Here are 50 newsworthy anniversaries coming up in August 2016 for you to write about (and make money from). The anniversaries are listed 6 months in advance to give you enough time to find markets, and research and write your articles.
We have painstakingly cross-checked every entry, but you are advised to check all facts again as part of your research. Please let us know of any errors you find.
The listing below is a small sample of the entries for August from The Date-A-Base Book 2016. There are 256 anniversaries for August in the book (five times as many as are listed here). The book covers the whole of 2016 from January to December and features more than 3,450 anniversaries in total.
Just one published article should cover the cost of your copy many times over – and the book also explains how to get your articles published.
If you need to work further ahead, The Date-A-Base Book 2017 is also available.
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200 years ago (14 Aug 1816)
Britain annexed the Tristan da Cunha archipelago in the south Atlantic.
200 years ago (24 Aug 1816)
The Treaty of St. Louis was signed in Missouri by representatives from the USA and the united tribes of Ottawa, Ojibwa, and Potawatomi. The tribes relinquished their rights to land ceded to the USA in 1804, and in exchange received $1,000 worth of merchandise, paid over 12 years. (The treaty came into effect on 30th December.)
150 years ago (1 Aug 1866)
Death of John Ross, Native American Indian. Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation (1828–66). Although he devoted much of his life to resisting the USA’s attempts to seize Cherokee lands, he eventually capitulated and helped remove his people to the Oklahoma Territory.
150 years ago (8 Aug 1866)
Birth of Matthew Henson, the first African American Arctic explorer. He accompanied Robert E. Peary on most of his expeditions, including the 1909 expedition when they became the first men to reach the North Pole.
150 years ago (13 Aug 1866)
Birth of Giovanni Agnelli, Italian industrialist who founded the Fiat car company.
150 years ago (23 Aug 1866)
The Austro–Prussian War ended with the signing of the Peace of Prague. Prussian victory.
100 years ago (3 Aug 1916)
Death of Roger Casement, Irish nationalist. (Executed for treason for his role in the Easter Rising.)
100 years ago (25 Aug 1916)
The National Park Service was established in the USA.
100 years ago (29 Aug 1916)
The U.S. Congress passed the Philippine Autonomy Act (also known as the Jones Law). It created the first fully elected Philippine legislature.
80 years ago (1 – 16 Aug 1936)
The 11th Olympic Games were held in Berlin, Germany. It was the last Olympics for 12 years due to World War II.
80 years ago (1 Aug 1936)
Birth of Yves Saint-Laurent, Algerian-born French fashion designer. (Died 2008.)
80 years ago (2 Aug 1936)
Death of Louis Blériot, French aviation pioneer, engineer and inventor. The first person to fly across the English Channel.
80 years ago (14 Aug 1936)
The last public execution in the USA. Rainey Bethea was hanged for rape in Owensboro, Kentucky.
80 years ago (26 Aug 1936)
The Anglo–Egyptian Alliance Treaty was signed in Cairo, Egypt, ending Britain’s occupation of Egypt.
75 years ago (1 Aug 1941)
The first mass-produced Jeep rolled off the production line, for service in WWII. (Before this, all Jeeps had been prototypes and test models.)
75 years ago (2 Aug 1941)
Birth of Doris Coley, American pop singer (The Shirelles). (Died 2000.)
75 years ago (14 Aug 1941)
World War II: Britain and the USA issued the Atlantic Charter, a joint declaration that laid out the aims and goals of the Allied powers during and after the war.
75 years ago (14 Aug 1941)
Death of Saint Maximilian (also spelled Maksymilian) Kolbe, Polish Franciscan friar and martyr who sheltered 2,000 Jewish refugees from the Nazis and took the place of a condemned man at Auschwitz concentration camp. (Executed.)
75 years ago (15 Aug 1941)
German spy Josef Jakobs became the last person to be executed at the Tower of London. (He parachuted into Britain during WWII and was executed by a military firing squad.)
75 years ago (25 Aug – 17 Sep 1941)
World War II – Operation Countenance: the Anglo–Soviet invasion of Iran. The invasion was in response to Iran’s declaration of neutrality, its refusal to allow its territory to be used for the war effort against Germany, and its refusal to expel German nationals. Allied victory. The Shah of Iran was forced to abdicate on 16th September.
60 years ago (3 Aug 1956)
Bedloe’s Island in New York Harbor was renamed Liberty Island. (It is the site of the Statue of Liberty.)
60 years ago (11 Aug 1956)
Death of Jackson Pollock, influential American abstract expressionist artist. Best known for his drip paintings. (Car crash, aged 44.)
60 years ago (14 Aug 1956)
Death of Bertolt Brecht, German poet, playwright and theatrical director/reformer who developed the epic theatre style and promoted leftist/Marxist causes.
60 years ago (16 Aug 1956)
Death of Bela Lugosi, Hungarian-born American stage and film actor. Best known for his horror roles, most notably as Count Dracula.
60 years ago (27 Aug 1956)
Britain’s first nuclear power station, Calder Hall in Cumbria, began operating. (It was officially opened by the Queen on 17th October. It was the first nuclear power station in the world to generate power on an industrial scale. The world’s first nuclear power station began operating in the Soviet Union in 1954, on an experimental basis, but its output was significantly lower than Calder Hall’s.)
50 years ago (1 Aug 1966)
The Cultural Revolution (also known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution) began in China. It was intended to preserve China’s Maoist/Communist ideology by banishing capitalist and traditional elements from society. Millions of people were persecuted or displaced and there were violent struggles throughout the country. (The Revolution ended after Mao Zedong’s death in 1976.)
50 years ago (1 Aug 1966)
University of Texas at Austin spree shooting, USA. American engineering student Charles Whitman shot and killed 15 people and wounded 31 others before being shot dead by police. (In the early hours of the same morning he had also killed his wife and mother. It was the deadliest college campus shooting until 2007.)
50 years ago (3 Aug 1966)
Death of Lenny Bruce, American stand-up comedian, satirist and free speech activist. Noted for his black humour and controversial routines punctuated by obscenity.
50 years ago (4 & 5 Aug 1966)
U.S. newspapers and radio stations republished an extract from a British newspaper article dated March 1966 in which John Lennon of the Beatles said his band was ‘more popular than Jesus’. It provoked widespread protests, with radio stations in many states refusing to play their records. (He apologised on 12th August during a press conference in Chicago to promote the start of their final tour.)
50 years ago (5 Aug 1966)
The album Revolver by the Beatles was released in the UK. (USA: 8th August.)
50 years ago (10 Aug 1966)
NASA launched its Lunar Orbiter I spacecraft to the Moon to map its surface and photograph potential landing sites for the Apollo missions. It also took the first photo of the Earth from the Moon’s orbit.
50 years ago (24 Aug 1966)
The sci-fi film Fantastic Voyage was released in the USA. (UK: 14th October.)
50 years ago (26 Aug 1966 – 21 Mar 1990)
Namibian War of Independence. SWAPO victory. South-West Africa gained its independence from South Africa and became the Republic of Namibia.
50 years ago (29 Aug 1966)
The Beatles performed their final concert, at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, California, USA.
40 years ago (1 Aug 1976)
Trinidad and Tobago severed its links with the British monarchy and became an independent republic.
40 years ago (1 Aug 1976)
Austrian racing driver Niki Lauda suffered life-threatening burns and was left with permanent disfigurement when he crashed in the German Grand Prix. (As a result of this accident, the Nürburgring circuit was declared too dangerous to race on. It was rebuilt and shortened.)
30 years ago (9 Aug 1986)
British rock band Queen performed their final live concert before the death of singer Freddie Mercury, at Knebworth Park, Stevenage, UK.
30 years ago (17 Aug 1986)
Pixar released its first film, Luxo Jr. The 2-minute film stars a computer-animated desk lamp. It was the first CGI film to be nominated for an Academy Award.
25 years ago (5 Aug 1991)
Death of Paul Brown, American football coach who introduced numerous innovations both on and off the field, including filmed reviews of games, classroom study and written tests for players, and new blocking tactics.
25 years ago (5 Aug 1991)
Death of Soichiro Honda, Japanese industrialist and engineer who founded the Honda Motor Company.
25 years ago (6 Aug 1991)
The first ever website (info.cern.ch) went live. The web’s inventor, Tim Berners-Lee, also posted a description of the World Wide Web project on the alt.hypertext newsgroup and provided a link to download the first web browser, though it could only run on NeXT workstations. (The World Wide Web was opened up to new users on 23rd August.)
25 years ago (8 Aug 1991)
British journalist John McCarthy was released by Islamic Jihad in Lebanon after being held hostage for over 5 years.
25 years ago (19 – 21 Aug 1991)
Attempted coup in the Soviet Union. Hard-line members of the Communist Party tried to seize control from President Mikhail Gorbachev. The coup failed after just 3 days and eventually led to the collapse of communism and the disintegration of the USSR. On 24th August Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. On 29th August the Soviet Parliament voted to suspend all activities of the Communist Party.
25 years ago (20 Aug 1991)
The following former Soviet states gained their independence this month: Estonia (20th), Latvia (21st), Ukraine (24th), Belarus (25th), Moldova (27th), Azerbaijan (30th), Kyrgyzstan (31st), Uzbekistan (31st).
25 years ago (25 Aug 1991)
German racing driver Michael Schumacher made his Formula 1 debut in the Belgian Grand Prix.
20 years ago (6 Aug 1996)
NASA reported that a meteorite (ALH 84001) found in Antarctica and believed to have come from Mars showed possible signs of primitive life, including hydrocarbons, minerals and microfossils consistent with bacterial activity.
20 years ago (13 Aug 1996)
Microsoft released its Internet Explorer 3 web browser. It was the first widely used version and led to a browser war with Netscape Navigator.
20 years ago (16 Aug 1996)
A female gorilla, Binti Jua, rescued a three-year-old boy who had fallen into the primate enclosure at Brookfield Zoo near Chicago, USA.
20 years ago (28 Aug 1996)
Britain’s Prince Charles and Princess Diana were divorced. Princess Diana could no longer be addressed as Her Royal Highness but would be known as Diana, Princess of Wales.
10 years ago (23 Aug 2006)
Austrian kidnapping victim Natascha Kampusch escaped from captivity after 8 years. (She had been kidnapped by Wolfgang Priklopil at the age of 10 and held in a secret cellar beneath his garage in Strasshof an der Nordbahn.)
10 years ago (24 Aug 2006)
Pluto was downgraded to a dwarf planet when the International Astronomical Union (IAU) redefined the term ‘planet’.
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