1588: The “Invincible” Spanish Armada is sighted approaching England, and several skirmishes follow, forcing the invading fleet to make a long and costly retreat around Scotland and Ireland 1609: Samuel de Champlain shoots and kills two Iroquois chiefs at Ticonderoga, New York, setting the stage for French-Iroquois conflicts for the next 150 years 1848: Irish […]
1794: French Revolutionary figure Maximilien Robespierre and 22 other leaders of “the Terror” are guillotined to thunderous cheers in Paris 1914: Austria-Hungary decides against mediation and declares war on Serbia, the first declaration of war of World War I 1917: Silent Parade organized by James Weldon Johnson, 10,000 African Americans march on Fifth Avenue in […]
1586: Walter Raleigh brings the first tobacco to England from Virginia 1689: Battle of Killiecrankie: Jacobite Scottish Highlanders under Viscount Dundee defeat royalist forces under General Hugh Mackay 1789: US Congress establishes the Department of Foreign Affairs, now referred to as the State Department 1866: First transatlantic telegraph cable comes ashore at Heart’s Content, Newfoundland, […]
657: Battle of Siffin occurs during the first Muslim civil war between Ali ibn Abi Talib and Muawiyah I beside the Euphrates River 1519: Francisco Pizarro receives a royal charter for the west coast of South America 1533: Francisco Pizarro orders the death of the last Sapa Inca Emperor, Atahualpa 1803: The Surrey Iron Railway, arguably […]
306: Constantine I is proclaimed Roman Emperor by his troops 1814: English engineer George Stephenson introduces his first steam locomotive, a traveling engine designed for hauling coal on the Killingworth wagonway, named Blücher 1943: Benito Mussolini is dismissed as Italian Prime Minister and arrested on the authority of King Victor Emmanuel III 1944: World War […]
1534: French explorer Jacques Cartier claims for France the lands around Gaspé by erecting a 30-foot cross at Pointe-Penouille [1] 1567: Mary, Queen of Scots, is forced to abdicate, and her one-year-old son becomes King James VI of Scotland 1832: Benjamin Bonneville leads the first wagon train across the Rocky Mountains through Wyoming’s South Pass […]
1777: King Louis XVI of France and his Foreign Minister clandestinely agree to supply the United States with munitions during the American Revolution 1829: William Austin Burt patents America’s first typewriter, the typographer 1840: Union Act passed by the British Parliament, uniting Upper and Lower Canada 1944: Bretton Woods Conference ends, establishes the International Bank […]
1099: Godfrey of Bouillon is elected the first Defender of the Holy Sepulchre of the Kingdom of Jerusalem during the First Crusade 1456: Hungarian army under John Hunyadi defeats the forces of Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II and ends the Siege of Belgrade (Nándorfehérvár), halting Ottoman expansion in Europe for 70 years 1515: First Congress of […]
356 BC: Herostratus sets fire to the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, one of the Seven Wonders of the World 365: An earthquake on Crete followed by a tsunami around the Eastern Mediterranean allegedly destroys Alexandria 1861: First Battle of Bull Run [Battle of First Manassas], the first major battle of the US Civil War, […]
1793: Scottish explorer Alexander Mackenzie completes the first European east-to-west crossing of America north of Mexico 1921: Congresswoman Alice Mary Robertson becomes the first woman to preside over the floor of US House of Representatives 1969: NASA’s Apollo 11 lunar module, carrying Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, lands on the surface of the Moon. Seven hours […]
