Today in history
1312 — German King Henry VII is crowned Holy Roman Emperor in Rome.
1613 — The original Globe Theatre in London burns down during the first performance of Shakespeare’s Henry VIII.
1855 — The Daily Telegraph is first published in London.1864 — Samuel Crowther is consecrated Bishop of Niger, the first black Church of England bishop.
1916 — Irish nationalist Sir Roger Casement is found guilty of treason and sentenced to death for conspiracy with Germany.
1949 — South Africa begins its apartheid program by enacting a ban against racially mixed marriages.
1967 — Jayne Mansfield, US film actress, is killed in a car crash near New Orleans.
1992 — Algerian head of state Mohammed Boudiaf is assassinated as he opens a cultural centre in the eastern Algerian town of Annaba.
1994 — Prince Charles admits on television that he committed adultery during his marriage to Princess Diana but says he has no plans for a divorce.
2000 — A first printing of the US Declaration of Independence fetches $US8.14 million in a Sotheby’s online auction, breaking the record for any sale on the internet.
2002 — A North Korean navy vessel sinks a South Korean naval patrol boat in an exchange of fire in the Yellow Sea. Four South Korean sailors are killed in the battle.
2003 — American actress Katharine Hepburn dies aged 96. She won a record four best actress Oscars during a career that spanned much of the 20th century.
2010 — Drug cartels, which fund 1/10th of Mexico’s economy, insert themselves into politics, killing the leading candidate for governor of a northern state only days before elections in 12 states.
2015 — Greece misses a key debt repayment deadline to the IMF; Australian tennis player Nick Kyrgios is one of five Aussies to snare dayone wins at Wimbledon; desperate asylum seekers in Nauru were treated like animals by some guards and formed suicide pacts, according to two social workers’ accounts.
2016 — Three men in Turkey, believed to be Islamic State militants, open fire then blow themselves up in Istanbul’s main international airport, killing 45 people and wounding more than 230 others. Today’s Birthdays: George Washington Goethals, US builder of Panama Canal (1858-1928); Antoine Marie Roger de Saintexupery, French aviator and writer (1900-1944); Oriana Fallaci, Italianborn journalist (1929-2006); Bret Mckenzie, NZ comedian and actor (1976-); Nicole Scherzinger, US singer (1978-); Christopher Egan, Australian actor (1984-).