Historical Events on August 4

Events 1 - 200 of 211

• 1181 Supernova SN 1181 in the constellation Cassiopeia observed by Chinese and Japanese astronomers, lasting until August 6

• 1351 Sea battle at Zwartewaal: William, Duke of Bavaria, defeats the forces of his mother Margaret II, Countess of Hainaut and her English allies
• 1558 1st printing of Zohar in Spain - popularizes Jewish study of Kabbalah
• 1578 Battle of The Three Kings [Battle of Alcazar quivir): Moroccans defeat a Moroccan-Portuguese alliance in northern Morocco with 10,000 killed

• 1636 Johan Mauritius appointed governor of Dutch Brazil
• 1666 Hurricane hits Guadeloupe, Martinique and St Christopher; thousands die
• 1666 St James' Day naval battle is an English victory against the Dutch during Second Anglo-Dutch War off the Kent coast
• 1693 Date traditionally ascribed to Dom Pérignon's invention of Champagne
• 1701 The Peace of Montreal: thirty Amerindian tribes sign accord guaranteeing their neutrality in the event of conflict between France and England [1]
• 1704 War of Spanish Succession, English and Dutch troops occupy Gibraltar
• 1730 Crown prince Frederick of Prussia escapes to England
• 1735 Jury acquits John Zenger (NY Weekly Journal) charged with seditious libel by royal governor of NY (victory for Freedom of press)

• 1777 Retired British cavalry officer Philip Astley establishes his riding school with performances in London, precursor of the circus
• 1789 French Revolution: The National Constituent Assembly meets and issues the first decrees that abolish centuries of feudalism in France
• 1790 United States Revenue Cutter Service is established to serve as an armed customs enforcement service (becoming the US Coast Guard in 1915)
• 1791 The Treaty of Sistova is signed, ending the Ottoman-Habsburg wars
• 1821 1st edition of American magazine "The Saturday Evening Post"

• 1824 Battle of Kos is fought between Turks and Greeks
• 1830 Plans for city of Chicago laid out
• 1845 Emigrant ship Cataraqui wrecks in Bass Strait with the loss of 400 lives, only nine survive, Australia's deadliest maritime civil disaster [1]
• 1854 The Hinomaru is established as the official flag to be flown from Japanese ships
• 1855 John Bartlett publishes "Familiar Quotations"
• 1862 US government collects its 1st income tax
• 1864 Land & naval action new Brazos Santiago, Texas
• 1870 British Red Cross Society forms

• 1881 122°F (50°C), Seville, Spain (European record)
• 1886 Colombia adopts constitution

• 1897 Henry A Rucker appointed Collector of Internal Revenue for Georgia
• 1900 An allied expeditionary force, made up of Japanese, Russian, British, French and American troops, sets off from Tientsin for Peking, China, to put down Boxer rebellion
• 1902 The Greenwich foot tunnel under the River Thames opens
• 1903 Cardinal Giuseppe Sarto of Venice elected Pope Pius X, known as the 'pope of the poor and humble'

• 1914 German fleet under Admiral Wilhelm Souchon fire on the Algerian coast
• 1914 US declares neutrality on the outbreak of WWI
• 1914 WWI: German army shoots Belgian priests and burns down village of Battice

• 1914 WWI: King Albert I becomes Supreme Commander of Belgian army after German declaration of war
• 1916 Denmark and the United States sign a treaty whereby the Danish West Indies, including the Virgin Islands, are to be ceded to the US in 1917 for $25 million
• 1916 The Turks attack the British line at Romani in the northern Sinai (WWI)
• 1917 Pravda calls for the killing of all capitalists, priests and officers

• 1919 Hungarian communist leader Béla Kun flees to Vienna after the Hungarian Soviet Republic is overthrown by the Romanian Army

• 1922 Lizzie Murphy becomes the first female to play against MLB players in a charity exhibition; all-stars from New England and AL v Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park
• 1925 1st Dutch government of Prime Minister Hendrikus Colijn forms
• 1925 US marines leave Nicaragua after 13-year occupation
• 1929 Cleveland Indians, trailing 6-5 in 9th with 2 outs score AL record tying 9 runs, beat NY Yankees 14-6
• 1929 Jones Beach in NY opens
• 1930 Child labor laws established in Belgium

• 1934 II British Empire Games open at London's White City Stadium

• 1936 American Helen Stephens runs 11.5 to win the 100m at the Berlin Olympics, beating controversial intersex athlete Stanisława Walasiewicz of Poland
• 1936 Greek Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas leads a 'self-coup' giving him authoritarian control of the country
• 1941 Brooklyn Dodgers catcher Mickey Owen becomes 1st MLB player to take 3 foul pop-ups in one inning (3rd) in 11-6 win v NY Giants

• 1942 1st train with Jews departs Mechelen Belgium to Auschwitz
• 1942 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill arrives in Cairo, Egypt

• 1942 German occupier orders all Dutch homing pigeons killed
• 1943 British premier Winston Churchill travels on the Queen Mary to Canada
• 1943 Soviet units reach suburbs of Orel
• 1943 USAAF bombs Germans in Troina

• 1944 British 8th Army reaches suburbs of Florence, Italy

• 1945 Red Sox outfielder Tom McBride drives in MLB record tying 6 runs in an inning (4th) during 15-4 win v Washington
• 1946 An earthquake of magnitude 8.0 hits northern Dominican Republic. 100 are killed and 20,000 are left homeless.
• 1947 American boxer Ike Williams knocks out Bob Montgomery in 6 rounds in Philadelphia to unify the world lightweight title
• 1947 The Supreme Court of Japan is established
• 1948 5 day Southern States filibuster succeeds in maintaining America's poll tax
• 1948 An American sweep of the medals in the 110m hurdles at the London Olympics with William Porter taking gold, ahead of Clyde Scott and Craig Dixon
• 1948 Fanny Blankers-Koen of the Netherlands wins the 80m hurdles in Olympic record 11.2 at the London Olympics; 2nd of unprecedented 3 individual track & field gold medals
• 1948 Hungary's Olga Gyarmati wins the first ever Olympic women's long jump competition at the London Games
• 1948 The women's shot put introduced to track & field program at the London Olympics; inaugural gold medallist Micheline Ostermeyer of France who also won the women's discus gold

• 1953 Black families move into Trumbull Park housing project in Chicago
• 1953 New York Yankees hurler Vic Raschi sets MLB record for a pitcher by driving in 7 runs in a 15-0 win v Detroit
• 1954 Boscombe Down 1st flight of supersonic P-1 Lightning
• 1954 The Government of Pakistan approves the National Anthem, written by Hafeez Jullundhry and composed by Ahmed G. Chagla

• 1956 German Wilhelm Herz becomes first to ride motorcycle at 200mph (210mph/338kph) at the Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah
• 1956 Indonesia says it will not pay debts to the Netherlands
• 1956 Lee Petty dismounts car on lap 32, waves red flag to field because of dusty conditions at NASCAR Grand National at Tulsa, Oklahoma; race halted and never completed

• 1960 Rocket propelled USAF research aircraft sets record at 2,150 MPH
• 1961 28th NFL Chicago College All-Star Game: Philadelphia 28, All-Stars 14, 66,000 at Soldier Field
• 1961 Spokane, Washington reaches August record 108°F

• 1964 Bodies of civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James E. Chaney discovered in an earthen Mississippi dam
• 1964 North Vietnam purportedly engage US Navy ships in the Gulf of Tonkin for a second time, resulting in US Congress passing the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, granting authority to assist any Southeast Asian facing "communist aggression"; later investigation deemed the second attack never happened as shipboard communications were misinterpreted
• 1965 Cook Islands enters into free association with New Zealand
• 1966 8th British Empire Games & Commonwealth Games open in Kingston, Jamaica; first Games held outside 'White Dominions'
• 1967 34th NFL Chicago College All-Star Game: Green Bay 27, All-Stars 0 ; 70,934 at Soldier Field
• 1967 British pirate radio station Radio 355 resigns air

• 1967 Shortwave group ANARC's 1st convention (Chicago)
• 1967 US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
• 1967 USSR performs nuclear test at the Semipalatinsk Test Site in northeast Kazakhstan
• 1968 WXTV TV channel 41 in New York-Paterson, NY (UNI) begins broadcasting

• 1971 US launches 1st satellite into lunar orbit from manned spacecraft
• 1972 Arthur Bremer jailed for 63 years for shooting Alabama Governor Wallace

• 1973 NY Yankees pitcher Lindy McDaniel puts in one of the best relief stints in MLB history, entering in 2nd inning, allows only 1 run in 13 innings in 3-2 win v Detroit Tigers
• 1974 Crawford-Butler Act allows Puerto Ricans to elect own governor

• 1976 England beats Australia by 8 wickets in the limited overs cricket international at Lord's; first time women are permitted to play on the main square at 'the home of cricket'
• 1976 USSR performs nuclear test at the Semipalatinsk Test Site in northeast Kazakhstan
• 1977 US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
• 1977 US President Carter establishes Department of Energy
• 1979 Italian government of Cossiga begins
• 1979 USSR performs nuclear test at the Semipalatinsk Test Site in northeast Kazakhstan
• 1980 -11] Hurricane Aline, kills 272 in Texas & Caribbean
• 1980 7-time All Star Maury Wills becomes only the 3rd black manager in MLB history when Darrell Johnson is fired by Seattle Mariners after a 9 game losing streak
• 1981 Columbia mated with SRBs and external tank for STS-2 mission

• 1982 Outfielder Joel Youngblood becomes only MLB player to get hits for 2 different teams in 2 different cities on the same day; singles for Mets in Chicago day game; traded, then singles for Expos in Philadelphia night game
• 1983 Bettino Craxi is sworn in as Prime Minister of Italy, the 1st Socialist to hold the office

• 1983 France performs nuclear test
• 1983 Revolution in Republic of Upper Volta brings Thomas Sankara to power

• 1984 Americans Al Joyner and Mike Conley take the gold and silver medals in the men's triple jump at the Los Angeles Olympics

• 1984 Republic of Upper Volta becomes Burkina Faso (National Day)
• 1985 American hang glider Larry Tudor set a world record for gain of height, climbing 4,343m in one flight [1] [2]

• 1985 Scott Verplank beats Jim Thorpe in Western Open playoff, first amateur to win a PGA Tour event since Gene Littler 1954

• 1986 After winning only token damages in antitrust lawsuit against the NFL, USFL owners vote to suspend operations for 1986 season; folded before 4th season
• 1986 Reports of probable OPEC (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) agreement on output quotas sends oil prices higher
• 1987 FCC vote 4-0 to rescind fairness doctrine for broadcasters
• 1988 Congress votes $20,000 to each Japanese-American interned in WW II
• 1988 Hertz car rental will pay out $23 million in consumer fraud case
• 1990 95.5°F (35.3°C) in De Bilt Netherlands (highest Aug temperature in Netherlands)
• 1990 European community proposes a boycott of Iraq
• 1991 The Greek cruise ship Oceanos sinks off the Wild Coast of South Africa
• 1992 In its debut at the Barcelona Olympics the badminton singles gold medals are both won by Indonesian athletes, whilst both men's & women's doubles go to South Korea
• 1992 Italian fencer Giovanna Trillini wraps up gold medals in both women's foil events at the Barcelona Olympics as part of the winning team
• 1992 The diving competition at the Barcelona Olympics concludes with Chinese athletes dominant, winning 3 of 4 gold medals contested - American Mark Lenzi wins 3m springbaord
• 1993 Angolan air force bombs Huambo
• 1993 Rwandian Hutus and Tutsis sign peace treaty in Arusha, Tanzania

• 1994 Dwingeloo 1, near milky way system, discovered

• 1994 Truck carrying millions of bees overturns on NY parkway

• 1996 XXVI Summer Olympic Games close in Atlanta, Georgia
• 1997 "The Keenan Ivory Wayans Show" premieres on Fox TV
• 1997 185,000 Teamsters union United Parcel Service drivers walk off the job.
• 1997 In Colombia, international oil company Occidental Petroleum declare force majeure on all oil exports from the Cano Limon field after a series of attacks knocked out a major oil pipeline

• 2002 Soham murders: 10-year-old school girls Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells go missing from the town of Soham, Cambridgeshire.

• 2006 Dame Silvia Cartwright steps down as the Governor-General of New Zealand and is replaced by The Honourable Anand Satyanand, who is sworn in 23 August

• 2007 NASA's Phoenix spaceship is launched

• 2010 On 3rd anniversary of his 500th MLB career home run, Alex Rodriguez reaches the 600 HR mark in the NY Yankees 5-1 win v Toronto; 7th and youngest to reach milestone
• 2011 Mark Duggan is shot by police in London at 29, sparking widespread riots that cost an estimated £200 million worth of property damage
• 2012 45 people are killed by a suicide bombing in Abyan, Yemen

• 2012 South African Oscar Pistorius becomes first double-leg amputee to compete at the Olympics; 400m London; out in semi's
• 2012 Super Rugby Final, Waikato Stadium, Hamilton: Chiefs win their first SR title with a 37-6 thrashing of the Sharks (Durban, RSA) at home

• 2014 Hamas and Israel agree to another 72 hour ceasefire
• 2015 31 people are killed and 100 are injured after floods partially sweep two passenger trains off a bridge in Madhya Pradesh, India
• 2015 A plague of locusts in Southern Russia prompts a state of emergency to be declared
• 2015 Muppets Miss Piggy and Kermit the Frog announce the end to their relationship on Twitter

• 2017 Aldi supermarket withdraws all eggs from sale after chemical fipronil found in eggs from The Netherlands

• 2018 Super Rugby Final, AMI Stadium, Christchurch: Canterbury Crusaders successfully defend title with 37-18 home win against the Lions from Johannesburg; Crusaders' 9th SR title
• 2019 Australian cricket batsman Steve Smith hits brilliant 142 following his 1st innings 144 in 1st Test v England at Edgbaston; only 4th batsman all-time to score more than 140 in each innings of a Test match
• 2019 Car explosion kills 20 with 47 injured in Cairo, Egypt, in terrorist-related incident
• 2019 China's central bank allows its currency to weaken under usual 7-1 ratio to the US dollar for first time in a decade in response to further US trade tariffs
• 2019 Frank Zapata is the first person to cross the English Channel by flyboard in 22 minutes
• 2019 Gunman kills nine and injures 27 at a bar in Dayton, Ohio, in 2nd mass shooting in 24 hours in the US
• 2020 COVID-19 infection spike forces a return to lockdown in Manila and surrounding provinces in the Philippines, affecting 27 million people as cases pass 100,000

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