12 History Lessons + 6 Births & 6 Deaths for August 4, 2025
Today’s History:
- 1693 – Dom Pérignon, a French monk, is said to have invented champagne (likely myth, but widely repeated).
- 1790 – The U.S. Coast Guard is founded as the Revenue Marine Service.
- 1821 – The Saturday Evening Post is published for the first time.
- 1914 – Germany invades Belgium, prompting Britain to declare war on Germany—marking the UK’s entry into World War I.
- 1944 – Anne Frank and her family are arrested by the Gestapo in Amsterdam.
- 1964 – The bodies of civil rights workers Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner are discovered in Mississippi.
- 1964 – Gulf of Tonkin incident occurs, escalating U.S. involvement in Vietnam.
- 1977 – President Jimmy Carter signs legislation creating the U.S. Department of Energy.
- 1984 – Prince’s Purple Rain tops the Billboard album chart for the first of 24 weeks.
- 2007 – NASA’s Phoenix spacecraft is launched, later confirming water on Mars.
- 2019 – A mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio leaves 9 dead just hours after the El Paso shooting.
- 2020 – Lebanon’s government resigns after the deadly Beirut port explosion days earlier.
Today’s Birthdays:
- 1955 – Billy Bob Thornton, actor, writer, and director (Sling Blade) (70)
- 1961 – Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States (64)
- 1971 – Jeff Gordon, NASCAR champion driver (54)
- 1981 – Meghan Markle, actress and Duchess of Sussex (44)
- 1987 – Greta Gerwig, actress, writer, and director (Lady Bird, Barbie) (38)
- 1992 – Dylan and Cole Sprouse, twin actors (The Suite Life, Riverdale) (33)
Today’s Deaths:
- 1875 – Hans Christian Andersen, Danish author of fairy tales (70)
- 1961 – Maurice Tourneur, influential French-American film director (85)
- 1977 – Edgar Adrian, Nobel Prize-winning English electrophysiologist (87)
- 1997 – Jeanne Calment, French woman recognized as the oldest verified human at 122 years old (122)
- 2006 – Melvin Schwartz, Nobel Prize-winning physicist (73)
- 2009 – Blake Snyder, screenwriter and author of Save the Cat! (51)
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