Significant and interesting moments in time with a South African angle, from this day in history:
325 The Council of Nicaea adopts the Nicene Creed, establishing the Christian faith’s doctrine of the Holy Trinity.
1609 Galileo Galilei demonstrates his first telescope to Venetian lawmakers.
1718 Hundreds of French colonists arrive in Louisiana and found the city of New Orleans.
1835 The first Great Moon Hoax article is published in The New York Sun, announcing the discovery of civilisation on the moon.
1914 The library of the Catholic University of Leuven is destroyed by the German army. Hundreds of thousands of volumes and Gothic and Renaissance manuscripts are lost.
1919 The first scheduled passenger service by airplane – between Paris and London – begins.
1939 Britain and Poland form an alliance in which the UK promises to defend Poland.
1940 The Royal Air Force launches its first raid on Berlin in retaliation for the German bombing of London the previous day.
1945 Chinese Communist Party members kill US intelligence officer John Birch – he is the Cold War’s first of millions of victims, mainly through proxy wars fought by the US and the Soviet Union.
1958 Inventor Momofuku Ando markets the first package of instant noodles, in Japan.
1993 American student Amy Elizabeth Biehl, 26, is dragged from her car by a mob in Guguletu, Cape Town, and stabbed to death.
1998 A bomb explodes in the Planet Hollywood restaurant at Cape Town’s V&A Waterfront killing two people and injuring 26. The bomb was detonated beneath the footrest of the bar at the restaurant. A number of victims lost limbs in the blast and were permanently maimed, including a 12-year-old British tourist. Pagad (People Against Gangsterism and Drugs) claimed responsibility for the attack stating that it was done in retaliation for American air-raids in Sudan and Afghanistan.
2004 Mark Thatcher, son of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, is arrested at his Cape Town home over a coup attempt in Equatorial Guinea.
2006 Hyperion, the world’s tallest living tree, a 700 to 800-year-old Redwood standing 115.55m tall , is discovered in Redwood National and State Parks, California.
2012 Voyager 1 becomes the first man-made object to enter interstellar space.
2018 Afghan Islamic State leader Abu Saad Erhabi and 10 others killed in an air strike in province of Nangarhar, Afghanistan
2019 US astronaut Anne McClain becomes the first person to be investigated for a crime alleged to have been committed in space after being accused of illegally accessing a bank account from the International Space Station. She was cleared.
2020 England's James Anderson becomes first fast bowler to reach 600 wickets in Test cricket; Pakistan batsman Azhar Ali caught at first slip on the fifth day of third Test at Southampton, England.
2020 The WHO announces that Africa has eradicated polio (defined as four years since last case).
2022 California votes to ban the sale of all new petrol-powered cars by 2035.