July 31
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July 31 is the 212th day (213th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 153 days remaining, as the final day of July.
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Events
- 1009 - Pietro Boccapecora becomes Pope Sergius IV
- 1423 - Hundred Years War: Battle of Cravant - The French army is defeated at Cravant on the banks of the river Yonne.
- 1498 - On his third voyage to the Western Hemisphere, Christopher Columbus becomes the first European to discover the island of Trinidad.
- 1588 - The Spanish Armada is spotted off the coast of England.
- 1667 - The Treaty of Breda ends the Second Anglo-Dutch War.
- 1703 - Daniel Defoe is placed in a pillory for the crime of seditious libel after publishing a politically satirical pamphlet, but is pelted with flowers.
- 1790 - First US patent issued; granted to inventor Samuel Hopkins.
- 1856 - Christchurch, New Zealand chartered as a city.
- 1917 - The Third Battle of Ypres starts in Flanders.
- 1919 - German national assembly adopts the Weimar constitution (to enter into force August 14)
- 1930 - The radio mystery program The Shadow airs for the first time.
- 1941 - Holocaust: Under instructions from Adolf Hitler, Nazi official Hermann Göring, orders SS general Reinhard Heydrich to "submit to me as soon as possible a general plan of the administrative material and financial measures necessary for carrying out the desired final solution of the Jewish question."
- 1945 - Pierre Laval, fugitive former leader of Vichy France, surrenders to Allied soldiers in Austria.
- 1948 - At Idlewild Field in New York, New York International Airport (later renamed John F. Kennedy International Airport) is dedicated.
- 1954 - First ascent of K2, by an Italian expedition led by Ardito Desio.
- 1956 - Jim Laker sets extraordinary record at Old Trafford in the fourth Test of taking nineteen wickets in a first-class match (the previous best was seventeen.
- 1961 - At Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts, the first All-Star Game tie in major league baseball history occurs when the game is stopped in the 9th inning due to rain.
- 1964 - Ranger program: Ranger 7 sends back the first close-up photographs of the moon, with images 1,000 times clearer than anything ever seen from earth-bound telescopes).
- 1971 - Apollo program: Apollo 15 astronauts become the first to ride in a lunar rover.
- 1973 - A Delta Airlines jetliner crashes while landing in fog at Logan Airport, Boston, Massachusetts killing 89
- 1975 - In Detroit, Michigan, Teamsters Union president Jimmy Hoffa is reported missing.
- 1976 - NASA releases the famous Face on Mars photo, taken by Viking 1
- 1987 - A rare, class F-4 tornado rips through Edmonton, Alberta, killing 27 people and causing $330 million in damage.
- 1992 - A Thai Airways Airbus A300-310 crashes into mountain south of Kathmandu, Nepal killing 113.
- 1996 - MIL-STD-1750A is declared inactive for use in new designs.
- 1999 - NASA intentionally crashes the Lunar Prospector spacecraft into the Moon, thus ending its mission to detect frozen water on the moon's surface.
- 2003 - WON is shut down.
Births
- 1396 - Philip III of Burgundy, duke of Burgundy (d. 1467)
- 1803 - John Ericsson, Swedish inventor and engineer (d. 1889)
- 1816 - George Henry Thomas, American general (d. 1870)
- 1901 - Jean Dubuffet, painter and sculptor (d. 1985)
- 1911 - George Liberace, musician (d. 1983)
- 1912 - Milton Friedman, recipient of the 1976 Nobel Prize in economics
- 1912 - Irv Kupcinet, newspaper columnist (d. 2003)
- 1913 - William Todman, game show producer
- 1914 - Louis de Funès, actor and comedian (d. 1983)
- 1916 - Bill Todman, game show producer (d. 1979)
- 1918 - Paul D. Boyer, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1918 - Hank Jones, pianist
- 1919 - Curt Gowdy, sports announcer
- 1919 - Primo Levi, author, chemist (d. 1987)
- 1921 - Whitney Young, civil rights activist (d. 1971)
- 1923 - Ahmet Ertegun, record company executive
- 1928 - Kurt Sontheimer, political scientist
- 1929 - Don Murray, actor
- 1930 - Oleg Popov, clown
- 1931 - Kenny Burrell, guitarist
- 1939 - France Nuyen, actress
- 1941 - Amarsinh Chaudhary, politician
- 1943 - William Bennett, former U.S. Secretary of Education and drug czar
- 1943 - Susan Flannery, actress
- 1944 - Geraldine Chaplin, actress
- 1946 - Gary Lewis, rock and roll musician
- 1946 - Bob Welch, rock and roll musician
- 1951 - Evonne Goolagong, tennis star
- 1951 - Barry Van Dyke, actor
- 1952 - Alan Autry, American football player, actor, mayor of Fresno, California
- 1952 - Helmuts Balderis, Latvian ice-hockey player
- 1958 - Bill Berry, rock and roll musician (of the band R.E.M.)
- 1958 - Mark Cuban, billionaire businessman, producer, Dallas Mavericks owner
- 1959 - Stanley Jordan, jazz guitarist
- 1962 - Wesley Snipes, actor
- 1964 - Jim Corr, singer, musician ("The Corrs")
- 1965 - J. K. Rowling, novelist
- 1966 - Dean Cain, actor
- 1974 - Jonathan Ogden, American football player
- 1974 - Luca Tiengo, Italian guitar player
- 1977 - Tim Couch, American football quarterback
- 1981 - Eric Lively, actor
- 1981 - Ira Losco, Maltese singer
Deaths
- 1099 - El Cid, Spanish warrior
- 1108 - King Philip I of France
- 1396 - William Courtenay, Archbishop of Canterbury
- 1547 - King Francis I of France (b. 1494)
- 1556 - Ignatius Loyola, Spanish priest, founder of the Jesuits
- 1784 - Denis Diderot, French philosopher and encylopedist (b. 1713)
- 1875 - Andrew Johnson, 17th President of the United States (b. 1808)
- 1886 - Franz Liszt, Hungarian composer
- 1914 - Jean Jaurès, French politician (d. 1859)
- 1917 - Francis Ledwidge, Irish poet
- 1937 - Charles Martine, Apache scout
- 1944 - Antoine de Saint-Exupery, French pilot and writer
- 1953 - Robert Taft, U.S. Senator from Ohio and Presidential candidate
- 1980 - Mohd. Rafi, Indian playback singer (b. 1924)
- 1993 - Baudouin I of Belgium
- 2001 - Poul Anderson, science fiction author
- 2003 - Guido Crepax, Italian comics artist
Holidays and observances
- La Hae Hawai‘i - Hawaiian Flag Day
- Republic of the Congo - Upswing of the Revolution
- Feast day of Saint Ignatius of Loyola
- A few hardcore devotees of Harry Potter celebrate Harry James Potter's birthday on this date. The novelist J. K. Rowling, writer of the Harry Potter books, chose this date as the fictional character's birthday as it is her own birthday (see above).
Fiction
- In Harry Potter and the Philospher's Stone, the fictional character Harry Potter's birthday is given as July 31. Though the year is unspecified, many fans believe the continuity to be set in modern times, placing his year of birth as 1980.
External links
- BBC: On This Day (http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/31)
July 30 - August 1 - June 30 - August 31 -- listing of all days
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