On this day: 1960 Olympic Games in Rome open

EVENTS, birthdays and anniversaries on August 25.
On this day in 1960 the Rome Olympics opened, at which US light-heavyweight Cassius Clay, later Muhammad Ali, won gold. Picture: GettyOn this day in 1960 the Rome Olympics opened, at which US light-heavyweight Cassius Clay, later Muhammad Ali, won gold. Picture: Getty
On this day in 1960 the Rome Olympics opened, at which US light-heavyweight Cassius Clay, later Muhammad Ali, won gold. Picture: Getty

1609: Galileo Galilei demonstrated his first telescope to Venetian lawmakers.

1814: Washington DC was burned and White House destroyed by British forces.

1825: Uruguay declared its independence from Brazil.

1830: The Belgian Revolution begins.

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1837: Henry William Crawford patented a process for producing galvanised iron.

1900: Writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, playing for MCC against London County, clean bowled WG Grace.

1910: Yellow Cab taxicab company was founded.

1916: The United States National Park Service was created.

1919: The world’s first scheduled air flights began, between London and Paris.

1933: The Diexi earthquake struck Mao County, Sichuan, China and killed 9,000 people.

1944: Paris is liberated by the Allies.

1950: United States President Harry Truman ordered the army to seize control of the nation’s railways to avert a strike.

1960: The 17th Olympic Games opened in Rome, at which Briton Anita Lonsbrough won gold in the 200 metre breaststroke. The light-heavyweight boxing gold medal was won by an American named Cassius Clay.

1964: Kenneth Kaunda elected Zambia’s first president.

1978: The Shroud of Turin went on show for the first time on the high altar at St John’s Cathedral in Turin.

1980: Zimbabwe joined the United Nations.

1985: Pop singer Michael Jackson paid £25 million for an ATV catalogue of music which included copyright of 5,000 songs, many by the Beatles.

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1989: The spacecraft Voyager, completing its 12-year voyage to Neptune, sent back pictures of Triton, its moon, and revealed two additional moons previously unknown to scientists.

1991: Belarus declared its independence from the Soviet Union.

1997: Egon Krenz, the former East German leader, was convicted of a shoot-to-kill policy at the Berlin Wall.

2009: Tobacco use was costing the UK economy £5 billion a year, according to research.

BIRTHDAYS

Sir Sean Connery, Edinburgh-born film actor, 85; Martin Amis, author, 66; Pamela Armstrong, television presenter, 64; Tim Burton, film director, 57; Elvis Costello (Declan McManus), pop singer, 61; Frederick Forsyth CBE, novelist, 77; Howard Jacobson, Man Booker Prize-winning novelist and critic, 73; Blake Lively, actress, 28; Claudia Schiffer, model and actress, 45; Wayne Shorter, jazz saxophonist, 82; Gene Simmons, rock musician (Kiss), 66; Keith Tippett, jazz pianist, 68; Lord Wallace of Tankerness, deputy first minister 1999-2005, MP 1983-2001, 61; Joanne Whalley, actress, 54.

ANNIVERSARIES

Births: 1530 Ivan the Terrible, the first Tsar of Russia; 1918 Leonard Bernstein, composer-conductor; 1921 Brian Moore, novelist (notably The Colour of Money); 1923 Dorothy Dunnett, novelist and painter.

Deaths: 1776 David Hume, philosopher and historian; 1819 James Watt, engineer and inventor; 1822 Sir William Herschel, astronomer who discovered Uranus; 1867 Michael Faraday, physicist; 1907 Mary Elizabeth Coleridge, novelist; 1984 Truman Capote, author; 2012 Neil Armstrong, first man to walk on the Moon, 20 July, 1969.

SCOTTISH ASYLUMS: CARE OF THE INSANE

25 August, 1925

IN their 11th annual report, the Board of Control for Scotland state that the number of insane and mentally defective persons under the supervision of the board on 1st January, 1925, was 20,850. Of this number, 18,393 persons were certified insane. This was an increase of 9 compared with the preceding year. Certified mental defectives had increased from 2,308 to 2,452. During the statistical year 3,176 lunatics were placed on the register, 1,541 were discharged and 1,625 died. The percentage of deaths to the average number of registered patients were 8.9, which was 1.6 per cent lower than the average for the past five years. The proportion of recoveries calculated on the admissions during the year was 33.4 per cent, which was 3.4 per cent above the average of five years from 1921 to 1924 inclusive. The above three figures did not take cognisance of the patients who entered asylums voluntarily.

• archive.scotsman.com

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