July 21
1831 - Belgium became independent as Leopold I was proclaimed King of the Belgians.
1861 - Confederate forces won victory at Bull Run at Manassas, Virginia in the first major battle of the Civil War.
1873 - The first train robbery west of the Mississippi River was pulled off by Jesse James and his gang.
1899 - Author Ernest Hemingway was born in Oak Park, Illinois.
1925 - In the "Monkey Trial" John T. Scopes was found guilty of violating Tennessee state law by teaching evolution. (The conviction was later overturned on a technicality.)
1944 - The Democratic National Convention in Chicago nominated Sen. Harry S. Truman to be vice president.
1944 - American forces landed on Guam during World War II, capturing it from the Japanese some three weeks later.
1949 - The U.S. Senate ratified the North Atlantic Treaty.
1954 - The Geneva Conference concluded with accords dividing Vietnam into northern and southern entities.
1961 - Capt. Virgil "Gus" Grissom became the second American to rocket into a sub-orbital pattern around the Earth, flying on the Liberty Bell 7.
1969 - Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin blasted off from the moon aboard the lunar module.
1970 - The Aswan High Dam was opened in Egypt.
1972 - The Irish Republican Army carried out 22 bombings in Belfast, Northern Ireland, killing nine people and injuring 130 in what became known as “Bloody Friday.”
1988 - Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis accepted the Democratic presidential nomination at the party's convention in Atlanta.
1998 - Astronaut Alan Shepard died at age 74.
1999 - Navy divers found and recovered the bodies of John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, Carolyn, and sister-in-law, Lauren Bessette, in the wreckage of Kennedy's plane in the Atlantic Ocean off Martha's Vineyard.
2002 - WorldCom filed for bankruptcy, the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history, after disclosing it had inflated profits by nearly $4 billion through deceptive accounting.
2007 - "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," the final volume in the book series by J.K. Rowling, went on sale.
2008 - Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, one of the world's top war crimes fugitives, was arrested in a Belgrade suburb by Serbian security forces. (He was sentenced by a U.N. court in 2019 to life imprisonment after being convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.)
2009 - Prosecutors in Cambridge, Massachusetts, dropped a disorderly conduct charge against prominent Black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., who was arrested by a white officer at his home near Harvard University after a report of a break-in.
2010 - President Barack Obama signed into law the most sweeping overhaul of U.S. lending and high finance rules since the 1930s.
2011 - The space shuttle program came to an end after 30 years as Atlantis landed at Cape Canaveral, Florida.
2016 - Donald Trump accepted the GOP presidential nomination with a speech in which he pledged to cheering Republicans and still-skeptical voters that as president, he would restore the safety they feared they were losing, strictly curb immigration and save the nation from what he said was Hillary Clinton’s record of “death, destruction, terrorism and weakness.”
2017 - White House press secretary Sean Spicer abruptly quit over President Donald Trump’s decision to name financier Anthony Scaramucci as the new White House communications director. Scaramucci announced from the White House briefing room that Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who had been Spicer’s deputy, would take over for Spicer. (Scaramucci would be fired on July 31 after 11 days on the job; he had used vulgar language to insult White House aides during a phone call to a reporter.)
2021 - Public health officials said U.S. life expectancy fell by a year and a half in 2020, the largest one-year decline since World War II; the drop was due mainly to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Birthdays
24 - Maggie Lindemann (singer)
30 - Rachael Flatt (figure skater)
30 - Jessica Barden (actress)
31 - Sara Sampaio (model)
33 - Rory Culkin (actor)
33 - Juno Temple (actress)
36 - Betty Gilpin (actress)
36 - Diane Guerrero (actress)
36 - Rebecca Ferguson (singer)
37 - Vanessa Lengies (actress)
38 - Zawe Ashton (actress)
41 - Blake Lewis (singer)
41 - Chrishell Stause (actress)
42 - CC Sabathia (baseball player)
44 - Josh Hartnett (actor)
44 - Justin Bartha (actor)
48 - Steve Byrne (actor/comedian)
49 - Ali Landry (actress)
50 - Paul Brandt (singer)
52 - Alysia Reiner (actress)
52 - Michael Fitzpatrick (singer)
53 - Emerson Hart (singer)
54 - Brandi Chastain (soccer player)
59 - Greg Behrendt (comedian)
62 - Matt Mulhern (actor)
62 - Lance Guest (actor)
65 - Jon Lovitz (actor/comedian)
71 - Jamey Sheridan (actor)
74 - Cat Stevens (singer)
79 - Leigh Lawson (actress)
========================================
Today in Sports History - July 21
1957 - Althea Gibson became the first black woman to win a major U.S. tennis title when she won the Women’s National clay-court singles competition.
1968 - Arnold Palmer became the first golfer to make a million dollars in career earnings after he tied for second place at the PGA Championship.
1973 - Hank Aaron hits his 700th career home run, joining Babe Ruth as the only players to ever reach that milestone.
1991 - Ferguson Jenkins, Gaylord Perry, Rod Carew, Tony Lazzeri and Bill Veeck are elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
1998 - Chinese gymnast Sang Lan, 17, was paralyzed after a fall while practicing for the women's vault competition at the Goodwill Games in New York. Spinal surgery 4 days later failed to restore sensation below her upper chest.
2002 - Ernie Els won the British Open in the first sudden-death finish in the 142-year history of the tournament.
2006 - Alex Rodriguez (New York Yankees) collected his 2,000th career hit and became the youngest player to reach the 450 home run mark.
2016 - The NBA moved the 2017 All-Star Game out of Charlotte because of its objections to a North Carolina law that limited anti-discrimination protections for lesbian, gay and transgender people.
1831 - Belgium became independent as Leopold I was proclaimed King of the Belgians.
1861 - Confederate forces won victory at Bull Run at Manassas, Virginia in the first major battle of the Civil War.
1873 - The first train robbery west of the Mississippi River was pulled off by Jesse James and his gang.
1899 - Author Ernest Hemingway was born in Oak Park, Illinois.
1925 - In the "Monkey Trial" John T. Scopes was found guilty of violating Tennessee state law by teaching evolution. (The conviction was later overturned on a technicality.)
1944 - The Democratic National Convention in Chicago nominated Sen. Harry S. Truman to be vice president.
1944 - American forces landed on Guam during World War II, capturing it from the Japanese some three weeks later.
1949 - The U.S. Senate ratified the North Atlantic Treaty.
1954 - The Geneva Conference concluded with accords dividing Vietnam into northern and southern entities.
1961 - Capt. Virgil "Gus" Grissom became the second American to rocket into a sub-orbital pattern around the Earth, flying on the Liberty Bell 7.
1969 - Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin blasted off from the moon aboard the lunar module.
1970 - The Aswan High Dam was opened in Egypt.
1972 - The Irish Republican Army carried out 22 bombings in Belfast, Northern Ireland, killing nine people and injuring 130 in what became known as “Bloody Friday.”
1988 - Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis accepted the Democratic presidential nomination at the party's convention in Atlanta.
1998 - Astronaut Alan Shepard died at age 74.
1999 - Navy divers found and recovered the bodies of John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, Carolyn, and sister-in-law, Lauren Bessette, in the wreckage of Kennedy's plane in the Atlantic Ocean off Martha's Vineyard.
2002 - WorldCom filed for bankruptcy, the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history, after disclosing it had inflated profits by nearly $4 billion through deceptive accounting.
2007 - "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," the final volume in the book series by J.K. Rowling, went on sale.
2008 - Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, one of the world's top war crimes fugitives, was arrested in a Belgrade suburb by Serbian security forces. (He was sentenced by a U.N. court in 2019 to life imprisonment after being convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.)
2009 - Prosecutors in Cambridge, Massachusetts, dropped a disorderly conduct charge against prominent Black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., who was arrested by a white officer at his home near Harvard University after a report of a break-in.
2010 - President Barack Obama signed into law the most sweeping overhaul of U.S. lending and high finance rules since the 1930s.
2011 - The space shuttle program came to an end after 30 years as Atlantis landed at Cape Canaveral, Florida.
2016 - Donald Trump accepted the GOP presidential nomination with a speech in which he pledged to cheering Republicans and still-skeptical voters that as president, he would restore the safety they feared they were losing, strictly curb immigration and save the nation from what he said was Hillary Clinton’s record of “death, destruction, terrorism and weakness.”
2017 - White House press secretary Sean Spicer abruptly quit over President Donald Trump’s decision to name financier Anthony Scaramucci as the new White House communications director. Scaramucci announced from the White House briefing room that Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who had been Spicer’s deputy, would take over for Spicer. (Scaramucci would be fired on July 31 after 11 days on the job; he had used vulgar language to insult White House aides during a phone call to a reporter.)
2021 - Public health officials said U.S. life expectancy fell by a year and a half in 2020, the largest one-year decline since World War II; the drop was due mainly to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Birthdays
24 - Maggie Lindemann (singer)
30 - Rachael Flatt (figure skater)
30 - Jessica Barden (actress)
31 - Sara Sampaio (model)
33 - Rory Culkin (actor)
33 - Juno Temple (actress)
36 - Betty Gilpin (actress)
36 - Diane Guerrero (actress)
36 - Rebecca Ferguson (singer)
37 - Vanessa Lengies (actress)
38 - Zawe Ashton (actress)
41 - Blake Lewis (singer)
41 - Chrishell Stause (actress)
42 - CC Sabathia (baseball player)
44 - Josh Hartnett (actor)
44 - Justin Bartha (actor)
48 - Steve Byrne (actor/comedian)
49 - Ali Landry (actress)
50 - Paul Brandt (singer)
52 - Alysia Reiner (actress)
52 - Michael Fitzpatrick (singer)
53 - Emerson Hart (singer)
54 - Brandi Chastain (soccer player)
59 - Greg Behrendt (comedian)
62 - Matt Mulhern (actor)
62 - Lance Guest (actor)
65 - Jon Lovitz (actor/comedian)
71 - Jamey Sheridan (actor)
74 - Cat Stevens (singer)
79 - Leigh Lawson (actress)
========================================
Today in Sports History - July 21
1957 - Althea Gibson became the first black woman to win a major U.S. tennis title when she won the Women’s National clay-court singles competition.
1968 - Arnold Palmer became the first golfer to make a million dollars in career earnings after he tied for second place at the PGA Championship.
1973 - Hank Aaron hits his 700th career home run, joining Babe Ruth as the only players to ever reach that milestone.
1991 - Ferguson Jenkins, Gaylord Perry, Rod Carew, Tony Lazzeri and Bill Veeck are elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
1998 - Chinese gymnast Sang Lan, 17, was paralyzed after a fall while practicing for the women's vault competition at the Goodwill Games in New York. Spinal surgery 4 days later failed to restore sensation below her upper chest.
2002 - Ernie Els won the British Open in the first sudden-death finish in the 142-year history of the tournament.
2006 - Alex Rodriguez (New York Yankees) collected his 2,000th career hit and became the youngest player to reach the 450 home run mark.
2016 - The NBA moved the 2017 All-Star Game out of Charlotte because of its objections to a North Carolina law that limited anti-discrimination protections for lesbian, gay and transgender people.
