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“I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use and by some other means to give us knowledge which we can attain by them.”
~ Galileo Galilei
Wikiquote (Galileo Galilei (February 15, 1564 – January 8, 1642) an Italian physicist and astronomer.)
August 14th, 1385
Portuguese Crisis of 1383-1385, Battle of Aljubarrota: Portuguese forces commanded by King João I and his general Nuno Álvares Pereira defeat the Castilian army of King Juan I.
Wikipedia Painting: Battle of Aljubarrota, 1385
August 14th, 1415
Battle of Ceuta: Henry the Navigator leads Portuguese forces to victory over the Marinids.
Wikipedia Photo: Ceuta, Ciudad Autónoma de Ceuta (Spanish)
August 14th, 1598
Nine Years' War, Battle of the Yellow Ford: Irish forces under Hugh O'Neill Earl of Tyrone, defeat an English expeditionary force under Henry Bagenal.
Wikipedia Photo: Ireland is an island to the north-west of continental Europe. (Ireland is divided between the Republic of Ireland, which covers just under five-sixths of the island, and Northern Ireland, a part of the United Kingdom, which covers the remainder and is located in the north-east of the island.)
● The Nine Years' War (Ireland from 1594 to 1603): It was fought between the forces of Gaelic Irish chieftains Hugh O'Neill of Tír Eoghain, Hugh Roe O'Donnell of Tír Chonaill and their allies, against English rule in Ireland.
August 14th, 1842
American Indian Wars:
1842 - Second Seminole War ends with the Seminoles forced from Florida to Oklahoma.
Wikipedia Photos: American Indians - Chief Crazy Horse, Tashunca-uitco (1849 - 1877) ● Geronimo Apache Chief (1829 - 1909) ● Indian Chief 'Two Eagles'; Crow Indian Chief ● Snake Cheif ● Band of Chiricahua Apache Indians, followers of legendary renegade Geronimo, attending a peace negotiation after a long struggle against U.S. government attempts to force them onto reservations - Tombstone, Arizona (1886), Life Magazine ● American Horse - Oglala ● Native American Arapaho Indian ● Washakie, Shoshone leader ● Arapaho American Indian Chief.
● Painting: Trail of Tears, American Indian Wars © Christine Chzasz.
August 14th, 1848
Oregon Territory is organized by act of Congress.
Wikipedia Painting: Sketches in North America and the Oregon Territory, by Henry James Warre (1819-1898)
August 14th, 1880
Cologne Cathedral, the most famous landmark in Cologne, Germany is completed.
Wikipedia Photo: Cologne Cathedral And Hohenzollern Bridge, Cologne, Germany.
August 14th, 1888
Arthur Sullivan's "The Lost Chord", one of the first audio recordings of music ever made, is played during a press conference introducing Thomas Edison's phonograph in London.
Wikipedia Image: The Lost Chord, Victorian postcard
August 14th, 1900
China - Boxer Rebellion:
1900 - Eight-Nation Alliance occupies Beijing, in a campaign to end the bloody Boxer Rebellion in China.
Wikipedia Photo: China from NASA Wordwind Satellite; © Great Wall of China, credit National Geographic; LongJi Terrace, credit National Geographic; Great Bear Rainforest, credit Paul Nicklen, National Geographic; Platoons of clay soldiers were buried with China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang Di, (required a labor force of 700,000 to build), credit O. Louis Mazzatenta, National Geographic.
The Boxer Rebellion, U.S. Army. ● Guangxu Emperor (fourth from left) with his officials and European officers shortly after the Boxer Rebellion.
August 14th, 1901
Number 21: The first claimed powered flight, by Gustave Whitehead.
Wikipedia Photo: Whitehead Glider modeled after the "Albatross", Gustave Whitehead.org
August 14th, 1916
World War I: Romania declares war on Austro-Hungary, joining the Entente in World War I.
Wikipedia Photo: French Soldiers, also joined by civilians, on their way to Berlin / 1st Battalion, Lancashire Fusliers. 1 July, 1916., Department of English, Univertisy of Illinois
August 14th, 1933
Tillamook Burn: Loggers cause a forest fire in the Coast Range of Oregon. It is extinguished on September 5, after destroying 240,000 acres
Wikipedia Photo: Tillamook Burn: View of one of the fires in August 1933
August 14th, 1935
United States Social Security Act passes, creating a government pension system for the retired.
Wikipedia Photo: President Roosevelt signing Social Security Act of 1935 in the Cabinet Room of the White House.
August 14th, 1936
Rainey Bethea is hanged in Owensboro, Kentucky in the last public execution in the United States.
Wikipedia Photo: Japanese parade through the Chungshan Gate,Nanking 1938 - two Japanese soldiers with captured Chinese M35 German helmets on their back.
August 14th, 1937
World War II:
1937 - Second Sino-Japanese War The beginning of air-to-air combat, when 6 Imperial Japanese Mitsubishi G3M bombers are shot down by the Nationalist Chinese Air Force while raiding Chinese air bases.
1941 - Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill sign the Atlantic Charter of war stating postwar aims.
1945 - Japan accepts the Allied terms of surrender in World War II and the Emperor records the Imperial Rescript on Surrender (August 15 in Japan standard time).
Wikipedia Photo: Bombing of Dresden in World War II; August Schreitmüller's sculpture 'Goodness' surveys Dresden after a firestorm started by Allied bombers in 1945.
USS Bunker Hill was hit by kamikazes piloted by Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa and another airman on 11 May 1945. 389 personnel were killed or missing from a crew of 2,600; Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa, who flew his aircraft into the USS Bunker Hill during a Kamikaze mission on 11 May 1945; Kamikaze Missions - Lt Yoshinori Yamaguchi's Yokosuka D4Y3 (Type 33 Suisei) "Judy" in a suicide dive against USS Essex. The dive brakes are extended and the non-self-sealing port wing tank is trailing fuel vapor and/or smoke 25 November 1944.
German V1 flying-bomb and V2 Rockets - Preparations for a Salvo Launch of V-2 Rockets in the Heidelager near Blizna (Poland) (1944), credit German History in Documents and Images GHDI.
Eastern Front (World War II); Germans race towards Stalingrad. August 1942; Soviet children during a German air raid in the first days of the war, June 1941, by RIA Novosti archive; Soviet sniper Roza Shanina in 1944. About 400,000 Soviet women served in front-line duty units Caucasus Mountains, winter 1942/43; Finnish ski patrol: the invisible enemy of the Soviet Army with an unlimited supply of skis; Men of the German Engineers Corps cross a river which is swollen after the first autumn rains, to strengthen bridges linking the German positions on the central front in Russia. by Keystone / Getty Images. October 1942; Russian snipers fighting on the Leningrad front during a blizzard. Photo by Hulton Archive / Getty Images, 1943; German soldiers surrendering to the Russians in Stalingrad, the soldier holding the white flag of surrender is dressed in white so that there could be no doubt of his intentions, a Russian soldier is on the right of the photograph. by Keystone / Getty Images, January 1943. Representatives of Japan stand aboard the USS Missouri prior to signing of the Instrument of Surrender.
August 14th, 1947
Pakistan gains Independence from the British Empire and joins the Commonwealth of Nations.
Wikipedia Photo: Charakusa Valley, Karakoram Mountains, Pakistan
August 14th, 1969
Founding and first official meeting of the American Football League.
Wikipedia Photo: 1960 AFL Championship game between the Los Angeles Chargers and Houston Oilers - American Football League (AFL introduced an exciting brand of football forcing the NFL to change its entrenched ways), Smithsonian
August 14th, 1974
Turkish invasion of Cyprus begins; 140,000 to 200,000 Greek Cypriots become refugees. Elsewhere, 126 Turkish Cypriots are massacred.
Wikipedia Photo: Turkish invasion of Cyprus - President of the Republic of Cyprus, Archbishop Makarios (1960-1977) in Athens.Patroclos Stavrou, Under Secretary to the Presiden - Kkazantzakis Publications.org
August 14th, 1994
Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, also known as "Carlos the Jackal" is captured.
Wikipedia Photo: Carlos the Jackal, source Getty Images
August 14th, 2005
Aviation accidents and incidents:
2005 - Helios Airways Flight 522; en route from Larnaca, Cyprus to Prague, Czech Republic crashes near Athens, with at least 121 on board. Observations from Greek fighter aircraft indicate a decompression problem.
Wikipedia Photo: ● Pan AM 747 ● U.S. Airways flight 1549 also known as the "Miracle on the Hudson" navigates an exit ramp near Burlington, New Jersey, June 5, 2011 ● Passengers stand on the wings of a U.S. Airways plane as a ferry pulls up to it after it landed in the Hudson River in New York, Reuters ● US Airways plane crashes into New York Hudson River, Photo: AP
August 14th, 2013
Modern conflicts in the Middle East, social unrest and terrorist attacks:
2013 - Egypt declares a state of emergency as security forces kill hundreds of demonstrators supporting former president Mohamed Morsi.
2007 - Kahtaniya bombings; kills at least 796 people.
2006 - Chencholai bombing; in which 61 Tamil girls are killed in Sri Lankan Airforce bombing.
Wikipedia Photo: Middle East satellite image, NASA. ● Camels are seen early morning on a beach in the Marina area of Dubai October 16, 2008. (Steve Crisp, Reuters) ● A portrait of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad burns during clashes between rebels and Syrian troops in Selehattin, near Aleppo, on July 23, 2012. (Bulent Kilic, AFP / GettyImages) ● Egyptians gather in their thousands in Tahrir Square to mark the one year anniversary of the revolution on Jan. 25, 2012 in Cairo Egypt. Tens of thousands have gathered in the square on the first anniversary of the Arab uprising which toppled President Hosni Mubarak. (Jeff J Mitchell, Getty Images) ● Black smoke rises above the Tehran skyline as supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi burn tires and other material in the streets as they fight running battles with police to protest the declared results of the Iranian presidential election in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 13, 2009. (Ben Curtis, AP) ● The Iron Dome defense system fires to interecpt incoming missiles from Gaza in the port town of Ashdod, Thursday, Nov. 15, 2012. (Tsafrir Abayov, AP)
July 14th, 2015
Cuba–United States relations: The United States Embassy Havana, Cuba re-opens after 54 years of being closed when Cuba–United States relations were broken off.
Wikipedia Image: Cuba–United States relations: The United States and Cuba resume full diplomatic relations after five decades. (New York Times: Roberto Salas)