July 2

It’s I Forgot Day and National Literacy Day and World UFO Day

ON THIS DAY…
1776 The Continental Congress adopts a resolution severing ties with Great Britain; wording of the formal Declaration of Independence is not approved until July 4
1777 Vermont becomes the first American state to abolish slavery
1819 The Factory Act is passed in Britain, creating restrictions on child labor
1823 “Bahia Independence Day” – the end of Portuguese rule in Brazil, with the final defeat of the diehard Portuguese crown loyalists in the province of Bahia
1843 An alligator falls from the sky during a Charleston, SC thunderstorm
1850 The first US patent for a gas mask with a self-contained breathing apparatus was issued to Benjamin J. Lane of Cambridge, MA for a “respiring apparatus”
1853 The Russian Army invades Turkey, beginning the Crimean War
1867 The first elevated railroad in the US opened for traffic in New York City; it ran along the curb line of Greenwich Street, between Battery Place and Dey Street
1869 The brig Novelty landed in Boston, MA with 84,075 gallons of molasses, shipped on a new principle – not in casks, but in bulk, in large tanks; the product arrived from Matanzas in excellent condition
1881 President James A. Garfield, waiting for a train in Washington, D.C., is shot by Charles Guiteau, a frustrated office-seeker; Garfield dies of his wounds on September 19
1889 To regulate commercial trusts and monopolies, Congress passes the Sherman Antitrust Act, which outlaws any “combination or conspiracy in restraint of trade”
1900 The first directed flight of a Zeppelin was made in Germany. LZ-1 was the first rigid airship to use a large internal metal frame containing multiple cells of hydrogen gas balloons
1903 Ed Delahanty, one of the great hitters of baseball’s early years, dies at age 35 when he is swept into Niagara Falls after being removed from a train for threatening other passengers
1922 A day before his 19th birthday, Ralph W. Samuelson became the first person to ride on water skis he had made as they are used today at Lake Pepin, MN
1934 The end of the Night of the Long Knives, with the death of the German Military Officer Ernst Röhm
1937 Pioneer aviator Amelia Earhart and navigator Frederick J. Noonan disappear without a trace in the South Pacific while attempting to fly around the world
1940 A US patent was issued to Enrico Fermi et al., for a process of producing radioactive substances
1940 The first pontoon bridge of reinforced concrete in the US was dedicated watched by a crowd of 2,000. Construction on the Lake Washington Floating Bridge, Seattle, WA
1941 Nazi massacre of Jews in Lutsk, Ukraine – Jewish men were summoned for work, about 2000 of them were taken to the Lubart Fortress and murdered
1947 An object speculated to be a UFO crashes near Roswell, NM, though the United States Air Force claims it is a weather balloon
1953 Houdini starring Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh opens in US movie theaters
1958 King Creole starring Elvis Presley opens in US movie theaters
1962 The first Wal-Mart store opens for business in Rogers, AR
1964 President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits segregation and discrimination based on sex, race, color, religion, or national origin
1966 The French military explode their nuclear test bomb codenamed Aldébaran in Mururoa, their first nuclear test in the Pacific
1971 Shaft starring Richard Roundtress opens in US movie theaters
1976 North and South Vietnam, divided since 1954, reunite to form the Socialist Republic of Vietnam
1979 The first US coin to honor a woman, the Susan B. Anthony dollar, is introduced
1982 Larry Walters of Southern California uses 45 helium balloons and a lawn chair to propel himself to 16,000 feet
1986 The movies About Last Night…, Big Trouble in Little China, The Great Mouse Detective, Psycho III and Under the Cherry Moon all open in US theaters
1997 Barry Sonnenfeld’s Men in Black starring Tommy Lee Jones, Will Smith and Vincent D’Onofrio opens in US movie theaters
2001 Doctors at Jewish Hospital in Louisville, KY implanted the first self-contained, mechanical heart replacement into 59-year-old Robert Tools
2002 Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly solo around the world nonstop in a balloon
2005 Ten Live 8 concerts are held around the world in an attempt to force G8 countries to address poverty
2008 The movies Kit Kittredge: An American Girl and Hancock open in US theaters

BORN:
1847 Marcel-Alexandre Bertrand, geologist who introduced the theory that certain mountains, in particular the Alps, were formed by folding of the Earth’s crust
1906 Hans Albrecht Bethe, theoretical physicist who helped to shape classical physics into quantum physics and increased the understanding of the atomic processes responsible for the properties of matter and of the forces governing the structures of atomic nuclei
1916 Barry Gray, radio personality who is generally considered the father of the “call-in” radio format
1916 Ken Curtis, actor (Gunsmoke, The Yellow Rose, Louis L’Amour’s Conagher, Disney’s Robin Hood, The Alamo, The Killer Shrews)
1927 Brock Peters, actor (Carmen Jones, Porgy and Bess, To Kill a Mockingbird, Major Dundee, Soylent Green)
1932 Dave Thomas, restaurateur and philanthropist; the founder and chief executive officer of Wendy’s Old Fashioned Hamburgers, a fast-food restaurant
1937 Polly Holiday, actress (Alice, Flo, W.W. and the Dixie Dancekings, Gremlins, Mrs. Doubtfire, Mr. Wrong)
1946 Ron Silver, actor (The West Wing, Ali, Veronica’s Closet, Chicago Hope, Timecop, Silkwood, Semi-Tough)
1947 Larry David, actor and Emmy Award-winning writer and producer (Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Fridays)
1970 Yancy Butler, actress (Doomsday Man, Witchblade, As the World Turns, Brooklyn South)
1986 Lindsay Lohan, actress (Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen, Freaky Friday, The Parent Trap, Herbie Fully Loaded)

DIED:
1566 Nostradamus (Michel de Nostredame), apothecary and reputed seer who published collections of prophecies that have since become famous world-wide, dies at 62
1788 Bathsheba Spooner, the first woman to be executed in the United States by Americans rather than the British dies at 34
1961 Ernest Hemingway, novelist, short-story writer, journalist and Nobel Prize laureate commits suicide by way of shotgun to the face in Ketchum, ID at the age of 61
1973 Betty Grable, singer, dancer, actress and pin-up icon (College Swing, Million Dollar Legs, Tin Pan Alley, Footlight Serenade, How to Marry a Millionaire), dies at 56
1991 Lee Remick, actress (The Omen, Anatomy of a Murder, Days of Wine and Roses, Loot, Telefon), dies at 55
1993 Fred Gwynne, character actor (The Munsters, Shadows and Fog, Pet Sematary, Car 54 Where Are You?), dies at 66
1997 James Stewart, Academy Award-winning actor (The Philadelphia Story, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It’s a Wonderful Life, Harvey, Anatomy of a Murder), dies at 89
1999 Mario Puzo, author, known for his novels about the Mafia, especially The Godfather, dies at 78