Monkey

July 21 (UPI) — On this date in history:

In 1861, the first major military engagement of the Civil War occurred at Bull Run Creek, Va.

In 1918, a German U-boat fired on the town of Orleans, Mass., on Cape Cod peninsula, damaging a tug boat and sinking four barges, and severely injuring one man. It was the only place in the United States to receive an enemy attack during World War I.

In 1925, the so-called Monkey Trial, which pitted Clarence Darrow against William Jennings Bryan in Dayton, Tenn., in one of the great confrontations in legal history, ended with John Thomas Scopes convicted and fined $100 for teaching evolution in violation of state law.

In 1969, U.S. astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin, lifted off from the moon in the Apollo 11 lunar module Eagle and docked with the command module Columbia piloted by Michael Collins.

In 1970, after 11 years of construction, the massive Aswan High Dam across the Nile River in Egypt was completed, ending the cycle of flood and drought in the Nile River region but triggering an environmental controversy.

In 2000, a report from special counsel John Danforth cleared U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno and the government of wrongdoing in the April 19, 1993, fire that ended the Branch Davidian siege near Waco, Texas.

File Photo by Bill Greenblatt/UPI

In 2007, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the seventh and final installment in the best-selling series, sold more than 8.3 million copies on its first day in bookstores.

In 2011, Greece continued efforts to climb out of a financial chasm with a second bailout pledge from other eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund worth $157 billion. Earlier, the nation dealt with its debt crisis with the help of a $146 billion loan package.

In 2024, President Joe Biden dropped his re-election bid in the 2024 presidential race, formally endorsing his vice president, Kamala Harris. Former President Donald Trump defeated Harris in November 2024 to win his second term in office.

In 2025, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee announced that it plans to follow U.S. President Donald Trump’s executive order banning transgender women from women’s sports.

July 10 (UPI) — On this date in history:

In 1925, the so-called Monkey Trial, in which John Scopes was accused of teaching evolution in school, a violation of state law, began in Dayton, Tenn., featuring a classic confrontation between William Jennings Bryan, the three-time presidential candidate and fundamentalist hero, and legendary defense attorney Clarence Darrow.

In 1962, the United States launched the first telecommunications satellite, Telstar, into orbit, which relayed TV pictures between the United States and Europe.

In 1985, Coca-Cola, besieged by consumers dissatisfied with the new Coke introduced in April, dusted off the old formula and dubbed it “Coca-Cola Classic.”

File Photo by Stephen Shaver/UPI

In 1989, Mel Blanc, the voice of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and countless other Warner Bros. cartoon characters and radio and TV comic creations, died from complications of heart disease. He was 81.

In 1991, Boris Yeltsin was inaugurated as the first freely elected president of the Russian republic.

In 1992, former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega was sentenced to 40 years in prison for cocaine racketeering.

In 2009, General Motors completed its race through bankruptcy with the signing of a contract with the U.S. government, which got 61 percent of the company. The recovery plan included considerable shrinkage, including the closing of factories and layoffs of 21,000 union workers.

Then-General Motors CEO Fritz Henderson attends a press conference in New York City on June 1, 2009. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI

In 2011, media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World, Britain’s best-selling weekly newspaper, abruptly ceased publication amid allegations that its reporters and investigators had hacked into telephones of royalty, politicians, celebrities, homicide victims, families of fallen soldiers and others to illegally gain material for stories.

In 2012, an Israeli court acquitted former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of corruption but found him guilty of breach of trust. The charges stemmed from a period before he was PM.

In 2018, divers rescued the last of the 12 boys and their soccer coach from a flooded cave in Thailand, where they’d been trapped for more than two weeks.

In 2024, the original Hermes Birkin bag — designed by Jean-Louis Dumas specifically for actor and singer Jane Birkin in 1985 — sold for $10 million at auction in Paris. A Japanese business executive, Shinsuke Sakimoto, won the bidding, making it the most expensive handbag ever sold.

File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI