Today in history
On August 4, 1977, President Jimmy Carter signed a measure establishing the Department of Energy.
In 1790, the U.S. Coast Guard had its beginnings as President George Washington signed a measure authorizing a group of revenue cutters to enforce tariff and trade laws and prevent smuggling.
In 1792, English romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley was born at Field Place near Horsham, England.
In 1830, plans for the city of Chicago were laid out.
In 1914, Britain declared war on Germany for invading Belgium; the United States proclaimed its neutrality in the mushrooming world conflict.
In 1936, Jesse Owens of the United States won the second of his four gold medals at the Berlin Olympics as he prevailed in the long jump over German Luz Long, who was the first to congratulate him.
In 1944, 15-year-old diarist Anne Frank was arrested with her sister, parents and four others by the Gestapo after hiding for two years inside a building in Amsterdam. (Anne and her sister, Margot, died at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.)
In 1964, the bodies of missing civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James Chaney were found buried in an earthen dam in Mississippi.
In 1975, the Swedish pop group ABBA began recording their hit single “Dancing Queen” at Glen Studio outside Stockholm (it was released a year later).
In 1987, the Federal Communications Commission voted 4-0 to abolish the Fairness Doctrine, which required radio and television stations to present balanced coverage of controversial issues.
In 1993, a federal judge sentenced Los Angeles police officers Stacey Koon and Laurence Powell to 2 1/2 years in prison for violating Rodney King’s civil rights.
In 1997, Teamsters went on a 15-day strike against United Parcel Service after talks broke down with the nation’s largest package delivery service. Jeanne Calment, at age 122 the world’s oldest person, died at a retirement home in Arles, France.
In 2004, former teacher Mary Kay Letourneau, convicted of having sex with a sixthgrade pupil, was released from a Washington state prison after 7 1/2 years behind bars.
Ten years ago: North Korean leader Kim Jong Il pardoned American journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee for entering the country illegally and ordered their release during a surprise visit by former U.S. President Bill Clinton. Taliban militants unleashed a wave of rockets at Kabul’s international airport and government buildings less than three weeks before Afghanistan’s presidential election. A gunman opened fire in a health club in Bridgeville, Pennsylvania, killing three women before killing himself.
Five years ago: On the first day of a U.S.-Africa summit in Washington, President Barack Obama announced $33 billion in commitments aimed at shifting U.S. ties with Africa beyond humanitarian aid and toward more equal economic partnerships. Israel and Hamas accepted an Egyptian cease-fire proposal meant to halt a bruising monthlong war that had claimed nearly 2,000 lives. James Brady, 73, the affable, witty press secretary who had survived a devastating head wound in the 1981 assassination attempt against President Ronald Reagan and undertook a personal campaign for gun control, died in Alexandria, Virginia.
One year ago: A utility worker was killed in a vehicle-related accident near a Northern California wildfire, becoming the seventh person to die amid the immense blaze that had been burning for two weeks near Redding. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro dodged what officials described as an assassination attempt when drones armed with explosives detonated as he delivered a speech to hundreds of soldiers.