Today in History, August 19


1840 - The City of Adelaide is declared, four years after settlement.

1914 - British Navy torpedoes and damages German battleship Westfalen in North Sea and the German fleet bombards English coast.

1918 - Britain opens offensive on the Western front during WWI.

1929 - Death of Sergei Diaghilev, Russian ballet impresario and director.

1930 - The two halves of the Sydney Harbour Bridge are joined together.

1934 - German plebiscite approves vesting of sole executive power in Adolf Hitler as Fuehrer.

1936 - Leading Spanish writer Federico Garcia Lorca is shot by Fascist supporters of Franco after being forced to dig his own grave at the beginning of the civil war.

1942 - Large raid by British and Canadian commandos on Dieppe, France, is repulsed with heavy casualties during WWII.

1945 - Start of the August Revolution against French rule in Vietnam, led by Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Minh.

1953 - The Soviet Union publicly acknowledges it has tested a hydrogen bomb.

1955 - Hundreds are killed in anti-French rioting in Morocco and Algeria.

1958 - Val McDonald arrives in Alice Springs to become the Northern Territory's first fully fledged transport driver.

1960 - Soviet Sputnik 5 satellite is launched into orbit carrying two dogs named Belka and Strelka.

1961 - Australian TV current affairs program Four Corners makes its debut.

1966 - Hundreds die during an earthquake in eastern Turkey.

1973 - George Papadopoulos sworn in as president of Greece as the monarchy comes to an end.

1977 - Death of US comedian-actor Groucho Marx.

1979 - Pope John Paul II makes major diplomatic gesture by calling for resumption of ties between Vatican and China's Roman Catholics.

1980 - A fire incinerates 301 people onboard a Saudi Arabian airliner when it makes an emergency landing at Riyadh airport.

1987 - Britain's mass murderer Michael Ryan shoots dead 16 people during a rampage through Hungerford, west of London.

1995 - In northern India, 348 people are killed when a passenger train rams another that had stopped on the tracks after hitting a cow.

2000 - Harry Oppenheimer, the South African mining magnate who became chairman of Anglo American Corp and De Beers Consolidated Mines, dies. He was 91.

2002 - A woman is sentenced to death-by-stoning under Islamic law in Nigeria for giving birth to a child nine months after her divorce.

2005 - The first-ever joint military exercise between Russia and China, called Peace Mission 2005, begins.

2007 - A major Gaza power company shuts off the last of its generators after Israel blocks the Nahal Oz fuel crossing the previous week because of security threats.

2008 - Pirates seize a Malaysian palm oil tanker with a crew of 39 in the Gulf of Aden.

2011 - Muammar Gaddafi's forces fire rockets, mortar shells and anti-aircraft guns in a bid to keep the rebels from gaining complete control and advancing toward the capital, only 50 kilometres away.

2012 - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange says he is a victim of an American "witch-hunt", from the balcony where he is holed-up at the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

2013 - Waves of Syrian Kurds cross a bridge into northern Iraq to escape the war embattling President Bashar al-Assad.

2014 - Egyptian attempts to broker an end to a month-long war between Israel and Hamas collapse in heavy fighting.

2015 - Islamic State terrorists behead Syrian antiques scholar Khaled al-Asaad, 81, who spent most of his life looking after the ancient ruins of Palmyra.

2016 - Australian mother Sara Connor and her British partner are arrested in Bali after the bashing death of a policeman on Kuta Beach.

2017 - Left-wing groups and Berlin residents prevent more than 500 far-right extremists from marching to the place where high-ranking Nazi official Rudolf Hess died 30 years ago.

2018 - India's Kerala state is hit by its worst floods in a century, which leave 350 dead and force the evacuation of an estimated 800,000 people.

Today's Birthdays:

Maria Jeanne Becu, Comtesse du Barry, French adventuress (1746-1793); Benjamin Harrison, 23rd US president (1833-1901); Orville Wright, US aviation pioneer (1871-1948); Georges Enescu, Romanian composer (1881-1955); Gabrielle `Coco' Chanel, French fashion designer (1883-1971); Ogden Nash, US writer-poet (1902-1971); Frank McCourt, Irish author (1930-2009); Jill St John, US actress (1940-); Bill Clinton, former US president (1946-); John Deacon, British musician (Queen) (1951-); Brendan Nelson, Australian politician (1958-); John Stamos, US actor (1963-); Kyra Sedgwick, US actress (1965-); Lee Ann Womack, US singer (1966-); Matthew Perry, US actor (Friends) (1969-); Mary Joe Fernandez, US tennis player (1971-); Missy Higgins, Australian singer-songwriter (1983-); Tammin Sursok, Australian actress and singer (1983-).

Thought For Today:

One can live in the shadow of an idea without grasping it - Elizabeth Bowen, Irish author.


Today in History, August 19

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