1342 – The St. Mary Magdalene's flood leads to several rivers in central Europe bursting their banks. It is Europe's worst flood of the second millennium.
1645 – Qing Dynasty regent Dorgon issues an edict ordering all male subjects of the Qing to shave their forehead and braid the rest of their hair into a queue identical to those of the Manchus. However another source says Salars wore the queue.[1][2][3]
1656 – The Raid on Malaga takes place during the Anglo-Spanish War.
1904 – Louis Rigolly, a Frenchman, becomes the first man to break the 100 miles per hour (160 kilometres per hour) barrier on land. He drove a 15-litre Gobron-Brille in Ostend, Belgium.
1907 – The passenger steamer SS Columbia collides with the steam schooner San Pedro off Shelter Cove, California. The Columbia sinks, killing 88 people.
1914 – Romania, it is decided, is neutral in World War I, after a decision by the country's crown council.
1925 – Tennessee high school biology teacher John T. Scopes is found guilty of teaching the theory of evolution. He is fined 100 dollars.
1925 – Malcolm Campbell becomes the first man to break the 150 miles per hour (240 kilometres per hour) land barrier at Pendine Sands, Wales. He drove a Sunbeam at a two-way average speed of 150.33 miles per hour (241.93 kilometres per hour).
1938 – In a peace deal at the end of the Chaco War, Bolivia loses part of its territory to Paraguay. That makes Paraguay twice as big.
1944 – Leaders of the July 20 plot to kill Adolf Hitler are executed.
2001 – At the end of a fireworks display in Okura Beach, Akashi, Hyogo, Japan, the footbridge connecting the beach to the JR Asagiri railway station becomes crowded, with the resulting crush killing 11 people and injuring 120.
2005 – Four suicide bombers fail to detonate their bombs on London's underground and bus systems.