Category Archives: History

History

On This Day – July 27

On This Day – July 27

  • 2012 Queen Elizabeth II officially opens the 2012 Summer Olympics in London

    It was the 3rd time London had hosted the multi-event international sports event. The ceremony was called Isles of Wonder and was directed by Danny Boyle.

  • 1985 Coup in Uganda

    Tito Lutwa Okello, an Ugandan military officer successfully staged a coup against president Milton Obote. He was ousted by current president Yoweri Museveni 6 months later.

  • 1955 Austrian State Treaty came to force

    The treaty re-established Austria as a democratic and sovereign country after World War II. It also ended the allied occupation of the country.

  • 1940 Bugs Bunny’s official debut

    Bugs Bunny made his official debut in A Wild Hare.

  • 1890 Vincent Van Gogh shoots himeslf

    The famed painter, shot himself in the chest. He died of his wounds two days later.

History

On this day July 26

On This Day – July 26

  • 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 is signed into law

    The law banned discrimination based on disability.

  • 1965 Independence of Maldives

    The Indian Ocean Island nation gained independence after 78 years of British rule.

  • 1963 Syncom 2, the world’s first geosynchronous communications satellite is launched

    Part of NASA’s Syncom program, it was responsible for transmitting the first TV signal from a geosynchronous satellite, a manmade satellite whose orbital period around the Earth matches the Earth’s rotation.

  • 1945 Potsdam Declaration is signed

    Also known as the Proclamation Defining Terms for Japanese Surrender, the declaration signed by the US, UK and China, detailed the terms of surrender for Japan after World War II.

  • 1847 The country of Liberia is founded

    This west African state was founded primarily by freed slaves from the United States. The Liberian constitution was based on the US’s constitution and the capital, Monrovia, is named after James Monroe, the fifth president of the United States.

History

On This Day – July 25

  • 2007 India gets its first female president

    Pratibha Patil, a politician stayed in office as the head of state of the South Asian country for 5 years.

  • 1984 Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the First Woman to Walk in Space

    The Soviet cosmonaut was part of the Soyuz T-12 mission, which docked at the Salyut 7 Space station. As part of the mission, she spent 3.5 hours in space testing tools. Savitskaya was also the second woman to go into space and the first to go to space twice.

  • 1978 World’s first test tube baby is born

    Louise Joy Brown was the first person to be conceived using in-vitro fertilization or IVF technology, pioneered by doctors Patrick Steptoe and Robert Edwards.

  • 1976 The famous Face on Mars photo is taken

    Viking 1, the first space probe to successfully land on Mars took the famous photo of the Cydonia region on the Red Planet.

  • 1956 Tunisia gains its independence from France

    The northernmost African country, became a French protectorate in 1881, under the Treaty of Bardo. The path to independence in the country was marred by civil unrest and conflict and was led by Habib Bourguiba, who became the first president of the independent country.

History

On this day July 24

 

Today in History

  • 2013 Santiago de Compostela derailment

    A high-speed train traveling from Madrid to Ferrol derailed on a curve killing 79 people and injuring over 100.

  • 1977 The 4-day long Libyan-Egyptian War comes to an end

    The border war began with thousands of Libyans marching towards Egypt’s borders.

  • 1959 Kitchen debate between Nixon and Khrushchev

    A series of debates, now popularly called the kitchen debates, occurred between U.S. Vice President Nixon and Soviet Premier Khrushchev in Moscow. Nixon was visiting a house built as part of an exhibit in the American National Exhibition.

  • 1923 The Treaty of Lausanne is signed between Turkey and the countries that formed the Allied Powers in the First World War

    Under the treaty,Turkey had to give up all the territorial claims made by the Ottoman Empire and agree to new borders.

  • 1911 Rediscovery of Machu Picchu

    The 15th century, largely forgotten Inca site in Peru was rediscovered by American Hiram Bingham III.