On This Day In History
August 16th
1896 Gold first discovered in Klondike, found at Bonanza Creek in the Yukon, Canada by George Carmack
1930 I British Empire Games open in Hamilton, Canada
1945 Puyi, the last Chinese Emperor and ruler of Manchukuo is captured by Soviet troops
1946 Direct Action Day: Widespread riots erupt in Calcutta between Muslims and Hindus over whether Pakistan should be a separate state, killing over 4,000 and leaving 100,000 homeless
2012 Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange is granted political asylum by Ecuador
August 17th
1590 Governor of Roanoke Island colony, John White, returns from England to find no trace of the colonists he had left there 3 years earlier [or Aug 18, 1591]
1903 Joe Pulitzer donates $1 million to Columbia University & begins the Pulitzer Prizes in America
1945 Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta declare Indonesia (Dutch East Indies) independent from the Netherlands
1945 Korea is divided into North and South Korea along the 38th parallel
1947 The Radcliffe Line, the border between Union of India and Dominion of Pakistan is revealed
1998 Monica Lewinsky scandal: US President Bill Clinton admits in taped testimony he had an “improper physical relationship” with the intern and on the same day admits before the nation he “misled people” about the relationship
Did You Know?
Projection in Paris of the very first animated cartoon, Fantasmagorie realized by Émile Cohl
Today in History in 1908
Would You Believe?
Baseball player Richie Ashburn fouls and hits fan Alice Roth twice in the same game at bat playing for the Philadelphia Phillies, 1st hit breaks her nose, 2nd one hits her while she is on the stretcher
Today in History in 1957
August 18th
1737 First public admittance to the Salon de Paris art exhibition at the Louvre in Paris
1838 United States Exploring Expedition headed by Charles Wilkes departs for the Pacific Ocean and Antarctica
1914 US President Woodrow Wilson issues “Proclamation of Neutrality”
1919 Anti-Cigarette League of America forms in Chicago, Illinois
1920 22 year old representative Harry T. Burn is deciding vote in Tennessee’s and thus America’s ratification of the 19th Amendment to the constitution allowing women’s suffrage after letter from his mother
1940 Battle of Britain: The air battle known as “The Hardest Day” occurs; Luftwaffe lose approximately 69 aircraft and the RAF lose 68 in one of the largest ever air battles
Did You Know?
French Astronomer Pierre Janssen discovers helium in solar spectrum during eclipse
Today in History in 1868
Would You Believe?
60-70ft sea serpent sightings reported offshore in Gloucester, Massachusetts
Today in History in 1817
August 19th
43 BC Octavian, later known as Augustus, compels the Roman Senate to elect him Consul
1839 Details of Louis Daguerre‘s 1st practical photographic process are released in Paris
1942 World War II: Over 4,000 Canadian and British soldiers killed, wounded or captured raiding Dieppe, France
1988 Iran and Iraq begin a cease-fire in their 8-year-old war (11 PM EDT)
1991 Conservative members of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union attempt to depose Mikhail Gorbachev in a coup d’état
2010 Operation Iraqi Freedom ends, with the last of the United States brigade combat teams crossing the border to Kuwait
Did You Know?
The Chinese Community in South Africa is granted ‘White’ status
Today in History in 1970
Would You Believe?
Start of first and only Olympic cricket match in Paris; GB beats France by 158 runs
Today in History in 1900
August 20th
1597 1st Dutch East India Company ships return from the Far East
1619 1st known African Americans in English North America (approx. 20) land at Point Comfort (Fort Monroe), Virginia. They are then sold or traded into servitude.
1741 Alaska first sighted by Danish explorer Vitus Bering at head of Russian expedition
1866 President Andrew Johnson formally declares US Civil War over
1905 Chinese revolutionary Sun Yat-sen forms the first chapter of T’ung Meng Hui, a union of all secret societies determined to bringing down the Manchus (Qing dynasty)
1968 During the night 250,000 Soviet and Warsaw Pact troops invade Czechoslovakia in response to the Prague Spring
1993 Oslo Peace Accords signed, after secret negotiations in Norway, followed by a public ceremony in Washington, D.C. the following month
Did You Know?
British PM Churchill says of Royal Air Force, “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few”
Today in History in 1940
Would You Believe?
Longest US men’s single tennis tournament match Palmer Presbrey defeats T S Tailer, 19-21, 8-6, 6-1, 6-4, an 80 game 1st-round contest
Today in History in 1888
August 21st
1192 Minamoto Yoritomo becomes Seii Tai Shōgun and the de facto ruler of Japan. (Traditional Japanese date: July 12, 1192)
1703 The Edirne Event: Turkish army removes Sultan Mustafa II, lessening the power of the sultans
1772 King Gustav III of Sweden completes a coup d’etat by adopting a new Constitution and installing himself as an enlightened despot, ending 50 years of parliamentary rule
1888 American inventor William Seward Burroughs patents the adding machine
1911 “Mona Lisa” stolen from the Louvre by Vincenzo Perugia; recovered in 1913
1959 Hawaii becomes the 50th US state
1991 Conservative coup in the Soviet Union is crushed by popular resistance led by Boris Yeltsin in three days
Did You Know?
1st British unmanned drone hit on a UK citizen outside a conflict – ISIS fighter Reyaad Khan in Raqqa, Syria
Today in History in 2015
Would You Believe?
After 108 years a “message in a bottle” put in the sea by UK Marine Biological Association is announced found on a beach in Amrum, Germany
Today in History in 2015
August 22nd
1485 Battle of Bosworth Field: Henry Tudor’s forces defeat English King Richard III during last battle in the Wars of the Roses. Richard is killed, the last English monarch to die in battle.
1639 Madras (now Chennai), India, founded by the British East India Company on sliver of land bought from local Nayak rulers
1642 English Civil War begins between Royalists and Parliament
1864 First Geneva Convention adopted in Geneva “for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded in Armies in the Field” signed by 12 nations
1922 Michael Collins was shot dead in an ambush at Béal na mBláth by members of the IRA opposed to the Anglo-Irish Treaty. Collins, with Arthur Griffith, had helped negotiate the treaty which led to the establishment of the Irish Free State.
1945 Vietnam conflict begins as Ho Chi Minh leads a successful coup
Did You Know?
The first air raid in history; Austria launches pilotless balloons against the Italian city of Venice
Today in History in 1849
Would You Believe?
St Columba reports seeing monster in Loch Ness
Today in History in 565