Today in History ~ July 25

306 – Constantine I is proclaimed Roman emperor by his troops.

1261 – The city of Constantinople is recaptured by Nicaean forces under the command of Alexios Strategopoulos, re-establishing the Byzantine Empire.

1467 – The Battle of Molinella: The first battle in Italy in which firearms are used extensively.

1609 – The English ship Sea Venture, en route to Virginia, is deliberately driven ashore during a storm at Bermuda to prevent its sinking; the survivors go on to found a new colony there.

1788 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completes his Symphony No. 40 in G minor (K550).

1792 – The Brunswick Manifesto is issued to the population of Paris promising vengeance if the French royal family is harmed.

1861 – American Civil War: The United States Congress passes the Crittenden-Johnson Resolution, stating that the war is being fought to preserve the Union and not to end slavery.

1866 – Congress passes legislation authorizing the rank of General of the Army. Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant becomes the first to be promoted to this rank.

1868 – The Wyoming Territory is established.

	In 1982, Svetlana Savitskaya became the second woman in space and, in 1984 became the first woman to perform a spacewalk. (The first woman in space was Valentina Tereshkova who was launched with the Vostok 6 mission in 1963)

1898 – In the Puerto Rican Campaign, the United States seizes Puerto Rico from Spain.

1917 – Sir Robert Borden introduces the first income tax in Canada as a “temporary” measure (lowest bracket is 4% and highest is 25%).

1946 – Nuclear weapons testing: Operation Crossroads: An atomic bomb is detonated underwater in the lagoon of Bikini Atoll.

1956 – Forty-five miles south of Nantucket Island, the Italian ocean liner SS Andrea Doria collides with the MS Stockholm in heavy fog and sinks the next day, killing 51.

1965 – Bob Dylan goes electric at the Newport Folk Festival, signaling a major change in folk and rock music.

1976 – Viking program: Viking 1 takes the famous Face on Mars photo.

1978 – Birth of Louise Joy Brown, the first human to have been born after conception by in vitro fertilisation, or IVF.

1984 – Salyut 7 cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskayabecomes the first woman to perform a space walk.

1562 – Katō Kiyomasa, Japanese warlord (d. 1611)

1750 – Henry Knox, First US Secretary of War (d. 1806)

1844 – Thomas Eakins, painter, sculptor, and photographer (d. 1916)

1870 – Maxfield Parrish, American painter and illustrator (d. 1966)

1915 – Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., American lieutenant and pilot (d. 1944)

1956 – Andy Goldsworthy, English-Scottish sculptor and photographer

1011 – Ichijō, emperor of Japan (b. 980)

1790 – William Livingston, First Governor of New Jersey (b. 1723)

1966 – Frank O’Hara, American poet and critic (b. 1926)

1989 – Steve Rubell,  co-owner of Studio 54 (b. 1943)