August 15
The American-built waterway across the Isthmus of Panama, to connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, is inaugurated with the passage of the U.S. vessel Ancon, a cargo and passenger ship. – 1914.
Emperor Hirohito broadcasts the news of Japan’s surrender to the Japanese people. In Japan’s Shinto religious tradition, the emperor was divine; his voice was the voice of a god. Hirohito said, “(Japan’s enemy) has begun to employ a most cruel bomb, the power of which to do damage is indeed incalculable.” – 1945.
The Woodstock Music Festival opens on a patch of farmland in White Lake, a hamlet in the upstate New York town of Bethel, which was host to more than of half a million festival-goers. – 1969.
August 16
While salmon-fishing near the Klondike River in Canada’s Yukon Territory, George Carmack reportedly spots nuggets of gold in a creek bed. His lucky discovery sparks the last great gold rush in the American West. News of the gold strike spread fast and over the next two years, as many as 50,000 would-be miners arrived in the region. – 1896.
August 17
Cleveland Indians shortstop Ray Chapman is struck in the temple by a ball pitched by Carl Mays of the New York Yankees. He dies 12 hours later. It was the first and only death as the result of a pitched ball in Major League Baseball history. – 1920.
A plane crash at Detroit Metropolitan Airport in Michigan kills 156 persons. A four-year-old girl was the sole survivor of the accident, which was caused by pilot error. – 1987.
U.S. president Bill Clinton becomes the first sitting president to testify before the Office of Independent Council as the subject of a grand-jury investigation. – 1998.
An earthquake in northwestern Turkey kills more than 17,000 individuals and leaves more than 250,000 homeless. The immense disaster exposed serious problems with government and building contractors in Turkey. – 1999.
August 18
The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution to guarantee women the right to vote, is ratified by Tennessee, for a two-thirds majority of state ratification necessary to make it the law of the land. – 1920.
The Yangtze River in China peaks during a horrible flood that kills 3.7 million individuals directly and indirectly over the next several months. Rice fields that dominated the landscape are destroyed and many perished from starvation and disease. It was perhaps the worst natural disaster of the 20th Century. – 1931.
August 19
The Iranian military, with the support and financial assistance of the United States government, overthrows the government of premier Mohammed Mosaddeq and reinstates the Shah of Iran. Iran remained a solid Cold War ally of the United States until a revolution ended the Shah’s rule in 1979. – 1953.
August 20
A dispatcher in the New York Times office sends the first telegram around the world by way of commercial service. After it goes more than 28,000 miles and relayed by 16 operators, the reply was received by the same operator 16.5 minutes later. – 1911.
A NASA rocket launches Voyager II, an unmanned 1,820-pound spacecraft, from Cape Canaveral, Fla.. It was to tour Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Aboard Voyager II was a 12-inch copper phonograph record called “Sounds of Earth.” It was intended as an introductory time capsule of Earth. – 1977.
August 21
Slave revolt led by Nat Turner begins in Southampton County, Va.. Turner’s rebellion was the largest slave revolt in U.S. history and led to a new wave of oppressive legislation prohibiting the movement, assembly, and education of slaves. – 1831.
U.S. senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois and Abraham Lincoln, a Kentucky-born lawyer and one-time U.S. representative from Illinois, begin a series of seven famous public encounters on the issue of slavery known as the Lincoln-Douglas Debates. Lincoln lost the Senate race, but his campaign brought national attention to the young Republican Party. – 1858.