A selection of significant and interesting snippets of news, with a South African angle, on this day over the ages
1215 The Magna Carta (Great Charter) is signed at “the birthplace of modern democracy” – Runymede, England – by King John. It is one of the most important documents in history as it established the principle that everyone is subject to the law, including the king, and guarantees the rights of individuals; the right to justice; the right to a fair trial; trial by a jury of one’s peers and the idea that justice should not be sold or unnecessarily delayed.
1667 The first fully documented human blood transfusion is performed by Dr Jean-Baptiste Denys, when a small amount of sheep’s blood is given to a 15-year-old boy, who lives.
1752 Benjamin Franklin proves that lightning is electricity.
1785 Two French balloonists die in the world’s first fatal aviation accident.
1844 Charles Goodyear receives a patent for vulcanisation, a process to strengthen rubber.
1864 Land around Confederate rebel General Robert E Lee’s home in Arlington, Virginia, is turned into a national military cemetery.
1896 A tsunami kills 22 000 people in Japan.
1901 Sergeant J Rogers of the South African Constabulary earns a Victoria Cross near Thaba Nchu.
1904 A fire on the steamboat SS General Slocum in New York kills 1 000 people.
1924 J Edgar Hoover takes over the FBI, and leads them for 37 years until his death. He largely made the bureau what it is today.
1974 Defence Minister PW Botha says the defence force has taken over from the police in protecting the country’s northern borders.
1986 The USSR’s Pravda information service says high-level Chernobyl staff, in what is today Ukraine, have been ‘fired for stupidity’ after a nuclear meltdown.
1991 Mount Pinatubo, in the Philippines, erupts in the second-largest volcanic eruption of the 20th century. The largest was the 1916 Novarupta eruption in Alaska.
1996 An IRA truck bomb in Manchester, England, wrecks the city centre, injuring 200 people.
2012 Nik Wallenda becomes the first person to walk on a tightrope over Niagara Falls.
2017 $664 000, the record price paid for a parking lot in Hong Kong
2019 A baseball jersey belonging to Babe Ruth becomes the most expensive sports memorabilia when it sells for $5.64 million at a New York auction.
2022 Black Death, the 14th-century plague which killed more than 60% of Europe’s population as well as great numbers of people in the Middle East and Asia, originated in central Asia’s Kyrgyzstan, according to new DNA research taken from burials at the country’s Lake Issyk Kul.