^{King George I barges down the Thames with an orchestra playing Handel’s “Water Music” in its first public performance, July 17, 1717}

Today in History

• Handel’s Water Music receives its first public performance as King George I and a barge with 50 musicians sail down the River Thames (1717)
• Willis Carrier builds the first air conditioner (1902)
• Bolsheviks massacre the Russian Imperial family (1918)
• Douglas “Wrong Way” Corrigan earns his nickname for flying across the Atlantic instead of flying to California as his flight plan stated (1938)
• Disneyland opens (1955)
• An American Apollo and a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft dock in orbit (1975)
• The US drinking age goes from 18 to 21 (1984)

Birthdays

• John Jacob Astor, businessman (1763)
• Erle Stanley Gardner, creator of Perry Mason (1889)
• James Cagney, actor and dancer (1899)
• Art Linkletter, radio and television host (1912)
• Phyllis Diller, comedian (1917)
• Vince Guaraldi, wrote the theme for Peanuts (1928)
• Diahann Carroll, singer (1935)
• Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall and consort of Charles, Prince of Wales (1947)
• Phoebe Snow, singer (1950)
• David Hasselhoff, actor and singer (1952)
• Angela Merkel, German chancellor (1954)

Deaths

• Adam Smith, economist (1790)
• Charlotte Corday, French revolutionary who murdered Jean-Paul Marat (1793)
• Billie Holiday, singer (1959)
• Ty Cobb, baseball player (1961)
• John Coltrane, saxophonist (1967)
• Dizzy Dean, baseball player (1974)
• Mickey Spillane, writer (2006)
• Walter Cronkite, television news anchor (2009)

Holidays and Celebrations

• Constitution Day (South Korea)
• Independence Day (Slovakia)
• International Firgun Day
• National Peach Ice Cream Day (US)
• U Tirot Sing Day (India)
• World Day for International Justice
• World Emoji Day

July 17 is the 198th day of the year (199th in leap years). There are 167 days remaining until the end of the year.