781: The oldest recorded eruption of Mt. Fuji
1588: The Spanish Armada is spotted off the coast of England.
1703: Daniel Defoe is placed in a pillory for the crime of seditious libel after publishing a politically satirical pamphlet, but is pelted with flowers instead.
1777: The United States Congress passes a resolution that the services of Marquis de Lafayette "be accepted, and that, in consideration of his zeal, illustrious family and connexions [sic], he have the rank and commission of major-general of the United States."
1790: The first U.S. patent is granted to inventor Samuel Hopkins for a potash process.1803: John Ericsson is born. He designed the USS Monitor, one of the first ironclad warships.
1883: Fred Quimby is born. He was the producer in charge of MGM's cartoon wing and helped make many of the classic Tom & Jerry cartoons and much of Tex Avery's more deranged cartoons.1912: Milton Friedman, economist, is born.
1917: The Third Battle of Ypres starts in Flanders.1919: The German national assembly adopts the Weimar constitution (to come into force on August 14).
1919: Curt Gowdy, the Voice of the Boston Red Sox, is born.
1929: Don Murray is born. He is best known for playing the ape-hating Governor Breck in Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, one of my favorite Apes movies. (For the record, it goes Planet, Conquest, Beneath, Escape and Battle. We shall not speak of the Tim Burton remake.)1930: The radio mystery program The Shadow is aired for the first time.
1932: The Nazis win more than 38% of the vote in German elections.
1932: Ted Cassidy is born. Most people remember him best as Lurch in the old Addams Family TV show.
1941: Under instructions from Adolf Hitler, Nazi official Hermann Göring orders SS General Reinhard Heydrich to "submit to me as soon as possible a general plan of the administrative material and financial measures necessary for carrying out the desired final solution of the Jewish question."1943: Lobo is born. He wrote the song "Me and You and a Dog Named Boo" which only makes me wish he'd run into Lobo, the DC Comics intergalactic bounty hunter.
"I'll frag that geek!"1962: Wesley Snipes is born.
1963: House music DJ Fatboy Slim is born. Here's a neat video for his song "Champion Sound.
1965: JK Rowling is born.
1966: Dean Cain is born. He played Superman/Clark Kent in the 90's-era Lois and Clark TV show.
1970: Black Tot Day: The last day of the officially sanctioned rum ration in the Royal Navy.Today in History elements mostly cribbed from The History Channel, Wikipedia, The New York Times, The Jewish World Review, The Writer's Almanac and anything else I can dig up.
