Today in history

11 th July 2021

                            Richard Branson becomes the first civilian to be launched into space via his Virgin Galactic spacecraft.


Branson -— along with Virgin Galactic employees Beth Moses, Colin Bennett, and Sirisha Bandla and pilots Dave Mackay and Michael Masucci — boarded the SpaceShipTwo, a winged plane with a single rocket motor that the company has spent nearly two decades developing, before the crack of dawn. Attached beneath its massive, twin-fuselaged mothership, dubbed WhiteKnightTwo, the vehicle took to the skies at 8:30 am MT and climbed to about 50,000 feet in the air.
Just after 9:15 in the morning, the SpaceShipTwo detached from its mothership and dropped momentarily before its engine screamed to life and the vehicle swooped upward. On board, the passengers experienced up to three Gs of force from the burst of extreme acceleration and watched the blue sky fade into the star-speckled darkness of outer space. At the top of the flight path, more than 50 miles high, the vehicle was suspended in weightlessness for a few minutes, allowing the passengers to enjoy panoramic views of the Earth and space as SpaceShipTwo flipped onto its belly. It then deployed its feathering system, which curls the plane's wings upward, mimicking the shape of a badminton shuttlecock, to turn the spaceship rightward as it flew back into the Earth's thick atmosphere and glided back down to a runway landing.

12 th July 1962


    A new group on the pop scene are given an opportunity with their first gig ,they called themselves
    The Rolling Stones :

                   

     

The Rolling Stones Play Their First Ever Gig
On a hot summer’s night on July 12, 1962, at London’s Marquee Jazz Club, The Rolling Stones played their first-ever gig.

Published on July 12, 2021By Richard HaversRolling Stones On Ed SullivanPhoto by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
When did the Rolling Stones play their first gig? Well, the story begins in the summer of 1962. Blues Incorporated, Alexis Korner’s band had a regular Thursday night gig at the Marquee Club in London’s Oxford Street. In the first week of July, Korner was offered a spot on BBC Radio’s Jazz Club, which didn’t go down well with Harold Pendleton, the man who ran the Marquee’s. Pendleton issued a blunt ultimatum: “If you leave this Thursday to do the broadcast, I will not guarantee your gig the Thursday after.”

Korner had a plan. He asked his friends and acolytes, Mick Jagger, Ian Stewart, Keith Richards, and Brian Jones to deputize for him at the Marquee. Having secured the gig, Mick Jagger’s first-ever utterance in the press was carried by Jazz News: “I hope they don’t think we’re a Rock ‘n Roll outfit..”



There was also the small matter of what the band should call themselves. According to Dave Godin, a friend from Kent, where Mick and Keith grew up, “I was there when they decided on the name, and there is no way that it came from the Muddy Waters 78 “Rolling Stone Blues.” No one would be seen dead with 78s, we exclusively had 45s and 7″ EPs. I had the Muddy Waters “Mississippi Blues” EP on London that includes “Mannish Boy” which has the interjection ‘Ooo I’m a rollin’ stone’.” Not everyone liked the name, particularly Ian Stewart, “I said it was a terrible name. It sounded like the name of an Irish Show Band, or something that ought to be playing at the Savoy.”

Jazz News previewed the first Rolling Stones gig as such: “Mick Jagger, R&B vocalist, is taking an R&B group into the Marquee tomorrow night, while Blues Incorporated do their Jazz Club gig. Called The Rollin’ Stones. The line-up is: Mick Jagger (vocals), Keith Richards & Elmo Lewis (guitars), Dick Taylor (bass), Ian Stewart (piano), & Mick Avory (drums). A second group under Long John Baldry, will also be there.”

Mick Avory, who later joined the Kinks, didn’t attend the gig on July 12, 1962, and no one can seem to recall if there even was a drummer – it would be six months before Charlie Watts was finally persuaded to join.

According to the handwritten set list, among the numbers they performed were songs by their heroes Jimmy Reed, Elmore James, Chuck Berry, and Fats Domino like “Kansas City,” “Confessin’ The Blues,” “Bright Lights Big City,” “Down The Road A Piece,” and “Dust My Broom.” Whether the Stones actually played them we’ll never know, but it gives us a fascinating insight into what they were listening to and rehearsing.

On the 50th anniversary of the Rolling Stones’ first gig, Mick Jagger gave an interview with Rolling Stone in 2012 saying, “Still the same name. It’s only Keith and myself that are the same people, I think. I’ve tried to find out when Charlie’s first gig was, and none of us can really remember and no one really knows. But it’s an amazing achievement.”

13 th July 2016 .

      Resignation of David Cameron .
                                                 Prime Minister of the United Kingdom David Cameron resigns, and is succeeded by Theresa May.

Prime Minister David Cameron has said he is to step down from his post after the UK voted to leave the EU. Here is the statement he made outside Downing Street.

Good morning everyone, the country has just taken part in a giant democratic exercise, perhaps the biggest in our history.

Over 33 million people from England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and Gibraltar have all had their say.

We should be proud of the fact that in these islands we trust the people for these big decisions.

We not only have a parliamentary democracy, but on questions about the arrangements for how we're governed there are times when it is right to ask the people themselves and that is what we have done.

The British people have voted to leave the European Union and their will must be respected.

I want to thank everyone who took part in the campaign on my side of the argument, including all those who put aside party differences to speak in what they believe was the national interest and let me congratulate all those who took part in the Leave campaign for the spirited and passionate case that they made.

The will of the British people is an instruction that must be delivered.

It was not a decision that was taken lightly, not least because so many things were said by so many different organisations about the significance of this decision.

So there can be no doubt about the result.

Across the world people have been watching the choice that Britain has made.

I would reassure those markets and investors that Britain's economy is fundamentally strong and I would also reassure Britons living in European countries and European citizens living here there will be no immediate changes in your circumstances.

There will be no initial change in the way our people can travel, in the way our goods can move or the way our services can be sold.

We must now prepare for a negotiation with the European Union.

This will need to involve the full engagement of the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland governments to ensure that the interests of all parts of our United Kingdom are protected and advanced.

But above all this will require strong, determined and committed leadership.

I'm very proud and very honoured to have been prime minister of this country for six years.

I believe we've made great steps, with more people in work than ever before in our history, with reforms to welfare and education, increasing people's life chances, building a bigger and stronger society, keeping our promises to the poorest people in the world and enabling those who love each other to get married whatever their sexuality, but above all restoring Britain's economic strength.

And I'm grateful to everyone who's helped to make that happen.

I have also always believed that we have to confront big decisions, not duck them. That is why we delivered the first coalition government in 70 years, to bring our economy back from the brink.

It's why we delivered a fair, legal and decisive referendum in Scotland.

And it's why I made the pledge to renegotiate Britain's position in the European Union and to hold the referendum on our membership and have carried those things out.

I fought this campaign in the only way I know how, which is to say directly and passionately what I think and feel - head, heart and soul.

I held nothing back, I was absolutely clear about my belief that Britain is stronger, safer and better off inside the European Union and I made clear the referendum was about this and this alone - not the future of any single politician including myself.

But the British people have made a very clear decision to take a different path and as such I think the country requires fresh leadership to take it in this direction.

I will do everything I can as prime minister to steady the ship over the coming weeks and months but I do not think it would be right for me to try to be the captain that steers our country to its next destination.

This is not a decision I've taken lightly but I do believe it's in the national interest to have a period of stability and then the new leadership required.

There is no need for a precise timetable today but in my view we should aim to have a new prime minister in place by the start of the Conservative Party conference in October.

Delivering stability will be important and I will continue in post as prime minister with my cabinet for the next three months.

The cabinet will meet on Monday, the governor of the Bank of England is making a statement about the steps that the Bank and the Treasury are taking to reassure financial markets.

We will also continue taking forward the important legislation that we set before Parliament in the Queen's Speech.

And I have spoken to Her Majesty the Queen this morning to advise her of the steps that I am taking.

A negotiation with the European Union will need to begin under a new prime minister and I think it's right that this new prime minister takes the decision about when to trigger Article 50 and start the formal and legal process of leaving the EU.

I will attend the European Council next week to explain the decision the British people have taken and my own decision.

The British people have made a choice, that not only needs to be respected but those on the losing side of the argument - myself included - should help to make it work.

Britain is a special country - we have so many great advantages - a parliamentary democracy where we resolve great issues about our future through peaceful debate, a great trading nation with our science and arts, our engineering and our creativity, respected the world over.

And while we are not perfect I do believe we can be a model for the multi-racial, multi-faith democracy, that people can come and make a contribution and rise to the very highest that their talent allows.

Although leaving Europe was not the path I recommended, I am the first to praise our incredible strengths.

I said before that Britain can survive outside the European Union and indeed that we could find a way.

Now the decision has been made to leave, we need to find the best way and I will do everything I can to help.

I love this country and I feel honoured to have served it and I will do everything I can in future to help this great country succeed.

Thank you very much.

14 th July 1789

The storming of the Bastille :
Storming of the Bastille in Paris. This event escalates the widespread discontent into the French Revolution. Bastille Day is still celebrated annually in France .

On 14 July 1789, a state prison on the east side of Paris, known as the Bastille, was attacked by an angry and aggressive mob. The prison had become a symbol of the monarchy’s dictatorial rule, and the event became one of the defining moments in the Revolution that followed. This article reporting the events of 14 July was published in an English newspaper called The World, a few days after the event took place. A medieval fortress, the Bastille’s eight 30-metre-high towers, dominated the Parisian skyline. When the prison was attacked it actually held only seven prisoners, but the mob had not gathered for them: it had come to demand the huge ammunition stores held within the prison walls. When the prison governor refused to comply, the mob charged and, after a violent battle, eventually took hold of the building. The governor was seized and killed, his head carried round the streets on a spike. The storming of the Bastille symbolically marked the beginning of the French Revolution, in which the monarchy was overthrown and a republic set up based on the ideas of ‘Liberté, égalité, fraternité’ (the French for liberty, equality and brotherhood). In France, the ‘storming of the Bastille’ is still celebrated each year by a national holiday.

15 th July 2006

Twitter :
Twitter, later one of the largest social media platforms in the world, is launched.



A Brief History
On July 15, 2006, the social media vehicle known as Twitter was launched, and quickly became an essential part of electronic communications , world-wide. Created by Noah Glass, Biz Stone, Evan Williams and Jack Dorsey, the social networking device caught on with frightening speed, and became one of our most important and prevalent sources of information.

Digging Deeper
By 2016 there were well over 300 million users of Twitter, and on election day in America 2016 over 40 million ‘tweets’ were sent regarding election news. Williams and Glass had founded an internet search and directory site called Odeo, and with Dorsey and Stone “brainstormed” an idea to create a form of short message communication that became Twitter. Odeo was reformed into Obvious Corp. (obviously!) and the original company sold. Dorsey came up with the main idea for Twitter, and since the domain name “twitter” was already taken, the undergraduate buddies decided on “twttr,” at least until the domain name Twitter could be obtained (which it was).

Twitter was first tested as an internal messaging system for employees of Odeo, and corporate maneuvering caused Twitter to become its own spin-off company from Odeo and Obvious. Glass was fired in 2007, and unfortunately for him that is when Twitter really took off. Using 2 massive (for the time) 60 inch plasma screens displaying tweets at the South by Southwest Interactive Conference in Austin, Texas, the new social networking tool was showcased to tech savvy people and it caught on in a big way, growing by leaps and bounds ever since.

In 2007 Twitter experienced 1.6 million tweets, and by 2008 the total had grown to 400 million that year. Growth was incredible, with 65 million tweets per day in 2010, and 140 million tweets per day in 2011. During critical news events, including sporting events and elections, the number of tweets being sent is almost incomprehensible, and are brief messages of a maximum of 140 characters. Growth finally started slowing as 2015 approached and Twitter began acquiring other internet companies. In November of 2013 Twitter went public, with 70 million shares offered at $26 apiece on the New York Stock Exchange. Unlike the Facebook IPO debacle, Twitter stock reached $44.90 a share that first day!

16 th July 1661


           Europes first banknotes :
                                                The first banknotes in Europe are issued by the Swedish bank Stockholms Banco.


                     
Stockholms Banco issued the first real banknotes in Europe. They were a great success, but it all ended in a bank failure.

It was Johan Palmstruch, founder of Stockholms Banco, Sweden's first bank, who issued the banknotes. The background to this was that, in 1660, the central government had started to mint new coins of a lower weight than the older ones. This meant that many depositors wanted their old, heavier coins back, as they had a higher metal value. This led to a bank run. To counteract this, Palmstruch started to issue deposit certificates. This was a security that gave the owner the right to withdraw the deposited amount in coins.

The special thing about the deposit certificates, which were called credit notes, was that the bank was no longer dependent on having money deposited to be able to lend. Instead, the new certificates were handed out as loans from the bank. They could be used to purchase anything and so the first banknotes in Europe were invented.

The new thing about Palmstruch's banknotes was that they were not linked to any deposit. Instead, they were based on the general public's confidence that the bank would pay the value of the note in coins upon demand.

The banknotes quickly became popular as they were more convenient than the heavy and cumbersome coins made of copper. During the following years, the bank printed more and more notes. This led towards them falling in value, a phenomenon we now know as inflation. Confidence was finally lost among the general public and many people demanded that their notes be redeemed. But Stockholms Banco did not have enough coins and therefore started to demand the loans it had granted be repaid. It ended with a bank failure and many people suffered financial problems.

The Council of the Realm – the government of the time – decided in 1664 that the loans would be repaid and that the credit notes would be withdrawn. Palmstruch was ordered to appear before the Svea Court of Appeal and was sentenced to death for mismanagement of the bank in 1668. He was reprieved but remained in prison until 1670 and died the following year.

 



     One of the original banknotes.

17 th July 1938


" Wrong way" Corrigan :

Douglas Corrigan takes off from Brooklyn to fly the "wrong way" to Ireland and becomes known as "Wrong Way" Corrigan.

On July 17, 1938, Douglas Corrigan began his "wrong way" transatlantic flight from New York to Dublin instead of California.

Douglas “Wrong Way” Corrigan’s took off from an airfield in Brooklyn on July 17, 1938, with plans to land in California. Claiming he took a wrong turn, the Irish American pilot landed in Dublin, Ireland the next day instead.

It has long been claimed that Corrigan flew the Atlantic on purpose
because he had been denied permission to do so at a time when the Charles Lindbergh flight aboard the Spirit of St.Louis, of 1927, was still considered a modern miracle.

Corrigan’s plane, which he had flown in from California the previous day, was so battered it was about to be grounded. After it landed, an inspection revealed over 60 violations including leaky fuel pipes.

Somehow, after a 28-hour flight at a little over 100 miles per hour, he landed in Baldonnel Aerodrome in Ireland, having been given up for lost.

At take-off at 5:15 the previous morning, he had 320 US gallons of gasoline and 16 US gallons of oil, Corrigan headed east from the 4,200-foot runway of Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn and kept going.

Corrigan claimed to have noticed his "error" after flying for about 26 hours. He landed at Baldonnel Aerodrome, County Dublin, on July 18, after a 28-hour, 13-minute flight. His provisions had been just two chocolate bars, two boxes of fig bars, and 25 US gallons of water.

Corrigan's plane had fuel tanks mounted on the front, allowing him to see only out of the sides. He had no radio and his compass was 20 years old.

As the journalist H. R. Knickerbocker reported after inspecting the plane: “As I looked over it at the Dublin airdrome I really marveled that anyone should have been rash enough even to go in the air with it, much less try to fly the Atlantic. He built it, or rebuilt it, practically as a boy would build a scooter out of a soapbox and a pair of old roller skates. It looked it. The nose of the engine hood was a mass of patches soldered by Corrigan himself into a crazy-quilt design. The door behind which Corrigan crouched for twenty-eight hours was fastened together with a piece of baling wire. The reserve gasoline tanks put together by Corrigan, left him so little room that he had to sit hunched forward with his knees cramped, and not enough window space to see the ground when landing.”

Corrigan was of Irish descent and was thus delighted to have reached the old sod. He returned home to a hero’s welcome including a ticker-tape parade in both New York and Chicago.

18 th July 1976

Perfect 10 :

Nadia Comăneci becomes the first person in Olympic Games history to score a perfect 10 in gymnastics at the 1976 Summer Olympics.


Nadia Comaneci did not expect perfection. Apparently, nobody else did either.

There were digital scoreboards inside the gymnastics venue at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, where the numbers would pop up after each athlete completed an event. High-tech for that time, the scoreboard was programmed to light up three digits — with a decimal place affixed after the first number.

And even though a perfect score would be a 10.00, the way the scoreboards were set up meant the highest score, in theory, that they could reveal would be a 9.95.

“The International Gymnastics Federation said, ‘Don’t worry, because nobody’s going to score a 10,’” Comaneci said. “So, I guess I messed them up, too.”


Comaneci, then a 14-year-old Romanian girl with a ribbon tied in her hair, stole the show at the Montreal Games when she became the first gymnast to score a perfect 10 at an Olympics. She wound up getting a staggering seven of those scores in Montreal, on the way to winning three gold medals and five medals overall at those games.

At an Olympics where there were countless stars and breakout moments — American track star Edwin Moses beginning his reign as the world’s premier 400-meter hurdler; a stacked U.S. boxing team led by Sugar Ray Leonard, Leon Spinks and Michael Spinks dominated the ring; Caitlin Jenner, then known as Bruce Jenner, won the decathlon; and a West German fencer named Thomas Bach won a gold medal long before he would become president of the International Olympic Committee — the Romanian teen rose above all others.

“I’m not sure what was the definition of perfection and whatever that meant,” said Comaneci, who was selected in 1976 as the global female athlete of the year by The Associated Press. “I think people didn’t expect a 10 probably, or they didn’t expect history to be made, but that was not my goal because I was not aware of any of this. So, my goal was to not make a major mistake and hit the ground.”

She won golds in the all-around competition, the balance beam and the uneven bars — the discipline where the first perfect 10 was earned. Comaneci also helped Romania win a silver in the team competition and took a bronze in the floor exercise. The only event where she didn’t medal was the vault, placing fourth there, a mere 0.025 points from silver and 0.175 points from gold.

Romania's Simona Halep, the world’s No. 2-ranked women’s tennis player, was born 15 years after Comaneci’s Montreal exploits. Halep never dabbled in gymnastics but said what Comaneci did generations ago still spurs on any athlete from that southeastern European country.

“Nadia was an inspiration for all of us,” Halep said at the U.S. Open last year. “Doesn’t matter which sport we had to do at that time. And she’s still a motivation for everybody.”

Comaneci won two more golds and four more overall medals at the Moscow Olympics in 1980. In 1989, just weeks before the revolution that toppled Nicolae Ceausescu, she slipped across the border to Hungary and defected to the U.S. And in 1996, she and fellow Olympic legend Bart Conner returned to her homeland for their wedding.

About 2,000 Romanians gathered outside to watch that ceremony on a video screen. Later, they cheered when Conner, in near-perfect Romanian, asked the crowd to accept him as one of theirs.

Conner and Comaneci still live in Norman, Oklahoma, where Conner won NCAA all-around titles in 1977 and 1978 to lead the Sooners to back-to-back national championships. The couple trains young gymnasts, host competitions and offer a free three-day event called The Bart and Nadia Sports Experience to about 10,000 kids each year

“The kids get introduced to sports, little kids that don’t know yet what they want to do,” Comaneci said. “They have fun, they try all the sports ... and then they get a medal at the end. So, they get to know what sports are all about, and if they kind of fall in love with one or the other sports they sign up for them.”

Most of the kids know about Comaneci’s achievements. But to kids, 44 years ago seems like a really long time.

“Imagine an 8-year-old girl who comes with her mom and competes and she’s all excited,” Comaneci said. “I’m in an elevator with the girl. The mom is trying to tell the girl, get her attention and say, ‘It’s Nadia.’ I was in next to her. And the little girl said, ‘She’s alive?’

“Kids, they think this must’ve been 100 years ago when they see the poster with me in 1976,” she said. “It’s like history. They think that the girl did this many, many, many, many years ago.”

Yet it lives on.

19 th July 1553

The nine day Queen .
The attempt to install Lady Jane Grey as Queen of England collapses after only nine days.



Tragic Lady Jane Grey is remembered in British history as the monarch with the shortest reign… just nine days.

Why was Lady Jane Grey’s reign as Queen of England so short?

Lady Jane Grey was the eldest daughter of Henry Grey, Duke of Suffolk and she was the great-grand-daughter of Henry VII.

She was proclaimed Queen after the death of her cousin, the protestant King Edward VI, son of Henry VIII. She was actually fifth in line to the throne, but was his personal choice as she was a Protestant.



Edward’s half-sister Mary, Henry VIII’s daughter with Catherine of Aragon, was actually next in line for the throne but as a devout Catholic, was out of favour.

Edward wanted to keep England firmly Protestant and he knew that Mary would take England back into the Catholic faith.

John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, was Protector to King Edward VI. He persuaded the dying young king to will his crown to Lady Jane Grey, who by coincidence just happened to be the Duke’s daughter-in-law.

Edward died on 6th July 1553 and Lady Jane ascended to the throne with her husband Lord Guildford Dudley at her side – she was just sweet sixteen.

Lady Jane was beautiful and intelligent. She studied Latin, Greek and Hebrew and was fluent in French and Italian.



However the country rose in favour of the direct and true royal line, and the Council proclaimed Mary queen some nine days later.

Unfortunately for Lady Jane, her advisors were grossly incompetent, and her father was partly responsible for her untimely execution as he was involved in an attempted rebellion.

This was the Wyatt rebellion, named after Sir Thomas Wyatt, who was an English soldier and a so-called ‘rebel’.

In 1554 Wyatt was involved in a conspiracy against the marriage of Mary to Phillip of Spain. He raised an army of Kentish men and marched on London, but was captured and later beheaded.

After the Wyatt rebellion was quashed, Lady Jane and her husband, who were lodged in the Tower of London, were taken out and beheaded on 12th February 1554.

Guildford was executed first on Tower Hill, his body taken away by horse and cart past Lady Jane’s lodgings. She was then taken to Tower Green within the Tower, where the block was waiting for her.



She died, it is said, very bravely… on the scaffold she asked the executioner, ‘Please dispatch me quickly’.

She tied her kerchief round her eyes and felt for the block saying, ‘Where is it?’ One of the onlookers guided her to the block where she laid her head down, and stretched out her arms saying, ‘Lord, into thy hands I commit my soul.’

And so she died… she had been Queen of England for just nine days …10th to 19th July 1553.

The shortest reign of any English monarch, before or since.

20 th July 1969

     Apollo 11 , theres a man in the moon.

Apollo 11's crew successfully makes the first manned landing on the Moon in the Sea of Tranquility. Americans Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin become the first humans to walk on the Moon six and a half hours later.

At 10:56 p.m. EDT, American astronaut Neil Armstrong, 240,000 miles from Earth, speaks these words to more than a billion people listening at home: “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” Stepping off the lunar landing module Eagle, Armstrong became the first human to walk on the surface of the moon.

At 9:32 a.m. on July 16, with the world watching, Apollo 11 took off from Kennedy Space Center with astronauts Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin Jr., and Michael Collins aboard. Armstrong, a 38-year-old civilian research pilot, was the commander of the mission. After traveling 240,000 miles in 76 hours, Apollo 11 entered into a lunar orbit on July 19. The next day, at 1:46 p.m., the lunar module Eagle, manned by Armstrong and Aldrin, separated from the command module, where Collins remained. Two hours later, the Eagle began its descent to the lunar surface, and at 4:18 p.m. the craft touched down on the southwestern edge of the Sea of Tranquility. Armstrong immediately radioed to Mission Control in Houston, Texas, a famous message: “The Eagle has landed.”

At 10:39 p.m., five hours ahead of the original schedule, Armstrong opened the hatch of the lunar module. As he made his way down the lunar module’s ladder, a television camera attached to the craft recorded his progress and beamed the signal back to Earth, where hundreds of millions watched in great anticipation. At 10:56 p.m., Armstrong spoke his famous quote, which he later contended was slightly garbled by his microphone and meant to be “that’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” He then planted his left foot on the gray, powdery surface, took a cautious step forward, and humanity had walked on the moon.

“Buzz” Aldrin joined him on the moon’s surface at 11:11 p.m., and together they took photographs of the terrain, planted a U.S. flag, ran a few simple scientific tests, and spoke with President Richard M. Nixon via Houston. By 1:11 a.m. on July 21, both astronauts were back in the lunar module and the hatch was closed. The two men slept that night on the surface of the moon, and at 1:54 p.m. the Eagle began its ascent back to the command module. Among the items left on the surface of the moon was a plaque that read: “Here men from the planet Earth first set foot on the moon–July 1969 A.D–We came in peace for all mankind.”

At 5:35 p.m., Armstrong and Aldrin successfully docked and rejoined Collins, and at 12:56 a.m. on July 22 Apollo 11 began its journey home, safely splashing down in the Pacific Ocean at 12:51 p.m. on July 24.

21 st July 1983

A chilly alternative to the recent heatwave :

The world's lowest temperature in an inhabited location is recorded at Vostok Station, Antarctica at −89.2 °C (−128.6 °F).

21 JULY 1983
During the southern hemisphere winter on 21 July 1983, temperatures at Russia's Vostok research station in Antarctica plunged to -89.2°C (-128.6°F), which is 54 degrees colder than the winter average there. This is the coldest temperature ever recorded on Earth. The Vostok site in Antarctica was chosen by the Soviet Union for research with the aim of drilling deep into ancient ice. French scientists began to participate in the deep-core activities at the site.

22 nd July 1606

                    Uniting the Union :

                                              The Acts of Union 1707 are agreed upon by commissioners from the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland, which, when passed by each country's Parliament, led to the creation of the Kingdom of Great Britain.

Uniting the kingdoms of Scotland and England had been proposed for a hundred years before it actually happened in 1707.

Suspicion and mistrust between the two countries had prevented the union throughout the 17th century. The Scots feared that they would simply become another region of England, being swallowed up as had happened to Wales some four hundred years earlier. For England the fear that the Scots may take sides with France and rekindle the ‘Auld Alliance‘ was decisive. England relied heavily on Scottish soldiers and to have them turn and join ranks with the French would have been disastrous.



In the late 1690s however, thousands of ordinary Scottish folk had been tempted to invest their hard earned money in a plan to link the two great oceans of the world by establishing an overland trading route between the Pacific and Atlantic. Almost every Scot who had £5 in his or her pocket, invested in the Darien Scheme, to establish a Scottish colony in Panama.

Poorly planned, the venture ended early in 1700 with significant loss of life and financial ruin for the Kingdom of Scotland.


With many influential individuals and whole families left bankrupt by the disaster, a few financial incentives appear to have convinced some dithering Scottish MPs of the potential benefits of a union with England. In the words of Robert Burns, they (the Scottish MPs) were “bought and sold for English gold”.


In a poorly attended Scottish Parliament the MPs voted to agree the Union and on 16 January 1707 the Act of Union was signed. The Act came into effect on May 1st 1707; the Scottish Parliament and the English Parliament united to form the Parliament of Great Britain, based in the Palace of Westminster, London, the home of the English Parliament.

Scotland kept its independence with respect to its legal and religious systems, but coinage, taxation, sovereignty, trade, parliament and flag became one. The red cross of St. George combined with the blue cross of St. Andrew resulting in the ‘old’ union flag. This is popularly called the Union Jack, although strictly speaking, this only applies when it is flown on the jackstaff of a warship.

The Union flag that we recognise today did not appear until 1801, after another Act of Union, when the ‘old’ flag combined with the red cross of St. Patrick of Ireland. By 1850 approximately 40% of total world trade was conducted through and by the United Kingdom (UK), making it the most successful economic union in history. By this time Glasgow had grown from a small market town on the River Clyde into the “Second City of the British Empire”.

2007 marked the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union between England and Scotland. A commemorative two-pound coin was issued to mark the anniversary, which occurred 2 days before the Scottish Parliament general election on 3 May 2007.

23 rd July 1943

Bath chair murder :
The Rayleigh bath chair murder occurred in Rayleigh, Essex, England.




The Rayleigh bath chair murder occurred in Rayleigh, Essex, England in 1943 when Archibald Brown, aged 47 was blown apart by an explosion.

Archibald and his wife Doris Lucy Brown lived in London Hill, Rayleigh and had two sons, Eric and Collin. Due to a motorcycle accident Archibald Brown lost the use of his legs at the age of 24 and thereafter required the use of a bath chair and was cared for by three nurses.

On Friday 23 July 1943 nurse Doris Irene Mitchell took Archibald Brown out of the house. After walking for about a mile, Brown had shifted his weight apparently while feeling for a cigarette in his pocket. Mitchell, having stopped to light the cigarette returned to the back of the chair and pushed it forward. Within half a dozen paces there was a violent explosion. Mitchell suffered leg injuries and as far as she could see Brown and his bath chair had completely disappeared. The police found portions of the body at the side of the road and in nearby trees and gardens.

Enemy action was soon ruled out as the cause of the explosion. Experts found the cause to be a British Hawkins grenade – a type of anti-tank mine that is detonated when an acid-filled glass ampule is broken. The device had been placed under the bath chair’s cushion. A formal murder investigation was begun. Doris Brown was interviewed at length at Rayleigh Police Station. It emerged that although Archibald Brown had been crippled and unable to walk, his will power was undiminished: he harshly ruled his wife and elder son. Eric Brown was constantly beaten and humiliated. Doris Brown stated that her husband had increasingly appeared to take a dislike to her. Eric too, had noticed the deterioration in Archibald’s behaviour, he had taken a liking to his new nurse and their walks together.

The blame fell on Eric Brown. He had previously attended lectures on the same mine used in the murder, and, having joined the army some years previously, had access to a weapons store in Spilsby. Eventually Eric Brown gave a confession in which he blamed his actions on Archibald Brown’s abusive attitude to both him and his mother. On 21 September 1943 he was committed to trial at the Essex Assizes. Declared insane, he was eventually released in 1975.

25 th July 1909

The first channel crossing by aircraft :
Louis Blériot makes the first flight across the English Channel in a heavier-than-air machine from Calais to Dover, England, United Kingdom in 37 minutes.

July 25, 1909 – The First Airplane Flight Across the English Channel


On this day in engineering history, Louis Blériot made the first flight across the English Channel in a heavier-than-air machine, a one-seat monoplane named the Blériot XI. The 22-mile trip from Les Barraques, France to Dover, England took only 36.5 minutes, but earned the French engineer a thousand-pound prize from the London Daily Mail. "The most beautiful dream that has haunted the heart of man since Icarus", Blériot is reported to have exclaimed, "today has become reality." Icarus, the character in Greek mythology to whom Blériot referred, had fallen to a watery death when he flew too close to the sun.

Louis Blériot's cross-channel flight ended England's aerial isolation and vindicated the French inventor's airplane designs. Although Blériot had enjoyed previous successes, he had also crashed several biplanes and narrowly escaped an Icarus-like demise. The wooden aircraft that Blériot flew on July 25, 1909 looked fragile, but was in fact structurally sound. Made of sturdy oak and poplar, the Blériot XI was powered by a 3-cylinder, 25-hp Anzani engine which could move the 529-lb. monoplane at speeds approaching 65 mph. The Blériot XI also featured castering landing gear that could pivot, allowing the plane to turn into the wind while still rolling in the direction of the runway. Wing warping, a system of cables and pulleys which twisted the trailing edges of the wings in opposite directions, was used to control the plane's roll.

When morning dawned on July 25, 1909, Louis Blériot longed to see the sun. For the third day in a row, fog and foul weather cloaked the English Channel. Shortly after 4 AM, the French aviator left Les Barraques while Hubert Latham, his chief rival for the thousand-pound prize, was still asleep. As Louis Blériot piloted his wooden monoplane above the channel's choppy waters, rain showers cooled the aircraft's temperamental engine. Soon, Louis Blériot saw the outlines of the English coast. As he approached Dover, the pilot spotted a French reporter waving the tricolour. A rough landing damaged the Bleriot XI's landing gear, but Louis Blériot – unlike Icarus – walked away unscathed.

26 th July 1803

First public railway :
The Surrey Iron Railway, arguably the world's first public railway, opens in south London, United Kingdom.


It is the end of the 18th Century. The Napoleonic War is raging. French Privateers are harassing British vessels carrying supplies across the Straits of Dover.

A safer way was needed for trade between the south coast and London. Portsmouth, the most important harbour on the coast, was an obvious choice. How to transport the goods between Portsmouth and London was the problem.

___
At this time roads were incapable of carrying heavy loads. But this was the era of canal building mania. So it was proposed to build a canal from Wandsworth to Portsmouth.

___
To be effective the canal would have to draw water from the River Wandle. The R. Wandle was at this time the source of power for many mills. In the ten miles covered by the canal there were 38 mills employing 1700 people. To reduce its flow would interrupt these industries. The mill owners, not unsurprisingly, would not agree to the proposal.

___
The idea of a railway was mooted. There were already small railways attached to specific industries, such as mines or mills but this railway would be a public railway designed to offer "a cheap and easy Communication of Coals, Corn and all Goods, Wares and Merchandise to and from the Metropolis and other Places"

___
The first stage was to be from Wandsworth to Croydon following the route of the River Wandle. William Jessop, the canal engineer, was asked to survey the route.

___
The S.I.R. would in fact be a plate-way, the track consisting of cast-iron angle-plates to guide the wheels of the horsedrawn waggons.

___
The railway sponsors gathered at The Spread Eagle on June 4th 1801 to appoint officers of the Company. William Jessop was to be the engineer .

___
The S.I.R would be authorised by the first Railway Act to pass through Parliament, this paved the way for all subsequent railway Bills.

___
As the the Act passed through the Lords a clause was added preventing the branch line to the calico printing works belonging to Richard Howard being extended. The reason for this is unknown, but curious, as R. Howard was one of the local shareholders.

___
The Act passed in May 1801 allowed a railway "from a place called Ram Field in the parish . of Wandsworth to or near a place called Pitlake Meadow in a town called Croydon"

___
The Surrey Iron Railway was formally opened on the 26th of July 1803, thus becoming the world's first public railway.

___
The European Magazine and London Review reported the event.

"The Iron Railway from Wandsworth to Croydon was opened to the public for the conveyance of goods. The Committee went up in waggons drawn by one horse, and, to show how motion is facilitated by the ingenious yet simple contrivance, a gentleman with his companion drove up the railway in a machine of his own invention, without horses, at a rate of fifteen miles per hour. " What this machine was, nobody knows.

___
But in 1805 other events changed the need for the railway. Nelson defeated Napoleon's navy at the battle of Trafalgar, thus removing the threat to merchant shipping in the channel. So although the line to Merstham continued to be used for the next forty years the line to Portsmouth was never built.

___
Application was made to extend the line to Reigate, Merstham and Godstone. Only the section to Merstham was built, opening in 1805 .

___
The railway never prospered financially. The company rarely paid a dividend, none after 1825 and the company was eventually wound up in 1846.

___
Death on the railway
The speed of the trains was hardly more than walking pace, yet three fatalities are recorded. In 1807 a Mr Thomas Strattin was run over by a waggon. Two small boys were also run over by wagons, one in 1808 and one in 1810 .

_
Full Circle
The Surrey Iron Railway was the first transport project to come under the Parliamentary Bill procedure; the last one was the Croydon Tramlink Bill passed on 21st July 1994.

___
Progress!
The S.I.R was designed to carry goods. The first railway to carry passengers was the Mumbles Railway opened in 1807. Like the S.I.R. the carriages were horse drawn. Later it changed to steam power and eventually electricity.

___
Nothing New Under The Sun!
The company provided only the track; users provided their own horses and waggons

27 th July 1940

Wots up doc :


The animated short A Wild Hare is released, introducing the character of Bugs Bunny.



According to his 1990 “biography”, Bugs Bunny was born in Brooklyn New York on July 27, 1940, in a warren under Ebbets Field, home of the Brooklyn Dodgers. A Utah celery grower once offered a lifetime supply of their product to everyone at the studio, if they switched Bugs over to a celery diet. But carrots it was. For fifty years, production had to stop as Mel Blanc, the real-life voice of Bugs Bunny, stopped to spit out the raw carrot he ate to make the sound of his character eating a carrot.

Bugs evolution“A Wild Hare”, directed by Tex Avery and released on this day in 1940, was the first recognizable Bugs Bunny cartoon. For the first time Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny are cast as hunter and tormentor, the first time Mel Blanc used that trademark Flatbush accent, and the first in which Bugs uses his catchphrase, “Ehhh, What’s up, Doc?” A Wild Hare was a huge success in theaters, receiving an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Short Film and ensuring Bugs Bunny’s future as a stock character.

28 th July 2009

   Kennewick man :

                        – The remains of a prehistoric man are discovered near Kennewick, Washington. Such remains will be known as the Kennewick Man.

                       

Who is “The Ancient One,” also known as “Kennewick Man”?

On July 28, 1996, two men at Columbia Park in Kennewick, Washington, accidentally found part of a human skull on the bottom of the Columbia River, about ten feet from shore. Later searches revealed a nearly complete, ancient skeleton, now known as “The Ancient One” or “Kennewick Man.”

Public interest, debate, and controversy began when independent archaeologist Dr. James Chatters, working on contract with the Benton County coroner, thought that the bones might not be Native American. He described them as “Caucasoid” and sent a piece of bone to a laboratory to be dated. The results indicated an age older than 9,000 years, making The Ancient One among the oldest and most complete skeletons found in North America. Subsequent research on the bones indicated that the skeleton is between 8,400–8,690 years old.

Shortly after the remains were discovered, a group of scholars sued the federal government—representing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which manages the land where the remains were found—to prevent the remains from being returned to the tribes under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA).

NAGPRA, passed in 1990, provides legal protections for Native American human remains, including their return to tribal communities if the tribes can prove they are related to the remains. The scientists argued that the remains were not proven to be related to present-day tribes, therefore they should not be subject to NAGPRA, and should be available to the scientific community for study. Several Washington and Oregon tribes joined the Federal Government in defending the suit.

As of April 19, 2004, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld an earlier decision by U.S. District Court Judge Jelderks that the remains could not be defined as “Native American” under the NAGPRA law. Therefore, The Ancient One remained under the control of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and scientific study by the plaintiffs was allowed to take place.

Statement on the repatriation of The Ancient One.

On Friday, February 17, 2017, the remains of The Ancient One, otherwise known as Kennewick Man, were returned to the tribes who claim him as their ancestor.

29 th July 1588

The Spanish armada :
Anglo-Spanish War: Battle of Gravelines: English naval forces under the command of Lord Charles Howard and Sir Francis Drake defeat the Spanish Armada off the coast of Gravelines, France.

When Queen Mary I died, and with her England's brief and bloody restoration of Catholicism, she was replaced with Elizabeth I, who reimposed Protestantism.

But Philip II of Spain, Mary's widower, didn't take too kindly to this outrageous heresy. So he built a vast fleet of ships, and assembled an army of 30,000 men in the Netherlands. The two would join up and after a swift and efficient invasion, England would be restored to the Catholic fold.

Pope Sixtus V, having assigned the plan the status of a Holy Crusade, blessed the Grande y Felicsima Armada. And on 28 April 1588, with 130 ships under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia carrying 8,000 sailors and 18,000 soldiers, the Spanish Armada set sail from Lisbon.

After a few delays for bad weather, they were sighted off Cornwall on 19 July, and soon after off Plymouth, where Sir Francis Drake was almost certainly not playing bowls.

The English fleet outnumbered them with smaller, nimbler ships, but the Armada had considerably more firepower. And the strict crescent formation they kept made inflicting damage on them very difficult. So the two fleets danced around each other, skirmishing up the English Channel until the Spanish anchored at Gravelines, now home to a French nuclear power station, but then part of the Spanish Netherlands.

On 28 July, the battle began in earnest. The English sent fireships – old ships loaded with pretty much anything that would burn – among the Spanish. The Armada broke formation, and was now vulnerable. And on 29 July, the English attacked in the Battle of Gravelines.

English ships and an unfavourable wind made escape back down the English Channel impossible, so the Armada fled northwards and attempted to return round the tip of Scotland and back down the west coast of Ireland. But again the weather intervened, with storms dashing many ships on the rocky coasts. Less than half the ships that set out returned safely.

The victory was a huge boon for Elizabeth, England and the Protestant faith, and dealt a massive blow to Spain's dreams of world domination.

30 th July 2006


The last top of the pops:
The world's longest running music show Top of the Pops is broadcast for the last time on BBC Two. The show had aired for 42 years.


Top of the Pops
On 26th July 2006, the final edition of Top of the Pops was recorded at BBC Television Centre in London. Just under 200 members of the public were in the audience for the show, which was co-hosted by veteran disc jockey Sir Jimmy Savile – its very first presenter. Classic performances from the Spice Girls, Wham, Madonna Beyonce and Robbie Williams featured in the show alongside The Rolling Stones who were the very first band to appear on Top of the Pops on New Year’s Day in 1964, televised from the BBC studios in Manchester in the North of England.

The end of Top Of The Pops! How could they?

Top Of The Pops crept onto our TV screens on New Year’s Day 1964, Those early years brought all the rising stars into our living rooms: The Beatles, The Stones, The Kinks, The Who, The Troggs, and any act from the other side of the pond would always end up on TOTP. The Supremes, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, The Four Tops – they all were featured.

Initially, acts performing on the show mimed to their latest record, but in July 1966, just after the show had been moved to London from Manchester, and after discussions with the Musicians’ Union, miming was banned. After a few weeks during which some bands’ attempts to play as well as on their records were somewhat lacking, a compromise was reached whereby a specially recorded backing track was permitted — as long as all the musicians on the track were present in the studio. The TOTP Orchestra, led by Johnny Pearson, augmented the tracks when necessary. This arrangement continued until 1980.

The show was originally intended for a short run, but ran for over 42 years; during its heyday in the 1970s, it attracted over 15 million viewers each week.

Sadly, due to the BBC’s wiping old pop music programmes to save money on videotape, out of the first 500 episodes (1964–73) only about 20 complete recordings remain in the BBC archives.

The programme gave us some memorable moments:

When All About Eve performed a ‘live’ dubbed version of ‘Martha’s Harbour’ in 1988, owing to a studio technical error the taped vocals were broadcast without the band being able to hear them, resulting in the TV audience hearing the recorded version of the song, while the band members sat motionless on screen waiting for their cue to begin.

While performing their 1982 hit ‘Jackie Wilson Said (I’m in Heaven When You Smile)’, the band Dexys Midnight Runners were seen performing in front of a projection of the darts player Jocky Wilson instead of soul singer Jackie Wilson. Opinions differ as to whether this was deliberate or accidental.

One of my favourites was when Rod Stewart and The Faces appeared playing ‘Maggie May’. They were joined by their staunch supporter DJ John Peel – miming the mandolin part that was played by Lindisfarne’s Ray Jackson on the record. Near the end of the song, Rod and the Faces begin to kick around a football – despite the fact that the music can be still heard playing in the background.

But never mind the artists, here come Pan’s People! The only reason the majority of the UK male population tuned into the show every Thursday night wasn’t to see the latest poptastic tune – it was to drool over the girl dancers in the skimpiest of outfits. In an era before pop videos, they danced to songs whose original artists were not available to perform them live. The girls were gorgeous, with nicknames like “Babs”, “Flick” and “Dee Dee”. Whoever ‘Pan’ was didn’t matter, (who was Pan?). All that mattered was seeing those six hippy chicks doing the craziest formation dances known to man. After Pan’s People TOTP gave us more dancing girls: Ruby Flipper, Legs & Co. and Zoo, and they were all good. But no-one could replace Pan’s People.

Some acts would send up the whole scenario – The Stranglers drummer played his kit facing the wrong way and when Oasis mimed to their hit ‘Whatever’ in 1994, one of the cello players from the symphony orchestra was replaced by rhythm guitarist Bonehead, who clearly had no idea how the instrument should be played.

On Nirvana’s only performance on the show, Kurt Cobain “played” his guitar with his fingers inches away from the frets while drummer Dave Grohl danced around for most of the performance.

The last show was broadcast on 30th July 2006, and it didn’t go out with a bang, more of a sad whimper. Nobody cared about TOTP anymore, nobody really cared about the charts anymore.

31 st July 1971

Taxi on the moon :
Apollo program: the Apollo 15 astronauts become the first to ride in a lunar rover.


On July 31, 1971, U.S. Astronauts David Scott and James Irwin became the first humans to drive on the moon.

Over a decade before the moon landing, scientists speculated about the possibility of traveling the lunar surface. As early as 1952, Wernher von Braun wrote published a series of articles titled “Man Will Conquer Space Soon!” which discussed the logistics of a six-week stay on the moon. By the mid 1960s, von Braun, then director of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, revealed that research had already begun for lunar vehicles.


But the drive to keep costs down meant that no lunar vehicles were ready by the time we landed the first men on the moon in 1969. However, following that success, funding was granted for the creation of lunar rovers. They were developed in just 17 months and cost $38 million (for four rovers).


The result was like something out of the future. Made out of a variety of lightweight alloys, the 463-pound rovers could carry up 1,080 pounds. They were folded so they could fit in the cargo bay and locked into place as they were removed and opened up. The rovers could reach a top speed of eight miles per hour. (Though Apollo 17 astronaut Eugene Cernan set the lunar land-speed record at 11.2 miles per hour in 1972.)

Between July 31 and August 2, the Apollo 15 crew traveled 15.7 miles on the moon’s surface (more than the 4.2 miles covered by all previous expeditions on foot). They also collected about 170 pounds of lunar material to bring back to earth for examination.



While the mission was a success, it came under scrutiny. The astronauts had brought postage stamps in their space suits without permission, and planned to sell them when they returned to earth.

Rovers were used again for the Apollo 16 and 17 missions, which covered another 40 miles of the moon’s surface. One astronaut from the Apollo 17 mission stated “the Lunar Rover proved to be the reliable, safe and flexible lunar exploration vehicle we expected it to be. Without it, the major scientific discoveries of Apollo 15, 16, and 17 would not have been possible; and our current understanding of lunar evolution would not have been possible.”

1 st August 1714

                         By George !, he's got it :

                                                             George, Elector of Hanover, becomes King George I of Great Britain, marking the beginning of the Georgian era of British history.

                            George was elector of Hanover and, from 1714, the first Hanoverian king of Great Britain.

George was born on 28 May 1660 in Hanover, Germany, the eldest son of the Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg. In 1682, George married his cousin Sophia and they had two children. A decade later, he divorced her for alleged infidelity and imprisoned her in a castle until her death in 1726.

In 1701, under the Act of Settlement, George's mother Sophia was nominated heiress to the English throne if the reigning monarch William III and his heir Anne died without issue. The Act sought to guarantee a Protestant succession and George's mother was the closest Protestant relative, although there were at least 50 Catholic relatives whose claims were stronger. The Electress Sophia and Anne died in quick succession and George became king in August 1714.

The following year George was faced with a rebellion by the Jacobites, supporters of the Catholic James Stuart, who had a strong claim to the throne. This was concentrated mainly in Scotland, and was suppressed by the end of the year. Another smaller rebellion in 1719 was not a serious threat.

With some Tories sympathetic to the Jacobites, George turned to the Whigs to form a government, and they were to dominate politics for the next generation. Opposition to the king gathered around George's only son, the prince of Wales, making their already poor relationship even worse.

George was active in British foreign policy in the early years of his reign. His shrewd diplomatic judgment enabled him to help forge an anti-Spanish alliance with France in 1717 - 1718.

In 1720 the South Sea Company, with heavy government, royal and aristocratic investment, collapsed. The resulting economic crisis made the king and his ministers extremely unpopular. Robert Walpole was left as the most important figure in the administration and in April 1721 was appointed first lord of the Treasury and in effect, 'prime minister'. His ascendancy coincided with the decline of the political power of the monarchy and George became less and less involved in government.

George remained unpopular in England throughout his life, partly because of his inability to speak English but also because of the perceived greed of his mistresses and rumours concerning his treatment of his wife.

George died on 11 June 1727 during a visit to Hanover and was succeeded by his son.

2 nd August 1973
   Summerlands Isle Of Man disaster:

                            A flash fire kills 51 people at the Summerland amusement centre at Douglas, Isle of Man.


                      Summerland Fire Disaster


Douglas, Isle of Man The 2nd of August 1973 AD

Faced with the loss of trade to sunnier regions of the world, Douglas on the Isle of Man responded by building a huge climate-controlled leisure complex called Summerland, completed in 1971. The building occupied three-and-a-half acres and was seven storeys high, using new plastic materials for soundproofing and to maximise natural light. Summerland had bars, restaurants, artificial sun, games and amusements, a disco and even Turkish baths. What it did not have was adequate protection against fire.
At about 19:00 on August 2 1973 three boys were having an illicit cigarette near a dismantled kiosk. Their activity started a small fire in the kiosk materials which at around 19.40 spread to the wall: sound insulation in the wall rapidly caught fire; other plastic materials went up as the flames spread. As all too often seems the case in such stories, fire-doors were locked, forcing people , there were about 3000 in the complex at the time - to funnel into limited exits. Some died in the crush; others were caught by what amounted to a flash-fire, the open design putting few barriers in the path of the inferno. No sprinkler system came to the rescue. Neither apparently was the warning system fit for purpose , the fire brigade learned of the blaze between 20 and 30 minutes after it had started, either via a taxi company or a ship at sea depending on which source is given credence.
The final death toll in the fire is thought to have been between 50 and 53 , such was the intensity of the flames that it was impossible to determine precisely. Somewhat typically of such disasters the subsequent public enquiry decided the deaths were the result of misadventure.

3 rd August 1946

   Worlds first theme park :
                                       Santa Claus Land, the world's first themed amusement park, opens in Santa Claus, Indiana, United States.
                         
                 Santa Claus Land, the first theme park, opened 76 years ago


                   In 1941, Louis Koch, a retired man living in Evansville, Indiana, took a road trip 50 miles east to the small town of Santa Claus. Having fathered nine children, Koch was disappointed to discover that the tiny enclave offered Santa Claus in name only. There was no Santa Claus, the man, to see there. What would kids think if they traveled there in hunt of the jolly fat man?

Koch dreamt up a place where people could visit Santa Claus at any time of the year. Indiana only had one amusement park at the time, Indiana Beach, up the road a bit in Monticello. Thus, Santa Claus Land was born. The park opened its gates on August 3, 1946. It was the world's first amusement park to have an overriding theme.

    Visitors  would not find roller coasters on day one. Instead, there was a House of Dolls, a choo choo, a restaurant and Santa Claus, of course. The first ride constructed was the Santa Claus Land Railroad, a one-eighth-scale train modeled after a Baltimore and Ohio locomotive. Eventually, a paddock for deer and peacocks, as well as a Jeep-go-round, were added. The House of Dolls was home to over 2,000 dolls, curated by Koch's sister, Helen Robb. Admission was free until 1955. Over the years, the park added the Willie Bartley Water Ski Thrill Show, the Santa Claus Choir and more reindeer-themed rides.

Eventually, the park branched out to include other holidays — Halloween, Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July. Since 1984, the amusement park has gone by the name of Holiday World. The train was eventually retired in 2012.

4 th August 1693

Cheers Dom :
Date traditionally ascribed to Dom Perignon's invention of champagne; it is not clear whether he actually invented champagne, however he has been credited as an innovator who developed the techniques used to perfect sparkling wine.

Aug. 4, 1693: Dom Pérignon 'Drinks the Stars'

1693: Champagne is said to have been invented on this day by Dom Pierre Pérignon, a French monk. It almost certainly isn’t true. Because Dom Pérignon lived at the Benedictine abbey in Hautvillers at the time of his “invention,” the village in France’s Champagne region, not far from Èpernay, is generally regarded as the birthplace […]


But like many historical claims, the night they invented champagne appears more fanciful than fact. Sparkling wine certainly existed before Dom Pérignon arrived on the scene, although it would be unrecognizable today as champagne. But whether he invented the champagne method single-handedly is doubtful.

This much is true, though: He made an enormous contribution by developing the technique that finally produced a successful white wine from red wine grapes, something vintners had been trying to accomplish for years. That was a major step toward the development of modern champagne, probably the major step.

Even his famous quote, "Come quickly, I am drinking the stars," appears to be apocryphal. The evocative declaration is plastered on a champagne ad dating from the 1880s, but is hard to trace back any further, certainly not to the 17th century.

In any case, Dom Pérignon spent a lot of time trying to get the bubbles out of his sparkling wine, primarily to mitigate the effects of refermentation, a major problem for winemakers of the time. Generations of bon vivants, from Madame Pompadour and Napoleon to Dorothy Parker and Noël Coward, were no doubt grateful that he failed.

What is fair to say is that Dom Pérignon established the principles of modern champagne making that are still in use today.

Vineyards have existed in the Champagne region since Roman times. The name, in fact, comes from the Latin campania, which refers to the province's physical resemblance to Campania, south of Rome.

By the time Dom Pérignon arrived at the abbey in 1668 to serve as cellar master, Champagne was already a major wine-producing region. In fact, it was locked in a bitter rivalry for viticultural primacy with its southern neighbor, Burgundy.

Champagne aside, Dom Pérignon proved a very able cellar master. Under his stewardship, the abbey more than doubled the size of its vineyards, earning him a burial, following his death in 1715, in a section of the abbey church usually reserved for abbots.

5 th August 1962

Marilyn :
American actress Marilyn Monroe is found dead at her home from a drug overdose.




On August 5, 1962, movie actress Marilyn Monroe is found dead in her home in Los Angeles. She was discovered lying nude on her bed, face down, with a telephone in one hand. Empty bottles of pills, prescribed to treat her depression, were littered around the room. After a brief investigation, Los Angeles police concluded that her death was “caused by a self-administered overdose of sedative drugs and that the mode of death is probable suicide.”


Marilyn Monroe was born Norma Jeane Mortenson in Los Angeles on June 1, 1926. Her mother was emotionally unstable and frequently confined to an asylum, so Norma Jeane was reared by a succession of foster parents and in an orphanage. At the age of 16, she married a fellow worker in an aircraft factory, but they divorced a few years later. She took up modeling in 1944 and in 1946 signed a short-term contract with 20th Century Fox, taking as her screen name Marilyn Monroe. She had a few bit parts and then returned to modeling, famously posing nude for a calendar in 1949.

She began to attract attention as an actress in 1950 after appearing in minor roles in the The Asphalt Jungle and All About Eve. Although she was onscreen only briefly playing a mistress in both films, audiences took note of the blonde bombshell, and she won a new contract from Fox. Her acting career took off in the early 1950s with performances in Love Nest (1951), Monkey Business (1952), and Niagara (1953). Celebrated for her voluptuousness and wide-eyed charm, she won international fame for her sex-symbol roles in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), How to Marry a Millionaire (1953) and There’s No Business Like Show Business (1954). The Seven-Year Itch (1955) showcased her comedic talents and features the classic scene where she stands over a subway grating and has her white skirt billowed up by the wind from a passing train. In 1954, she married baseball great Joe DiMaggio, attracting further publicity, but they divorced eight months later.


In 1955, she studied with Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio in New York City and subsequently gave a strong performance as a hapless entertainer in Bus Stop (1956). In 1956, she married playwright Arthur Miller. She made The Prince and the Showgirl–a critical and commercial failure–with Laurence Olivier in 1957 but in 1959 gave an acclaimed performance in the hit comedy Some Like It Hot. Her last role, in The Misfits (1961), was directed by John Huston and written by Miller, whom she divorced just one week before the film’s opening.


By 1961, Monroe, beset by depression, was under the constant care of a psychiatrist. Increasingly erratic in the last months of her life, she lived as a virtual recluse in her Brentwood, Los Angeles, home. After midnight on August 5, 1962, her maid, Eunice Murray, noticed Monroe’s bedroom light on. When Murray found the door locked and Marilyn unresponsive to her calls, she called Monroe’s psychiatrist, Dr. Ralph Greenson, who gained access to the room by breaking a window. Entering, he found Marilyn dead, and the police were called sometime after. An autopsy found a fatal amount of sedatives in her system, and her death was ruled probable suicide.


In recent decades, there have been a number of conspiracy theories about her death, most of which contend that she was murdered by John and/or Robert Kennedy, with whom she allegedly had love affairs. These theories claim that the Kennedys killed her (or had her killed) because they feared she would make public their love affairs and other government secrets she was gathering. On August 4, 1962, Robert Kennedy, then attorney general in his older brother’s cabinet, was in fact in Los Angeles. Two decades after the fact, Monroe’s housekeeper, Eunice Murray, announced for the first time that the attorney general had visited Marilyn on the night of her death and quarreled with her, but the reliability of these and other statements made by Murray are questionable.

Decades after her death, Marilyn Monroe remains a major cultural icon.