Following are some of the major events to have occurred on August 12:
1922 – Arthur Griffith, first president of the Irish Republic and a founder of Sinn Fein, died.
1955 – German novelist Thomas Mann died; best known for “Death in Venice” and “The Magic Mountain”.
1964 – Ian Fleming, English author and creator of the spy character James Bond, died.
1982 – U.S. actor Henry Fonda died aged 77. He appeared in “Young Mr Lincoln”, “Mister Roberts” and “12 Angry Men” and received a belated Oscar for his last film, “On Golden Pond”.
1998 – A Titan 4A rocket carrying a secret U.S. spy satellite exploded just after lift-off at Cape Canaveral.
2000 – The Russian navy’s nuclear submarine Kursk sank in the Barents Sea after an explosion with the loss of all 118 crew.
2000 – The first Iraqi train to Syria in 19 years arrived in the northern city of Aleppo, resuming rail service after two decades of tension.
2003 – Argentina’s lower house of Congress annulled amnesties for military officers who tortured and murdered leftists during the 1976-1983 “Dirty War”.
2004 – Julia Child, grande dame of U.S. television cooking shows and international culinary star, died aged 91.
2005 – Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar was shot dead in an attack blamed by the government on the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
2005 – Yelena Isinbayeva sets new world record in women’s pole vault final at world athletics championships.
(Reuters)
