History for July 18 - On-This-Day.com:
Harriet Nelson 1912, Richard "Red" Skelton 1913, Nelson Mandela 1918 - President of South Africa
John Glenn 1921 - Astronaut, Hunter S. Thompson 1937, Dion DiMucci (Dion and the Belmonts) 1939
Martha Reeves (Martha and the Vandellas) 1941, Elizabeth McGovern 1961, Vin Diesel 1967 - Actor
0064 - The Great Fire of Rome began.
1789 - Robespierre, a deputy from Arras, France, decided to back the French Revolution.
1872 - The Ballot Act was passed in Great Britain, providing for secret election ballots.
1914 - Six planes of the U.S. Army helped to form an aviation division called the Signal Corps.
1935 - Ethiopian King Haile Selassie urged his countrymen to fight to the last man against the invading Italian army.
1936 - The first Oscar Meyer Wienermobile rolled out of General Body Company’s factory in Chicago, IL.
1936 - The Spanish Civil War began as Gen. Francisco Franco led an uprising of army troops based in Spanish North Africa.
1942 - The German Me-262, the first jet-propelled aircraft to fly in combat, made its first flight.
1947 - U.S. President Truman signed the Presidential Succession Act, which placed the Speaker of the House and the Senate President Pro Tempore next in the line of succession after the vice president.



