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| Event Description
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Citing a potential fire hazard, Apple Computer recalls 1.1 million laptop batteries supplied by Sony. |
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Leading astronomers declare that Pluto is no longer defined as a planet. |
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An independent US commission issues its final report on the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal. It finds the abuse of inmates at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison is mainly to be blamed on soldiers running the facility, but US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the Joint Chiefs of Staff also failed to exerc ... |
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Two Russian Tupolev airliners crash minutes apart, killing 89 people. Chechen terrorists are suspected. Security is stepped up at Moscow's airports and other public sites. |
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The Washington Post announces that US led forces have begun a covert program to train agents who once served in the Iraqi intelligence service to help identify resistance to American forces. |
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Hurricane Andrew hits South Florida |
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NASA's space probe Voyager 2 passes the planet Neptune. |
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Mark David Chapman is sentenced to a prison term of 20 years to life for the murder of ex-Beatle John Lennon. |
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France explodes its first hydrogen bomb and becomes the world's fifth nuclear military power. |
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Abbie Hoffman leads a group in the gallery of the New York Stock Exchange to throw dollar bills down to the traders below. When they begin to frantically scramble to collect the money, the message of Hoffman's protest is fully realized. |
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Don Schollander becomes the first person to swim he 200 metre freestyle in less than 2 minutes. His time is 1:58. |
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The American Communist Party is outlawed by the Communist Control Act. |
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Japanese aircraft carrier Ryuho is sunk in the Battle of the East Solomon Islands. |
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Germany insttitutes 2-year compulsory military service. |
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The Soviet Union and France sign a treaty of neutrality. |
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Yasser Arafat is born in Cairo, Egypt according to his birth certificate. He had insisted he was born on August 4 in Jerusalem. |
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Strong German resistance in Lorraine and the Ardennes results in Gen. Joseph Joffre ordering a retreat back to France. The German Schlieffen Plan is successful and forces the French to abort Plan 17. |
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Japan announces that it formally intends to annex Korea, the so-called Hermit Kingdom. |
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Thomas Edison patents the motion picture camera. |
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The city of Calcutta, India is founded after the territory is possessed by the British East India Company. Calcutta is now the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal. |
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In Mainz, Germany 6000 Jews are killed due to their alleged role in the bubonic plague. |
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Pope Innocent III declares that the Magna Carta is invalid. |
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August 24