2008 facts for kids

2008 is the 123rd day of the year (124th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar; 242 days remain until the end of the year.

Events

Up to 1900

• 1132 – Battle of Nocera between Ranulf II of Alife and Roger II of Sicily.
• 1148 – King Louis VII of France lays siege to Damascus during the Second Crusade.
• 1245 – Pope Innocent IV forces King Sancho II of Portugal out, and replaces him with Afonso III of Portugal.
• 1411 – The Battle of Harlaw, one of the bloodiest in Scotland, takes place.
• 1487 – Citizens of Leeuwarden, the Netherlands, strike against a ban on foreign beer.
• 1534 – Jacques Cartier plants a cross on the Gaspe peninsula in present-day Quebec, taking possession of the territory and naming it after Francis I of France.
• 1567 – Mary, Queen of Scots, is deposed and replaced by her 1-year-old son King King James VI.
• 1701 – Detroit, Michigan is founded.
• 1783 – The Kingdom of Georgia and the Russian Empire sign the Treaty of Georgievsk.
• 1814 – War of 1812: General Phineas Riall advances toward Niagara to halt Jacob Brown's American invaders.
• 1823 – Chile abolishes Slavery.
• 1823 – The Naval Battle of Lake Maracaibo takes place.
• 1832 – Benjamin Bonneville leads the first wagon train across the Rocky Mountains by using Wyoming's South Pass.
• 1847 – After 17 months of travel, Brigham Young leads 148 Mormon pioneers into Salt Lake Valley, resulting in the establishment of Salt Lake City.
• 1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Kernstown – Confederate General Jubal Early defeats Union troops led by General George Crook in an effort to keep Yankees out of the Shenandoah Valley.
• 1866 – Reconstruction: Tennessee becomes the first U.S. state to be readmitted to the Union following the American Civil War.

1901 – 1950

• 1901 – O. Henry is released from prison in Austin, Texas after serving three years for embezzlement from a bank.
• 1910 – James MacGillivray publishes the first account of Paul Bunyan in the Detroit News.
• 1911 – Hiram Bingham III re-discovers Machu Picchu "the Lost City of the Incas".
• 1915 – Passenger ship Eastland capsizes in central Chicago, with the loss of 845 lives.
• 1922 – The draft of the British Mandate for Palestine is officially confirmed the Council of the League of Nations.
• 1923 – The Treaty of Lausanne, settling the boundaries of modern Turkey, is signed in Switzerland by Greece, Bulgaria and other countries that fought in World War I.
• 1924 – Archaeologist Themistoklis Sofoulis becomes Prime Minister of Greece.
• 1927 – The Menin Gate war memorial is unveiled at Ypres.
• 1929 – The Kellogg-Briand Pact, renouncing war as an instrument of foreign policy, goes into effect (it was first signed in Paris on August 27, 1928 by most leading world powers).
• 1931 – A fire at a home for aged people in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania kills 48 people.
• 1935 – The dust bowl heat wave reaches its peak, sending temperatures to 109 °F (44 °C) in Chicago and 104 °F (40 °C) in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
• 1938 – The first successful climb of the Eiger North Face is made.
• 1943 – World War II: Operation Gomorrah begins: British and Canadian aeroplanes bomb Hamburg by night, those of the Americans by day. By the end of the operation in November, 9,000 tons of explosives will have killed more than 30,000 people and destroyed 280,000 buildings.
• 1950 – Bumper 8 becomes the first aircraft to be launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

1951 – 2000

• 1956 – At New York City's Copacabana Club, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis perform their last comedy show together which started on July 25, 1946, almost exactly ten years earlier.
• 1959 – At the opening of the American National Exhibition in Moscow, US vice-president Richard Nixon and Nikita Khrushchev have a "kitchen debate."
• 1965 – Vietnam War: Four F-4C Phantoms escorting a bombing raid at Kang Chi are the targets of anti-aircraft missiles in the first such attack against American planes in the war. One is shot down and the other three sustain damage.
• 1966 – Michael Petkey makes the first BASE jump from El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, along with Brian Schubert. They both end up with broken bones.
• 1967 – During an official state visit to Canada, French President Charles de Gaulle declares to a crowd of over 100,000 in Montreal: Vive le Québec libre! (Long live free Quebec!). The statement, interpreted as support for Quebec independence, delighted many Quebecers but angered the Canadian government and many English Canadians.
• 1969 – Apollo program: Apollo 11 splashes down safely in the Pacific Ocean.
• 1974 – Watergate scandal: The United States Supreme Court unanimously rule that President Richard Nixon did not have the authority to withhold subpoenaed White House tapes and they order him to surrender the tapes to the Watergate special prosecutor.
• 1974 – Konstantinos Karamanlis arrives in Greece, following the collapse of the military junta.
• 1977 – End of the four-day long Libyan-Egyptian War.
• 1983 – George Brett, batting for the Kansas City Royals against the New York Yankees, has a game-winning home run nullified in the "Pine Tar Incident".
• 1990 – Iraqi forces start massing on the Kuwaiti border, preparing for the invasion on August 2.
• 1998 – Russel Eugene Weston Jr. bursts into the United States Capitol and opens fire killing two police officers. He is later ruled to be incompetent to stand trial.

From 2001

• 2001 – Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the last Tsar of Bulgaria when he was a child, is sworn in as Prime Minister of Bulgaria, and became the only monarch in history to regain political power through democratic election to a different office. He becomes Prime Minister under the name Simeon Saksburggotsky.
• 2001 – The Taiwan Solidarity Union is established.
• 2002 – James Traficant is expelled from the United States House of Representatives on a vote of 420 to 1.
• 2002 – Alfred Moisiu becomes President of Albania.
• 2005 – Lance Armstrong wins the Tour de France for seventh consecutive year. After being revealed to have taken illegal drugs to improve his performance during his career, all of his Tour de France titles are removed from the record in 2012.
• 2010 – Love Parade disaster: At a stampede at a music festival in Duisburg, Germany, 19 people are crushed to death. 2 later die in hospital, as a result of their injuries.
• 2010 – Over 80,000 people record their lives for the YouTube documentary A Life in a Day.
• 2012 – President of Ghana John Atta Mills dies aged 68. His Vice President John Dramani Mahama is sworn in as President later the same day.
• 2013 – A passenger train carrying over 218 people crashes just outside Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, northwest Spain, killing at least 80 people and injuring at least 130. It was travelling from Madrid to Ferrol on the Galician coast when it crashed. It occurred a day before the regional July 25 holiday in Galicia.
• 2014 – Air Algerie Flight 5017 crashes in Mali on a flight between Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso and Algiers, Algeria.
• 2014 – Reuven Rivlin becomes the 10th President of Israel, succeeding Shimon Peres.
• 2015 – Barack Obama makes the first visit by a US President to Kenya.
• 2016 – The International Olympic Committee decides against banning the entire Russian team from the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, after its track-and-field athletes had already been banned following a doping scandal.

Births

Up to 1900

• 923 – Suzaku, Emperor of Japan (d. 952)
• 1468 – Catherine of Saxony, Archduchess of Austria (d. 1524)
• 1574 – Thomas Platter the Younger, Swiss physician (d. 1629)
• 1720 – Louisa Ulrika of Prussia, Prussian princess and Queen of Sweden (d. 1782)
• 1725 – John Newton, cleric and hymnist (d. 1807)
• 1737 – Alexander Dalrymple, Scottish geographer (d. 1808)
• 1740 – Juan Ignacio Molina, Chilean naturalist (d. 1829)
• 1757 – Vladimir Borovikovski, Russian painter (d. 1825)
• 1759 – King Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia (d. 1824)
• 1783 – Simón Bolívar, South American liberator (d. 1830)
• 1783 – Frédéric de Lafresnaye, French ornithologist (d. 1861)
• 1786 – Joseph Nicollet, mathematician and explorer (d. 1843)
• 1798 – John Adams Dix, American general, senator and Governor of New York (d. 1879)
• 1802 – Alexandre Dumas, père, French writer (d. 1870)
• 1803 – Adolphe Charles Adam, French composer (d. 1956)
• 1817 – Adolphe, Grand Duke of Luxembourg (d. 1905)
• 1823 – Arthur I. Boreman, Governor of West Virginia (d. 1896)
• 1826 – Ivan Bloch, Polish banker (d. 1902)
• 1828 – Nikolay Chernyshevsky, Russian writer (d. 1889)
• 1832 – John J. Bagley, 16th Governor of Michigan (d. 1881)
• 1841 – Francisco da Veiga Beirao, Portuguese politician (d. 1916)
• 1847 – Margarete Steiff, German seamstress, known for Steiff stuffed toys (d. 1909)
• 1851 – Friedrich Schottky, German mathematician (d. 1935)
• 1853 – William Gillette, actor and writer (d. 1937)
• 1857 – Henrik Pontoppidan, Danish writer (d. 1943)
• 1857 – Juan Vicente Gomez, Venezuelan officer, politician and dictator (d. 1935)
• 1858 – Wolfgang Kapp, Prussian civil servant and journalist (d. 1922)
• 1860 – Alphonse Mucha, Czech artist (d. 1939)
• 1860 – Princess Charlotte of Prussia (d. 1919)
• 1864 – Frank Wedekind, German writer (d. 1918)
• 1867 – Vicente Acosta, El Salvadorean poet (d. 1908)
• 1878 – Lord Dunsany, writer (d. 1957)
• 1880 – Ernest Bloch, Swiss composer (d. 1959)
• 1883 – Katia Mann, wife of Thomas Mann (d. 1980)
• 1884 – Maria Caserini, Italian actress (d. 1969)
• 1886 – Jun'ichiro Tanizaki, Japanese writer (d. 1965)
• 1888 – Arthur Richardson, Australian cricketer and coach (d. 1973)
• 1895 – Robert Graves, English writer (d. 1985)
• 1896 – Hermann Kasack, writer (d. 1966)
• 1897 – Amelia Earhart, American aviator (d. 1937) (disappeared)
• 1899 – Chief Dan George, Native American actor (d. 1981)
• 1899 – Bernice Madigan, American supercentenarian (d. 2015)
• 1900 – Zelda Fitzgerald, American artist (d. 1948)

1901 – 1950

• 1908 – Cootie Williams, trumpeter (d. 1985)
• 1914 – Frances Oldham Kelsey, Canadian physician (d. 2015)
• 1914 – Edwin Mirvish, retailer and impresario (d. 2007)
• 1916 – John D. MacDonald, novelist (d. 1986)
• 1917 – Robert Farnon, conductor, composer and arranger (d. 2005)
• 1918 – Ruggiero Ricci, American violinist (d. 2012)
• 1920 – Bella Abzug, American politician and activist (d. 1998)
• 1920 – Constance Dowling, American actress (d. 1969)
• 1921 – Giuseppe Di Stefano, Italian tenor (d. 2008)
• 1923 – Warren E. Hearnes, 46th Governor of Missouri (d. 2009)
• 1926 – Hans Günter Winkler, German equestrian jumper
• 1929 – Peter Yates, British movie director (d. 2011)
• 1930 – Keshubhai Patel, Indian politician, former Chief Minister of Gujarat
• 1931 – Ermanno Olmi, Italian director
• 1933 – John Aniston, Greek-American actor
• 1933 – Doug Sanders, American golfer
• 1934 – Rudy Collins, American drummer (Dizzy Gillespie Quintet)
• 1935 – Pat Oliphant, Australian political cartoonist
• 1936 – Ruth Buzzi, comedienne
• 1936 – Dan Inosanto, American martial artist and actor
• 1937 – Manoj Kumar, Indian actor, director, producer and screenwriter
• 1939 – Walt Bellamy, American basketball player (d. 2013)
• 1940 – Stanley Hauerwas, Christian theologian
• 1942 – Chris Sarandon, American actor
• 1944 – Jan-Carl Raspe, German Red Army Faction militant (d. 1977)
• 1945 – Azim Premji, Indian businessman
• 1947 – Robert Hays, actor
• 1947 – Peter Serkin, American pianist
• 1949 – Michael Richards, comedian
• 1949 – Joan Enric Vives Sicilia, Catalan bishop and co-Prince of Andorra

1951 – 1975

• 1951 – Lynda Carter, American actress
• 1951 – Chris Smith, British politician
• 1952 – Gus Van Sant, American movie director
• 1953 – Claire McCaskill, American politician, United States Senator for Missouri
• 1956 – Charlie Crist, American politician, 44th Governor of Florida, 2007 – 2011
• 1956 – Pat Finn, American game show host and producer
• 1957 – Pam Tillis, American country music singer
• 1958 – Konrad Graber, Swiss Federal Councillor
• 1960 – Catherine Destivelle, Algerian-born French rock climber and mountaineer
• 1963 – Karl Malone, American basketball player
• 1964 – Pedro Passos Coelho, Prime Minister of Portugal
• 1964 – Barry Bonds, American Major League Baseball player
• 1964 – Banana Yoshimoto, Japanese writer
• 1965 – Andrew Gaze, Australian basketball player and broadcaster
• 1965 – Kadeem Hardison, actor
• 1966 – Martin Keown, English footballer
• 1966 – Hilarion, Russian writer and theologian
• 1968 – Kristin Chenoweth, American actress and singer
• 1968 – Laura Leighton, American actress
• 1969 – Rick Fox, American basketball player
• 1969 – Jennifer Lopez, American actress, dancer, fashion designer and singer
• 1970 – Julia Bradbury, English journalist and presenter
• 1971 – Dino Baggio, Italian footballer
• 1971 – John Partridge, English actor, singer and dancer
• 1975 – Tracey Crouch, English politician

From 1976

• 1977 – Danny Dyer, British actor
• 1977 – Mehdi Mahdavikia, Iranian footballer
• 1978 – Andy Irons, American surfer (d. 2010)
• 1979 – Rose Byrne, Australian actress
• 1979 – Ryan Humphrey, American basketball player
• 1981 – Summer Glau, American actress
• 1982 – Elisabeth Moss, American actress
• 1982 – Anna Paquin, Canadian-born actress
• 1983 – Daniele De Rossi, Italian footballer
• 1985 – Lukas Rosol, Czech tennis player
• 1986 – Andrei Lutai, Russian figure skater
• 1986 – Vugar Gashimov, Azerbaijani chess player (d. 2014)
• 1986 – Natalie Tran, Australian actress and writer
• 1987 – Mara Wilson, American actress
• 1987 – Jovan Belcher, American football player (d. 2012)
• 1989 – Kim Tae-Hwan, South Korean footballer
• 1989 – Felix Loch, German luger
• 1990 – Daveigh Chase, American actress
• 1990 – Jay McGuiness, English singer (The Wanted)
• 1991 – Lin Yue, Chinese diver
• 1991 – Emily Bett Rickards, Canadian actress
• 1992 – Mitch Grassi, American singer
• 1992 – Mikael Kingsbury, Canadian skier
• 1998 – Bindi Irwin, daughter of Steve Irwin

Deaths

Up to 1950

• 811 – Gao Yang, Chinese chancellor (b. 740)
• 1115 – Matilda, Countess of Tuscany (b. 1046)
• 1129 – Shirakawa, Emperor of Japan (b. 1053)
• 1568 – Carlos, Prince of Asturias, son of Philip II of Spain (b. 1545)
• 1594 – John Boste, English martyr and saint (b. 1544)
• 1739 – Benedetto Marcello, Italian composer (b. 1686)
• 1768 – Nathaniel Lardner, English theologian (b. 1684)
• 1862 – Martin Van Buren, 8th President of the United States (b. 1782)
• 1883 – Matthew Webb, British swimmer (b. 1848)
• 1891 – Hermann Raster, German-American journalist and politician (b. 1827)
• 1906 – Ferdinand von Saar, Austrian writer, dramatist and poet (b. 1833)
• 1908 – Vicente Acosta, El Salvadorean poet (b. 1867)
• 1910 – Arkhip Kuindzhi, Russian painter (b. 1841)
• 1920 – Ludwig Ganghofer, German writer (b. 1855)
• 1922 – Saint George Ashe, British rower (b. 1871)
• 1927 – Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Japanese writer (b. 1892)

1951 – 2000

• 1957 – Sacha Guitry, French actor and director (b. 1885)
• 1960 – Hans Albers, German actor and singer (b. 1891)
• 1962 – Wilfrid Noyce, English mountaineer (b. 1917)
• 1965 – Constance Bennett, American actress (b. 1904)
• 1969 – Witold Gombrowicz, Polish novelist and dramatist (b. 1904)
• 1970 – Beatrice Roberts, American actress (b. 1901)
• 1973 – Konstantinos Dovas, Greek general and Prime Minister (b. 1898)
• 1974 – James Chadwick, British physicist (b. 1891)
• 1976 – Julius Döpfner, German cardinal (b. 1913)
• 1980 – Peter Sellers, British actor (b. 1925)
• 1980 – Uttam Kumar, Indian actor, director and producer (b. 1926)
• 1985 – Ezechiele Ramini, Italian missionary and martyr (b. 1953)
• 1986 – Fritz Albert Lipmann, American biochemist (b. 1899)
• 1991 – Isaac Bashevis Singer, writer, received Nobel Prize in Literature in 1978 (b. 1902)
• 1992 – Arletty, French singer and actress (b. 1898)
• 1995 – Marjorie Cameron, American writer, painter, actress and occultist (b. 1922)
• 1996 – Mohammed Farah Aidid, Somali warlord
• 1997 – William J. Brennan, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (b. 1906)
• 1997 – Saw Maung, Burmese dictator (b. 1928)

From 2001

• 2005 – Richard Doll, British epidemiologist (b. 1912)
• 2008 – Norman Dello Joio, American composer (b. 1913)
• 2010 – Alex Higgins, Northern Irish snooker player (b. 1949)
• 2010 – Theo Albrecht, German businessman (Aldi Nord) (b. 1922)
• 2011 – Virgilio Noe, Italian cardinal (b. 1922)
• 2011 – Dan Peek, American singer (b. 1951)
• 2012 – John Atta Mills, President of Ghana (b. 1944)
• 2012 – Sherman Hemsley, American actor (b. 1938)
• 2012 – Chad Everett, American actor (b. 1936)
• 2013 – Fred Dretske, American philosopher (b. 1932)
• 2013 – Steve Berrios, American drummer (b. 1945)
• 2013 – Virginia E. Johnson, American sexologist (b. 1925)
• 2014 – Yoo Chae-yeong, South Korean singer (b. 1973)
• 2014 – Jaan Arder, Estonian singer (b. 1952)
• 2014 – Dale Schlueter, American basketball player (b. 1945)
• 2015 – Peg Lynch, American comedy writer and actress (b. 1916)
• 2016 – Marni Nixon, American singer and actress (b. 1930)

Holidays and observances

• Ecuador, Bolivia, Venezuela – Simón Bolívar Day
• Utah – Pioneer Day (1847)
• Vanuatu – Children's Day
• Venezuela – Birth of the Libertador (Simón Bolívar Day)
• Ancient Latvia – Jekaupa Diena held

Images for kids

• 

  Edmund Hillary

• 

  Heath Ledger

• 

  Suharto

• 

  Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

• 

  Roy Scheider

• 

  Janez Drnovšek

• 

  Giuseppe Di Stefano

• 

  Sir Arthur C. Clarke

• 

  Paul Scofield

• 

  Charlton Heston

• 

  Eddy Arnold

• 

  Irena Sendler

• 

  Sydney Pollack

• 

  Chinghiz Aitmatov

• 

  Cyd Charisse

• 

  George Carlin

• 

  Evelyn Keyes

• 

  Bernie Mac

• 

  Isaac Hayes

• 

  Paul Newman

• 

  Jörg Haider

• 

  Sœur Emmanuelle

• 

  Michael Crichton

• 

  Horst Tappert

• 

  León Febres Cordero

• 

  Eartha Kitt

• 

  Aerial view of Kingston Explosion site on December 23rd 2008

• 

  Tibetan monks arrested after the March, 14 unrest

• 

  2008 Sichuan earthquake

• 

  XXIX Summer Olympics in Beijing, China

• 

  South Ossetia war

• 

  Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the subprime mortgage crisis

See also

In Spanish: 2008 para niños