On This Day In History!

2008
Manitoba Provincial Mountain Bike Championships

1998
Britain, the United States and the Netherlands agree to put two Libyans on trial for planting the bomb which blew up a Pan Am airliner over the town of Lockerbie, Scotland killing all those on board and several on the ground.

1991
The Parliament of Ukraine declares independence from the Soviet Union.
1990Irishman Brian Keenan is released by his Islamic kidnappers in Beirut after spending 52 months in captivity.

1986
Irish musician Bob Geldof marries Paula Yates.

1981
American Mark Chapman is given a 20 year life sentence for shooting John Lennon - the former member of the British group, The Beatles - in New York.

1975
Death sentences imposed on former Greek Prime Minister Georgios Papadopoulos and two other leaders of the 1967 coup, are commuted to life imprisonment.

1968
France becomes the world's fifth nuclear power when it successfully explodes a hydrogen bomb near Fugataufa Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.

1965
450,000 year old body of man is found in a Hungarian limestone quarry.

1954
The United States of America outlaws membership of the Communist Party with the Communist Control Act - signed by US President Dwight Eisenhower.

1951
The start of the Mau-Mau rebellion against British rule in Kenya.

1922
Arab states reject the granting of a British mandate in Palestine given by the League of Nations.

1875
British Merchant Navy captain Matthew Webb becomes first man to swim the English Channel in 21 hours 45 minutes.

1814
British troops led by General Ross invade the city of Washington and set fire to buildings in the capital, including the White House and the Capitol.

1572
The St Bartholomew's Day massacre in Paris after Charles IX orders the killing of thousands of French Huguenots. An estimate 70,000 are put to deaththroughout France.

79AD
An eruption from Mount Vesuvius destroys the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum killing at least 2,000. The hot volcanic ash helps preserve both bodies and buildings for hundreds of years.