August 6, 2016

210 years ago
1806

Europeana
The Holy Roman Empire ended with the abdication of Emperor Francis II.

125 years ago
1891

Born on this date
William Slim, 1st Viscount Slim. U.K. military officer. Governor-General of Australia, 1953-1960. Field Marshal Slim saw action in both World Wars, serving with the Anzacs and the Indian Army in World War I, and commanding the Burma Corps in World War II. Viscount Slim died on December 14, 1970 at the age of 79.

100 years ago
1916

Born on this date
Richard Hofstadter. U.S. historian. Dr. Hofstadter taught at Columbia University for many years, and was known for his emphasis on ideas and political culture. He won Pulitzer Prizes for his books The Age of Reform (1955) and Anti-intellectualism in American Life (1963); his other books included Social Darwinism in American Thought, 1860–1915 (1944); The American Political Tradition and the Men Who Made It (1948); and The Paranoid Style in American Politics (1964). Dr. Hofstadter died of leukemia on October 24, 1970 at the age of 54.

Dom Mintoff. Prime Minister of Malta, 1955-1958, 1971-1984. Mr. Mintoff led the Malta Labour Party from 1949-1984, and served as Prime Minister before and after Malta achieved independence from Great Britain in 1964. His time as Prime Minister was characterized by the establishment of a welfare state. Mr. Mintoff left office as Prime Minister on December 22, 1984, but retained his seat in Parliament until 1998. He died on August 20, 2012, two weeks after his 96th birthday.

90 years ago
1926

At the movies
Don Juan, starring John Barrymore, received its premiere screening at Warners' Theatre in New York City. The premiere marked the first use of Warner Brothers' Vitaphone sound-on-disc sound system with a synchronized musical score and sound effects.

Swimming
Gertrude Ederle became the first woman to swim across the English Channel, accomplishing the feat in 14 hours 31 minutes.

75 years ago
1941

Died on this date
Elwyn Hargraves; Ned Turman. U.S. soldiers. Sergeant Hargraves and Mr. Turman, a Negro draftee, were killed, and three military policemen were wounded, in a gun battle at the U.S. Army base at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

War
General Wladyslaw Anders, who had been released from a Soviet prison camp, was appointed commander of a Polish army to be raised in Russia. Two Germans who were allegedly landed by seaplane off the British coast were executed as spies at Wandsworth Prison in London. A Japanese spokesman said that the United States was threatening Japan by seeking Soviet support for an encirclement plan. U.K. Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden told the House of Commons that any Japanese action against Thailand "would be a matter of concern" to Britain "as a threat to the security of Singapore." U.S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull said that Japanese occupation of Thailand would bear directly upon the problem of American security. The Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano claimed that Pope Pius XII had helped to bring about an armistice in the border war between Ecuador and Peru.

Defense
The U.S. Senate voted against extending the service of draftees to a total of two years; interventionists argued that draftees may have to be in the Army for five years. The Senate voted 57-19 to override President Franklin D. Roosevelt's veto of the $320-million defense highway bill, which would apportion the money among states instead of according to military needs.

Politics and government
The Ecuadorian Congress voted unlimited economic and military powers, including censorship, to President Carlos Arroyo del Rio for the period of the present extraordinary and the next ordinary session of Congress.

Education
Georgia Governor Eugene Talmadge appointed a five-man committee to weed out all public school textbooks that advocated racial equality, Nazism, Communism, Fascism, or socialism.

70 years ago
1946

Died on this date
Tony Lazzeri, 42. U.S. baseball player. Mr. Lazzeri was a second baseman with the New York Yankees (1926-1937); Chicago Cubs (1938); Brooklyn Dodgers (1939); and New York Giants (1939), batting .292 with 178 home runs and 1,191 runs batted in in 1,740 games. He was a member of World Series championship teams in 1927, 1928, 1932, 1936, and 1937. On May 24, 1936, "Poosh 'Em Up Tony" became the first major league player to hit 2 grand slams in the same game, and drove in 11 runs, an American league record that still stands. Mr. Lazzeri was an epileptic, but never had a seizure on the field; he died of a reported heart attack, although it was also said that he had suffered a seizure and fallen down the stairs at his home and broken his neck. Mr. Lazzeri was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1991.

War
Chinese Nationalist and Communist representatives at the Truce Executive headquarters in Peking agreed to a truce in the western provinces of Hupeh, Honan, and Shansi.

Politics and government
U.S. Representative John Sparkman (Democrat--Alabama) was chosen in the state Democratic primary to complete the U.S. Senate term of the late John Bankhead. Democrats in Virginia renominated U.S. Senator Harry Byrd in the state primary and named Porter Hardy, Jr. and Thomas Stanley candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives.

Society
The British government of Prime Minister Clement Attlee introduced a "bonuses for babies" program under the Family Allowance Act, designed to increase the birth rate at a weekly cost of $4 million.

Transportation
The U.S. National Safety Council announced that 18 American airlines had completed their 1945 schedules with no fatal accidents.

60 years ago
1956

On television tonight
After going bankrupt in 1955, the DuMont Television Network made its final network broadcast, a boxing match from St. Nicholas Arena in New York in the Boxing from St. Nicholas Arena series.

War
U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles warned President Dwight Eisenhower that Western use of force against Egypt would entail possible war with the entire Arab world.

Diplomacy
The People's Republic of China cabled offers of visas to 15 American newsmen who had requested them. The U.S. State Department said that the United States would continue to bar travel to Communist China on U.S. passports under criminal statute penalties.

Politics and government
Hernan Siles Zuazo took office as President of Bolivia, succeeding Victor Paz Estenssoro.

Labour
The Suez Canal Company gave its workers until August 15 to choose between loyalty to their contracts and collaboration with the "de facto authority" of the Egyptian government.

50 years ago
1966

Hit parade
#1 single in Australia (Kent Music Report): Wild Thing--The Troggs (2nd week at #1)

#1 single in France: Ton Nom--Salvatore Adamo (7th week at #1)

#1 single in Italy (FIMI): Tema--I Giganti (6th week at #1)

#1 single in West Germany (Media Control): Strangers in the Night--Frank Sinatra

#1 single in the Netherlands (De Nederlandse Top 40): Sunny Afternoon--The Kinks (4th week at #1)

#1 single in the U.K. (New Musical Express): With a Girl Like You--The Troggs

#1 single in the U.S.A. (Billboard): Wild Thing--The Troggs (2nd week at #1)

U.S.A. Top 10 (Cash Box)
1 Lil' Red Riding Hood--Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs
2 They're Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-Haaa!--Napoleon XIV
3 Wild Thing--The Troggs
4 Summer in the City--The Lovin' Spoonful
5 Mother's Little Helper--The Rolling Stones
6 The Pied Piper--Crispian St. Peters
7 I Saw Her Again--The Mamas and the Papas
8 Hanky Panky--Tommy James and the Shondells
9 Sweet Pea--Tommy Roe
10 Sunny--Bobby Hebb

Singles entering the chart were Wouldn't it be Nice (#57)/God Only Knows (#74) by the Beach Boys; The Dangling Conversation by Simon and Garfunkel (#61); Say I Am (What I Am) by Tommy James and the Shondells (#63); Go Ahead and Cry by the Righteous Brothers (#64); Respectable by the Outsiders (#78); With a Girl Like You by the Troggs (#82); Sugar and Spice by the Cryan' Shames (#88); Livin' Above Your Head by Jay & the Americans (#90); I'm Your Hoochie Cooche Man (Part 1) by Jimmy Smith (#93); I Want to Be with You by Dee Dee Warwick (#94); Ain't Nobody Home by Howard Tait (#96); Lonely Summer by the Shades of Blue (#99); Dear Mrs. Applebee by Flip Cartridge (#100); Mr. Dieingly Sad by the Critters (also #100); and Love Attack by James Carr (also #100). I Want to Be with You was originally from the Broadway musical Golden Boy (1964).

Died on this date
Cordwainer Smith, 53. U.S. author. Dr. Smith, born Paul Linebarger, was a scholar in East Asian studies, and was involved with the U.S. Army's Office of War Information, literally writing--under his real name--the textbook Psychological Warfare (1948). Dr. Smith was best known for the novel Norstrilia (1975--originally published in two volumes in 1964 and 1968) and the short story collection The Rediscovery of Man (1993). Dr. Smith died of a heart attack.

Married on this date
Luci Baines Johnson, youngest daughter of U.S. President Lyndon Johnson, married Patrick J. Nugent of Waukegan, Illinois in the Roman Catholic Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington.







Personal
This blogger took his first plane ride, a DC-9 flight from Edmonton to Vancouver.

Europeana
Ponte Salazar, Europe's longest suspension bridge, opened near Lisbon. The bridge measured 7,472 feet from anchorage to anchorage, with the main span covering 3,323 feet.

Politics and government
Lieutenant General Rene Barrientos Ortuno, elected July 3, was inaugurated as President of Bolivia.

40 years ago
1976

Hit parade
#1 single in New Zealand: Shannon--Henry Gross (2nd week at #1)

#1 single in West Germany (Media Control): Ein Bett im Kornfeld--Jürgen Drews (2nd week at #1)

#1 single in Switzerland: Die kleine Kneipe--Peter Alexander (2nd week at #1)

30 years ago
1986

Hit parade
#1 single in Sweden (Topplistan): Touch Me (I Want Your Body)--Samantha Fox (5th week at #1)

Weather
A low-pressure system that redeveloped off the New South Wales coast dumped a record 328 millimetres (13 inches) of rain in a day on Sydney, Australia.

Politics and government
Social Credit Party leader Bill Vander Zalm was sworn in as Premier of British Columbia, replacing the retiring Bill Bennett.

25 years ago
1991

Died on this date
Roland Michener, 91. Governor General of Canada, 1967-1974. Mr. Michener began his political career in provincial politics in Ontario before entering federal politics as a Progressive Conservative. He represented the Toronto riding of St. Paul's in the House of Commons from 1953-1962, and served as the Speaker of the House of Commons from 1957-1962. Mr. Michener was appointed Canada's High Commissioner to India in July 1964 and Ambassador to Nepal in January 1965. He was recalled to Canada to become Governor General after the death in office of Georges Vanier. Mr. Michener was the first Canadian Governor General to undertake state visits abroad, which were very successful. He was known for promoting physical fitness, and at the age of 80 climbed to the top of the mountain in Alberta that was named in his honour.

Shapour Bakhtiar, 77. Prime Minister of Iran, 1979. Dr. Bakhtiar, a member of the National Front and an opponent of the excesses of Shah Reza Pahlevi, served as Prime Minister from January 4-February 11, 1979 during the last days of the Shah's regime. Dr. Bakhtiar declared Iran to be a republic and himself as the country's first President just before fleeing to exile in France upon the return to Iran and accession to power of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. The Islamic Republic of Iran issued a death sentence for Mr. Bakhtiar and finally carried it out; Dr. Bakhtiar and his secretary Soroush Katibeh were stabbed to death by three assassins in Dr. Bakhtiar's home in the Paris suburb of Suresnes.

Harry Reasoner, 68. U.S. journalist. Mr. Reasoner began his broadcasting career with CBS in 1948; he was one of the founders of the television newsmagazine program 60 Minutes in 1968. Mr. Reasoner moved to ABC in 1970, co-hosting the ABC Evening News until 1978, when he rejoined CBS and 60 Minutes. He made his last broadcast on May 19, 1991 and died in hospital reportedly after suffering a blood clot in a fall at his home. Mr. Reasoner won three Emmy Awards and a George Foster Peabody Award.

Environment
Canadian Environment Minister Jean Charest announced the creation of Aulavik National Park on Banks Island in the Northwest Territories.

Technology
Tim Berners-Lee released files describing his idea for the World Wide Web.

Politics and government
Ontario Premier Bob Rae recognized First Nations' right to self government, announcing that Ontario would devolve the following powers to each nation: policing; justice; medical care; education; and resources.

Takako Doi, chairman of the Social Democratic Party, became Japan's first female Speaker of the House of Representatives.

20 years ago
1996

Space
NASA announced that the ALH 84001 meteorite, thought to originate from Mars, contained evidence of primitive life forms.

War
Chechen rebels attacked Grozny and two other towns.

World events
Hundreds of Greek Cypriots tried to breach the buffer zone between themselves and rival Turks.

Politics and government
Catherine Callbeck, the first woman to be elected leader of a provincial government in Canada, announced her resignation as Premier of Prince Edward Island, pending the selection of a successor, after just 3½ years in office.

Labour
The Russian government ordered 10,000 striking miners in the Vladivostok region back to work; the miners had been on strike since July 15, demanding back pay.

Disasters
The death toll from an outbreak of food poisoning in Japan had reached 8, with 9,000 becoming ill since May. Everythng from meat to radish sprouts was suspected as the cause.