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SCMP Reporter

In Hong Kong

1959: A man washing clothes beside a stream in Pokfulam was swept away by a swift torrent. Chan Sien-tai, 41, was badly injured and taken to Queen Mary Hospital.

1963: British MP Denis Healey arrived in the colony 'to find out how the miracle of Hong Kong is achieved'.

1968: Five people were killed and 17 were injured after an explosion on the Liberian tanker Cerberus set ablaze the American freighter Coastal Sentry, at a Junk Bay shipyard.

1971: Flat for sale: Three-bedroom, 1,200-square-foot flat in Patterson St, Causeway Bay. Available immediately. $185,000.

1977: Millions of dollars worth of gold and cash were traded in Hong Kong and Bangkok as Saigon's Chinese tried to take their money out of Vietnam.

Around the world

1778: The first treaty between the United States and Indian tribes was signed at Fort Pitt. Andrew and Thomas Lewis signed for the US and chiefs White Eyes and John Kill Buck represented the Delaware nation.

1796: President George Washington delivered his farewell address to the American people. He had been president since 1789.

1798: One hundred French exhibitors took part in the first significant trade show, at the Temple d'Industrie in Paris.

1862: The Battle of Antietam halted the Confederate advance into the North in the American Civil War.

1871: The Mont Cenis railway tunnel, the first of the routes through the Alps, was opened and ran for 13km, from Modane, France, to Bardonecchia, Italy.

1900: Britain's Queen Victoria signed the document which united the six Australian colonies as a Federal Commonwealth with effect from January 1, 1901.

1931: The first long-playing record to rotate at 33.333 rpm was demonstrated by the RCA Victor company in New York.

1935: Manuel Quezon y Molina was elected the first president of the Philippine Commonwealth, established under American tutelage.

1939: Russia invaded Eastern Poland, meeting little resistance and capturing 217,000 Poles.

1944: The failed 'Operation Market Garden' began with British airborne troops being dropped at Arnhem.

1948: Count Folke Bernadotte of Sweden, a United Nations mediator between Israel and the Arabs, was killed by Jewish extremists in Jerusalem during a fact-finding mission.

1957: In Thailand, the government of Field-Marshal Pibul Songgram was overthrown in a bloodless coup by General Sarit Thanarat.

1978: The Camp David summit between US president Jimmy Carter, Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Menachem Begin of Israel ended with a framework for a peace treaty.

1994: Karl Popper, one of the 20th century's most respected philosophers, died. He was 92.

1999: Frankie Vaughan, British 1950s matinee idol and crooner, died. He was nicknamed 'Mr Moonlight' after his hit song Give Me The Moonlight. He was 71.



Today in history