Heavyweight boxer Tony 'Two Ton' Galento accepted a bet and fought an octopus with boxing gloves on its tentacles on August 5, 1946. The fight was declared a draw.
Russia's Big Diomede island and the U.S.'s Little Diomede island in the Bering Strait are only 2 miles apart.
King George V of the UK was an avid stamp collector. At the time of his death in 1936, King George's stamp collection was so large that it had its own room in Buckingham Palace.
Joseph Merrick, whose very severe face and body deformities were exhibited at a freak show as the "Elephant Man," was born on August 5, 1862. Merrick had to sleep sitting up because of the extra weight his deformities put on his head. According to his autopsy, he died of a dislocated neck by trying to sleep lying down, in order to "be like other people."
Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong was born on August 5, 1930, to Stephen Koenig Armstrong and Viola Louise Engel in Auglaize County, near Wapakoneta, Ohio. Before becoming an astronaut, Armstrong was in the United States Navy and served in the Korean War. He flew 78 missions over Korea for a total of 121 hours in the air, most of which was in January 1952. After the war, he served as a test pilot before joining the NASA Astronaut Corps in 1962.
The engineer William Kamkwamba was born in Malawi on August 5, 1987. At the age of 15 he taught himself how to build windmills out of junk from the scrap yard to provide electricity for his family. Later on he built another windmill to power water pumps to irrigate fields. He did all of this through library books, as his family couldn't afford schooling.
For more August 5 birthdays, including Leonardo Da Vinci's earliest known dated work, the first recorded user of a fountain pen and the first ever recreational rock climb, check out OnThatDay.
The first Electric Traffic Light in Bucharest c1924.
The world's first traffic light system was invented by the British railroad signal engineer JP Knight. These first traffic lights consisted of revolving red and green lanterns, illuminated by gas. They were installed in December 1868 at the intersection of George and Bridge Streets in front of the House of Commons in London to control the flow of horse buggies and pedestrians.
After less than a month's use, the gas lantern that illuminated them exploded, seriously injuring the police officer who was operating them. Traffic lights did not return to the UK until the mid 1920s.
In the first two decades of the 20th century, semaphore traffic were in use all over the United States with each state having its own design of the device. They were controlled by a traffic officer who would blow a whistle before changing the commands on this signal to help alert travelers of the change.
The first electric traffic lights were officially unveiled in Cleveland, Ohio at the intersection of Euclid Avenue and East 105th Street on August 5, 1914. There was no amber light, only red and green.
After witnessing a serious accident between a motor vehicle and a horse-drawn carriage at an intersection, African American inventor, Garrett Morgan set out to come up with a three-position traffic signal. What he came up with was a T-shaped pole unit that featured Stop, Go and an all-directional stop position. This "third position" halted traffic in all directions to allow pedestrians to cross streets more safely. The patent was granted in November 1923.
Garrett Morgan's hand-cranked semaphore traffic management device was in use throughout North America until all manual traffic signals were replaced by the automatic red, yellow, and green-light traffic signals currently used around the world.
A group of independent English Christians borrowed £4,000 from a London company of investors to subsidize a voyage across the Atlantic to a plot of land they had obtained near the Hudson River in the New World. The ship they hired for the voyage, The Mayflower, was tiny, with a deck just 90ft long. This small ship departed from Southampton, England on August 5, 1620 taking their 102 passengers to the New World, as well as its crew of 25-30.
Mayflower II, a replica of the original "Mayflower" By GmaJoli
WANT MORE THINGS THAT HAPPENED ON AUGUST 5? CHECK OUT MY ONTHATDAY BLOG. HERE'S A LINK.
