July 18

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July 18 is the 199th day (200th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 166 days remaining.

Events

64 - Great fire of Rome: A fire begins to burn in the merchant area of Rome and soon burns completely out of control while Emperor Nero reportedly plays his lyre and sings while watching the blaze from a safe distance.
1830 - Uruguay adopts its first constitution.
1863 - American Civil War: The first formal African American military unit, the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, unsuccessfully assaults Confederate-held Fort Wagner but their valiant fighting still proves the worth of African American soldiers during the war.
1914 - Within the United States Army the Signal Corps is formed giving definite status to its air service for the first time.
1925 - Adolf Hitler publishes his personal manifesto Mein Kampf.
1942 - World War II: The Germans test fly the Messerschmitt Me-262 using only its jets for the first time.
1944 - World War II: Hideki Tojo resigns as Prime Minister of Japan due to numerous setbacks in the war effort.
1947 - President Harry S. Truman signs the Presidential Succession Act into law which places the Speaker of the House and the Senate President Pro Tempore next in the line of succession after the United States Vice President.
1968 - Vietnam War: The two-day Honolulu Conference begins in Honolulu, Hawaii between US President Lyndon B. Johnson and South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu.
1969 - After a party on Chappaquiddick Island, Senator Edward Kennedy from Massachusetts drives an Oldsmobile off a wooden bridge into a tide-swept pond and his passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, drowns. Kennedy doesn't report the incident for 10 hours.
1984 - In San Ysidro, California, 41-year-old James Oliver Huberty sprays a McDonald's restaurant with gun-fire killing 21 people before being shot dead by police.
1994 - In Buenos Aires, an explosion destroys a building housing several Jewish organizations killing 96 and injuring many more.
1996 - Storms provoke severe flooding on the Saguenay River in Quebec, beginning one of Canada's costliest natural disasters ever.
2001 - In Baltimore, Maryland, a 60-car train derailment occurs in a tunnel sparking a fire that will last days and virtually shut-down downtown Baltimore.