marți, 14 august 2007

today's history

======Events======


* 1183 - Taira no Munemori and the Taira clan take the young Emperor Antoku and the three sacred treasures and flee to western Japan to escape pursuit by the Minamoto clan. (Traditional Japanese date: Twenty-fifth Day of the Seventh Month of the Second Year of Juei).
* 1385 - Portuguese Crisis of 1383–1385: Battle of Aljubarrota - Portuguese forces commanded by King João I and his general Nuno Álvares Pereira defeat the Castilian army of King Juan I.
* 1598 - Nine Years War: Battle of the Yellow Ford - Irish forces under Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, defeat an English expeditionary force under Henry Bagenal.
* 1791 - Ceremony at Bois Caiman, Haiti; Haitian Revolution begins.
* 1842 - Indian Wars: Second Seminole War ends, with the Seminoles forced from Florida to Oklahoma.
* 1846 - The Cape Girardeau meteorite, a 2.3 kg chondrite-type meteorite strikes near the town of Cape Girardeau in Cape Girardeau County, Missouri..
* 1880 - Cologne Cathedral, the most famous landmark in Cologne, Germany, completed.
* 1885 - Japan's first patent is issued to the inventor of a rust-proof paint.
* 1893 - France introduces motor vehicle registration.
* 1897 - The town of Anosimena is captured by French troops from Menabe defenders in Madagascar.
* 1901 - The first claimed powered flight, by Gustave Whitehead in his Number 21.
* 1908 - First beauty contest held in Folkestone, England.
* 1912 - United States Marines invade Nicaragua to support the U.S.-backed government installed there after José Santos Zelaya resigned three years earlier.
* 1921 - Tannu Tuva, later Tuvinian People's Republic is established as a completely independent country (which is supported by Russia).
* 1936 - Rainey Bethea is hanged in Owensboro, Kentucky in the last public execution in the United States. * 1941 - World War II - Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt sign the Atlantic Charter of war stating postwar aims.
* 1945 - Japan accepts the Allied terms of surrender in World War II and the Emperor records the Imperial Rescript on Surrender (August 15 in Japan standard time).
* 1947 - Pakistan gains Independence from the British Indian Empire under the administration of United Kingdom and joins the British Commonwealth.
* 1969 - United Kingdom troops deploy in Northern Ireland.
* 1980 - Lech Wałęsa leads strikes at Gdańsk, Poland shipyards.
* 1994 - Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, the terrorist known as "Carlos the Jackal", is captured.
* 2003 - Widescale power blackout in the northeast United States and Canada.

============Birthdays============

1740 - Pope Pius VII
1867 - John Galsworthy, Nobel Prize Laureate
1933 - Richard R. Ernst, Swiss chemist and Nobel Prize Laureate
1945 - Steve Martin, American comedian
1959 - Magic Johnson, American basketball player
1960 - Sarah Brightman, English soprano
1966 - Halle Berry, American actress

============ Holidays============

* Morocco - Allegiance of Oued Eddahab or Río de Oro.
* Pakistan - Independence Day (From the Indian Empire and from the British colonialist and imperialists under the foreign control of the United Kingdom, 1947).
* Paraguay - Flag Day.
* United States - National Creamsicles Day.