Today in history
Today is Tuesday, July 31, the 212th day of 2018. There are 153 days left in the year. Highlights in history on this date:
1830 —The Rev William Yate arrives in the Bay of Islands with the country’s first handprinting press. By the end of the year a Maori catechism entitled Ko te Katikihama III will become the first printed publication in New Zealand.
1844 — At Port Chalmers, the New Zealand Company completes the purchase of the Otago Block from Ngai Tahu.
1870 — The jail at Clyde is broken into and robbed of all the escort gold and money for the month.
1875 — The Rev Patrick Francis Healy, a priest, becomes president of Georgetown University in the United States, making him the first black person to preside over a predominantly white university.
1910 — Dr Hawley Crippen and his mistress, Ethel Le Neve, are arrested on board the liner SS Montrose as it enters the St Lawrence
River, Canada.
1912 — The world’s first film censorship law is passed in the United States, preventing the interstate transportation of films showing prize fights.
1913 — New Zealand’s first ski club, the Ruapehu
Ski Club, is established.
1928 — MGM’s Leo the Lion roars for the first time, before MGM’s first talking motion picture, White Shadows in the South Seas.
1947 — In a move to give the New Zealand dairy industry and Government shared responsibility in export marketing, the Dairy Products Marketing Commission Act passes into law; in Dunedin, the Kaikorai cable tram service ends, with its last run up the Stuart St line at 11.10pm. It is replaced by diesel buses.
1954 — Mt Godwin Austen (K2) in the Himalayas is first climbed, by an Italian expedition led by Ardito Desio.
1956 — England spin bowler Jim Laker takes all 10 Australian wickets for 53 runs in the second innings of a cricket test at Old Trafford, after a first innings haul of 9/37.
1960 — The Malayan emergency officially ends, by which time 15 New Zealand servicemen had lost their lives, only three in active combat.
1962 — Television transmission begins in Dunedin, with the introduction of the regional channel DNTV2.
1964 — The US Ranger 7 spacecraft transmits to
Earth the first closeup pictures of the moon. 1965 — After finishing second in 1964, Kiri Te Kanawa wins the prestigious Mobil Song Quest final held in the Dunedin Town Hall.
1975 — The Irish pop group the Miami Showband is ambushed and murdered by Protestant gunmen near Newry in Northern Ireland.
1976 — John Walker becomes the third New Zealander to win an Olympic 1500m race, at the Montreal Olympic Games.
1998 — South Africa ends the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s public exploration of apartheid’s horrors.
2004 — A renovator and former shearer from Gisborne, Gary Lewis, adds some Maori lineage to the British Royal Family when he marries Lady Davina Windsor, at the time 22nd in line to the throne.
2007 — The deployment of British troops to support Northern Ireland police, codenamed Operation Banner, officially ends after 38 years.
Today’s birthdays
William Calder, New Zealandborn engineer (18601928);
William James Hardham, New
Zealand recipient of the Victoria Cross
(18761928); Thomas (George) Pitt CholmondeleyTapper, New Zealand auto racing driver (19102001);
Verdun Scott, New Zealand cricket and rugby league international (19161980); Derek Harland Ward, New Zealand flying ace WW2 (19171942); France Nuyen, Frenchborn actress (1939); Tony Steel, All Black and New Zealand politician (1941); Susan Flannery, US actress (1943); Geraldine Chaplin, US actress (1944); Russell Morris, Australian singer (1948); Brian Turner, New Zealand football international (1949); Ruth Aitken, New Zealand netball representative and coach (1956); Bill Berry, US musician with REM (1958);
Wesley Snipes, US actor (1962); J.K. Rowling, British author (1965); Dean Cain, US actor (1966);
Sam Hammington, New Zealand actor (1977);
Robert Telfer, US actor (1977); David Hill, All Black (1978); Mils Muliaina, All Black (1980);
Paul Whatuira, New Zealand rugby league representative (1981); Alex Glenn, New Zealand rugby league representative (1988).
Thought for today
Equal opportunity means everyone will have a fair chance at being incompetent. — Laurence J. Peter, US writer (191990).