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Other Notable Events for August 3

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Published in History & Quotes

On this date in history:

In 1492, Christopher Columbus set sail from Spain, seeking a western route to India, with a convoy of three small ships -- the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria -- and fewer than 100 crew. (They reached land at Guanahani, an island in the Caribbean, on Oct. 12.)

In 1914, Germany declared war on France and invaded Belgium. (The following day, Britain declared war on Germany and World War I was underway.)

In 1958, the U.S. nuclear submarine Nautilus crossed under the North Pole.

In 1981, U.S. air traffic controllers went on strike. (The strikers were fired within one week.)

In 1990, the prime ministers of East and West Germany agreed to move up unification to early fall and rescheduled all-German elections for Oct. 14.

In 2004, the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor was opened to the public for the first time since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.

In 2005, in the first emergency repair conducted in space, astronauts fixed a potentially dangerous problem by removing two strips of protruding cloth from the underside of the space shuttle Discovery.

In 2007, the U.S. Congress passed a bill allowing the National Security Agency to monitor email and telephone communications between the United States and foreign countries without a court warrant if terrorism was believed to be involved.

In 2008, once-exiled Russian writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, whose works revealed the harshness of the Soviet penal system, died at the age of 89. The Nobel Prize-winning author of One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich had been reported ill for years.

In 2010, a Manchester, Conn., beer and wine distributorship driver who was allegedly caught stealing beer, went on a shooting rampage after a disciplinary hearing at the company, killing eight people and himself.

In 2013, incumbent Robert Mugabe, 89, was declared winner of Zimbabwe's presidential election. Opponents alleged the vote that gave Mugabe a seventh term was rigged.

In 2014, an earthquake in southern China's Yunnan province killed nearly 400 people, injured 1,800 and destroyed thousands of homes..

 


Copyright 2015 by United Press International

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