July 17
1902: Willis Carrier produced a set of designs for what would become the world’s first modern air-conditioning system.
1918: Russia’s Czar Nicholas II and his family were executed by the Bolsheviks.
1936: The Spanish Civil War began as right-wing army generals launched a coup attempt against the Second Spanish Republic.
1955: Disneyland opened in Anaheim, California, after its $17 million yearlong construction; the park drew a million visitors in its first 10 weeks.
July 18
1536: The English Parliament passed an act declaring the authority of the pope void in England.
1863: During the Civil War, Union troops spearheaded by the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, made up of Black soldiers, charged Confederate-held Fort Wagner on Morris Island, S.C.
1925: Adolf Hitler published the first volume of his autobiographical manifesto Mein Kampf (My Struggle).
July 19
1812: During the War of 1812, the First Battle of Sackets Harbor in Lake Ontario resulted in an American victory as U.S. naval forces repelled a British attack.
1969: Apollo 11 and its astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin and Michael Collins, went into orbit around the moon.
1979: The Nicaraguan capital of Managua fell to Sandinista guerrillas, two days after President Anastasio Somoza fled the country.
July 20
1917: The World War I draft lottery began when Secretary of War Newton Baker, blindfolded, drew number 258 from a glass bowl in the Senate office building.
1944: An attempt by a group of German officials to assassinate Adolf Hitler with a bomb failed as the explosion only wounded the Nazi leader.
1951: Jordan’s King Abdullah I was assassinated in Jerusalem by a Palestinian gunman who was shot dead on the spot by security.
1969: Astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin became the first men to walk on the moon.
July 21
1925: The so-called “Monkey Trial” ended in Dayton, Tennessee, with John T. Scopes found guilty of violating state law for teaching Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. (The conviction was later overturned)
1861: During the Civil War, the first Battle of Bull Run was fought at Manassas, Virginia, resulting in a Confederate victory.
1944: American forces landed on Guam during World War II, capturing it from the Japanese some three weeks later.
1954: The Geneva Conference concluded with accords dividing Vietnam into northern and southern entities.
July 22
1933: Aviator Wiley Post landed at Floyd Bennett Field in New York City, completing the first solo flight around the world in 7 days, 18 hours and 49 minutes. 1934: Bank robber John Dillinger was shot to death by federal agents outside Chicago’s Biograph Theater. 1942: The Nazis began transporting Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto to the Treblinka concentration camp.
1943: American forces led by Gen. George S. Patton captured Palermo, Sicily, during World War II.
July 23
1903: The Ford Motor Company sold its first car, a Model A, for $850.
1958: Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II named the first four women to peerage in the House of Lords.
2011: Singer Amy Winehouse, 27, was found dead in her London home from accidental alcohol poisoning.
