Today is Tuesday, July 19, the 201st day of 2016. There are 165 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History
On July 19, 1941, Britain launched its “V for Victory” campaign during World War II with Prime Minister Winston Churchill calling the V-sign hand gesture “the symbol of the unconquerable will of the people of the occupied territories and a portent of the fate awaiting the Nazi tyranny.”
On this date
In 1553, King Henry VIII’s daughter Mary was proclaimed Queen of England after pretender Lady Jane Grey was deposed.
In 1848, a pioneering women’s rights convention convened in Seneca Falls, New York.
In 1903, the first Tour de France was won by Maurice Garin.
In 1944, the Democratic national convention convened in Chicago with the nomination of President Franklin D. Roosevelt considered a certainty.
In 1952, the Summer Olympics opened in Helsinki, Finland.
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 1979, the Nicaraguan capital of Managua fell to Sandinista guerrillas, two days after President Anastasio Somoza fled the country.
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 1986, Caroline Kennedy, daughter of President John F. Kennedy, married Edwin A. Schlossberg in Centerville, Massachusetts.
In 1989, 111 people were killed when United Air Lines Flight 232, a DC-10 which suffered 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, President George H.W. Bush joined former presidents Ronald Reagan, Gerald R. Ford and Richard M. Nixon at ceremonies dedicating the Nixon Library and Birthplace (since re-designated the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum) in Yorba Linda, California.
In 1996, opening ceremonies were held in Atlanta for the 26th Summer Olympic Games.
Ten years ago: President George W. Bush issued his first presidential veto, rejecting a bill that could have multiplied federal money for embryonic stem cell research; a few hours later, the House voted 235-193 to overturn Bush’s veto, 51 short of the required two-thirds majority. Actor Jack Warden died in New York at age 85.
Five 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.
One year ago: Saying they felt a “deep sense of ethical responsibility for a past tragedy,” executives from Japan’s Mitsubishi Materials Corp. offered an unprecedented apology to a 94-year-old former U.S. prisoner of war for using American POWs as forced labor during World War II; James Murphy of Santa Maria, California, accepted the apology during a solemn ceremony hosted by the Museum of Tolerance at the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles.
Comments are not available on this story. Read more about why we allow commenting on some stories and not on others.
We believe it's important to offer commenting on certain stories as a benefit to our readers. At its best, our comments sections can be a productive platform for readers to engage with our journalism, offer thoughts on coverage and issues, and drive conversation in a respectful, solutions-based way. It's a form of open discourse that can be useful to our community, public officials, journalists and others.
We do not enable comments on everything — exceptions include most crime stories, and coverage involving personal tragedy or sensitive issues that invite personal attacks instead of thoughtful discussion.
You can read more here about our commenting policy and terms of use. More information is also found on our FAQs.
Show less