TODAY IN HISTORY
TODAY IS WEDNESDAY, AUG. 15, the 227th day of 2018. There are 138 days left in the year. TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT IN HISTORY: On this date in 1945, in a pre-recorded radio address, Japan’s Emperor Hirohito announced that his country had accepted terms of surrender for ending World War II.
In 1483, the Sistine Chapel was consecrated by Pope Sixtus IV.In 1914, the Panama Canal officially opened as the SS Ancon crossed the justcompleted waterway between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.
In 1935, humorist Will Rogers and aviator Wiley Post were killed when their airplane crashed near Point Barrow in the Alaska Territory.
In 1947, India became independent after some 200 years of British rule.
In 1961, as workers began constructing a Berlin Wall made of concrete, East German soldier Conrad Schumann leapt to freedom over a tangle of barbed wire in a scene captured in a famous photograph.
In 1965, the Beatles played to a crowd of more than 55,000 at New York’s Shea Stadium.
In 1969, the Woodstock Music and Art Fair opened in upstate New York.
In 1974, a gunman attempted to shoot South Korean President Park Chunghee during a speech; although Park was unhurt, his wife, Yuk Young-soo, was struck and killed, along with a teenage girl. The gunman was later executed.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS: Actress Abby Dalton is 86. Actress Lori Nelson is 85. Civil rights activist Vernon Jordan and actor Jim Dale are 83. Actress Pat Priest is 82. Musician Pete York (Spencer Davis Group) is 76. Rock singer-musician Tom Johnston (The Doobie Brothers) is 70. Britain’s Princess Anne and actress Tess Harper are 68. Rock singer-musician Matt Johnson (The The) is 57. Movie director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu is 55. Actress Debra Messing is 50. Actor Anthony Anderson is 48. Actor Ben Affleck and singer Mikey Graham (Boyzone) are 46. Actress Natasha Henstridge is 44. Latin pop singer Belinda, actress Courtney Hope, rock singer Joe Jonas (The Jonas Brothers) and actor-singer Carlos PenaVega are 29. Actress Jennifer Lawrence and rap DJ Smoove da General (Cali Swag District) are 28.