Wikipedia defines history as the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. It came from the Greek word ‘historia’ – which means ‘inquiry, knowledge acquired by investigation’.
Did you know? There are many who claim Herodotus, a fifth century BC Greek historian, as the “father of history”.
This website utilizes pages from Wikipedia to extract historical events from 3761 BC up to the present. There are 105,062 records in the database that include events, births and deaths of popular individuals. The present day Gregorian calendar was adopted to show dates of interest.
Let us begin with today’s history. You may also enter a specific day using the form on the right sidebar.
What are the important events that happened on August 17? Here are historical events, facts, and some myths about this day.
August 17: Facts & Myths About This Day
August 17 is the 229th day of the year 2017 in the Gregorian calendar. There are 136 days remaining until the end of this year. The day of the week is Thursday.
Under the Julian calendar, this day is August 4, 2017 – a Thursday. Both day of the week are the same but did you notice the difference with the Gregorian calendar?
When this day started, 1,502,928,000 seconds has elapsed since midnight of January 1, 1970 – the Unix epoch.
Strange as it may, if we name this day after a polygon then it will be called ‘dihectaicosaenneagon’ day.
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Leo is the zodiac sign of a person born on this day. Peridot is the modern birthstone for this month. Diamond is the mystical birthstone from Tibetan origin that dates back over a thousand years.
According to the lunisolar Chinese calendar, there are 186 days remaining before the start of the next Chinese New Year.
The ancient Maya civilization believes that the end of the world will happen on December 21, 2012. There are now 1,700 days since this fabled cataclysmic event.
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August 17 Historical Events
- 1807 –Robert Fulton’s North River Steamboat leaves New York City for Albany, New York on the Hudson River, inaugurating the first commercial steamboat service in the world.
- 1883 –The first public performance of the Dominican Republic’s national anthem, Himno Nacional.
- 1953 –Addiction: First meeting of Narcotics Anonymous in Southern California.
- 1978 –Double Eagle II becomes first balloon to cross the Atlantic Ocean when it lands in Miserey near Paris, 137 hours after leaving Presque Isle, Maine.
- 1988 –Pakistani President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq and U.S. Ambassador Arnold Raphel are killed in a plane crash.
Who were born on August 17?
- 1686 –Nicola Porpora, Italian composer (d. 1768)
- 1880 –Percy Sherwell, South African cricketer (d. 1948)
- 1960 –Sean Penn, American actor and director
- 1968 –Helen McCrory, English actress
- 1971 –Jorge Posada, Puerto Rican baseball player
Who died on August 17?
- 1657 –Robert Blake, British admiral (b. 1599)
- 1935 –Charlotte Perkins Gilman, American feminist and writer (b. 1860)
- 1954 –Billy Murray, American recording artist (b. 1877)
- 1983 –Ira Gershwin, American lyricist (b. 1896)
- 1988 –Victoria Shaw, Australian-born American actress (b. 1935)
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