August 19

295 BC The oldest known Roman temple to Venus, the Roman goddess of love, beauty and fertility, was dedicated by Quintus Fabius Maximus Gurges during the Third Samnite War on August 19, 295 BC. The temple was built after Fabius Gurges vowed to build it to Venus if he was victorious in the Battle of Sentinum. The battle was a major victory for the Romans, and it helped to secure their dominance over the Samnites.

43 BC After Gaius Octavius, later known as Augustus, lost his father, his Great Uncle Julius Caesar officially adopted him. Caesar had his nephew raised to the college of Pontifices, a major Roman priesthood, at the age of 16. Four years later, following the death of Caesar, Gaius compelled the Roman Senate to elect him Consul on August 19, 43 BC. Augustus controlled the West, his brother-in-law Mark Antony the East and Lepidus, Africa. By 31 BC Gaius was sole leader of the Roman world.

14 The Roman emperor Augustus died on August 19, 14 AD after becoming ill en route to his summer villa. Unable to complete the trip, he stopped at Nola, his parental home, where his father had died 60 years before. His friends gathered round him, charioteering across from Rome. Augustus introduced to Rome water system, fire brigade, a police force, professional army an efficient administrative system including gathering of taxes and reorganized the welfare system including the distribution of corn.

Augustus with a laurel crown. Photo by Marie-Lan Nguyen

1274 When King Henry III died in November 1272, his eldest son, Prince Edward became King of England as Edward I. Prince Edward became the English king while travelling during the Ninth Crusade. He did not return to England for nearly two years to assume the throne. Shortly after his return from the Ninth Crusade, Edward I was crowned king of England at Westminster Abbey on August 19, 1274. 

1662 In June 1662, French mathematician, physicist, and philosopher Blaise Pascal was seized with a violent illness, probably stomach cancer, and after two months of agony, he realized he didn't have much longer to live and requested he could die with the poor in the hospital for incurables. His last words were "My God, Forsake me not.” Pascal died on August 19, 1662 just two months after his 39th birthday. He was buried in the cemetery of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont.

1745 Charles Edward Stuart ('Bonnie Prince Charlie')'s father was Prince James Stuart the old pretender, his grandfather James II of England.  Stuart persisted in his claim to the British throne and on August 19, 1745 landing in Scotland with about a dozen fighting men he raised his bulk standard to start the Second Jacobite Rising. He pressed as far south as Derby, but ran out of food. As the English Catholics failed to rise, the Jacobite army retreated into Scotland.

Charles Stuart, romantic icon.

1800 In the summer of 1799, Joseph Fry, a Quaker banker, visited the Gurney family. He admired their daughter Elizabeth and asked her to marry him, but at first she refused, as Joseph seemed very dull to her. However, Elizabeth came to love Joseph, and they married at the Norwich Goat Lane Friends Meeting House on August 19, 1800  They had eleven children, five sons and six daughters. From 1813 Elizabeth Fry devoted herself to her prison reform and humanitarian work.

1839 After years of experimenting, the French artist Louis Daguerre evolved the early photographic process which would subsequently be known as the daguerreotype. The French government bought the patent for Daguerre's photographic process and announced on August 19, 1839 that they were releasing it as a gift “free to the world”. They agreed to award Daguerre an annuity of 6,000 Francs for the rest of his life, and to give the estate of Niépce 4,000 Francs yearly.

View of the Boulevard du Temple, taken by Daguerre in 1838 in Paris

1848 In January 1848, James W. Marshall found a gold nugget at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, California. John Augustus Sutter and James Marshall tried to keep the discovery a secret and it wasn't until The New York Herald broke the news to the East Coast of the United States on August 19, 1848 and President Polk announced the discovery later in the year that the California gold rush began.

1861 During the reign of Mongkut, the king of Siam (Thailand) in the mid-19th century, the primary means of transport in Bangkok was by boat. Western consuls, complaining of ill health due to a lack of roads in which they could travel by horse-drawn carriage, requested that the king build a new road on the east side of the river. Mongkut agreed to build Charoen Krung Road, the first in Siam using modern construction methods on August 19, 1861. 

Postcard of Charoen Krung Road, c. 1910s–1920s

1871 Aviation pioneer Orville Wright was born in Dayton, Ohio, on August 19, 1871. He had five other siblings including his older brother Wilbur. His father the Rev Milton Wright, was an editor, clergyman later a non-conformist Bishop. He once preached a sermon saying, "If God wanted to fly he would have given us wings". Three months later his sons Orville and Wilbur had made their first powered flight.

1883 Gabrielle Chanel was born in Saumur, France on August 19, 1883 to an unwed laundrywoman mother and itinerant street vendor father. After the death of her mother she was sent to live at the convent of Aubazine, where she learnt to sew. At the age of 23 Chanel became the mistress of the wealthy textile heir Étienne Balsan, and while with him she began designing hats. She became a licensed milliner in 1910 and opened a boutique at 21 rue Cambon, Paris named Chanel Modes.

1900 A cricket tournament was held at the 1900 Summer Olympics, the only time that cricket has been a part of the Olympic Games. The tournament consisted of only two teams, Great Britain and France. The match was played on 19–20 August 1900 at the Vélodrome de Vincennes in Paris. Great Britain won the match by 158 runs.

1909 The first five-mile race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway was held on August 19, 1909. 12,000 spectators watched a car win with the average speed of 57.4 mph. The track, made of crushed rock held together by tar, broke apart killing two drivers and a spectator in the course of a race that lasted just two laps. The speedway was rebuilt that same year with 3.2 million paving bricks to create a safer environment, reopening in December 1909.  

1946 Bill Clinton was born William Jefferson Blythe III in Hope, Arkansas on August 19, 1946. His  father, William Jefferson Blythe, died in a car accident, three months before Clinton was born. His nurse anesthetist mother, remarried when William was four to car salesman Roger Clinton. William took the last name Clinton in high school. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech so impressed a teenage Clinton that he memorized the entire speech right after it was given.

1957 US Senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina set a filibuster record in the U.S. Senate on August 19, 1957. He spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes. Thurmond took steam baths daily to dehydrate his body so he would not have to stop speaking to use the bathroom.

1964 The Beatles began their first full concert tour of North America on August 19, 1964 at the sold-out Cow's Palace arena in San Francisco. Their opening song at 9pm was "Twist and Shout." The Beatles played several shows across the United States and Canada during this tour, which contributed significantly to their rise in popularity in North America.

1991 A group of hardline members within the Soviet government, the Communist Party, and the KGB were deeply alarmed by the direction in which Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev was taking the country. Gorbachev was placed under house arrest while on holiday in the town of Foros, Ukraine on August 19, 1991. However, the coup quickly unraveled as it became clear that the plotters lacked broad support. Gorbachev was released from house arrest and returned to Moscow on August 22.