kerch polytechnic college, Crimea
Event of Interest
2019 UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson announces new Brexit deal with the EU, removes the Northern Ireland backstop clause
Boris Johnson
Agreement of Interest
2019 Turkey agrees to a ceasefire in Northern Syria for 5 days to allow withdrawal of Kurdish troops, after talks between US VP Mike Pence and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan
Mike Pence
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
- 2019 The 'Blob', mysterious yellow slime organism (physarum polycephalum) with 720 sexes, moves and can solve problems to go on display at the Paris Zoological Park
- 2019 US adults identifying as Christian falls 12% in a decade to 2/3 according to the Pew Research Center, born-again Protestants falls to 16%
Event of Interest
2019 Mick Mulvaney, President Trump's acting chief of staff says the White House withheld nearly $400 million in military aid from Ukraine to further Trump's own political interests
Donald Trump
Election of Interest
2020 Labour Party headed by Jacinda Ardern re-elected in a landslide in New Zealand's general election
Jacinda Ardern
- 2020 Chicago declared the 'rattiest city' in America for the sixth year in a row by pest control service Orkin