This is a list of selected July 4 anniversaries that appear in the "On this day" section of the Main Page. To suggest a new item, in most cases, you can be bold and edit this page. Please read the selected anniversaries guidelines before making your edit. However, if your addition might be controversial or on a day that is or will soon be on the Main Page, please post your suggestion on the talk page instead.
Please note that the events listed on the Main Page are chosen based more on relative article quality and to maintain a mix of topics, not based solely on how important or significant their subjects are. Only four to five events are posted at a time and thus not everything that is "most important and significant" can be listed. In addition, an event is generally not posted this year if it is also the subject of the scheduled featured article, featured list or picture of the day.
To report an error when this appears on the Main Page, see Main Page errors. Please remember that this list defers to the supporting articles, so it is best to achieve consensus and make any necessary changes there first.
Staging area
Images
Use only ONE image at a time
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Fireworks over the Washington Monument -
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The U.S. Declaration of Independence -
The Grand Union Flag of the Thirteen Colonies in 1776 -
A Waffen-SS Tiger I engages another tank -
Alice Liddell -
The Brazilian cruiser Bahia -
Tempel 1, after the Deep Impact collision -
Bipolar junction transistor
Ineligible
| Blurb | Reason |
|---|---|
| 1187 – Saladin defeated Guy of Lusignan, King of Jerusalem, at the Battle of Hattin and captured the True Cross. | lots of CN tags (7) |
| 1610 – Polish–Muscovite War: The outnumbered forces of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth defeated the Tsardom of Russia at the Battle of Klushino. | single source |
| 1802 - In West Point, New York, the United States Military Academy began operations. | featured on March 16 |
| 1892 – Western Samoa changed the International Date Line, causing Monday (July 4) to occur twice, resulting in a year with 367 days. | 5 refimprove sections |
| 1894 – The Republic of Hawaiʻi was proclaimed at Aliʻiolani Hale in Honolulu, with Sanford B. Dole as the first president. | refimprove section |
| 1898 – The French ocean liner SS La Bourgogne collided another ship in dense fog near Sable Island and sank, resulting in 549 deaths, mostly passengers. | refimprove |
| 1943 – World War II: Fighting began in the Battle of Kursk, the largest full-scale battle in history as well as the largest series of armoured clashes. | featured on August 23 |
| 2002 – American aviator Steve Fossett became the first person to fly solo nonstop around the world in a balloon, completing an almost 14-day trip after landing in Queensland, Australia. | refimprove section |
| 2012 – CERN announced the initial discovery of the Higgs boson elementary particle after a 40-year search for its existence. | Higgs boson: outdated; Search: refimprove section |
| Feast day of Saint Ulrich of Augsburg (Catholicism); | Feast date not cited |
| Philippe de Monte |d|1603| | Date not cited |
Eligible
- 1054 – Chinese astronomers recorded the sudden appearance of a "guest star", later identified as the supernova that created the Crab Nebula.
- 1643 – First English Civil War: Royalist forces defeated the Parliamentarians at the Battle of Burton Bridge, securing a crossing of the River Trent for a convoy of supplies travelling with Queen Henrietta Maria.
- 1776 – In Philadelphia, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, announcing that the thirteen American colonies were no longer a part of the British Empire.
- 1837 – The Grand Junction Railway, the world's first long-distance railway with steam traction, opened between Birmingham and Newton Junction.
- 1855 – The first edition of Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass was published, and it went on to become one of the most important collections of American poetry.
- 1862 – In a boat on the River Thames from Oxford to Godstow, author Lewis Carroll told Alice Liddell (pictured) and her sisters a story that later formed the basis for his book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
- 1918 – World War I: Allied forces led by the Australian general John Monash won the Battle of Hamel, demonstrating the effectiveness of combined-arms techniques in trench warfare.
- 1941 – German AB-Aktion in Poland: After capturing Lwów, the Nazis executed professors of the University of Lwów along with their families.
- 1941 – The Holocaust: During the German occupation of Latvia, a number of synagogues in Riga were set on fire, killing many Jews who were confined within.
- 1943 – The aircraft carrying Władysław Sikorski, prime minister of the Polish government-in-exile, crashed off Gibraltar, killing him and fifteen others and leading to several conspiracy theories.
- 1945 – The Brazilian cruiser Bahia (pictured) was accidentally sunk by one of its own crewmen, killing more than 300 people.
- 1950 – The United States' anti-communist propaganda source Radio Free Europe made its first broadcast aimed at Czechoslovakia.
- 1951 – William Shockley announced the invention of the junction transistor, for which he, John Bardeen, and Walter Houser Brattain later won the Nobel Prize in Physics.
- 1965 – The first Annual Reminder, a series of pickets that were some of the earliest LGBT actions in the United States, took place at Independence Hall in Philadelphia.
- 1976 – Israeli forces raided Uganda's Entebbe International Airport to free hostages taken by hijackers on Air France Flight 139.
- 1982 – Four Iranian diplomats were kidnapped after they were stopped at a checkpoint in northern Lebanon by Lebanese Phalange forces; their fates remain unknown.
- 1988 – Kylie Minogue's first album, Kylie, was released, and went on to top the charts in the UK and New Zealand.
- 2005 – The impactor of the NASA space probe Deep Impact collided with the comet Tempel 1, excavating interior material to study its composition.
- Born/died: | Usama ibn Munqidh |b|1095| Raynald of Châtillon |d|1187| Elizabeth of Portugal |d|1336| Min Phalaung |d|1593| Brian Twyne |d|1644| John Leake |b|1656| Christian Fürchtegott Gellert |b|1715| Samuel Richardson |d|1761| John Adams and Thomas Jefferson |d|1826| Hubert Cecil Booth |b|1871| Jack Warhop |b|1884| Poundmaker |d|1886| Suzanne Lenglen |d|1938| Geraldo Rivera |b|1943| Andre Spitzer |b|1945| Sonia Pierre |b|1963| Yonatan Netanyahu |d|1976| Koko|b|1971| Victor Chang|d|1991| Swastima Khadka|b|1995| Barthélemy Mukenge|d|2018|
July 4: Independence Day in the United States (1776); Republic Day in the Philippines (1946); Liberation Day in Rwanda (1994)
Crab Nebula
- 414 – Byzantine emperor Theodosius II proclaimed his elder sister Aelia Pulcheria as Augusta.
- 1054 – Chinese astronomers recorded the sudden appearance of a "guest star", later identified as the supernova that created the Crab Nebula (pictured).
- 1863 – American Civil War: Confederate forces failed in an attempt to recapture the Union-occupied Helena, Arkansas.
- 1954 – In what is known as "The Miracle of Bern", West Germany defeated Hungary 3–2 to win the FIFA World Cup.
- 1954 – CIA officers arrived in Guatemala City to begin Operation PBHistory in an attempt to justify the overthrowing of Guatemalan president Jacobo Árbenz one week earlier.
- Brian Twyne (d. 1644)
- Jack Warhop (b. 1884)
- Koko (b. 1971)
- Victor Chang (d. 1991)