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Today is the 214th day of 2021 There are 151 days left in the year
TODAYS HIGHLIGHT
1920: Marcus Garvey, black leader and founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, reaches the height of his power as he presides at an international convention in New York City.
OTHER EVENTS
1776: Members of the Continental Congress begin adding their signatures to the United States Declaration of Independence.
1830: France's King Charles X abdicates after July Revolution against his conservative policies.
1876: Wild Bill Hickok - a frontiersman, marksman, gambler, and legend of the American West - is murdered in the city of Deadwood, in what is now South Dakota.
1928: Italy signs 20-year treaty of friendship with Ethiopia.
1934: Germany's President Paul von Hindenburg dies at age 87, and Adolf Hitler assumes the title of "Der Fuehrer".
1935: Britain passes the Government of India Act, separating Burma and Aden from India and granting self-government with a central legislature in New Delhi.
1939: Scientist Albert Einstein says in letter to United States President Franklin D Roosevelt that America should start an atomic research programme.
1943: A United States Navy patrol torpedo boat, PT-109, commanded by Lieutenant John F Kennedy, sinks after being hit by a Japanese destroyer off the Solomon Islands. Kennedy is credited with saving members of the crew.
1951: In an effort to slow down the influx of illegal immigrants to the United States, a Mexican-US migrant labour treaty is signed, bringing 300,000 Mexicans to work on US harvests.
1954: Brigadier General Herbert D Vogel was nominated by President Dwight D Eisenhower to be a member of the Tennessee Valley authority, replacing Chairman Gordon R Clapp.
1963: The United States tells United Nations it will halt all sales of military equipment to South Africa because of its apartheid policy.
1990: Iraq invades Kuwait and Saddam Hussein's subsequent refusal to withdraw his troops sparks the Persian Gulf War in which an international force led by the United States quickly defeats Iraq.
1992: At the Summer Olympics in Barcelona, American athlete Jackie Joyner-Kersee, considered by many to be the greatest female athlete ever, wins the heptathlon, becoming the first person to win the event in consecutive Games.
1995: King Fahd replaces his oil and finance ministers in Saudi Arabia's most significant leadership shake-up since he came to power in 1982.
1999: In India, 226 people die when two trains crash head-on in the predawn darkness near Gaisal, about 500 kilometres (310 miles) north of Calcutta.
2000: In Kashmir, Islamic guerrillas open fire on a crowd of unarmed Hindu pilgrims and Muslim porters during supper; the 24-hour wave of violence that follows leaves 101 dead.
2001: Muslim extremists seize 36 Filipinos on the southern Philippine island of Basilan; at least four are beheaded.
2002: Kazakh authorities sentence Galymzhan Zhakiyanov, founding member of the reform movement Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan (DCK), to seven years in prison for corruption and abuse of power.
2003: The United States State Department suspends two programmes that allowed foreign air travellers on certain routes to enter the country without a visa.
2005: Snipers and soldiers in green berets keep watch as King Fahd, one of the world's wealthiest monarchs, is laid to rest in Riyadh, Saudia Arabia.
2006: Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko says that he is nominating his former Orange Revolution foe, Viktor Yanukovych, to become prime minister.
2007: An overnight train derails in central Congo after its brakes failed, killing about 100 people.
2008:Two French humanitarian aid workers kidnapped on July 18 in Afghanistan are released.
2009: Nigerian Government forces hunt for surviving members of a radical Islamist sect after heavy fighting leaves at least 700 people dead and buildings and cars scorched.
2010: President Barack Obama hails this month's planned withdrawal of all US combat troops from Iraq - "as promised and on schedule" - as a major success despite deep doubts about the Iraqis' ability to police and govern their country.
2011: Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, 83 and ailing, goes on trial on charges of corruption and ordering the killing of protesters during the 18-day uprising that toppled him, and many Egyptians are celebrating the chance at retribution against a long-time authoritarian ruler.
2012: Kofi Annan announces his resignation as peace envoy to Syria and issues a blistering critique of world powers, bringing to a dramatic end a frustrating six-month effort to achieve even a temporary ceasefire as the country plunges into civil war.
2016: Chemist Ahmed H Zewail - who in 1999 became the first Egyptian and the first Arab to win a Nobel Prize in a science category (chemistry) - dies in Pasadena, California.
TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS
Edward A Freeman, English historian (1823-1892); Romulo Gallegos, Venezuelan president and novelist (1884-1969); Myrna Loy, US actress (1905-1993); James Baldwin, US author (1924-1987); Peter O'Toole, British actor (1932-2013); Isabel Allende, Chilean author (1942- ); Joanna Cassidy, US actress (1945- )
- AP