July 14 History, Fun Facts, and Trivia

July 14 Observances

July 14 is Bastille Day, France’s national holiday; Shark Awareness Day; National Mac and Cheese Day; National Grand Marnier Day; National Tape Measure Day; and Pandemonium Day. Pandemonium Day has no official guidelines, which is probably the point. Bastille Day and Pandemonium Day on the same date are either redundant or historically accurate, depending on your knowledge of the French Revolution.

Shark Awareness Day

Sharks have existed for approximately 450 million years, which means they predate trees, the dinosaurs, and the rings of Saturn in their current form. They have survived five mass extinction events. Despite this track record, they are currently in serious trouble.

Approximately 100 million sharks are killed by humans each year, primarily for the shark fin trade, as bycatch in commercial fishing, and through habitat destruction. About 8 people worldwide are killed by sharks annually. Lightning strikes kill roughly 50 Americans per year alone. The math is not favorable to the shark’s reputation.

Over a third of all shark species are now threatened with extinction according to the IUCN Red List. Sharks are apex predators that regulate ocean ecosystems. Their decline has measurable effects on fish populations, coral reefs, and ocean health worldwide. The fear runs in the wrong direction.

Trivia: The odds of being killed by a shark in the United States are approximately 1 in 3.7 million. The odds of dying from a bee or wasp sting are 1 in 46,000. Nobody has made a summer blockbuster about bees.

What Happened on July 14?

July 14 is Bastille Day, the start of the French Revolution, the day Billy the Kid was shot, the day Jane Goodall arrived in Tanzania to begin work that would change how humans understand primates, the day NASA’s New Horizons flew past Pluto for the first time, and the birthday of Woody Guthrie, Gustav Klimt, and Gerald Ford. SpongeBob SquarePants was also born on this date, year unspecified.

If you were born on July 14, you were likely conceived the week of October 21 of the prior year.

July 14 History Highlights

1789 — Bastille Day. Tens of thousands of Parisian citizens stormed the Bastille, a fortress used as a political prison, and released its seven prisoners. The Bastille was not especially crowded that day, but it was a powerful symbol of royal tyranny, and symbols matter more than logistics during revolutions. The storming of the Bastille marks the beginning of the French Revolution, one of the most consequential political upheavals in modern history. France celebrates the date annually with a military parade down the Champs-Élysées and fireworks at the Eiffel Tower.

1791 — The Priestley Riots drove Joseph Priestley, the chemist who discovered oxygen, out of Birmingham, England. He was a supporter of the French Revolution and a religious dissenter, which made him deeply unpopular with certain crowds. His house, library, and laboratory were destroyed. He emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1794 and never returned to England.

1798 — The Sedition Act became law in the United States, making it a federal crime to publish false or malicious statements about the U.S. government or its officials. It was widely used to prosecute political opponents of the Adams administration and is now regarded by legal historians as one of the clearest early violations of the First Amendment. It expired in 1801 when Jefferson took office and declined to renew it.

1853 — The first major American World’s Fair, the Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations, opened in New York City at the Crystal Palace, modeled on the London exhibition of 1851. It drew over one million visitors. Elisha Otis demonstrated his safety elevator at the fair, cutting the rope holding the platform while standing on it to prove the safety brake would hold. It did. Elevators became commercially viable shortly afterward.

1874 — The so-called Little Chicago Fire burned 47 acres of the city, destroying 812 buildings and killing 20 people. It is less remembered than the Great Chicago Fire of October 1871, which killed an estimated 300 people and destroyed roughly 17,450 buildings. Chicago has had a complicated relationship with fire.

1881 — Billy the Kid was shot and killed by Sheriff Pat Garrett at Fort Sumner, New Mexico. Billy was 21 years old. Garrett and Billy had known each other before Garrett became the lawman tasked with bringing him in. Billy had escaped from jail two months earlier, killing two guards in the process. Garrett found him in the dark at a friend’s house and fired twice. The first shot killed him. Billy the Kid’s real name was William Henry McCarty Jr., possibly born William Bonney. He is credited with killing eight men, though the number is disputed. He became a legend almost immediately after his death.

1933 — In Germany, the Nazi Party was declared the only legal political party, completing the process of Gleichschaltung (political coordination), the systematic elimination of all independent institutions and opposition. The same day, the Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring was proclaimed, mandating compulsory sterilization of people deemed to have genetic disorders. It was enforced against an estimated 400,000 people before the end of World War II.

1938 — Howard Hughes completed his record-setting flight around the world, landing at Floyd Bennett Field in New York. He had departed July 10 and covered approximately 14,800 miles in 91 hours and 14 minutes, beating the previous record by nearly four days. He was met by a ticker-tape parade in New York City.

1960 — Jane Goodall arrived at the Gombe Stream Reserve in present-day Tanzania to begin her study of chimpanzees. She was 26 years old, had no formal scientific degree, and had been hired by paleoanthropologist Louis Leakey, who believed untrained observers made better field researchers. Within months she observed chimps using tools, overturning the scientific consensus that tool use was uniquely human. She has worked in conservation ever since and is now one of the most recognized scientists in the world.

1969 — The United States officially withdrew the $500, $1,000, $5,000, and $10,000 bills from circulation, citing their primary use in organized crime and tax evasion rather than ordinary commerce. The bills still exist and are legal tender, but most are now worth far more to collectors than their face value. The $10,000 bill featured Salmon P. Chase, Lincoln’s Treasury Secretary, who almost nobody recognizes, which was perhaps the point.

1992 — 386BSD was released by Lynne and William Jolitz, launching what became the open-source operating system movement. Linus Torvalds released Linux shortly afterward, having been inspired in part by the limitations of available systems. Between them, these two releases underpinned the internet infrastructure that most of the modern world now runs on.

2015 — NASA’s New Horizons probe made its closest approach to Pluto, passing within 7,800 miles of the surface after a nine-year, three-billion-mile journey. The images it returned showed mountains of water ice and a heart-shaped nitrogen plain now called Tombaugh Regio, named for Pluto’s discoverer. It was the first time any spacecraft had visited Pluto. New Horizons is still traveling outward into the Kuiper Belt and is expected to remain operational until the early 2030s.

Billboard Number One on July 14

1962: “Roses Are Red (My Love)” — Bobby Vinton (No. 1: July 14 through August 10, 1962). Four weeks at the top. Vinton was a relative unknown when the song was released; multiple labels had passed on it. It became his breakthrough hit and the best-selling single of 1962.
1979: “Bad Girls” — Donna Summer (No. 1: July 14 through August 17, 1979). Five weeks at the top. Summer had three No. 1 hits in 1979 alone. “Bad Girls” was written after her publicist was mistaken for a prostitute by a police officer. Summer turned the incident into one of the defining songs of the disco era.

Born on July 14

Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) — Austrian symbolist painter and the leading figure of the Vienna Secession movement. His most famous work, The Kiss (1907-1908), is housed at the Belvedere Museum in Vienna and is considered one of the most recognized paintings in the world. Klimt famously said he was not interested in painting self-portraits because he found himself a dull subject. His quote in today’s Birthday Quotes section explains it in his own words.
Woody Guthrie (1912-1967) — American folk singer and songwriter who wrote “This Land Is Your Land” (1940), one of the most recognized American songs ever written. His guitar bore the inscription “This Machine Kills Fascists.” He suffered from Huntington’s disease for the last several years of his life and died in 1967. Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and countless others have cited him as a primary influence. The Woody Guthrie Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma, holds his archives.
Gerald Ford (1913-2006) — 38th President of the United States (1974-1977), the only person to have served as both Vice President and President without being elected to either office. He was appointed Vice President after Spiro Agnew resigned and assumed the presidency after Richard Nixon resigned over Watergate. His pardon of Nixon one month after taking office cost him significant public support and likely his 1976 election loss to Jimmy Carter. He is now generally regarded by historians as a decent and stabilizing figure during a turbulent period. He lived to 93, the longest-lived president in American history until Jimmy Carter surpassed him in 2019.
Dave Fleischer (1894-1979) — American animator and co-creator, with his brother Max, of Betty Boop and Popeye the Sailor. Fleischer Studios was the primary competitor to Disney in the 1930s. Their style was darker, jazzier, and more urban than Disney’s and has influenced animators ever since.
Tom Carvel (1906-1990) — Greek-American businessman who founded the Carvel ice cream chain after his ice cream truck got a flat tire near Hartsdale, New York in 1934. He sold the melting ice cream out of the broken-down truck, made $14 in two days, and decided to open a shop on the spot. He became famous for recording his own raspy-voiced radio commercials, which ran for decades and became unintentionally iconic.
Ingmar Bergman (1918-2007) — Swedish film director widely regarded as one of the greatest filmmakers in cinema history. His works include The Seventh Seal (1957), Wild Strawberries (1957), and Fanny and Alexander (1982). He made 60 films and numerous stage productions. Woody Allen, Martin Scorsese, and Francis Ford Coppola have all named him as a primary influence. He spent the last years of his life on the Swedish island of Faro, where he had shot several films, and rarely left.
Harry Dean Stanton (1926-2017) — American actor whose face appeared in over 250 films and television shows. He was never a box office star but was one of the most respected character actors in Hollywood history. Paris, Texas (1984) gave him one of cinema’s great lead performances. Wim Wenders directed it; Sam Shepard wrote it. He played guitar and sang country music in his spare time.
Rosey Grier (1932) — American football player, six-time Pro Bowl defensive tackle for the New York Giants and Los Angeles Rams, and later actor and ordained minister. He was one of the “Fearsome Foursome” defensive line with the Rams. He was also a needlepoint enthusiast who wrote a book called Rosey Grier’s Needlepoint for Men (1973), which is exactly as great as it sounds.
Jerry Rubin (1938-1994) — American activist and co-founder of the Youth International Party (Yippies). He was a defendant in the Chicago Seven trial following the 1968 Democratic National Convention protests. In the 1980s he became a successful businessman and networker in New York, a transformation that puzzled many of his former colleagues. He was struck by a car in Los Angeles in 1994 and died two weeks later.
Jackie Earle Haley (1961) — American actor who played Kelly Leak in The Bad News Bears (1976) as a child and then essentially disappeared from Hollywood for two decades before returning with an Academy Award-nominated performance in Little Children (2006). He later played Rorschach in Watchmen (2009).
Matthew Fox (1966) — American actor best known as Jack Shephard in Lost (2004-2010), one of the most-watched drama series of the 2000s. The finale remains one of the most discussed and debated endings in television history. Fox has rarely acted since.
Conor McGregor (1988) — Irish mixed martial artist and former UFC Featherweight and Lightweight Champion simultaneously, the first fighter in UFC history to hold titles in two weight classes at the same time. His 2017 boxing match against Floyd Mayweather Jr. generated over $600 million in revenue, making it one of the highest-grossing combat sports events ever. He has been involved in multiple legal controversies since retiring from active competition.

Birthday Quotes from July 14 Birthdays

“It’s a folk singer’s job to comfort disturbed people and to disturb comfortable people.”
— Woody Guthrie

“I have never painted a self-portrait. I am less interested in myself as a subject for a painting than I am in other people, above all women. There is nothing special about me. I am a painter who paints day after day from morning to night. Whoever wants to know something about me ought to look carefully at my pictures.”
— Gustav Klimt

“I am living permanently in my dream, from which I make brief forays into reality.”
— Ingmar Bergman

“I am a child of America. If ever I’m sent to Death Row for my revolutionary crimes, I’ll order as my last meal: a hamburger, french fries, and a Coke.”
— Jerry Rubin

“At the end of the day, you gotta feel some way. So why not feel unbeatable? Why not feel untouchable?”
— Conor McGregor

“I promise my fellow citizens only this: to uphold the Constitution, to do what is right as God gives me to see the right, and to do the very best that I can for America.”
— Gerald Ford

Random Trivia and Shower Thoughts for July 14

Ben Franklin’s 13 Virtues, No. 5: Frugality. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself. Waste nothing. Franklin wrote these virtues in his autobiography at age 79 and noted that he had never fully mastered any of them, which he considered the point of having them.
When Clue was released in 1985, theaters received one of three different endings. Audiences in different cities saw different conclusions. The home video release included all three endings sequentially, with the third presented as the “real” one. The film was a box office disappointment and is now considered a cult classic.
The Tower of London is wider than it is tall. Most people picture it as a tall spire. It is actually a squat, sprawling complex that covers about 12 acres. The central White Tower is 90 feet tall and 118 feet wide.
Baby’s real name in Dirty Dancing was Frances. Her father calls her “Baby” because she was the baby of the family. Nobody puts Frances in a corner either, but it sounds different.
The capital of Namibia is Windhoek. It was called Windhuk under German colonial administration. Namibia was the last African country to gain independence, in 1990.
There is only one country between North Korea and Norway: Russia. Russia borders both. Russia is very large.
“Friendships born on the field of athletic strife are the real gold of competition. Awards become corroded, friends gather no dust.” — Jesse Owens
The sleeve on the outside of a coffee cup is called a zarf. The word originally referred to an ornamental metal holder for a hot coffee cup used in the Middle East. It has been repurposed for cardboard sleeves. The barista does not know this word either.
“Plastics.” — Mr. Maguire (Walter Brooke) in The Graduate (1967). One of the most quoted single-word pieces of career advice in film history. The full exchange is better: “I want to say one word to you. Just one word.” “Yes, sir.” “Are you listening?” “Yes, I am.” “Plastics.”
I bet the first person who said “I’m a poet and I didn’t even know it” felt really clever.
Isn’t it odd the way everyone assumes the goo in a soap dispenser is always soap?
Jane Goodall arrived in Tanzania on July 14, 1960, with no scientific degree, a notebook, and binoculars. Within months she had observed behavior no scientist had ever documented. Her funding came from the National Geographic Society after Louis Leakey convinced them she was worth supporting. She is now in her 90s and still traveling the world on behalf of conservation. The chimps got the right observer.