Today in history
Today is Wednesday, August 22, the 234th day of 2018. There are 131 days left in the year. Highlights in history on this date:
1350 — Philip VI of France dies and is succeeded by
John II.
1485 — England’s King Richard III is killed at the
Battle of Bosworth, ending the War of the Roses. 1567 — The Spanish Duke of Alba establishes the ‘‘Council of Blood’’ and begins a reign of terror as military governor in the Netherlands.
1582 — An English party in Scotland carries out the Ruthven Raid, capturing King James VI while he is hunting and holding him captive until June 1583.
1642 — The English Civil War begins when
King Charles I brands Parliament and its soldiers as traitors.
1654 — Jacob Barsimson, said to be the first Jewish
immigrant to America, lands in New Amsterdam.
1762 — Ann Franklin becomes the first woman editor of an American newspaper, the Mercury , in Newport, Rhode Island.
1784 — Vincent Lunardi makes England’s first hotair balloon flight, accompanied by a cat and a dog.
1787 — Inventor John Fitch demonstrates his steamboat Perseverance on the Delaware River in the United States.
1788 — The British found a settlement in Sierra
Leone, Africa, as an asylum for freed slaves.
1799 — Napoleon Bonaparte abandons the Egyptian campaign and slips past blockading British ships to return to France.
1846 — The US annexes New Mexico. 1851 — The yacht America beats 14 other boats from the Royal Yacht Squadron of Great Britain in a race around the Isle of Wight to win the £100 Cup (also known as the Hundred Guinea Cup). The crew donated the trophy to the New York Yacht Club and in 1870 it was offered as a challenge prize under the name the ‘‘America’s Cup’’.
1864 — The Geneva Convention for the protection of the wounded in times of active warfare is signed, leading to the formation of the Red Cross.
1871 — New Zealand’s first dairy factory is established on Otago Peninsula, called the Otago Peninsula Cooperative Cheese Factory Company Ltd. By the early 20th century, most factories were owned by cooperatives.
1911 — Officials in Paris announce that the Leonardo da Vinci painting the Mona Lisa was stolen from the Louvre Museum the night before. It was recovered in 1913 in Italy.
1922 — Irish politician and Sinn Fein leader Michael Collins, largely responsible for the 1921
AngloIrish treaty, is killed in an ambush.
1962 — NS Savannah, the world’s first nuclearpowered ship, completes her maiden voyage from Yorktown, Virginia, to Savannah, Georgia.
1983 — The New Zealand Party is launched by a group including property tycoon Bob Jones. Described by Labour Party leader David Lange as ‘‘a club for rich playboys’’, the libertarian party gained more than 12% of the vote at the 1984 general election without winning a seat.
1986 — The estate of Karen Silkwood is awarded $US1.3 million in a compensation claim against US nuclear energy company Kerr McGee.
1990 — Scores of angry smokers block streets near Moscow’s Red Square for hours to protest at a cigarette shortage.
1995 — Soldiers from Zaire expel 3000 Rwandan refugees and march 8000 others towards their homeland, ignoring international protests.
1998 — Angolan troops enter the war in Congo on the side of President Laurent Kabila, apparently saving the capital, Kinshasa; the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA), one of Northern Ireland’s most ruthless Republican guerrilla groups, announces a ‘‘complete ceasefire’’.
Today’s birthdays:
Samuel Pierpont Langley, US astronomer and aviation pioneer (18341906); Claude Debussy, French composer (18621918); Leni Riefenstahl, Naziera filmmaker (19022003); John Lee Hooker, US blues musician (19172001); Ray Bradbury, US sciencefiction author (19202012); Pat O’Connor, New Zealand professional wrestler (19241990); Maurice Gee, New Zealand novelist (1931); Valerie Harper, US actress (1939);
Cindy Williams, US actress (1947); David Marks, US musician (1948); Tori Amos, US musician (1963); Howie Dorough, US musician (1973); Kristen Wiig, US actress (1973); Rebecca Rolls, New Zealand cricket and football international (1975);
Dan WeekesHannah, New Zealand actor (1987); Sarah Major, New Zealand actress (1988).
Thought for today:
We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are. — Anais Nin, FrenchAmerican author (19031977).