On July 26th...

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Independence Day (Liberia)

1471 Pope Paul II died.

1519 Francisco Pizarro received a royal charter for the west coast of South America.

1581 The Netherlands declared its independence.

1739 American politician George Clinton was born.

1775 The United States Post Office was created.

1788 New York became the 11th state to ratify the Constitution.

1790 The U.S. Congress passed the Assumption Bill, making the U.S. responsible for state debts.

1803 The Surrey Iron Railway, arguably the world's first public railway, opened in south London.

1835 The first sugar cane plantation in Hawaii was begun.

1847 Liberia declared its independence.

1856 Playwright George Bernard Shaw was born.

1863 Sam Houston, leader of Texas' independence movement, died.

1867 King Otho of Greece died.

1875 Psychologist Carl Jung was born.

1894 Novelist and essayist Aldous Leonard Huxley was born.

1895 Actress Gracie Allen was born.

1903 U.S. Senator Estes Kefauver was born.

1908 The Federal Bureau of Investigation was established.

1909 Actress Vivian Vance was born.

1922 Film director Blake Edwards was born.
1922 Actor Jason Robards was born.

1925 American politician William Jennings Bryan died.

1926 American politician Robert Todd Lincoln died.

1928 Film director Stanley Kubrick was born.

1940 Singer Dobie Gray was born.

1943 Singer Mick Jagger was born.

1945 The Allies issued the Potsdam Declaration.

1947 The National Military Establishment (now the U.S. Department of Defense) was established.
1947 The Central Intelligence Agency was established.

1948 President Harry Truman ordered the desegregation of all U.S. forces.

1949 Drummer Roger Taylor was born.

1952 King Farouk I of Egypt abdicated.
1952 Evita Peron, former First Lady of Argentina, died.

1956 Figure skater Dorothy Hamill was born.

1957 Guatemalan President Carlos Castillo Armas was assassinated by a palace guard.

1958 Commanders Malcolm Ross and Morton Lee Lewis set a new endurance record for flights into the stratosphere.
1958 Nine-year-old Prince Charles of the United Kingdom was named Prince of Wales by his mother, Queen Elizabeth II.
1958 Typhoon Alice struck Japan's main island and killed 41 persons.

1959 Actor Kevin Spacey was born.

1963 A massive earthquake devastated Skoplje, Yugoslavia, killing over 1,000 persons.
1963 Syncom II, the first synchronous satellite, was successfully launched from Cape Canaveral.

1964 Actress Sandra Bullock was born.

1978 Pete Rose set a new National League record by hitting safely in his 38th consecutive game.

1984 George Gallup, founder of the Gallup Poll, died.

1987 Journalist Frank Marshall Davis died.

2005 STS-114 Discovery became the first scheduled space shuttle launch since the Challenger disaster of 2003.

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This page was last updated on April 17, 2018.