1723: The birth of Sir Joshua Reynolds, an influential English painter, specialising in portraits. He was one of the founders and first President of the Royal Academy. King George III appreciated his merits and knighted him in 1769.
1945: The first atomic bomb test is successfully exploded. On July 16, 1945, at 5:29:45 a.m., the Manhattan Project yields explosive results as the first atom bomb is successfully tested in Alamogordo, New Mexico.
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Plans for the creation of a uranium bomb by the Allies were established as early as 1939, when Italian emigre physicist Enrico Fermi met with U.S. Navy department officials at Columbia University to discuss the use of fissionable materials for military purposes. That same year, Albert Einstein drafted a letter with the Hungarian-born physicist Leo Szilard and sent it to President Franklin Roosevelt supporting the theory that an uncontrolled nuclear chain reaction had great potential as a basis for a weapon of mass destruction.
1945: The leaders of the three Allied nations (Winston Churchill, Harry S Truman and Josef Stalin) gathered in the German city of Potsdam to decide the future of a defeated Germany.
1951: The Catcher in the Rye is published
The book, written by J.D. Salinger is considered to be one of the top 100 works of fiction of the 20th century.
1979: Iraqi president, Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr resigns. The fourth president of Iraq resigned from his post citing health reasons and promoted his Vice President, Saddam Hussein to the post of President. His brutal rule, which lasted 24 years, was marked by costly and unsuccessful wars with neighbouring countries as well as atrocities against the Iraqi people.
1987: The two biggest airlines in the UK (One time rivals British Caledonian and British Airways) merged in order to compete with America’s giant air corporations.
1988: Harewood, the Queen’s cousin, brought in police to investigate the theft of the world’s smallest horse, Pernod, a 27-inch-high Shetland stallion.
1996: Diana, Princess of Wales, announced that she was severing links with more than 100 charities.
1999: JFK Jr. killed in plane crash. On July 16, 1999, John F. Kennedy, Jr.; his wife, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy; and her sister, Lauren Bessette, die when the single-engine plane that Kennedy was piloting crashes into the Atlantic Ocean near Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Jr., was born on November 25, 1960, just a few weeks after his father and namesake was elected the 35th president of the United States. On his third birthday, “John-John” attended the funeral of his assassinated father and was photographed saluting his father’s coffin in a famous and searing image. Always in the media spotlight, he was celebrated for the good looks that he inherited from his parents. In 1988, he was named the “Sexiest Man Alive” by People magazine. He was linked romantically with several celebrities, including the actress Daryl Hannah, whom he dated for five years.
2000: Footballer George Best’s doctor begged every barman in Britain to refuse to serve alcohol to the footballing legend to help him beat his addiction. Best was controversially granted an NHS liver transplant in 2002 and died in 2005, aged 59, due to complications from a drug used to prevent the rejection of transplanted organs.
2001: Prime Minister Tony Blair acknowledged that public services could not be transformed totally within the coming Parliament.
BIRTHS ON THIS DAY: July 15
Wizkid, 34 years
Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun, who is known professionally as Wizkid, is a Nigerian singer and songwriter, born on 16 July 1990 in the Ojuelegba suburb of Surulere, Lagos. Wizkid is a voice in the emerging Afrobeats movement. His music is a blend of Afrobeats, Afropop, R&B, afrobeat, reggae, dancehall, and pop. He has won many awards including Grammy Award for Best Music Video 2021.
Ginger Rogers, (16 July 1911 – 25 April 1995)
Ginger Rogers was an American actress, singer, and dancer, best remembered for her on-screen partnership with Fred Astaire in a series of 10 Hollywood musical films. Their pairing has become one of the most iconic in the history of American cinema, lauded for the effortless grace and impeccable timing they brought to their intricate dance sequences.
Born on July 16, 1911, Rogers began her career in vaudeville and on Broadway in the 1920s. Her film career took off in the 1930s when she was paired with Astaire in Flying Down to Rio (1933). The duo’s chemistry was apparent, and their dance sequences, often featuring innovative choreography and stunning sets, were the highlight of their films. Some of their most celebrated works together include Top Hat (1935) and Swing Time (1936).
Despite the fame and success she garnered with Astaire, Rogers was determined to prove herself as a versatile actress. She achieved this in films like Kitty Foyle (1940), for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress. Rogers continued to act in films and on television well into the 1960s, and she also returned to the stage on occasion, with a career that spanned nearly five decades. She died at the age of 83.
