July 2 - Events

Events

• 437 – Emperor Valentinian III, begins his reign over the Western Roman Empire. His mother Galla Placidia ends her regency, but continues to exercise political influence at the court in Rome.
• 626 – Li Shimin, the future Emperor Taizong of Tang, Emperor of China, ambushes and kills his rival brothers Li Yuanji and Li Jiancheng in the Xuanwu Gate Incident.
• 706 – In China, Emperor Zhongzong of Tang inters the bodies of relatives in the Qianling Mausoleum, located on Mount Liang outside Chang'an.
• 963 – The imperial army proclaims Nicephorus Phocas Emperor of the Romans on the plains outside Cappadocian Caesarea.
• 1298 – The Battle of Göllheim is fought between Albert I of Habsburg and Adolf of Nassau-Weilburg.
• 1494 – The Treaty of Tordesillas is ratified by Spain.
• 1555 – The Ottoman Admiral Turgut Reis sacks the Italian city of Paola.
• 1561 – Menas, Emperor of Ethiopia, defeats a revolt in Emfraz.
• 1582 – Battle of Yamazaki: Toyotomi Hideyoshi defeats Akechi Mitsuhide.
• 1613 – The first English expedition from Massachusetts against Acadia led by Samuel Argall takes place.
• 1644 – English Civil War: Battle of Marston Moor.
• 1679 – Europeans first visit Minnesota and see headwaters of Mississippi in an expedition led by Daniel Greysolon de Du Luth.
• 1698 – Thomas Savery patents the first steam engine.
• 1776 – The Continental Congress adopts a resolution severing ties with the Kingdom of Great Britain although the wording of the formal Declaration of Independence is not approved until July 4.
• 1777 – Vermont becomes the first American territory to abolish slavery.
• 1823 – Bahia Independence Day: the end of Portuguese rule in Brazil, with the final defeat of the Portuguese crown loyalists in the province of Bahia.
• 1839 – Twenty miles off the coast of Cuba, 53 rebelling African slaves led by Joseph Cinqué take over the slave ship Amistad.
• 1853 – The Russian Army crossed the Pruth river into the Danubian Principalities, Moldavia and Wallachia—providing the spark that set off the Crimean War.
• 1871 – Victor Emmanuel II of Italy enters Rome after having conquered it from the Papal States.
• 1881 – Charles J. Guiteau shoots and fatally wounds U.S. President James Garfield, who eventually dies from an infection on September 19.
• 1890 – The U.S. Congress passes the Sherman Anti-Trust Act.
• 1897 – Italian scientist Guglielmo Marconi obtains a patent for radio in London.
• 1900 – The first Zeppelin flight takes place on Lake Constance near Friedrichshafen, Germany.
• 1917 – The East St. Louis Riots end.
• 1934 – The Night of the Long Knives ends with the death of Ernst Röhm.
• 1937 – Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan are last heard from over the Pacific Ocean while attempting to make the first equatorial round-the-world flight.
• 1940 – Indian independence leader Subhas Chandra Bose is arrested and detained in Calcutta.
• 1950 – The Golden Pavilion at Kinkaku-ji in Kyoto, Japan burns down.
• 1962 – The first Wal-Mart store opens for business in Rogers, Arkansas.
• 1964 – U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964 meant to prohibit segregation in public places.
• 1966 – The French military explodes a nuclear test bomb codenamed Aldébaran in Mururoa, their first nuclear test in the Pacific.
• 1976 – Fall of the Republic of Vietnam; Communist North Vietnam declares their union to form the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.
• 1986 – Rodrigo Rojas and Carmen Gloria Quintana were burnt alive during a street demonstration against the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet in Chile.
• 1993 – 37 participants in an Alevi cultural and literary festival are killed when a mob of demonstrators set fire to their hotel in Sivas during a violent protest.
• 2000 – Vicente Fox Quesada is elected the first President of México from an opposition party, the Partido Acción Nacional, after more than 70 years of continuous rule by the Partido Revolucionario Institucional.
• 2001 – The AbioCor self contained artificial heart is first implanted.
• 2002 – Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly solo around the world nonstop in a balloon.
• 2010 – The South Kivu tank truck explosion in the Democratic Republic of the Congo kills at least 230 people.