Independence Day
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| John Trumbull's painting, Declaration of Independence, depicting the five-man drafting committee of the Declaration of Independence presenting their work to the Congress. The painting can be found on the back of the U.S. $2 bill. The original hangs in the US Capitol rotunda. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons |
Events
362 BC – Battle of Mantinea: The Thebans, led by Epaminondas, defeated the Spartans.
414 – Emperor Theodosius II, age 13, yields power to his older sister Aelia Pulcheria, who reigned as regent and proclaimed herself empress (Augusta) of the Eastern Roman Empire.
836 – Pactum Sicardi, a peace treaty between the Principality of Benevento and the Duchy of Naples, is signed.
993 – Ulrich of Augsburg is canonized as a saint.
1054 – A supernova, called SN 1054, is seen by Chinese Song dynasty, Arab, and possibly Amerindian observers near the star Zeta Tauri. For several months it remains bright enough to be seen during the day. Its remnants form the Crab Nebula.
1120 – Jordan II of Capua is anointed as prince after his infant nephew's death.
1187 – The Crusades: Battle of Hattin: Saladin defeats Guy of Lusignan, King of Jerusalem.
1253 – Battle of West-Capelle: John I of Avesnes defeats Guy of Dampierre.
1359 – Francesco II Ordelaffi of Forlì surrenders to the Papal commander Gil de Albornoz.
1456 – Ottoman wars in Europe: The Siege of Nándorfehérvár (Belgrade) begins.
1534 – Christian III is elected King of Denmark and Norway in the town of Rye.
1584 – Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe arrive at Roanoke Island.
1610 – The Battle of Klushino is fought between forces of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russia during the Polish–Muscovite War.
1634 – The city of Trois-Rivières is founded in New France (now Quebec, Canada).
1744 – The Treaty of Lancaster, in which the Iroquois cedes lands between the Allegheny Mountains and the Ohio River to the British colonies, was signed in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
1754 – French and Indian War: Battle of Fort Necessity: After surrendering to French Capt. Louis Coulon de Villiers on July 3 George Washington and his troops abandon Fort Necessity.
1774 – Orangetown Resolutions are adopted in the Province of New York, one of many protests against the British Parliament's Coercive Acts.
1776 – American Revolution: Second Continental Congress: The United States officially declared its independence from Great Britain by approving and adopting the Declaration of Independence.
1778 – American Revolutionary War: American forces under George Clark capture Kaskaskia during the Illinois campaign.
1802 – At West Point, New York, the United States Military Academy opens.
1803 – The Louisiana Purchase is announced to the American people.
1817 – In Rome, New York, construction on the Erie Canal begins.
1826 – Thomas Jefferson, third president of the United States, dies the same day as John Adams, second president of the United States, on the fiftieth anniversary of the adoption of the United States Declaration of Independence.
1827 – Slavery is abolished in New York State.
1831 – Samuel Francis Smith writes "My Country, 'Tis of Thee" for the Boston, Massachusetts July 4 festivities.
1837 – Grand Junction Railway, the world's first long-distance railway, opens between Birmingham and Liverpool.
1838 – The Iowa Territory is organized.
1855 – In Brooklyn, New York City, the first edition of Walt Whitman's book of poems, Leaves of Grass, is published.
1862 – Lewis Carroll tells Alice Liddell a story that would grow into Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequels.
1863 – American Civil War: Siege of Vicksburg: Vicksburg, Mississippi surrenders to Ulysses S. Grant after 47 days of siege. One hundred fifty miles up the Mississippi River, a Confederate Army was repulsed at the Battle of Helena, Arkansas.
1863 – American Civil War: The Army of Northern Virginia withdrew from the battlefield after losing the Battle of Gettysburg, signalling an end to the Southern invasion of the North.
1878 – Thoroughbred horses Ten Broeck and Mollie McCarty run a match race, recalled in the song Molly and Tenbrooks.
1879 – Anglo-Zulu War: The Zululand capital of Ulundi is captured by British troops and burned to the ground, ending the war and forcing King Cetshwayo to flee.
1881 – Booker T. Washington establishes Tuskegee Institute in Alabama.
1886 – The people of France offer the Statue of Liberty to the people of the United States.
1886 – The first scheduled Canadian transcontinental train arrives in Port Moody, British Columbia.
1887 – The founder of Pakistan, Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, joins Sindh-Madrasa-tul-Islam, Karachi.
1892 – Western Samoa changes the International Date Line. Monday, July 4 occurs twice, resulting in a year with 367 days.
1894 – The short-lived Republic of Hawaii is proclaimed by Sanford B. Dole.
1895 – The poem "America the Beautiful," by Wellesley College Professor Katherine Lee Bates, is published in the Fourth of July edition of the church periodical The Congregationalist. The poem with music by Samuel A. Ward was published as a song in 1910.
1903 – Philippine–American War officially is concluded.
1903 – Dorothy Levitt is reported as the first English woman to compete in a 'motor race'.
1910 – African-American boxer Jack Johnson took on former undefeated heavyweight champion James J. Jeffries, beating him in 15 rounds, sparking race riots across the United States.
1911 – A massive heat wave strikes the northeastern United States, killing 380 people in eleven days and breaking temperature records in several cities.
1913 – President Woodrow Wilson addresses American Civil War veterans at the Great Reunion of 1913.
1914 – The funeral of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie takes place in Vienna, six days after their assassinations in Sarajevo.
1914 – D.W. Griffith began filming his controversial film "The Birth of a Nation," which introduced filmmaking techniques that influenced many other directors.
1915: The little town of Cataldo, Idaho, was wiped out by an early morning fire. The blaze, cause unknown, consumed every building in the small business district, including a general store, a hotel, a railway freight house and a saloon. [verification needed]
1918 – Ottoman sultan Mehmed VI ascended to the throne.
1918 – World War I: The Battle of Hamel, a successful attack by the Australian Corps against German positions near the town of Le Hamel on the Western Front.
1918 – Bolsheviks killed Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and his family. [Julian calendar date]
1926 – Knoebels Amusement Resort is opened in Elysburg, Pennsylvania.
1927 – The Lockheed Vega first flew.
1934 – Leo Szilard patented the chain-reaction design that would later be used in the atomic bomb.
1939 – Lou Gehrig, recently diagnosed with Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, informs a crowd at Yankee Stadium that he considers himself "The luckiest man on the face of the earth", then announces his retirement from major league baseball.
1939 – Huỳnh Phú Sổ founds Hòa Hảo Buddhism.
1941 – Nazi troops massacre Polish scientists and writers in the captured Ukrainian city of Lviv.
1941 – World War II: The Burning of the Riga synagogues: The Great Choral Synagogue in German occupied Riga is burned with 300 Jews locked in the basement.
1942 – World War II: The 250 day Siege of Sevastopol in the Crimea ends when the city falls to Axis forces.
1943 – World War II: The Battle of Kursk, the largest full-scale battle in history and the world's largest tank battle, begins in Prokhorovka village.
1943 – World War II: In Gibraltar, a Royal Air Force B-24 Liberator bomber crashes into the sea in an apparent accident moments after takeoff, killing sixteen passengers on board; only the pilot survives.
1946 – The Kielce pogrom against Jewish Holocaust survivors in Poland.
1946 – After 381 years of near-continuous colonial rule by various powers, the Philippines attains full independence from the United States.
1947 – The "Indian Independence Bill" is presented before the British House of Commons, proposing the independence of the Provinces of British India into two sovereign countries: India and Pakistan.
1950 – Radio Free Europe first broadcasts.
1951 – A court in Czechoslovakia sentences American journalist William N. Oatis to ten years in prison on charges of espionage.
1951 – William Shockley announced the invention of the junction transistor.
1960 – Due to the post-Independence Day admission of Hawaii as the 50th U.S. state on August 21, 1959, the 50-star flag of the United States debuts in Philadelphia, almost ten and a half months later (see Flag Act).
1961 – On its maiden voyage, the Soviet nuclear-powered submarine K-19 suffers a complete loss of coolant to its reactor. The crew are able to effect repairs, but 22 of them die of radiation poisoning over the following two years.
1966 – U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Freedom of Information Act into United States law. The act went into effect the next year.
1976 – Israeli commandos raid Entebbe airport in Uganda, rescuing 103 hostages, all but four of the passengers and crew of an Air France jetliner seized by Palestinian terrorists.
1977 – The George Jackson Brigade plants a bomb at the main power substation for the Washington state capitol in Olympia, in solidarity with a prison strike at the Walla Walla State Penitentiary Intensive Security Unit.
1982 – Four Iranian diplomats are abducted by Lebanese militia in Lebanon.
1984 – Richard Petty wins his 200th and final NASCAR Winston cup race.
1986 – More than 250 sailing ships and the United States' biggest fireworks display honored the Statue of Liberty in its 100th birthday year.
1987 – In France, former Gestapo chief Klaus Barbie (a.k.a. the "Butcher of Lyon") is convicted of crimes against humanity and sentenced to life imprisonment.
1994 – Rwandan Genocide: Kigali, the Rwandan capital, is captured by the Rwandan Patriotic Front, ending the genocide in the city.
1995 – The British Parliament reconfirmed John Majors as prime minister.
1997 – NASA's Pathfinder space probe lands on the surface of Mars.
1998 – Japan launches the Nozomi probe to Mars, joining the United States and Russia as a space exploring nation.
2004 – The cornerstone of the Freedom Tower is laid on the site of the World Trade Center in New York City.
2005 – The Deep Impact collider hits the comet Tempel 1.
2006 – North Korea test-launched seven ballistic missiles in what it called "routine military exercises," causing a firestorm of anger among its neighbors and the United States.
2007 – The Russian resort city of Sochi was selected to host the 2014 Winter Olympics.
2009 – The Statue of Liberty's crown reopens to the public after eight years of closure due to security concerns following the September 11 attacks.
2009 – The first of four days of bombings begins on the southern Philippine island group of Mindanao.
2010 – U.S. Army Gen. David Petraeus took command of the Afghan war, acknowledging the "tough fight" ahead for NATO forces while pledging "We are in this to win."
2012 – The discovery of particles consistent with the Higgs boson at the Large Hadron Collider is announced at CERN.
2013 – The Death of Hung Chung-chiu: A Republic of China Army corporal dies under suspicious circumstances while serving a detention sentence during his enlisted service.
2013 – The Statue of Liberty reopened to the public nine months after it was closed because of damage caused by Hurricane Sandy.
2014 – Russian President Vladimir Putin, in a U.S. Independence Day message to President Barack Obama, called for better relations between the two countries "despite the current differences and difficulties."
2015 – Tupou VI is officially crowned as the King of Tonga.
Saints' Days and Holy Days
Traditional Western
Within the Octave of the Apostles.
Contemporary Western
Anglican, Episcopal, Lutheran
Eastern Orthodox
Saints
Saint Andrew of Crete, archbishop (712)
Venerable Martha, mother of Symeon Stylites the Younger (554)
Hieromartyr, Theodore of Cyrene, Bishop of Cyrene in Libya
and those martyrs with him
Saint Andrei Rublev, iconographer (1430)
Holy Royal Martyrs of Russia: Tsar Nicholas II, Tsaritsa Alexandra,Crown Prince Alexei, and Grand duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria,
and Anastasia, and those martyred with them (1918)
Burial of prince Andrei I Bogolyubsky
Pre-Schism Western Saints
St. Finbar, Abbot of Innis-Doimhle (most likely present-day Inch,
Co. Wexford), Ireland.
Co. Wexford), Ireland.
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