Today in history: July 21
Organizers of the Kennedy Center Honors announced that the 2021 honorees would be Motown Records creator Berry Gordy, “Saturday Night Live” mastermind Lorne Michaels, opera singer Justino Diaz, folk music legend Joni Mitchell, and actor-singer Bette Midler.
1925: John T. Scopes
On July 21, 1925, the so-called “Monkey Trial” ended in Dayton, Tennessee, with John T. Scopes found guilty of violating state law for teaching Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. (The conviction was later overturned on a technicality.)
1954: Geneva Conference
In 1954, the Geneva Conference concluded with accords dividing Vietnam into northern and southern entities.
1998: Alan Shepard
In 1998, astronaut Alan Shepard died in Monterey, California, at age 74; actor Robert Young died in Westlake Village, California, at age 91.
1999: John F. Kennedy Jr
In 1999, Navy divers found and recovered the bodies of John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, Carolyn, and sister-in-law, Lauren Bessette (bih-SEHT’), in the wreckage of Kennedy’s plane in the Atlantic Ocean off Martha’s Vineyard.
2002: Ernie Els
In 2002, Ernie Els won the British Open in the first sudden-death finish in the 142-year history of the tournament.
2008: Radovan Karadzic
In 2008, former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic (RA’-doh-van KA’-ra-jich), one of the world’s top war crimes fugitives, was arrested in a Belgrade suburb by Serbian security forces. (He was sentenced by a U.N. court in 2019 to life imprisonment after being convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.)
2009: Henry Louis Gates Jr
In 2009, prosecutors in Cambridge, Massachusetts, dropped a disorderly conduct charge against prominent Black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., who was arrested by a white officer at his home near Harvard University after a report of a break-in.
2012: Jacques Rogge
Ten years ago: The president of the International Olympic Committee, Jacques Rogge (zhahk ROH’-geh), rejected the latest calls for a minute of silence for the Israeli victims of the 1972 Munich massacre at the opening ceremony of the London Olympics.
2012: Kennedy Center Honors
Organizers of the Kennedy Center Honors announced that the 2021 honorees would be Motown Records creator Berry Gordy, “Saturday Night Live” mastermind Lorne Michaels, opera singer Justino Diaz, folk music legend Joni Mitchell, and actor-singer Bette Midler.
2016: NBA All-Star Game
The NBA moved the 2017 All-Star Game out of Charlotte because of its objections to a North Carolina law that limited anti-discrimination protections for lesbian, gay and transgender people.