Today in History, July 15
HIGHLIGHTS IN HISTORY ON THIS DATE
1099 - Three years after the First Crusade set out, the Christian army storms Jerusalem and puts Muslim inhabitants to the sword.
1601 - Austria's Archduke Albert begins a three-year siege of Ostend, the last Dutch stronghold in Belgium, with Spanish force.
1685 - The Duke of Monmouth is beheaded in England for his part in a rebellion. It takes the inexperienced executioner eight blows of the axe to sever his head.
1789 - France's King Louis XVI is awakened and told his authority has collapsed with the fall of the Bastille.
1795 - La Marseillaise is officially adopted as the French national anthem.
1869 - Margarine is patented in France by Hippolyte Mege Mouries.
1912 - The Commonwealth Bank of Australia opens its doors for the first time as a savings bank.
1916 - Boeing Co, originally known as Pacific Aero Products, is founded in Seattle, Washington, by William Boeing.
1945 - Italy declares war on Japan, its former Axis partner in World War II.
1953 - UK killer John Christie is hanged for his wife's murder, although he's believed to have slain at least eight people.
1958 - South Africa resumes full membership of the United Nations.
1977 - Anti-drug campaigner Donald McKay disappears and is presumed murdered in the southern NSW town Griffith.
1985 - A gaunt-looking Rock Hudson appears at a news conference with actress Doris Day to promote her cable television program. It's later revealed the actor was suffering from AIDS.
1987 - Taiwan ends 38 years of martial law to pave the way for multi-party elections.
1994 - Former West Australian premier Brian Burke begins a two-year jail term after being convicted of fraud.
1997 - Fashion designer Gianni Versace is shot dead outside his Miami Beach mansion by serial killer Andrew Cunanan.
2000 - Zimbabwe launches the resettlement of black peasants on farms seized from whites in all its eight provinces.
2002 - A Pakistan judge convicts four defendants of the kidnapping and murder of American journalist Daniel Pearl.
2004 - Former Rwandan finance minister Emmanuel Ndindabahizi is convicted and jailed for life for his role in the country's 1994 genocide.
2005 - Investigators probing the UN oil-for-food program say they have found evidence of "gross mismanagement" and possible corruption by the UN agency overseeing compensation for victims of Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
2006 - The UN Security Council votes unanimously to impose weapons-related sanctions on North Korea in response to its flurry of missile tests earlier in the month.
2010 - Argentina becomes the first Latin American country to legalise gay marriage.
2011 - Rupert Murdoch accepts the resignations of The Wall Street Journal's publisher and the chief of his British operations as the once-defiant media mogul struggles to control an escalating phone hacking scandal.
2013 - Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says the government will scrap the fixed carbon price and move to the emissions trading scheme a year early.
2015 - Brisbane estate agent Gerard Baden-Clay is jailed for life for the murder of his wife Allison - later downgraded to manslaughter on appeal.
2016 - The Liberal Party defends itself from claims it is broke after reports emerge Malcolm Turnbull donated at least $1 million to fund the election campaign. The PM takes until February to admit the donation of $1.75m just before the July 2 poll.
2017 - A plan to resettle refugee detainees held in an Australian-run offshore detention centre in America is thrown into doubt after US officials interviewing the refugees leave the facility abruptly.
Today's Birthdays:
Inigo Jones, English architect (1573-1652); Rembrandt (Rembrandt Harmes van Rijn), Dutch artist (1606-1669); Walter Benjamin, German literary critic (1892-1940); Iris Murdoch, Irish-born writer (1919-1999); Jacques Derrida, French philosopher (1930-2004); Millie Jackson, US singer (1944-); Jan-Michael Vincent, US actor (1944-); Linda Ronstadt, US singer (1946-); Colin Barnett, Western Australian politician (1950-); Jesse Ventura, US actor-wrestler turned politician (1951-); Steve Mortimer, former Australian rugby league player (1956-); Forest Whitaker, US actor-director (1961-); Brian Austin Green, US actor (1973-); Chris Taylor, Australian comedian (1974-); Diane Kruger, German actress and former fashion model (1976-).
Thought For Today:
It is astonishing what force, purity, and wisdom it requires for a human being to keep clear of falsehoods - Margaret Fuller, American journalist and social critic (1810-1850).
