August 23
30 BC – After
the successful invasion of Egypt,
Octavian executes
Marcus Antonius Antyllus, eldest son of
Mark Antony, and
Caesarion, the last king of the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt and only child of
Julius Caesar and
Cleopatra.
79 –
Mount Vesuvius begins stirring, on the feast day of
Vulcan, the Roman god of fire. The next day turns out to be a complete, and total bummer.
1305 –
Sir William Wallace is executed for
high treason at Smithfield in London.
1382 – Siege of Moscow:
The Golden Horde led by khan
Tokhtamysh lays siege to the capital of the
Grand Duchy of Moscow.
1541 – French explorer
Jacques Cartier lands near
Quebec City in his third voyage to Canada.
1775 – American Revolutionary War:
King George III delivers his
Proclamation of Rebellion to the Court of St James's stating that the American colonies have proceeded to a state of open and avowed rebellion.
1784 – Western North Carolina (now eastern Tennessee) declares itself an
independent state under the name of Franklin; it is not accepted into the United States, and only lasts for four years.
1858 – The
Round Oak rail accident occurs in Brierley Hill in the
Black Country, England. It is 'Arguably the worst disaster ever to occur on British railways'.
1901 – Six hundred American school teachers,
Thomasites, arrived in Manila on the
USAT Thomas.
1904 – The automobile
tire chain is patented.
1921 –
British airship R-38 experiences structural failure over Hull in England and crashes in the Humber estuary. Of her 49 British and American training crew, only four survive.
1923 –
Captain Lowell Smith and Lieutenant John P. Richter performed the first mid-air refueling on
De Havilland DH-4B, setting an endurance flight record of 37 hours.
1927 – Italian anarchists
Sacco and Vanzetti are executed after a lengthy, controversial trial.
1942 – World War II: Beginning of the
Battle of Stalingrad.
1944 – World War II:
King Michael of Romania dismisses the pro-Nazi government of Marshal Antonescu, who is arrested. Romania switches sides from the Axis to the Allies.
1954 – First flight of the
C-130 Hercules transport aircraft.
1966 –
Lunar Orbiter 1 takes the first photograph of Earth from orbit around the Moon.
1967 - (speaking of the Moon...) Enjoying a wild birthday party,
Keith Moon, drummer with
The Who, drove his Lincoln car into a Holiday Inn swimming pool. As the party had become out of control, the police were called to put an end to the festivities. Moon, ever keen to avoid the boys in blue, sneaked outside and got into a
Lincoln Continental Limousine and attempted to make a getaway. Unfortunately, in his inebriated state he released the handbrake, and began rolling towards the pool. Moon simply sat back and waited, as the car crashed through the fence around the pool, and into the water.
1970 -
Lou Reed and the
Velvet Underground performed together for the last time at the New York Club '
Max's Kansas City'. Reed worked as a typist for his father for the next two years, at $40 per week.
1973 – A
bank robbery gone wrong in Stockholm, Sweden, turns into a hostage crisis; over the next five days the hostages begin to sympathize with their captors, leading to the term
"Stockholm syndrome".
1977 – The
Gossamer Condor wins the
Kremer prize for human powered flight.
1989 –
Singing Revolution: Two million people from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania stand on the Vilnius–Tallinn road, holding hands (
Baltic Way).
1,645 Australian domestic airline pilots resign after the airlines
threaten to fire them and sue them over a dispute.
1990 – Saddam Hussein appears on Iraqi state television with a number of Western "guests" (actually hostages) to try to prevent the
Gulf War.
1990 – West Germany and
East Germany announce that they will reunite on October 3.
2006 –
Natascha Kampusch, who had been abducted at the age of ten, escapes from her captor, after eight years of captivity.
2007 – The skeletal remains of Russia's last royal family members
Alexei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich of Russia, and his sister
Grand Duchess Anastasia are discovered near Yekaterinburg, Russia.
2011 – A magnitude
5.8 (class: moderate) earthquake occurs in Virginia. Damage occurs to monuments and structures in Washington D.C. and the resulted damage is estimated at $200 million–$300 million USD.
Libyan leader
Muammar Gaddafi is overthrown after the National Transitional Council forces take control of Bab al-Azizia compound during the Libyan Civil War.
Births
1754 – Louis XVI of France;
1785 – Oliver Hazard Perry; 1912 – Gene Kelly; 1917 – Tex Williams
; 1929 – Vera Miles; 1931 – Barbara Eden; 1932 – Mark Russell
; 1946 – Keith Moon
(The Who);
1947 – Rex Allen, Jr.♪ ♫; 1949 – Shelley Long, Rick Springfield♪ ♫; 1951 – Jimi Jamison♪ ♫(Survivor); 1951 – Queen Noor of Jordan; 1960 – Gary Hoey
; 1961 – Dean DeLeo
(Stone Temple Pilots); 1963 – Kenny Wallace
; 1969 – Jeremy Schaap (son of sportscaster Dick Schapp); 1970 – Jay Mohr, River Phoenix; 1976 – Scott Caan (
Hawaii Five-O, son of James Caan); 1978 – Kobe Bryant; 1988 – Jeremy Lin
Deaths
30 BC– Caesarion, Marcus Antonius Antyllus; 1305 – William Wallace; 1723 – Increase Mather;
1819 – Oliver Hazard Perry; 1926 – Rudolph Valentino (fullname (take a deep breath) Rodolfo Alfonso Raffaello Pierre Filibert Guglielmi di Valentina d'Antonguella, whew); 1927 – Nicola Sacco, Bartolomeo Vanzetti; 1960 – Oscar Hammerstein II♪ ♫; 1962 – Hoot Gibson; 2002 – Hoyt Wilhelm; 2005 – Brock Peters (
To Kill A Mockingbird); 2013 – Richard J. Corman (R.J. Corman Railroad)