79 – Mount Vesuvius erupted and the cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Stabiae were buried in volcanic ash

410 – The Visigoths began to pillage Rome for three days

1200 – John of England, famous for issuing the first Magna Carta, married Isabella of Angouleme at the Bordeaux Cathedral

1215 – Pope Innocent III declared Britain’s Magna Carta invalid

1456 – The printing of the Gutenberg Bible, one of the first books in Europe, was completed

1553 – A Catholic Mass was sung at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London.

1608 – The first official English representative to India landed in Surat

1690 – Calcutta, India was founded – It’s now got the Bengali name Kolkata

1814 – British troops invaded Washington, D.C. and burnt down the White House and several other buildings

1815 – The modern Constitution of the Netherlands was signed

1847 – Charlotte Bronte, using the pseudonym Currer Bell, sent a manuscript of Jane Eyre to her publisher in London

1853 – The first crisps (potato chips) were prepared by Chef George Crum in Saratoga Springs New York who got annoyed because a customer kept saying his fried potatoes were too soggy

1869 – Cornelius Swarthout invented the waffle iron to make waffles with

1875 – Captain Matthew Webb set off on his successful attempt to become the first person to swim English Channel – It took him 21 hours 45 minutes

1891 – Inventor Thomas Edison patented the motion picture camera

1906 – Kidney transplants were performed on dogs and cats at a Toronto medical conference.

1909 – Workers started pouring concrete for the Panama Canal

1911 – Manuel d’Arriaga was elected the first president of Portugal

1912 – Alaska became a United States territory

1931 – Britain’s second Labour Government under Ramsay McDonald resigned. It was succeeded by a National Government made up of members of all the main parties

1932 – Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly across the United States non-stop from Los Angeles to Newark, New Jersey

1946 – At Newquay in Cornwall, Maisie Dunn became the first person to wear a bikini on a British beach

1947 – The first Edinburgh Festival was held

1949 – The treaty creating NATO came into effect

1957 – 17 year-old striker Jimmy Greaves played his first league game for Chelsea

1960 – A temperature of â??88°C (â??127°F) was measured in Vostok, Antarctica – a world-record low

1963 – The 200-metre freestyle was swum in less than 2 minutes for the first time by Don Schollander

1963 – Stevie Wonder became the first artist ever to score a US No.1 album and single in the same week

1966 – The Doors started recording their first album in California

1967 – Two penguins from Chessington Zoo were taken on a day trip to a local ice-rink to cool off during sweltering London temperatures

1967 – 17-year old singer and guitarist Bruce Springsteen joined a group called Earth.

1968 – France exploded its first hydrogen bomb, thus becoming the world’s fifth nuclear power

1970 – A radioactive leak caused the shutdown of part of the Windscale nuclear power station

1975 – Queen started recording ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ at Rockfield studios in Monmouth, Wales. It took over three weeks

1975 – Annabel Hunt became the first actress to appear nude on British television during a performance of the opera Ulysses from Glyndebourne on STV

1979 – Blues legend BB King celebrated 30 years in show business

1981 – Mark Chapman was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison for murdering John Lennon

1987 – Donny Osmond released his first single in 10 years ‘I’m In It For Love’

1989 – Colombian drug barons declared “total war” on the Colombian government

1989 – The brewery Bass bought the Holiday Inn hotel chain

1990 – The Irish hostage, Brian Keenan, was released in Beirut after more than four years in captivity

1991 – Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as head of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

1991 – Ukraine declared itself independent from the Soviet Union

1993 – In America, Los Angeles police announced that they were investigating allegations of child abuse made against singer Michael Jackson

1995 – Windows ’95 was released by Microsoft

1996 – Liam Gallagher failed to turn up for the recording of the Oasis’ MTV unplugged session in front of 400 fans. He later sat in the audience and watched the show with his brother Noel taking over on vocals

1995 – Pulp singer Jarvis Cocker presented ‘Top Of The Pops’

2004 – Queen became the first rock act to receive an official seal of approval in Iran and get an album officially released there

2004 – Rock star Lenny Kravitz complained that he couldn’t meet women because his bodyguards were always in the way

2005 – Justin Timberlake accepted libel damages from the News of the World over a fake story that he had an affair behind girlfriend Cameron Diaz’s back

2006 – Pluto was demoted to the status of a ‘dwarf planet’ by astronomy experts

2010 – The X-Factor (UK) was accused of rigging the auditions by using digital auto-tuning to make certain contestant’s voices sound better

2010 – After a decade of summer broadcasting, the last ever episode of ‘Big Brother’ was aired on Channel 4 in the UK. The show was later snapped up by Channel 5.

TODAYS BIRTHDAYS

1934 – Kenny Baker, English actor, dwarf and occasional musician, he’s the man inside R2-D2 in Star Wars (78)

1936 – A. S. Byatt, Sheffield-born English novelist, her best known book is “Possession” – The sort of woman they’ll mention on BBC4 a lot (76)

1938 – David Freiberg, American bassist and singer with Quicksilver Messenger Service and Jefferson Starship (74)

1940 – Jim Brady, American singer with The Sandpipers, who had a big hit with “Guantanamera” (72)

1943 – Pini Zahavi, Israeli football agent, one of the first super-agents, he represents Rio Ferdinand amongst many others (69)

1945 – Ken Hensley, English musician with rockers Uriah Heep in the 70′s (67)

1947 – Anne Archer, American actress, Oscar-nominated for her role as the betrayed housewife in the 1987 film “Fatal Attraction” (65)

1948 – Jean-Michel Jarre, laser-obsessed French keyboards star, a pioneer in the electronic, synthpop, ambient and New Age fields, best known for “Oxygene” (64)

1952 – Linton Kwesi Johnson, Jamaican dub poet, the only black poet to be published in the Penguin Classics series (60)

1953 – Sam Torrance, Scottish golfer, former winning Ryder Cup player and Captain – now a commentator (59)

1957 – Jeffrey Daniel, American dancer and singer with Shalamar of “Night To Remember” fame, Michael Jackson learned a lot of his dance moves from him (55)

1957 – Stephen Fry, English comedian, actor, writer, raconteur, director and, most recently, a fan of Twitter (55)

1958 – Steve Guttenberg, American actor, star of the 80′s in films like Cocoon, Three Men and a Baby, Police Academy, and Short Circuit – Most recently on the USTV show “Dancing With The Stars” (54)

1961 – Colin Angus, musician with The Shamen, who had a 1992 Number One with ‘Ebeneezer Goode’ (51)

1961 – Mark Bedford, bass player with ska-pop legends, Madness. The youngest member of the band (51)

1963 – John Bush, American singer formerly with thrash metal stars Anthrax (49)

1965 – Marlee Matlin, American actress, deaf star of the movie “Children of a Lesser God” for which she became the youngest woman to win a Best Actress Oscar, aged 21 in 1986 (47)

1967 – Michael Thomas, English ex-footballer who’ll always be loved by Arsenal fans for scoring the goal that won them the league title with almost the last kick of the season v Liverpool at Anfield in 1989 – Also won Liverpool the FA cup in 1992 with the winning goal (45)

1973 – Dave Chappelle, American actor and Comedian, sometimes seen on cable TV in the UK (39)

1973 – Carmine Giovinazzo, American actor, famous for playing forensic scientist Danny Messer on the hit TV series CSI: New York (39)

1981 – Chad Michael Murray, American actor, best known for his role as Lucas Scott in the US teen series ‘One Tree Hill’ (31)

1983 – Christopher Parker, British actor, played Spencer Moon on EastEnders, was a finalist on the first series of “Strictly Come Dancing” – also a stunt double in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (29)

1988 – Rupert Grint, English actor, plays Ron Weasley in all the “Harry Potter” films. He’s the ginger one. (24)

2010 – Florence Rose Endelion Cameron, English daughter to PM David Cameron and wife Samantha (2)