Would you believe that on this day in history, Dr. Pemberton, made a syrup intended as a patent medicine but ended up being Coca-Cola? Today, Coca-Cola is one of the most popular soft drinks in the world.
Read more interesting facts about May 8 in history. Here is an overview of what made headlines on this day.
- 1794-The United States Post Office was established.
- 1879-George Selden applied for the first automobile patent.
- 1886-Coca-Cola was invented.
- 1889-Ernest Rutherford published his discovery of two different kinds of radiation.
- 1919-Edward George Honey first proposed the idea of a moment of silence to commemorate The Armistice of World War I, which led to the creation of Remembrance Day.
- 1921-Sweden abolished capital punishment.
- 1927-The White Bird plane and its crew mysteriously disappeared on this day.
- 1939-Clay Puett’s electric starting gate was used for the first time.
- 1945-U.S. President Harry Truman announced that World War II had ended in Europe.
- 1959-Mike and Marian Ilitch founded “Little Caesars Pizza Treat”.
- 1962-Oskar Schindler and his wife Emilie Schindler were honored for saving 1200 Jews during WWII, in a ceremony on the Avenue of the Righteous, Jerusalem.
- 1967-Muhammad Ali was indicted for refusing induction into US Army.
- 1970-The Beatles released the album Let It Be.
- 1978-Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler climbed Mount Everest without an oxygen supply.
- 1984-Moscow announced that the USSR will not take part in the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles.
- 1984-The Soviet Union announced that they would not participate in the 1984 Summer Olympics Games in Los Angeles.
- 1985-“New Coke” was released to the public on the 99th anniversary of Coca-Cola.
- 1988-Mike Tyson crashed his $183,000, Bentley, in New York City.
- 1999-The first female cadet graduated from The Citadel military college.
- 2012-Dmitry Medvedev was confirmed as Russian Prime Minister by the State Duma, after being nominated by Vladimir Putin.