August 1
Today is
Lammas Day in England and Scotland, celebrating the wheat harvest.
In the Northern Hemisphere, today is
Lughnasadh, marking the beginning of the harvest season.
30 BC –
Octavian (later known as Augustus) enters Alexandria, Egypt, bringing it under the control of the Roman Republic.
1620 – The
Speedwell leaves
Delfshaven to bring pilgrims to America by way of England.
1715 – The
Riot Act comes into force in England.
1800 – The
Acts of Union 1800 are passed which merge the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
1831 – A new
London Bridge opens.
1911 –
Harriet Quimby takes her pilot's test and becomes the first U.S. woman to earn an Aero Club of America aviator's certificate.
1964, Billboard Magazine reported that the
harmonica was making a comeback in a big way thanks to its use by Stevie Wonder, The Rolling Stones, The Beatles and Bob Dylan.
1966 – Charles Whitman
kills 16 people at the University of Texas at Austin before being killed by the police.
1971, The
Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour started on prime time American TV. By this time,
Sonny and Cher had stopped producing hit singles so the duo decided to sing and tell jokes in nightclubs across the country. CBS head of programming
Fred Silverman saw them one evening and offered them their own show.
1981 – MTV begins broadcasting in the United States and airs its first video, "
Video Killed the Radio Star" by The Buggles.
1993 – The
Great Mississippi and Missouri Rivers Flood of 1993 comes to a peak.
2004 – A
supermarket fire kills 396 people and injures 500 others in Asunción, Paraguay.
2007 – The
I-35W Mississippi River bridge, spanning the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, Minnesota, collapses during the evening rush hour.
Births
10 BC – Claudius; 1659 – Sebastiano Ricci
; 1770 – William Clark (Lewis & Clark); 1779 – Francis Scott Key
; 1809 – William B. Travis (Remember the Alamo?); 1819 – Herman Melville; 1843 – Robert Todd Lincoln; 1912 – Henry Jones; 1930 – Lawrence Eagleburger; 1931 – Ramblin' Jack Elliott♪ ♫; 1933 – Dom DeLuise; 1936 – Yves Saint Laurent; 1942 – Jerry Garcia♪ ♫; 1944 – Andrew G. Vajna; 1946 – Boz Burrell♪ ♫; 1951 – Tim Bachman♪ ♫(BTO); 1951 – Tommy Bolin♪ ♫(Deep Purple, James Gang);
1953 – Robert Cray♪ ♫
; 1957 – Taylor Negron; 1959 – Joe Elliott♪ ♫(Def Leppard); 1960 – Chuck D♪ ♫(Public Enemy), Professor Griff♪ ♫(Public Enemy); 1961 – Brad Faxon; 1963 – Coolio♪ ♫; 1964 – Adam Duritz♪ ♫(Counting Crows); 1978 – Dhani Harrison♪ ♫(George Harrison's son); 1979 – Jason Momoa (GoT)
Deaths
30 BC – Mark Antony; 1903 – Calamity Jane; 1966 – Charles Whitman; 1970 – Frances Farmer; 1977 – Francis Gary Powers; 1980 – Strother Martin; 1981 – Paddy Chayefsky; 2006 – Bob Thaves (creator
Frank & Ernest); 2009 – Corazon Aquino; 2015 – Cilla Black♪ ♫