Today in History

Today in History

Today is Monday, July 19, the 200th day of 2021. There are 165 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On July 19, 1969, Apollo 11 and its astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin and Michael Collins, went into orbit around the moon.

On this date:

In 1848, a pioneering women's rights convention convened in Seneca Falls, New York.

In 1943, Allied air forces raided Rome during World War II, the same day Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini met in Feltre in northern Italy.

In 1961, TWA became the first airline to begin showing regularly scheduled in-flight movies as it presented "By Love Possessed" to first-class passengers on a flight from New York to Los Angeles.

In 1975, the Apollo and Soyuz space capsules that were linked in orbit for two days separated.

In 1980, the Moscow Summer Olympics began, minus dozens of nations that were boycotting the games because of the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan.

In 1989, 111 people were killed when United Air Lines Flight 232, a DC-10 which sustained the uncontained failure of its tail engine and the loss of hydraulic systems, crashed while making an emergency landing at Sioux City, Iowa; 185 other people survived.

In 1990, baseball's all-time hits leader, Pete Rose, was sentenced in Cincinnati to five months in prison for tax evasion.

In 1993, President Bill Clinton announced a policy allowing homosexuals to serve in the military under a compromise dubbed "don't ask, don't tell, don't pursue."

In 2005, President George W. Bush announced his choice of federal appeals court judge John G. Roberts Jr. to replace Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. (Roberts ended up succeeding Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who died in Sept. 2005; Samuel Alito followed O'Connor.)

In 2006, prosecutors reported that Chicago police beat, kicked, shocked or otherwise tortured scores of Black suspects from the 1970s to the early 1990s to try to extract confessions from them.

In 2007, "Mad Men," a cable TV series about a New York advertising agency, premiered on AMC.

In 2014, a New York City police officer (Daniel Pantaleo) involved in the arrest of Eric Garner, who died in custody two days earlier after being placed in an apparent chokehold, was stripped of his gun and badge and placed on desk duty. (Pantaleo was fired in August 2019.) Actor James Garner, 86, died in Los Angeles.

Ten years ago: Summoned by British lawmakers to answer for a phone hacking and bribery scandal at one of his tabloids, media mogul Rupert Murdoch told a parliamentary committee hearing he was humbled and ashamed, but accepted no responsibility for wrongdoing.

Five years ago: Republicans meeting in Cleveland nominated Donald Trump as their presidential standard-bearer; in brief videotaped remarks, Trump thanked the delegates, saying: "This is a movement, but we have to go all the way." Writer-director Garry Marshall, 81, whose deft touch with comedy and romance led to a string of TV hits that included "Happy Days" and "Laverne & Shirley" and the box-office successes "Pretty Woman" and "Runaway Bride," died in Burbank, California.

One year ago: President Donald Trump refused to publicly commit to accepting the results of the upcoming election, telling Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday" that it was too early to make any such guarantee. U.S. House leaders said they were "alarmed" by the tactics used by federal agents against protesters in Portland, Oregon and other cities; the mayor of Portland said the presence of the agents was worsening tensions in the city, which had seen nearly two months of nightly protests since the death of George Floyd. The Bahamas said it would ban travelers from the United States; a surge in coronavirus infections had followed the islands' reopening to international tourism.

Today's Birthdays: Actor Helen Gallagher is 95. Country singer Sue Thompson is 95. Singer Vikki Carr is 81. Blues singer-musician Little Freddie King is 81. Country singer-musician Commander Cody is 77. Actor George Dzundza is 76. Rock singer-musician Alan Gorrie (Average White Band) is 75. International Tennis Hall of Famer Ilie Nastase is 75. Rock musician Brian May is 74. Rock musician Bernie Leadon is 74. Actor Beverly Archer is 73. Movie director Abel Ferrara is 70. Actor Peter Barton is 65. Rock musician Kevin Haskins (Love and Rockets; Bauhaus) is 61. Movie director Atom Egoyan is 61. Actor Campbell Scott is 60. Actor Anthony Edwards is 59. Actor Clea Lewis is 56. Percusssionist Evelyn Glennie is 56. Classical singer Urs Buhler (Il Divo) is 50. Actor Andrew Kavovit is 50. Rock musician Jason McGerr (Death Cab for Cutie) is 47. Actor Benedict Cumberbatch is 45. Actor Erin Cummings is 44. TV chef Marcela Valladolid is 43. Actor Chris Sullivan ("This is Us") is 41. Actor Jared Padalecki is 39. Actor Trai Byers is 38. Actor Kaitlin Doubleday ("Nashville") is 37. Actor/comedian Dustin Ybarra is 35. Actor Steven Anthony Lawrence is 31.