they say it's yer birthday

July 31 is the 212th day (213th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 153 days remaining, as the final rockin' cool day of July.

Events

1423 - Hundred Years War: Battle of Cravant - The French army is defeated at Cravant on the banks of the river Yonne.

1498 - On his third voyage to the Western Hemisphere, Christopher Columbus becomes the first European to discover the island of Trinidad.

1588 - Spanish Armada is spotted off the coast of England.

1667 - Treaty of Breda ends the Second Anglo-Dutch War.

1703 - Daniel Defoe is placed in a pillory for the crime of seditious libel after publishing a politically satirical pamphlet, but is pelted with flowers.

1790 - First US patent issued; to inventor Samuel Hopkins.

1856 - Christchurch, New Zealand chartered as a city.

1917 - The Third Battle of Ypres starts in Flanders.

1919 - German national assembly adopts the Weimar constitution (to enter into force August 14)

1930 - The radio mystery program The Shadow airs.

1941 - Holocaust: Under instructions from Adolf Hitler, Nazi official Hermann Göring, orders general Reinhard Heydrich to "submit to me as soon as possible a general plan of the administrative material and financial measures necessary for carrying out the desired final solution of the Jewish question."

1945 - Pierre Laval, fugitive former leader of Vichy France, surrenders to Allied soldiers in Austria.

1948 - At Idlewild Field in New York, New York International Airport (later renamed John F. Kennedy International Airport) is dedicated.

1954 - First ascent of K2, by an Italian expedition led by Ardito Desio.

1961 - At Fenway Park in Boston, the first All-Star Game tie in Major League Baseball history occurs when the game is stopped in the 9th inning due to rain. A Wig is born.

1964 - Ranger program: Ranger 7 sends back the first close-up photos of the moon, with images 1,000 times clearer than anything ever seen from earth-bound telescopes).

1971 - Apollo 15 astronauts become first to ride lunar rover.

1973 - A Delta Airlines jetliner crashes while landing in fog at Logan Airport, Boston, killing 89

1975 - In Detroit, Teamsters Union president Jimmy Hoffa is reported missing.

1976 - NASA releases the famous Face on Mars photo, taken by Viking 1

1987 - A rare, class F-4 tornado rips through Edmonton, killing 27 people and causing $330 million in damage.

1992 - A Thai Airways Airbus A300-310 crashes into mountain south of Kathmandu, Nepal killing 113.

1996 - MIL-STD-1750A (Military Standard Sixteen-Bit Computer Instruction Set Architecture) is declared inactive for use in new designs. Good job.

1999 - NASA intentionally crashes the Lunar Prospector spacecraft into the Moon, thus ending its mission to detect frozen water on the moon's surface. Brilliant.

Births

1396 - Philip III of Burgundy, duke of Burgundy (d. 1467)
1803 - John Ericsson, Swedish inventor/engineer (d. 1889)
1816 - George Henry Thomas, American general (d. 1870)
1901 - Jean Dubuffet, painter and sculptor (d. 1985)
1911 - George Liberace, musician (d. 1983)
1912 - Milton Friedman, 1976 Nobel Prizewinner (economics)
1912 - Irv Kupcinet, newspaper columnist (d. 2003)
1913 - William Todman, game show producer!!
1914 - Louis de Funès, actor and comedian (d. 1983)
1916 - Bill Todman, game show producer!! (d. 1979)
1918 - Hank Jones, pianist
1919 - Curt Gowdy, sports announcer
1919 - Primo Levi, author, chemist (d. 1987)
1921 - Whitney Young, civil rights activist (d. 1971)
1923 - Ahmet Ertegun, record company executive
1928 - Kurt Sontheimer, political scientist
1929 - Don Murray, actor
1930 - Oleg Popov, clown
1931 - Kenny Burrell, guitarist
1939 - France Nuyen, actress
1941 - Amarsinh Chaudhary, politician
1943 - William Bennett, former U.S. Sec. of Ed./drug czar
1943 - Susan Flannery, actress
1944 - Geraldine Chaplin, actress
1946 - Gary Lewis, rock and roll musician
1946 - Bob Welch, rock and roll musician
1951 - Evonne Goolagong, tennis star
1951 - Barry Van Dyke, actor (no relation)
1952 - Alan Autry, football player, actor, Mayor of Fresno CA
1952 - Helmuts Balderis, Latvian ice-hockey player
1958 - Bill Berry, rock and roll musician (REM)
1958 - Mark Cuban, billionaire, Mavericks owner, dickhead
1959 - Stanley Jordan, jazz guitarist
1961 - Yer Man, Wig!!
1962 - Wesley Snipes, actor schmactor
1964 - Jim Corr, singer, musician (The Corrs)
1965 - J. K. Rowling, novelist (might be a witch)
1966 - Dean Cain, actor
1974 - Jonathan Ogden, American football player
1977 - Tim Couch, American football quarterback
1981 - Eric Lively, actor
1981 - Ira Losco, Maltese singer

Deaths

1099 - Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar ("El Cid"), Spanish warrior
1108 - King Philip I of France
1556 - Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Jesuits
1875 - Andrew Johnson, 17th Pres. of USA (b. 1808)
1886 - Franz Liszt, composer
1914 - Jean Jaurès, French Socialist politician (d. 1859)
1917 - Francis Ledwidge, Irish poet
1937 - Charles Martine, Apache scout
1944 - Antoine de Saint-Exupery, French pilot and writer
1953 - Robert Taft, Senator from Ohio, son of William Howard Taft, "Mr. Republican"
1980 - Mohd. Rafi, Bollywood playback singer (b. 1924)
1993 - Baudouin I of Belgium
2001 - Poul Anderson, science fiction author

Holidays

- La Hae Hawai‘i - Hawaiian Flag Day

- Republic of the Congo - Upswing of the Revolution

- Feast day of Saint Ignatius of Loyola

- Devotees of Harry Potter celebrate Harry James Potter's birthday on this date

- AirVenture: The World's Greatest Aviation Celebration held in Oshkosh, Wisconsin July 25–31 or thereabouts

BTW

Perhaps the most important fact of all... 1961, as MAD Magazine pointed out on its first cover for the year, was the first "upside-down" year (i.e. one that looked the same upside down) since 1881, and the last until 6009.