- Canada Day

- First stamps were issued by the United States Post Office. (1847)

- Battle of Gettysburg (U.S. Civil War) began. (1863)

- Louis Bleriot, French aviator, was born. (1872)

- First U.S. zoo opened. (1874)

- The Rough Riders stormed San Juan Hill. (1898)

- The U.S. Standards Bureau became effective. (1901)

- Bretton Woods Conference establishes IMF and World Bank. (1944)

- ZIP Codes were introduced. (1963)

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- Halfway point of the year

- Nostradamus, French astrologer, physician, and prophet, died. (1566)

- Vermont became the first colony to abolish slavery. (1777)

- President James A. Garfield was shot and fatally wounded. (1881)

- The Sherman Anti-Trust Act became law. (1890)

- Thurgood Marshall, first African-American Supreme Court Justice. (1908)

- Ralph W. Samuelson became the first person to make his own water skis and ride on them. (1922)

- The United States Army Air Corps was created. (1926)

- Amelia Earhart, aviator, disappeared while attempting to make the first round-the-world flight at the equator. (1937)

- First National Literacy Day designated by Congress. (2000)

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- Aphelion Day (day when the Earth is farthest from the sun) 2009

- Quebec was founded by Samuel Champlain. (1608)

- Pony Express arrived in San Francisco with overland letters from New York. (1861)

- Pickett's Charge occurred during the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg. (1863)

- George M. Cohan, playwright, songwriter, and producer, was born. (1878)

- Franz Kafka, writer, born. (1883)

- Idaho became the 43rd state. (1890)

- Klaus Barbie was convicted in Lyon, France, of crimes against humanity and sentenced to life imprisonment for atrocities he committed during World War II. (1987)

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- Independence Day

- 96^th Tour de France (July 4 – 26, 2009)

- Day when a star is to be added to the American flag for every state admitted to the nation the previous year (established 1818)

- Nathaniel Hawthorne, American novelist and short-story writer, was born. (1804)

- Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italian soldier and nationalist leader, was born. (1807)

- Presidents Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, died. (1826)

- The United States Secret Service was established in the Treasury Department. (1865)

- Calvin Coolidge, 30th President of the United States, was born. (1872)

- The Republic of the Philippines was founded after over 45 years of United States rule. (1946)

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- David G. Farragut, American naval hero, was born in Knoxville, Tennessee. (1801)

- P.T. Barnum, founder of the Greatest Show on Earth, was born. (1810)

- Venezuela became the first South American country to declare its independence from Spain. (1811)

- Korean War, the clash between American and North Korean forces, began. (1950)

- Algeria declared its independence from France. (1962)

- Arthur Ashe became the first black American to win the Wimbledon men's singles tennis title. (1975)

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- Thomas Jefferson proposed a new coinage system based on the decimal system. (1785)

- Republican Party held first party convention. (1854)

- Louis Pasteur, famous for pasteurization process, accomplished the first effective anti-rabies inoculation. (1885)

- Robert Peary sailed the Roosevelt on his expedition to explore the Arctic. (1909)

- Jim Thorpe, a Native American originally named Bright Path, gained fame as the world's greatest athlete while at the Olympic Games in Stockholm, Sweden. (1912)

- George W. Bush, past-President, born. (1946)

- Althea Gibson became the first African American to win a tennis championship at Wimbledon. (1957)

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- Father - Daughter Take a Walk Together Day

- Full moon 2009

- Camillo Golgi, biologist, was born. (1843)

- U.S. annexation of California was proclaimed at Monterey after the surrender of a Mexican garrison. (1846)

- Four assassination conspirators were hanged for their part in President Lincoln's death. (1865)

- Hawaiian Island Kingdom annexed by the U.S. (1898)

- Ringo Starr, Beatles' drummer, was born. (1940)

- Alaska statehood bill signed by President Eisenhower. (1958)

- Michelle Kwan, Olympic figure skater, was born. (1980)

- Sandra Day O'Connor nominated to be the first female Supreme Court justice. (1981)

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- Vasco da Gama, Portuguese navigator, left Lisbon in search of a sea route to India. (1497)

- Giovanni da Verrazzano, Italian explorer, arrived in France to report on his discoveries in the New World, including the New York Bay. (1524)

- First American passport was issued. (1796)

- John D. Rockefeller, U.S. oil millionaire and philanthropist, was born. (1839)

- Commodore Matthew Perry reached Japan with his ships. (1853)

- The ice cream sundae was born on this day in Ithaca, New York…or was it in Two Rivers, Wisconsin…or maybe even in Buffalo…? (1881)

- Stock market fell to its lowest point during the Depression. (1932)

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- Argentina Independence Day

- Elias Howe, inventor of the sewing machine, was born. (1819)

- Charles Baudelaire, poet of sickness and evil, born. (1821)

- Nikola Tesla, the master of lightning, was born at midnight. (1856)

- Fourteenth Amendment ratification complete on this day. (1864)

- Swimmer Johnny Weissmuller (and film actor who played Tarzan) became the first man to swim 100 meters in under a minute. (1922)

- King Camp Gillette, U.S. inventor and manufacturer of the safety razor, died. (1932)

- The Bureau of Internal Revenue was renamed the Internal Revenue Service. (1953)

- USS Thresher was launched, the first of a class of U.S. nuclear-powered attack submarines. (1960)

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- Clerihew Day

- Mary Queen of Scots assumed the title of Queen of England. (1559)

- Wyoming became the 44th state. (1890)

- Jazz pianist Jelly Roll Morton died. (1941)

- Telstar I, the first television telecommunications satellite was launched from Cape Canaveral. (1962)

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- World Population Day

- Thomas Bowdler, prudish censor, born. (1754)

- John Quincy Adams was born. (1767)

- Hamilton and Burr, political adversaries, duel. (1804)

- James Abbott McNeil Whistler, artist, was born. (1834)

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- Henry David Thoreau was born in Concord, Massachusetts. (1817)

- George Eastman, U.S. inventor and industrialist, was born. (1854)

- R. Buckminster Fuller, architect, designer, philosopher, among other things, was born. (1895)

- Oscar Hammerstein II, lyricist, known for his collaboration with Richard Rodgers, was born. (1895)

- Milton Berle, aka “Mr. Television,” was born. (1908)

- Vietnam and the U.S. formally established diplomatic relations for the first time since the Vietnam War. (1995)

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- Julius Caesar's birth celebrated. (100 B.C.)

- Savannah became the capitol of Georgia. (1782)

- Northwest Territory was established by Congress. (1787)

- Henry R. Schoolcraft discovered the source of the Mississippi River. (1832)

- Guglielmo Marconi received a U.S. patent for a wireless telegraph. (1897)

- The first Soccer World Cup competition began in Montevideo, Uruguay. (1930)

- Frank Sinatra made his recording debut with the Harry James band. (1939)

- Erno Rubik, Hungarian mathematician, educator, and inventor of the Rubik's Cube, was born. (1944)

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- Bastille Day ( France )

- St. Swithun’s Day ( England )

- “La Marseillaise” was officially adopted as the French national anthem. (1795)

- Frederick Louis Maytag, inventor of the washing machine, was born. (1857)

- Owen Wister, novelist, was born in Philadelphia. (1860)

- Alfred Nobel received a patent for dynamite. (1867)

- Woody Guthrie, folk singer, born. (1912)

- William Hanna, cartoonist, was born. (1911)

- Gerald R. Ford, 38^th President of the U.S., born. (1913)

- Treasury Department halted production of all currency notes in denominations higher than $100. (1969)

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- Rembrandt Van Rijn, artist, was born. (1606)

- Napoléon Bonaparte surrenders from aboard HMS Bellerophon. (1815)

- Kid Chocolate becomes Cuba 's first world boxing champion. (1931)

- Boeing 707, the first commercial jet transport airplane built in the United States, was tested in Washington State. (1954)

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- Claire of Assisi was born. (1194)

- Washington, in the District of Columbia, was declared by Congress the permanent capital of the United States. (1790)

- Reinforced concrete was first patented by Joseph Monier of Paris. (1867)

- Polar explorer Roald Amundsen was born. (1872)

- Ginger Rogers, dancer and film actress, was born. (1911)

- First atomic bomb was exploded at Los Alamos, New Mexico. (1945)

- Apollo 11 was launched on its historic mission to land men on the moon. (1969)

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- Ephraim Shay, inventor of the Shay-type steam locomotive, was born. (1839)

- Greenbacks were issued by the United States government. (1861)

- Harvard School of Dental Medicine, first in nation, was established. (1867)

- Gordon Gould, who coined the word laser, was born. (1920)

- Spanish Civil War began. (1936)

- Disneyland opened. (1955)

- Mary Leakey discovered the oldest human skull in Olduvai Gorge. (1959)

- Land-speed world record set by Donald Campbell. (1964)

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- Robert Hooke, English scientist and inventor, was born. (1635)

- Nelson Mandela, South African nationalist leader, was born. (1918)

- John Glenn, senator and astronaut, was born. (1921)

- Ty Cobb recorded his 4,000th career hit. (1927)

- Intel Corporation, inventor of the microchip, was incorporated. (1968)

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- National Ice Cream Day 2009

- Johannes Kepler had a “vision” of his solar system model. (1595)

- Inventor Samuel Colt was born. (1814)

- Edgar Degas, French impressionist painter and sculptor, was born. (1834)

- Bloomers, a new fashion in female dress, were introduced by Amelia Jenks Bloomer. (1843)

- First Woman's Rights Convention began in Seneca Falls, New York. (1848) [Note: Scroll down the page to see entry.]

- Winston Churchill introduced his “V for Victory” campaign. The BBC took the first four notes of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, which matched the “dot-dot-dot-dash” Morse code for the letter V, and played it before news bulletins. (1941)

- Olympic Games opened in Atlanta, Georgia. (1996)

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- Columbian Independence Day

- Sir Edmund Hillary, one of first two men to scale Mt. Everest, was born. (1919)

- Special Olympics first held. (1968)

- Apollo 11 accomplished first moon landing. (1969)

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- New Hampshire became the 9th state. (1788)

- Paul Julius Reuter, founder of the news agency that bears his name, was born. (1816)

- First Battle of Bull Run (American Civil War). (1861) [Note: Scroll down the page to see entry.]

- Ernest Hemingway, writer, was born. (1899)

- The Trans-Siberian Railway was completed and opened up Siberia to large-scale colonization after 13 years of effort. (1904)

- Aswan High Dam in Egypt was completed after 18 years of construction. (1970)

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- Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel, German astronomer and mathematician who calculated the path of Halley's Comet, was born. (1784)

- Gregor Johann Mendel, Austrian pioneer in the study of heredity, was born. (1822)

- Photographer Edward Farber, inventor of a portable, battery-operated stroboscopic flash unit for still cameras that effectively "stops action," was born. (1914)

- Wiley Post, U.S. pioneer aviator, became the first person to fly solo around the world. (1933)

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- Bell X-2 rocket plane set aircraft-speed world record of 3,050 kph. (1956)

- The Coinage Act was signed, which substituted cupronickel-clad coins for silver coins in U.S. circulating coins, and deleted all mint marks from coins. The mint marks returned in 1968. (1965)

- Tarzan, a Walt Disney animated film, was shown by a film-less projection system and thus became the first film to be produced and shown entirely using digital technology. (1999)

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- Mary, Queen of Scots, was forced to abdicate and her son, James VI, became King of Scotland at the age of one. (1567)

- Simon Bolivar, South American revolutionary, was born. (1783)

- Alexandre Dumas, French novelist and dramatist, was born. (1802)

- Brigham Young and fellow members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints arrived in Utah's Great Salt Lake Valley. (1847)

- Machu Picchu, the Lost City of the Incas, was discovered by Hiram Bingham. (1911)

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- Rosalind Franklin, English scientist who contributed to the discovery of the molecular structure of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), was born. (1920)

- Puerto Rico became a commonwealth of the United States. (1952)

- Ocean liner Andrea Doria and the Swedish ship Stockholm collided off the coast of New England. (1956)

- First test-tube baby was born in England. (1978)

- Svetlana Savitskaya became the first woman to walk in space. (1984)

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- Parent's Day 2009 (4^th Sunday)

- New York became the 11th state. (1788)

- Liberia became the first independent republic in Africa. (1847)

- George Bernard Shaw, Irish dramatist and writer, was born in Dublin. (1856)

- Dr. Carl Jung, Swiss psychologist, was born. (1875)

- Aldous Huxley, author (Brave New World), was born. (1894)

- Fidel Castro led an attack against the Cuban Army, which began the struggle of the Cuban people for the overthrow of Batista's military dictatorship. (1953)

- National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities are established by President Lyndon Johnson. (1965)

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- Tobacco was first brought to England by Sir Walter Raleigh from Virginia. (1586)

- Johann Bernoulli, father of the Bernoulli Principle, was born. (1667)

- Opium War between China and Britain began. (1839)

- Insulin was isolated by Toronto University doctors Sir Frederick Banting and Charles Best. It proved an effective treatment for diabetes. (1921)

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- Potatoes were introduced to Europe by Sir Thomas Harriot. (1586)

- Fingerprints were first used as a means of identification in India. (1858)

- Beatrix Potter, children's author and illustrator, was born in England. (1866)

- Metric system was authorized for the standardization of weights and measures throughout the United States. (1866)

- 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified, granting citizenship to U.S. blacks. (1868)

- Deep sea explorer Jacques Piccard was born. (1922)

- Former First Lady, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, born. (1929)

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- Safety pin inventor Walter Hunt was born. (1796)

- Harris Treaty was signed. (1858) [Note: Scroll down the page to see entry.]

- First iron lung (electric respirator) was installed in a hospital. (1927)

- NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) was authorized by Congress. (1958)

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- Emily Brontë, poet, born. (1818)

- Henry Ford, manufacturer, was born. (1863)

- Corn flakes were invented by William Kellogg at Battle Creek Sanitarium. (1898)

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- U.S. Patent Office issued its first patent. (1790)

- United States Customs Service was created when the Tariff Act became effective. (1789)

- Screw propeller inventor John Ericsson was born. (1803)

- J.K. Rowling, author of Harry Potter books, was born. (1965)

- Gene therapy was used for the first time in the treatment of human disease, after U.S. government panel approval. (1990)

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