This date in history

[Jimbuna]

259 - St Dionysius elected as Pope, succeeding Sixtus II

[Aktungbby]

1914: At six o'clock in the evening, nearly one month after the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife by a young Gavrilo Princeps in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Baron Giesl von Gieslingen, ambassador of the Austro-Hungarian Empire to Serbia, delivers an ultimatum to the Serbian foreign ministry. The Balkan Wars are over... the Great War has just started..., 1984: 21-year-old Vanessa Williams gives up her Miss America title, the first resignation in the pageant's history, after Penthouse magazine declares to publish nude photos of the beauty queen in its September issue. A great career in show biz is actually launched! Move over Dillinger; Talk about 'ladies in Red' knockin'em dead! 1962: Avoiding a Cold war showdown, the U.S. and the Soviet Union sign an agreement guaranteeing a free and neutral Laos President John F.Kennedy issued a thinly veiled threat of direct U.S. intervention in Laos if the Soviet Union didn't quit aiding the communist Pathet Lao. To little avail: 1975: shortly after victory of communist North Vietnam over South Vietnam, the Pathet Lao took control in Laos, where a communist government is in power still. 1965: Lyndon B Johnson rejects his own advisors: no ultimatum of a 'National Emergency', which might piss off the Commies, in favor of a 'low key' approach to the growing political tarpit of Viet Nam.... and authorized a total of 44 U.S. battalions sent to Viet Nam...and a massive escalation of the war.

[Jimbuna]

1132 - Battle of Nocera between Ranulf II of Alife and Roger II of Sicily.

[Aktungbby]

Roger II didn't lose many; Nocera had been his first battle and he established himself as King of Sicily. A Norman by culture: By 1138 -PAYBACK- " Roger, now supported by Benevento, destroyed all the rebels' castles in the region, capturing an immense booty. Ranulf himself, who had taken refuge in Troia, his capital, was killed by a malaric fever on 30 April 1139. Later, Roger exhumed him from the Troian cathedral in which he was buried and threw him in a ditch, only to later repent and rebury him decently." Ahhh...Chivalry! OL' ROG II was king for 24 years and died at age 58 having united all Norman conquest in Italy and sent troops to the Second Crusade. He is buried at Palermo Cathedral...Mostly he notably loved money... and is ON the money!

[Jimbuna]

864 - The Edict of Pistres of Charles the Bald orders defensive measures against the Vikings.

[Aktungbby]

^Indeed!

[Aktungbby]

1956: the Andrea Doria collided with the Stockholm: going> Really Going> GONE>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Andrea_Doria

[Aktungbby]

1909: Louis Bleriot (#1!) crosses the English Channel from Calais to Dover 21 miles-three wheels and three cylinders; 36 minutes and 30 seconds: Le start> Le flight> Le finis>And walks away from the landing: Rule one! with the 1,000 pound prize.

[Jimbuna]

657 - Battle of Siffinduring the first Muslim civil war between Ali ibn Abi Talib and Muawiyah I in Syria.

[Aktungbby]

Battle of Ṣiffīn, (May–July 657) , series of negotiations and skirmishes during the first Muslim civil war in northern Syria, ending in the arbitration of Adhruḥ (February 658–January 659), which undermined the authority of Ali as fourth caliph and prepared for the establishment of the Umayyad Dynasty." Here's the real rub IMHO:
"The hero of the battle began to bring on victory when Amr al-Aas on Muawiya's side said, "Call the enemy to the Word of God."
Muawiya eagerly accepted these words and his men raised 500 copies (leaves?)of the Holy Qur'an on their spears, saying that the Holy Book would decide their differences. This trick had a strange effect on some people in the army of Imam Ali, who dropped their weapons and agreed that the Holy Qur'an should decide the matter." Now if I impaled the Holy Qur'an on my spear...I'd never hear the end of it Allah is not an equal opportunity impaler! Nothing changes in that 'neck of the woods'...er desert! Urdu with subtitles-they still make movies about it!

[Aktungbby]

1878: Wyatt Earp, Retired horse thief and convicted pimp, now deputy Marshall, attempting to preserve the peace in Dodge City with Jim Masterson shoots and fatally wounds George Hoy (victim#1) in Wichita KS. 1908: the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is born when U.S. Attorney General Charles Bonaparte orders a group of newly hired federal investigators to report to the Department of Justice. One year later, the Office of the Chief Examiner was renamed the Bureau of Investigation, and in 1935 it became the Federal Bureau of Investigation. 1945: War with Japan still in progress, Winston Churchill is forced to resign as British prime minister following his party's electoral defeat by the Labour Party. It was the first general election held in Britain in more than a decade. The same day, Clement Attlee, the Labour leader, is sworn in as the new PM. 1953: The Castro brothers strike their first blow against the Batista government, Fidel and Raúl Castro planned a multi-pronged attack on military installations; the rebels unsuccessfully attacked military barracks. No matter: Fidel and his brother are still around; everyone else ...is NOT JFK on the matter:
"I believe that there is no country in the world including any and all the countries under colonial domination, where economic colonization, humiliation and exploitation were worse than in Cuba, in part owing to my country’s policies during the Batista regime. I approved the proclamation which Fidel Castro made in the Sierra Maestra, when he justifiably called for justice and especially yearned to rid Cuba of corruption. I will even go further: to some extent it is as though Batista was the incarnation of a number of sins on the part of the United States. Now we shall have to pay for those sins. In the matter of the Batista regime, I am in agreement with the first Cuban revolutionaries. That is perfectly clear."

— U.S. President John F. Kennedy, Bay of Pigs and the Cuban missile crises later? We still payin'!

[Jimbuna]

432 - St Celestine I ends his reign as Catholic Pope

[Jimbuna]

754 - Pope Stephen II, [III] makes Pippin de Korte, King of France

[Otto Fuhrmann]

Austro-Hungary declares war on Serbia - 100 years ago today.

[Aktungbby]

1540: Chief Minister, Thomas Cromwell is beheaded on the same day (treason?) that his boss, good King Henry VIII, marries his late wife's (Anne Boleyn-beheaded (treason?) cousin, teenaged Catherine Howard, also beheaded, age 19,(treason?)I635: Cyrano de Bergerac, a well-endowed duelist and playwright, dies, age 36 either from a botched assassination attempt(treason?) or confinement in an asylum...no one NOSE for sure!1794: Maximillien Robespierre, a firebrand of the French Revolution, goes to the (conspiracy against the Republic-treason?) Clearly politics is a sharp-edged business! and the French didn't rename the month of July Thermidor (heat) for nothing!