Historical Events -  August 26

1303 – Allauddin Khilji captured Chittorgarh.

1498 – Michelanjelo, Italian sculptor Started sculpturing famous ‘Pieta’.

1768 – Captain James Cook stated sail from England on board HMS Endeavour.

1789 – The French Assembly adopted the declaration of the Rights of Man.

1883 – Eruption of Krakatoa Volcano, caused around 36,000 deaths.

1920 – US legislature ratified the Nineteenth Amendment giving American woman right to vote.

1936 – The first high definition television programs seen in Britain were transmitted today from the BBC studios at Alexandra Palace, London, to the Radio show at Olympia (Radiolympia).

1952 – The Soviets announced the first successful intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) tests had taken place.

1988 – American swimmer Lynne Cox crossed the 11 mile (17.5 km) wide Lake Baikal in Siberia in 4 hours. 20 minutes. The first long swim in a cold water lake.

 

Famous Birthdays   – August  26  

1740 – Josef Michel Montgolfier, French inventor and pioneer of the hot balloon with his brother Jacques Etienne Montgolfier.

1743 – Antoine Lavoisier, French chemist. He is widely considered in popular literature as the “father of modern chemistry”

1819 – Prince Albert, Bavarian-born consort to Queen Victoria, patron of the arts and organizer of the Great Exhibition of 1851.

1873 – Lee De Forest, the American radio and television pioneer, and inventor of the Audion vacuum tube, which made broadcasting possible. 

1883 – Thiruvarur Viruttachala Kalyanasundaram. Tamil scholar, activist, and essayist.

1883 – Algernon Lyons, a senior Royal Navy officer who served as First and Principal Naval Aide-de-Camp to Queen Victoria.

1910 – Mother Teresa, Albanian-Indian Roman Catholic nun, and missionary. Noble Prize laureate and honored with India’s highest civilian award Bharat Ratna.

1918 – Katherine Johnson, American physicist, and mathematician.  Calculations of Orbital Mechanics as a NASA employee were critical to the success of the first and subsequent U.S. crewed spaceflights.

1956 – Menaka Gandhi, Indian Politician.

 

Death Anniversaries   – August 26

1723 – Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, Dutch microscopist and biologist. Commonly known as ‘Father of microbiology’.

1910 – William James, American philosopher. The first educator to introduce the psychology course in the U.S.

1969 – S. S. Vasan, an Indian journalist, writer, advertiser, film producer, director, and business tycoon.

1972 – Sir Francis Chichester, English yachtsman who was the first old age pensioner to sail around the world singlehanded.

1974 – Charles Lindbergh. American pilot and explorer.  He is famous for winning the Orteig Prize for making a nonstop flight from New York City to Paris.

1997 – Josef Burr Tyrreff, Canadian Geologist. He discovered the bones of the Albertosaurus dinosaur.

1980 – Tex Avery, American cartoonist, and director. Known for producing and directing animated cartoons during the golden age of American animation. He created the classic cartoon characters, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and Porky Pig.

1993 – Roy Raymond, American Businessman. He founded Victoria’s Secret lingerie retail store in California in 1977.