356 BC – The Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, is destroyed by arson.
1568 – Eighty Years’ War: Battle of Jemmingen: Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alva defeats Louis of Nassau.
1645 – Qing dynasty regent Dorgon issues an edict ordering all Han Chinese men to shave their forehead and braid the rest of their hair into a queue identical to those of the Manchus.
1718 – The Treaty of Passarowitz between the Ottoman Empire, Austria and the Republic of Venice is signed.
1865 – In the market square of Springfield, Missouri, Wild Bill Hickok shoots and kills Davis Tutt in what is regarded as the first western showdown.
1873 – At Adair, Iowa, Jesse James and the James-Younger Gang pull off the first successful train robbery in the American Old West.
1904 – Louis Rigolly, a Frenchman, becomes the first man to break the 100 mph (161 km/h) barrier on land. He drove a 15-liter Gobron-Brillié in Ostend, Belgium.
1919 – The dirigible Wingfoot Air Express crashes into the Illinois Trust and Savings Building in Chicago, killing 12 people.
In Springfield, Missouri,1865, a dispute over gambling debts lead Wild Bill Hickok to engage in a quick-draw duel with gambler Davis Tutt. The gunfight helped give rise to the legend of the Wild West showdown.
1925 – In Dayton, Tennessee, high school biology teacher John T. Scopes is found guilty of teaching evolution in class and fined $100.
1959 – Elijah Jerry “Pumpsie” Green becomes the first African-American to play for the Boston Red Sox, the last team to integrate. He came in as a pinch runner for Vic Wertz and stayed in as shortstop in a 2-1 loss to the Chicago White Sox.
1969 – At 02:56 UTC, astronaut Neil Armstrong becomes the first person to walk on the Moon.
1972 – The Troubles: Bloody Friday: The Provisional IRA detonate 22 bombs in central Belfast, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom in the space of 80 minutes, killing nine and injuring 130.
1973 – In Lillehammer, Norway, Mossad agents kill a waiter whom they mistakenly thought was involved in the 1972 Munich Olympics Massacre.
1976 – Christopher Ewart-Biggs, the British ambassador to the Republic of Ireland, is assassinated by the Provisional IRA.
1977 – The start of the four-day-long Libyan-Egyptian War.
1983 – The world’s lowest temperature in an inhabited location is recorded at Vostok Station, Antarctica at −89.2 °C (−128.6 °F).
2008 – Ram Baran Yadav is declared the first president of Nepal.
2011 – NASA’s Space Shuttle program ends with the landing of Space Shuttle Atlantis on mission STS-135 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.
2012 – Erden Eruç completes the first solo human-powered circumnavigation of the world.
Births
1899 – Ernest Hemingway, author ~ Nobel prize 1954
1951 – Robin Williams, actor and comedian
Deaths
1796 – Robert Burns, Scottish poet (Auld Lang Syne)