Today in history
Today is Wednesday, Aug. 2, the 214th day of 2017. There are 151 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History
On August 2, 1776, members of the Second Continental Congress began attaching their signatures to the Declaration of Independence.
On this date
In 216 B.C., during the Second Punic War, Carthaginian forces led by Hannibal defeated the Roman army in the Battle of Cannae.
In 1876, frontiersman “Wild Bill” Hickok was shot and killed while playing poker at a saloon in Deadwood, Dakota Territory, by Jack McCall, who was later hanged. In 1892, movie producer Jack L. Warner was born in London, Ontario, Canada.
In 1923, the 29th president of the United States, Warren G. Harding, died in San Francisco; Vice President Calvin Coolidge became president. In 1927, President Calvin Coolidge issued a written statement to reporters: “I do not choose to run for President in nineteen twenty-eight.” In 1939, Albert Einstein signed a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt urging creation of an atomic weapons research program. President Roosevelt signed the Hatch Act, which prohibited civil service employees from taking an active part in political campaigns. In 1943, during World War II, U.S. Navy boat PT-109, commanded by Lt. (jg) John F. Kennedy, sank after being rammed in the middle of the night by the Japanese destroyer Amagiri off the Solomon Islands. Two crew members were killed. In 1967, the crime drama “In the Heat of the Night,” starring Sidney Poitier and Rod Steiger, premiered in New York. In 1974, former White House counsel John W. Dean III was sentenced to one to four years in prison for obstruction of justice in the Watergate coverup. (Dean ended up serving four months.)
In 1985, 137 people were killed when Delta Air Lines Flight 191, a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar, crashed while attempting to land at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.
In 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait, seizing control of the oil-rich emirate. (The Iraqis were later driven out in Operation Desert Storm.)
In 1997, “Naked Lunch” author William S. Burroughs, the godfather of the “Beat generation,” died in Lawrence, Kansas, at age 83.
Ten years ago: Mattel apologized to customers as it recalled nearly a million Chinese-made toys from its Fisher-Price division that were found to have excessive amounts of lead in their paint. A Marine Corps squad leader was convicted at Camp Pendleton, California, of murdering an unarmed Iraqi man during a frustrated search for an insurgent. (Sgt. Lawrence G. Hutchins III was sentenced to 11 years in prison; he served more than half of his sentence before his conviction was overturned. Although convicted in a 2015 retrial, Hutchins received no additional prison time.) Two small Russian submarines completed a voyage below the North Pole where they planted the country’s flag on the Arctic Ocean floor.
Five years ago: Kofi Annan resigned as peace envoy to Syria, blaming the Syrian government’s intransigence, the growing militancy of Syrian rebels and a divided U.N. Security Council that he said failed to forcefully back his effort. Gabby Douglas became the third American in a row to win gymnastics’ biggest prize when she claimed the all-around Olympic title; Michael Phelps added to his medal collection with his first individual gold medal of the London Games in the 200-meter individual medley.