NOW & THEN
11 JULY
1274: Robert the Bruce was born at Turnberry Castle.
1370: Marjory Stewart, the daughter of King Robert II, married John Dunbar, the first Earl of Moray, against her father’s consent.
1533: Pope Clement VII excommunicated King Henry VIII.
1690: William III defeated the deposed James II at the Battle of the Boyne.
1739: Pluto moved from being the ninth to the eight most distant planet from the sun.
1750: Halifax in Nova Scotia was almost totally destroyed by fire.
1776: Captain Cook sailed from Portsmouth in the Resolution, accompanied by the Discovery, on his third and last expedition.
1818: John Keats visited the first home of Robert Burns in Alloway and wrote his sonnet Written In The Cottage Where Burns Was Born.
1859: The chime of Big Ben in the clock tower of the Houses of Parliament was heard for the first time.
1897: Solomon Andree left Spitsbergen in a balloon for the North Pole.
1902: British prime minister Lord Salisbury resigned.
1924: Scottish athlete Eric Liddell won the Olympic 400 metres sprint in Paris.
1950: Puppets Andy Pandy, Teddy and Looby Loo first appeared on BBC television. The episodes were repeated for more than 25 years.
1962: The first transatlantic TV transmission took place via the satellite Telstar I.
1968: Colin Cowdrey became the first cricketer to play in 100 Test matches.
1969: David Bowie released his single Space Oddity and the Rolling Stones released Honky Tonk Women.
1975: China’s great terracotta army was uncovered near the ancient capital of Xian. More than 6,000 life-sized warriors were made in about 206 BC to guard the tomb of the first emperor.
1983: 19-year-old Lorraine Elizabeth Downes of New Zealand was crowned Miss Universe.
1990: Hundreds of thousands of miners in Ukraine held a oneday strike to protest against the policies of the Soviet government.
1994: A report said that women in Glasgow have the world’s highest rate of heart disease.
1995: Actor Hugh Grant was fined £750 by a Los Angeles court and put on probation for two years when he admitted lewd conduct with a prostitute.
1995: More than 8,000 Bosnian men and children (all Bosniaks) were killed by Serbian troops commanded by Ratko Mladic in Potocari near Srebrenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
2007: Four suicide bomber refugees found guilty of plotting to detonate explosions on three Tube trains and a bus in London in 2005 were jailed for life and ordered to serve a minimum of 40 years. All the bombs failed to go off.
2001: Neptune completed its first orbit since its discovery in 1846.
2010: Spain beat Netherlands 1-0 in South Africa to win the World Cup for the first time.
BIRTHDAYS
Giorgio Armani, fashion designer, 86; Craig Charles, comedian, 56; Lil’ Kim, rapper, 46; Mark Lester, actor and singer, 62; Lord Levy, 76; Dean Richards, rugby player and coach, 57; Richie Sambora, rock guitarist (Bon Jovi), 61; Peter de Savary, businessman and yachtsman, 76; Leon Spinks, former world heavyweight boxing champion, 67; Caroline Wozniacki, tennis player, 30.
ANNIVERSARIES
Births: 1754 Thomas Bowdler, Scottish physician and publisher; 1767 John Quincy Adams, 6th United States president; 1834 James Whistler, painter and writer; 1862 Liza Lehmann, composer and singer; 1916 Reg Varney, actor; 1918 John Stride, actor; 1924 Charlie Tully, Celtic and Northern Ireland footballer; 1926 Patrick Wymark, actor; 1929 David Kelly, Irish actor; 1950 Bonnie Pointer, R&B and disco singer (The Pointer Sisters).
Deaths: 1989 Lord Olivier, actor; 1994 Charles “Lefty” Edwards, saxophonist; 2005 Gretchen Franklin, actress (Eastenders); 2006 John Spencer, former world snooker champion; 2007 Lady Bird Johnson, former First Lady of US; 2014 Ray Lonnen, British actor.