Independence Day

Today is the 4th of July so I thought I’d take a few moments to have a little trip through some of the more notable events in our planet’s history.

On this day in 2012, the Large Hadron Collider in Cern detected the Higgs Boson signal. This was a very big deal (and I’m not saying that because I’m currently writing about a particle accelerator).

Today in 2009 Roger Federer won his record-breaking 15th Grand Slam in a suburb of South London.

In 1996 today, Dolly The Cloned Sheep was born. I’m not sure how a cloned sheep was actually born, but that’s what the books tell me. Maybe she was cloned and born in utero?

On this day in 1976 The Clash performed their first gig in a pub in Sheffield.

In 1962 on this day, Algeria finally gained independence from the cheese eating surrender monkeys France after a long and bloody ordeal.

Today in 1946 the Philippines declared itself an independent state.

Also today in 1946, the Bikini swimwear was invented (and named after the Bikini nuclear test which took place a couple of days earlier).

This day in 1884 the cheese eating surrender monkeys French presented the Statue of Liberty to the Americans (who have since been working to undo all of the statements the statue was dedicated to).

On this day in 1865 Lewis Carol’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was first published (and later recalled and oh boy do I know that feeling!).

Not much else happened, it’s a quiet day in history.