Today is the 166th day of 2026. There are 199 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

1934: President Franklin D Roosevelt signs an Act making the National Guard part of the US Army in the event of war or national emergency.

OTHER EVENTS

1215: King John of England signs the Magna Carta at Runnymede near Windsor in Surrey, limiting royal authority and establishing the principle that the king and his government are not above the law.

1567: The troops of Mary, Queen of Scots, refuse to fight rebels at Carberry Hill, and she surrenders on the condition that her husband is allowed to escape.

1785: Two French balloonists die in the world’s first fatal aviation accident.

1878: The world’s first moving pictures are captured on camera using 12 cameras.

1896: A tsunami strikes a Shinto festival on the beach at Sanriku, Japan; 27,000 people are killed, 9,000 are injured, and 13,000 houses are destroyed.

1904: More than 1,000 people die in fire aboard steamboat General Slocum off New York City.

1940: German troops occupy Paris as French resistance to the German invasion crumbles.

1951: Joe Louis scores his last knockout victory.

1955: The United States and Britain sign a cooperation agreement concerning atomic information for “mutual defence purposes”.

1963: Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II’s musical The Sound of Music, closes at Lunt Fontanne Theater, New York, after 1443 performances.

1970: Martial law is declared in Turkey when serious rioting breaks out.

1973: The Let’s Get It On single is released by Marvin Gaye.

1977: Spain holds its first free elections in four decades.

1985: The Shiite Muslim hijackers of a TWA Boeing 727 beat and shoot one of their hostages, US Navy diver Robert Stethem, 23, throwing him out of the plane to die on the tarmac at Beirut airport.

1991: Kuwait’s martial law court sentences six newspaper workers to death for working on an Iraqi publication during the occupation of Kuwait.

A climactic eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines takes place — the second-largest volcanic eruption on Earth in the 20th century.

1992: Japan’s Parliament approves the use of troops overseas for the first time since World War II, enabling Japan to join international peacekeeping operations.

1994: Disney’s animated musical film The Lion King opens in cinemas.

1996: American singer Ella Fitzgerald — known for her enormous vocal range and inventive interpretations, in both ballads and jazz improvisations known as scat — dies at age 79.

1997: British model Naomi Campbell is hospitalised for a drug overdose.

1998: Nigeria’s new military leadership releases nine of the country’s most prominent political prisoners, including General Olusegun Obasanjo, who becomes president less than a year later.

1999: After a final spree of burning, shooting and alleged rapes, Yugoslav forces withdraw from Kosovo’s border region with Albania.

2000: Roman Catholic Bishop Augustin Misago, accused of helping orchestrate the 1994 slaughter of more than a half-million Rwandans, is cleared of genocide charges and set free.

2004: Iraq’s neighbours endorse the US-backed Administration and the transfer of power, giving a boost to Iraq’s quest for international legitimacy.

2005: Spanish police arrest 16 Islamic terror suspects in raids in several cities, including 11 suspected members of a group thought to have ties to Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi’s al-Qaeda in Iraq.

2006: The Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument is established — at 582,578 square miles it is one of the largest marine conservation areas in the world.

2012: An Apple I computer sells for a record US $374,500.

2017: Scotland Yard launches a criminal inquiry and British Prime Minister Theresa May announces a public inquiry a day after the Grenfell Tower fire.

2018: Physicist Stephen Hawking’s ashes are interred in Westminster Abbey, London, between the remains of Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin.

2019: A baseball jersey belonging to Babe Ruth becomes the most expensive sports memorabilia when it sells for US$5.64 million at an auction in New York.

2020: Philippines journalist and Time Person of the Year Maria Ressa is found guilty of cyber libel in Manila amid claims charges are politically motivated.

2021: The US death toll from COVID-19 tops 600,000 (according to Johns Hopkins), with 65 per cent of adults vaccinated with at least one dose.

2022: Black Death, the 14th century plague, originated in Kyrgyzstan, according to new DNA research taken from burials at Lake Issyk Kul.

2023: A record-breaking outbreak of dengue fever in Peru causes 248 deaths and over 146,000 cases, forcing Health Minister Rosa Gutiérrez to resign.

2025: A peaceful protest of 100,000 to 150,000 people takes place in The Hague, Netherlands, demanding the Dutch Government take action against Israel’s military campaign in Palestine.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Issa, Japanese poet (1763-1828); Thomas Mitchell, British explorer of Australia, (1792-1855); Edvard Grieg, Norwegian composer (1843-1907); Courteney Cox, US actress (1964- ); Ice Cube, US rapper-actor (1969- )

— AP/OnThisDay.com/ Britannica.com/