43 BC Octavian , later known as Augustus , compels the Roman Senate to elect him consul 1263 King James I of Aragon censors Hebrew writing 1274 Edward I is crowned King of England at Westminster Abbey after returning from the Ninth Crusade 1399 King Richard II of England surrenders to his cousin Henry Bolingbroke at Flint Castle after promising to abdicate if his life was spared 1458 Aenea Silvio Piccolomini chosen as Pope Pius II 1493 Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I becomes Archduke of Austria upon the death of his father and co-ruler, Frederick III 1504 Battle of Knockdoe, the bloodiest battle of medieval Ireland, is fought in Galway between two Anglo-Irish lords: Gearoid Fitzgerald, Lord Deputy, defeats Ulick Finn Burke 1524 Emperor Charles V 's troops besiege Marseille, France 1561 Mary Queen of Scots arrives in Leith, Scotland to assume the throne after spending 13 years in France 1587 Sigismund III Vasa becomes King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania 1600 Dutch ship Liefde reaches Japan, barely making it across the Pacific with 25 crew members, including English navigator William Adams ; its cannons later play an important role in the Battle of Sekigahara [1] 1627 Prince of Orange Frederick Henry conquers Fort Groenlo after a siege during the Dutch Revolt against Spain 1665 The world's "most mysterious book," a codex known as the Voynich manuscript and written in an unknown script, is sent by the rector of Charles University in Prague to a Jesuit scholar (now in Yale University's Beinecke Library and still undeciphered) 1691 Battle of Slankamen: "The bloodiest battle of the century" Austrian Habsburg forces defeat the Ottoman army, killing Grand Vizier Köprülü Fazıl Mustafa Pasha 1692 Five more people, George Jacobs Sr., Martha Carrier, George Burroughs, John Proctor, and John Willard, are hanged after being convicted of witchcraft during the Salem witch trials in the Massachusetts Bay Colony [1] 1702 Battle of Santa Marta, Venezuela: English fleet defeats the French (battle ends August 25) 1745 Jacobite Rising 1745: Bonnie Prince Charlie raises his standard at Glenfinnan, Scotland, igniting the second Jacobite rebellion 1757 Battle of Gross-Jägersdorf: Russian army defeats Prussia [New style = August 30] 1768 Empress Catherine II commissions a new version of Saint Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg, Russia 1772 King Gustav III seizes control of the Swedish government in a coup d’état and restores royal authority, ending the parliamentary dominance of the Age of Liberty 1782 Battle of Blue Licks: 50 Loyalists and 300 Indigenous warriors ambush and rout 182 Kentucky militiamen, including Daniel Boone , in Kentucky County, Virginia, in one of the last battles of the American Revolutionary War 1791 Benjamin Banneker sends a copy of his Almanac and writes a letter to Thomas Jefferson criticizing his pro-slavery stance and requesting justice for African Americans using language from the Declaration of Independence 1793 Yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia, then the US capital, has its first fatality and lasts until November, killing around 5,000 people 1796 Spain and France sign an anti-British alliance 1812 US warship Constitution defeats British warship Guerriere 1813 Gervasio Antonio de Posadas joins Argentina's second triumvirate 1816 Java returns to Dutch rule after being controlled by the British for five years 1821 A liberal conspiracy to overthrow King Louis XVIII fails after authorities uncover the plot, thwarting an effort to end the restored Bourbon monarchy 1826 Canada Company is chartered to colonize Upper Canada (Ontario) 1836 HMS Beagle anchors at Angra, Azores 1839 Louis Daguerre 's daguerreotype photographic process with complete working instructions is published "free to the world" in Paris as a gift from the French government 1848 New York Herald is the first major eastern newspaper to report the discovery of gold in California 1861 Confederate Congress allies with the government of Missouri 1864 Second day of battle at Globe Tavern, Virginia, Union forces attempt to destroy Weldon Railroad Confederate supply route (successful August 21) 1886 Carlisle Graham survives his second ride in a barrel down Niagara Falls, although the barrel broke and he had to swim some, and permanently lost hearing in one ear 1887 Dmitri Mendeleev makes a solo ascent by balloon to an altitude of 11,500 feet (3.5 km) above Klin, Russia, to observe an eclipse 1891 William Huggins describes the astronomical application of spectroscopy 1895 American frontier murderer and outlaw John Wesley Hardin is shot and killed by John Selman Sr. in a saloon in El Paso, Texas 1897 First electric taxis drive in London 1900 Start of the first and only Olympic cricket match as Great Britain defeats France by 158 runs in Paris 1903 Philadelphia Phillies suffer a record ninth consecutive postponed game 1905 Russian Tsar Nicholas II installs the "Imperial Duma" without legislative powers 1909 "Wild" Bob Burman wins his first major auto race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, earning the Prest-O-Lite Trophy; the 100-lap, 250-mile race is completed by only three of the nine cars, and one racer and a mechanic are killed in a crash 1911 MLB New York Giants pitcher Christy Mathewson loses against the Cincinnati Reds after 22 consecutive wins against the team 1912 Percy Grainger's orchestral piece "Shepherd's Hey" premieres 1913 Frenchman Adolphe Célestin Pégoud makes the first parachute jump in Europe 1914 Elmer Rice 's courtroom drama "On Trial" premieres at the Candler Theatre in New York City, using innovative flashbacks to recount the events behind a murder trial 1914 German army executes 150 Belgians by firing squad 1914 German fleet bombs the English coast 1914 Harris Theatre (Candler, Coan & Harris) opens at 226 W 42nd St, New York City 1914 In a message to the Senate, US President Woodrow Wilson urges the American people to be "neutral in fact as well as name" 1915 British liner "SS Arabic" is sunk by a German submarine without warning while leaving Liverpool for New York, killing 44 and creating a diplomatic incident 1915 Rationing laws go into effect in the Netherlands 1917 Sunday benefit baseball game at NYC's Polo Grounds results in John McGraw and Christy Mathewson 's arrest for violating Blue Laws 1918 Irving Berlin 's military musical revue "Yip Yip Yaphank" opens at the Century Theatre and later transfers to the Lexington Theatre in NYC 1919 After nearly 100 years of British control, Afghanistan declares independence 1921 Detroit's Tiger Ty Cobb is the fourth and youngest player to achieve 3,000 hits against the Boston Red Sox 1927 Metropolitan Sergius proclaims the declaration of loyalty of the Russian Orthodox Church to the Soviet state 1931 Lefty Grove wins an AL record-tying 16th consecutive game 1934 The first All-American Soap Box Derby is held in Dayton, Ohio 1936 Trial against Lev Kamenev and Grigory Zinoviev for "Trotskyism" opens in Moscow 1939 37.6 cm of rainfall in Tuckerton, NJ (state record) 1941 Baseball umpire Jocko Conlan ejects Pirates manager Frankie Frisch for coming onto the field holding an umbrella to get a rainout 1941 Romania annexes the Transnistria territory from the Soviet Union following Operation Barbarossa 1942 Winston Churchill visits Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery ’s headquarters at Burg el-Arab in Egypt to discuss British preparations for the Second Battle of El Alamein 1942 World War II: General Friedrich Paulus orders the German 6th Army to conquer Stalingrad 1942 World War II: Over 4,000 Canadian and British soldiers are killed, wounded, or captured during a raid on Dieppe, France 1943 Belgian church excommunicates Nazi collaborator Léon Degrelle 1943 US air raid on German bases at Gilze-Rijen and Vlissingen, the Netherlands 1944 Allied air raid on Maastricht kills more than 80 people 1944 Last Japanese troops driven out of India 1944 Nazis give parts of Paris to the Resistance 1944 Paris police strike against Nazi occupiers 1944 Polish 1st Division occupies Hill 262 (Mont Ormel), Normandy 1944 US 15th Army Corps occupies Mantes-Gassicourt near Paris 1944 US 90th and Polish 1st Divisions occupy Chambois, Normandy 1944 US general Omar Bradley visits British general Bernard Montgomery 1945 Phillies' Jimmie Foxx , 37, pitches the first 7 innings against the Reds and wins 1947 J. Arens and D. van Dorpen synthesize vitamin A 1950 ABC begins broadcasting Saturday morning kids' shows (Animal Clinic and Acrobat Ranch) 1951 Bill Veeck of the St. Louis Browns sends Eddie Gaedel, a 3 ft 7 in (1.09 m) little person, to pinch-hit; he walks on four pitches 1953 Democratically elected Prime Minister of Iran Mohammad Mossadegh is overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the United Kingdom (under the name 'Operation Boot') and the United States (under the name TPAJAX Project) 1954 American Ralph Bunche is named Undersecretary of the UN 1955 32.4 cm of rainfall in Burlington, Connecticut (state record) 1955 Hurricane Diane kills 200 people and becomes the first billion-dollar damage storm in the northeastern United States 1955 US raises import duty on bicycles by 50% 1955 WINS radio in New York City announces it will not play white cover versions of R&B records, opting instead to play Fats Domino 's "Ain't That A Shame" rather than Pat Boone's 1957 NY Giants board of directors vote 8-1 to move their baseball franchise to San Francisco in 1958 [1] 1957 US Major David Simons reaches 30,933 meters in a balloon 1958 NAACP Youth Council begins a sit-in at a "whites-only" lunch counter at Katz Drug Store in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma [1] 1959 Honolulu, Hawaii seeks a franchise in baseball's new Continental League 1959 Satellite Discoverer 6 is launched into polar orbit 1960 American CIA pilot Francis Gary Powers is convicted of spying by the USSR (U-2 incident) and sentenced to 3 years in prison plus 7 in a labor camp; he serves 17 months before being exchanged for a captured Soviet KGB spy 1960 New England's first commercial atomic energy reactor, owned by the Yankee Atomic Electric Company, achieves a self-sustaining nuclear reaction in Rowe, Massachusetts [1] 1960 Soviet spacecraft Sputnik 5 carries two dogs, two rats, 40 mice, a rabbit, and fruit flies into space, becoming the first spacecraft to return animals alive from orbit 1961 Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson visits West Berlin to demonstrate US support after the construction of the Berlin Wall and receives an enthusiastic welcome 1962 Homer Blancos plays his finest round in golf, shooting a 55 1964 Communication satellite Syncom 3 is launched 1965 Auschwitz trials end with six life sentences 1965 Cincinnati Reds pitcher Jim Maloney throws his second no-hitter of the season in a 1-0 win over the Chicago Cubs 1965 The Yardbirds launch their first US tour 1966 Earthquake strikes Varto region in eastern Turkey with a 6.8 magnitude, killing around 2,400 1966 The Beatles are pelted with rotten fruit and firecrackers during a concert at the Mid-South Coliseum in Memphis, Tennessee; the Ku Klux Klan demonstrates outside the show and burns records 1967 The Beatles' "All You Need Is Love" single goes to #1 1969 Film adaptation of Arlo Guthrie 's song "Alice's Restaurant," directed by Arthur Penn and starring Guthrie, premieres 1969 MLB Chicago Cubs pitcher Ken Holtzman no-hits the visiting Atlanta Braves 3-0 at Wrigley Field 1970 The Chinese community in South Africa is granted "white" status

1973 France performs a nuclear test at Mururoa Atoll 1974 RCA Records releases "Pussy Cats," the tenth album by American singer Harry Nilsson in the US; the album is produced by John Lennon , and Nilsson works through a serious vocal cord injury that diminishes his acclaimed range 1976 President Gerald Ford wins the Republican presidential nomination at the Kansas City convention 1977 USSR performs a nuclear test at Sary Shagan, USSR 1978 Between 377 and 470 people die in an arson fire at a movie theater in Abadan, Iran 1979 "My Sharona" by The Knack hits #1 and stays at the top for 6 weeks 1979 Soviet Cosmonauts Vladimir Lyakhov and Valery Ryumin return to Earth aboard Soyuz 34 after a record 175 days in space 1980 Kansas City Royals' George Brett 's hitting streak ends at 30 games 1980 Saudi Arabian Lockheed Tristar crashes on landing at Riyadh, killing 301 1980 Willy Russell's play "Educating Rita" premieres in London, starring Julie Walters 1981 American athlete Renaldo Nehemiah runs the 110m hurdles in world record time of 12.93 seconds in Zurich, Switzerland 1981 Two US Navy F-14 jet fighters shoot down two Soviet-built Libyan SU-22s 1982 Soyuz T-7 launches; Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the second woman in space 1983 Dodgers trade Dave Stewart and Ricky Wright to Texas for Rick Honeycutt 1983 LSU footballer Billy Cannon is sentenced to 5 years for counterfeiting 1984 Republican convention in Dallas, Texas nominates incumbent Ronald Reagan for President 1985 Archbishop Desmond Tutu snubs P. W. Botha 's invitation to attend a meeting to discuss the role and actions of the police and security forces in South Africa following the Rubicon speech four days earlier 1985 Japan launches Suisei, the country's second probe of Halley's Comet 1986 Car bomb kills 20 in Tehran, Iran 1987 Hungerford Massacre, England: Michael Ryan kills 16 people with an assault rifle and then commits suicide 1988 Iran and Iraq begin a ceasefire in their eight-year-old war at 11 pm EDT 1988 Maung Maung succeeds General Sein Lwin as the 7th President of Burma 1988 NY Rangers sign ex-Canadian great Guy Lafleur out of retirement 1989 First crack in the Iron Curtain as Hungary opens its borders to Austria for a Pan-European Picnic for a few hours 1989 Tadeusz Mazowiecki is elected as the first non-communist Prime Minister of Poland 1990 Dodger José Offerman hits a home run in his first at-bat 1991 Conservative members of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union attempt to depose Mikhail Gorbachev in a coup d'état [1] 1991 Hurricane Bob hits the US, making landfall in Massachusetts 1992 Sri Lanka makes its highest cricket score ever, 8-547, against Australia 1992 Sri Lankan cricket wicketkeeper Romesh Kaluwitharana scores 132 on debut in the first Test against Australia in Colombo 1993 Dow Jones Industrial Average hits record high of 3612.13 1993 George Tiller, an abortion doctor, is shot in his arms by Rachelle Shannon 1993 Mattel and Fisher-Price toy companies merge 1993 Sally Gunnell runs a women's world record 400 m hurdles (52.74 seconds) 1995 After five days, Shannon Faulkner quits as the first woman at The Citadel 1995 Bruce Seldon TKO's Joe Hipp in the 10th round for the heavyweight boxing title 1995 Mike Tyson returns to the ring after serving three years in prison and defeats Peter McNeeley by disqualification in 89 seconds 1996 Major South African political parties begin their submissions to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) 1997 NY Yankees third baseman Wade Boggs pitches a scoreless inning against Anaheim 1997 STS-85 (Discovery 23) lands 1998 South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission chairperson, Archbishop Desmond Tutu , releases documents revealing an alleged plot by Western countries to assassinate UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld of Sweden 1999 In Belgrade, tens of thousands of Serbians rally to demand the resignation of Slobodan Milošević as president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia 2001 German Ferrari driver Michael Schumacher wins the Hungarian Grand Prix at the Hungaroring to clinch his fourth F1 World Drivers' Championship and equal Alain Prost 's record of 51 Grand Prix victories 2002 A Russian Mi-26 helicopter carrying troops is hit by a Chechen missile outside Grozny, killing 127 soldiers and injuring 20 in the worst attack in helicopter history 2003 A car bomb attack on United Nations headquarters in Iraq kills the agency's top envoy, Sergio Vieira de Mello, and 21 other employees 2003 A Hamas-planned suicide attack on a bus in Jerusalem kills 23 Israelis, 7 of whom are children 2004 American swimmer Aaron Peirsol wins the men's 200 m backstroke in an Olympic record time of 1:54.95, achieving the 100/200 m backstroke double at the Athens Olympics 2004 American swimmer Michael Phelps wraps up the 200/400 m individual medley double at the Athens Olympics as he wins the 200 m (1:57.14 OR) ahead of teammate Ryan Lochte 2004 Australian swimmer Jodie Henry records 53.84 to win the women's 100m freestyle gold medal ahead of Dutch star Inge de Bruijn at the Athens Olympics 2004 US gymnast Carly Patterson becomes the second American woman to win the all-around gold medal and the first to win at a non-boycotted Olympic Games when she takes gold in Athens 2005 A series of strong storms dubbed the "Toronto Supercell" lashes Southern Ontario, spawning several tornadoes and creating extreme flash flooding within the city of Toronto and its surrounding communities 2005 The first-ever joint military exercise between Russia and China, called Peace Mission 2005 begins 2007 15.12 inches (38.4 cm) of rainfall in Hokah, Minnesota (a state record, breaking the previous record after 35 years) 2007 The Tradition Senior Men's Golf, Crosswater Club: Mark McNulty of Zimbabwe wins lone career major title by 5 strokes from David Edwards 2008 Britain's Victoria Pendleton beats Anna Mears in the women's cycling sprint final at the Beijing Olympics, with Great Britain dominating the track by winning 7 of 10 gold medals 2008 Chris Hoy encapsulates British dominance in track cycling at the Beijing Olympics by beating teammate Jason Kenny to win the sprint, adding to his keirin and team sprint gold medals 2008 Lady Gaga 's debut album, "The Fame," is released by Interscope Records (Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album 2010) 2008 Reigning world champion Christine Ohuruogu wins the women's 400 m at the Beijing Olympics, earning Great Britain's 50th gold medal in Olympic track and field competition 2008 The men's gymnastics program at the Beijing Olympics concludes with the home team from China dominating the medals tally, taking 7 of 8 gold medals; Zou Kai wins 3 2009 A series of bombings in Baghdad, Iraq, kill 101 and injure 565 2010 Operation Iraqi Freedom winds down as the last of the United States Brigade Combat Teams cross the border into Kuwait [1] 2012 Plane crash in the mountainous region of Talodi, Sudan, kills 32, including several government officials and staff, en route to the Eid al-Fitr festival, which celebrates the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan; crash is blamed on bad weather conditions 2013 24 Egyptian policemen are killed in an attack in Rafah 2013 37 pilgrims are killed in a train accident in India 2013 91 people are killed by floods across China 2014 NASA satellites take photos showing that the eastern basin of the Aral Sea has, for the first time, completely dried up 2014 The 24-hour ceasefire extension renewal between Israel and Palestine is violated as Hamas fires rockets; the Israeli Air Force responds, killing 9 Gazans 2015 US Food and Drug Administration approves female Viagra libido pill Addyi 2016 A six-way tie for first place occurs in the final of the equestrian individual jumping competition at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics; Nick Skelton of Great Britain wins the gold medal jump-off 2016 Chloe Esposito of Australia sets an Olympic record with an overall score of 1,372 points to win the women's modern pentathlon in Rio de Janeiro. Élodie Clouvel of France is second with 1,356 points, and Oktawia Nowacka of Poland is third with 1,349 points 2016 City of San Francisco unveils a statue of singer Tony Bennett outside the Fairmont Hotel, where he first performs his signature song "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" in 1961 2016 Colombian BMX rider Mariana Pajón successfully defends her Olympic title by beating American Alise Post in the final in Rio de Janeiro 2016 Dilshod Nazarov of Tajikistan throws 78.68 m to win the men's hammer throw gold medal at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, earning the first gold medal for Tajikistan in Olympic history 2016 Germany defeats Sweden 2-1 in the women's football gold medal match at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, with 52,432 spectators at Maracanã Stadium 2016 Great Britain upsets the heavily favored Netherlands to win the women's field hockey gold medal at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics after drawing 3-3 in regulation time and winning a dramatic penalty shootout 2-0 2016 Kiley Neushul scores three goals as the US women's water polo team routs Italy 12-5 to win the gold medal in Rio de Janeiro and retain their Olympic title 2016 Vivian Cheruiyot of Kenya goes one better than her London silver medal by winning the women's 5,000m at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, running an Olympic record time of 14:26.17 2018 Limerick wins the All-Ireland Hurling Championship for the first time in 45 years with a 3-16 to 2-18 victory over defending champions Galway at Croke Park, Dublin 2018 Monsoon rains finally ease in Kerala State, India, with flooding taking 350 lives and 200,000 in relief camps 2018 N. K. Jemisin becomes the first author to win the Hugo Award for Best Novel in three consecutive years with her work "The Stone Sky"; she is also the first to win for all three novels in a trilogy [1] 2018 Novak Djokovic beats Roger Federer 6-4, 6-4 in the final of the Cincinnati Masters to become the first player to win all nine ATP Masters 1000 tournaments 2018 Two more earthquakes hit Lombok in Indonesia, killing 14 people two weeks after previous earthquakes 2018 Weinstein accuser Asia Argento is alleged to have sexually assaulted a 17-year-old in an article by "The New York Times" 2019 Evelyn Hernández is cleared of killing her newborn baby in a landmark case in a retrial in El Salvador 2019 Sudanese ex-President Omar al-Bashir admits he has received $90 million from Saudi Arabian royals at the start of his corruption trial in Khartoum 2020 Apple becomes the first US company to be valued at $2 trillion just two years after it reaches a $1 trillion valuation 2020 Golfing dinner termed #GolfGate, appearing to flout COVID-19 restrictions and attended by Irish political figures, prompts two politicians to later resign 2020 Largest floods in 70 years wet the toes of giant 71 m Leshan Buddha carved by a river just outside Chengdu, China, with 100,000 people evacuated 2020 US Postmaster General Louis DeJoy says he will suspend the controversial plan to cut costs until after the election 2021 Iran's official COVID-19 death toll surpasses 100,000 amid its fifth wave of infections, according to its Health Ministry 2022 30-hour siege begins at Hayat Hotel, Mogadishu, by Shabab militants, leaving 21 dead and 117 injured [1] 2022 European drought uncovers river "hunger stones" that once warn of famine, including the Děčín stone (earliest inscription 1417) on the Elbe River, with the carving "if you see me, then weep" [1] 2022 Mexico's former Attorney General Jesús Murillo Karam is arrested in connection with the disappearance of 43 students in 2014, one of the country's worst human rights tragedies [1] 2023 MLB Philadelphia Phillies shortstop Trea Turner hits two solo home runs in the same inning in a 12-3 win over the Nationals in Washington 2024 English tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch and five others die when their luxury yacht capsizes in a storm off the coast of Palermo [1] 2024 Sydney opens a new multi-billion-dollar metro line between Chatswood and Sydenham, the city's biggest transport change since the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge [1] 2025 John Wall, NBA five-time All-Star and Washington Wizards No. 1 draft pick in 2010, announces his retirement after 11 seasons [1] Historical Events Calendar Why The King Became a Party Pooper August 17, 1661 Why The King Became a Party Pooper What Happened To America's Lost Colony? August 18, 1587 What Happened To America's Lost Colony? Diamond That Says I Love You August 19, 1477 Diamond That Says I Love You The Battle For Western Civilisation August 20, 480 AD The Battle For Western Civilisation Search the largest and most accurate independent site for today in history.