On this date...

Lincoln Douglas Debates

In 1776, Suspense hangs over New York. Brigadier General William Livingston writes to Washington in “utmost haste.” A spy sent to Staten Island has returned with alarming news: The British are ready to strike, perhaps “this night at farthest.” 

In 1776, A violent storm bursts over New York City, lightning and thunder crashing almost without pause. Houses catch fire. Soldiers are struck down, including 10 men killed in a single flash. To those waiting for battle, the storm feels like an omen.

In 1793, prominent Philadelphia physician Benjamin Rush alerts the city’s mayor to a rapidly emerging yellow fever epidemic. By the time the epidemic ended, some 5,000 people had died.

In 1831, Nat Turner, an enslaved Black American, began a rebellion that killed between 55 and 60 white Virginians before being stopped by a 3,000-man militia.

In 1856, America’s first consul to Japan, Townsend Harris, arrived in Shimoda (traditional Japanese date: July 21, 1856)

In 1858, Debates between Abraham Lincoln, Republican Party nominee for the U.S. Senate, and incumbent Senator Stephen A. Douglas of the Democratic Party began; their focus was the question of whether slavery was to be extended to America’s western territories.

In 1863, The vicious guerrilla war in Missouri spills over into Kansas and precipitates one of the most appalling acts of violence during the war when Southern partisans raid the abolitionist town of Lawrence, Kansas and murder 150 men.

In 1888, American inventor William Seward Burroughs patents the adding machine.

In 1897, Ransom Eli Olds of Lansing, Michigan, founded Olds Motor Vehicle Company, which will later become Olds Motor Werks and then Oldsmobile.

In 1912, Arthur R. Eldred of Oceanside, New York, achieved the rank of Eagle Scout, the highest rank in the Boy Scouts of America. He was the first person to earn the award. He did not receive the badge until September 2 (Labor Day), as it had not yet been made.

In 1931, Yankees slugger Babe Ruth became the first MLB player to hit 600 career home runs as NY defeated the St. Louis Browns 11-7 at Sportsman’s Park

In 1942, the animated film Bambi had its theatrical release in the United States, and it became a classic in the Disney canon, noted for its lush hand-drawn animation and sensitive affective narrative.

In 1944, representatives from the United States, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and China met in the Dumbarton Oaks estate at Georgetown, Washington, D.C., to formulate the formal principles of an organization that would provide collective security on a worldwide basis. This organization would become the United Nations.

In 1950, officials of the United States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA) accepted Althea Gibson into their annual championship at Forest Hills, New York, making her the first African American player to compete in a U.S. national tennis competition.

In 1955, Chicago teenager Emmett Till arrives in Money, Mississippi, to visit relatives, a week before he is murdered.

In 1959, Hawaii became the 50th US state.

In 1961, American country singer Patsy Cline records struggling songwriter Willie Nelson’s song “Crazy” in Nashville, Tennessee.

In 1968, the Democratic Convention opens in Chicago and nominates Hubert Humphrey.

In 1968, PFC James Anderson Jr. is the first African American Marine to receive the Medal of Honor in the Vietnam War.

In 1971, Antiwar protesters associated with the Catholic Left raided draft offices in Buffalo, New York, and Camden, New Jersey, to confiscate and destroy draft records. The FBI and local police, tipped off by an informant, arrested 25 protesters, including two Catholic priests, in the midst of destroying and removing draft files. The FBI said the raiders had blackened their faces, worn dark clothes, and were in possession of burglars’ tools when they were arrested.

In 1974, the Equal Educational Opportunities Act was enacted. The new law addressed civil rights issues in education, barring states from discriminating against students based on gender, race, color, or national origin and requiring public schools to provide for students who do not speak English.

In 1980, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals was incorporated by animal rights advocates Ingrid Newkirk and Alex Pacheco.

In 1987, the romantic drama Dirty Dancing, starring Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey, was released in American theaters, and it became a huge—and enduring—hit.

In 1992, an 11-day siege began at the cabin of white separatist Randy Weaver in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, as government agents tried to arrest Weaver for failing to appear in court on charges of selling two illegal sawed-off shotguns; on the first day of the siege, Weaver’s teenage son, Samuel, and Deputy U.S. Marshal William Degan were killed.

In 1993, in a serious setback for NASA, engineers lost contact with the Mars Observer spacecraft as it was about to reach the red planet on a $980 million mission.

In 2008, Striker Carli Lloyd scores in extra time as the United States beats Brazil 1-0 to win the women’s football (soccer) gold medal at the Beijing Olympics.

In 2015, a trio of Americans, U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Spencer Stone, National Guardsman Alek Skarlatos, and college student Anthony Sadler, and a British businessman, Chris Norman, tackled and disarmed a Moroccan gunman on a high-speed train between Amsterdam and Paris.

In 2016, Greenville, South Carolina, police investigated reports of creepy clowns hanging around a local apartment complex, trying to lure kids into the woods. The story gained worldwide attention and set off a “killer clown panic” across the U.S.

In 2017, Americans witnessed their first full-blown coast-to-coast solar eclipse since World War I, with eclipse-watchers gathering along a path of totality extending 2,600 miles across the continent.

In 2018, California Representative Duncan Hunter was indicted for using campaign funds for personal expenses, including holidays and a flight for a pet rabbit.

In 2018, Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer and fixer, pleaded guilty to campaign-finance violations and other charges; Cohen said Trump directed him to arrange the payment of hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal to fend off damage to his White House bid. (Trump was found guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to the payments in May 2024.)

In 2018, Paul Manafort, former Trump campaign chairman, was convicted on eight counts of fraud in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia.

In 2020, a former police officer who became known as the Golden State Killer, Joseph James DeAngelo, told victims and family members in a Sacramento courtroom that he was “truly sorry” before he was sentenced to multiple life prison sentences for a decade-long string of rapes and murders.