Today in History, July 30

HIGHLIGHTS IN HISTORY ON THIS DATE:

1619 - First legislative assembly in America, known as the House of Burgesses, is convened in Jamestown, Virginia.

1715 - Eleven ships sink and nearly 1000 passengers and crew drown when a convoy of 12 Spanish ships filled with gold and silver is struck by a hurricane off the coast of Florida.

1792 - French national anthem La Marseillaise by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle, is first sung in Paris.

1898 - Death of Otto von Bismarck, founder and first chancellor of the German Empire.

1928 - Colour motion pictures are exhibited by George Eastman.

1935 - First Penguin book is published, starting the paperback revolution.

1942 - Various Australian cities come under aerial attack from the Japanese.

1947 - Norwegian Thor Heyerdahl's raft Kon Tiki reaches Tuamoto Islands in French Polynesia, after sailing from Peru to test theory that Polynesia was settled by South American Indians.

1963 - Soviet newspaper Izvestia reports that spy Kim Philby has been given asylum in Moscow.

1966 - England beats Germany 4-2 at Wembley to win the FIFA World Cup.

1971 - A Japanese Boeing 727 collides with a jet fighter over Shizukuishi, killing 162 people.

1973 - Eleven-year battle for British victims of the drug Thalidomide ends with compensation payments of STG20 million.

1980 - Republic of Vanuatu (formerly the Franco-British condominium of New Hebrides) achieves independence.

1990 - A car bomb planted by Irish republicans kills British Conservative MP Ian Gow, close aide of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

1994 - Zaire (modern-day Democratic Republic of the Congo) declares its eastern region, swamped by 1.7 million Rwandan refugees, a disaster region.

1997 - Eighteen people die in the NSW snowfields when a landslide sweeps one ski lodge onto another at the Thredbo Alpine Village. One person, ski instructor Stuart Diver, survives and is found and pulled to safety on August 2.

1999 - A collapsed tower causes the worst blackout in Taiwanese history, cutting off electricity to seven million households - one-third of the island - causing panic and fear that it might be under attack by China.

1999 - The US military officially closes its Panama operations, leaving its headquarters on the banks of the Panama Canal after a presence of nearly a century.

2000 - North and South Korea announce they will reopen border liaison offices and reconnect a rail line linking the two countries.

2001 - Nationalist coup leader George Speight is named as a candidate for Fiji's general election to replace MPs he ousted in his May 2000 armed raid on parliament. He is later elected while in jail but dismissed as an MP because he can't attend the legislature.

2003 - The world's last "Love Bug" Volkswagen Beetle - No. 21,529,464 in the car's 68-year history - rolls off the production line in Mexico, ending the long history of a car that was originally Hitler's idea.

2006 - Actor Mel Gibson apologises for a barrage of anti-Semitic remarks he made to sheriff's deputies after being stopped for drink-driving in Malibu.

2008 - A team of European scientists unveils a new method for extracting images hidden under old masters' paintings, recreating a colour portrait of a woman's face unseen since Vincent van Gogh painted over it in 1887.

2012 - President of Australia's beleaguered Health Services Union, Michael Williamson, resigns by text message after a leaked report detailed more than $20 million of questionable payments.

2015 - Bronwyn Bishop, Speaker of the House of Representatives, gives a long-awaited apology for a $5227 helicopter ride she charged to taxpayers and later repaid.

2016 - Australian athletes in Rio are forced to evacuate the Olympic village after fire alarms go off in the basement. It later emerges some have been robbed during the evacuation.

2017 - Australian authorities announce they have foiled a terrorist conspiracy to bring down an aeroplane leaving Sydney with an improvised explosive device.

Today's Birthdays:

Giorgio Vasari, Italian artist (1511-1574); Emily Bronte, British author (1818-1848); Henry Ford, US auto pioneer (1863-1947); Henry Moore, British sculptor (1898-1986); Buddy Guy, US blues musician (1936-); Arnold Schwarzenegger, Austrian actor and former California governor (1947-); Kate Bush, British singer (1958-); Laurence Fishburne, US actor (1961-); Lisa Kudrow, US actress (1963-); Simon Baker, Australian actor (1969-); Christopher Nolan, English film director (1970-); Hilary Swank, US actress (1974-); Yvonne Strahovski, Australian actress (1982-).

Thought For Today:

Incompetents invariably make trouble for people other than themselves - Larry McMurtry, US writer (1936-).

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