Today in History for 17th August 2026

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Historical Events

1891 - People's Bath, the first public bathhouse with showers, opens in New York City
1948 - Alger Hiss denies ever being a Communist agent
1964 - Boycott scores his first Test cricket century: 113 against Australia at The Oval
1989 - Baltimore Orioles shortstop Cal Ripken plays in his 1,208th consecutive game and moves to 3rd place all-time behind NY Yankees' Lou Gehrig and Boston Red Sox/NY Yankees' Everett Scott
2008 - China wins its 33rd gold medal of the Beijing Olympics by defeating Singapore in the table tennis women's team event, achieving its most successful Olympiad ever by winning all 10 singles and all 5 doubles matches

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Famous Birthdays

1904 - Leopold Nowak, Austrian musicologist (International Bruckner Society; Mozart's Requiem), and educator (Vienna University, 1932-73), born in Vienna, Austria (d. 1991)
1929 - Francis Gary Powers, American spy captured by the USSR after his U-2 spy was shot plane in 1959, born in Jenkins, Kentucky (d. 1977)
1955 - Kevin Welch, American country songwriter ("True Love Never Dies"), born in Long Beach, California
1960 - Johnny Bumphus, American boxer (WBA super lightweight title 1984), born in Tacoma, Washington (d. 2020)
1993 - Ederson [de Moraes], Brazilian football goalkeeper (Manchester City, Brazil), born in Osasco, Brazil

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Famous Deaths

1785 - Jonathan Trumbull, American politician and statesman during the American Revolutionary wars, Governor of Connecticut (1769-84), dies at 74
1887 - Franz Commer, German composer, dies at 74
1914 - James Grierson, British general, dies of an aneurism at 55
1987 - Rudolf Hess, German Nazi official (Deputy Fuhrer who dramatically escaped to Britain in 1941, sentenced to life in Spandau Prison), commits suicide at 93
2014 - Caterina De Nave, New Zealand television producer (Shortland Street), dies of leukaemia at 67

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