Events
- 1856 – The Great Train Wreck of 1856, occurs in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania killing over 60 people.
- 1945 – World War II: Potsdam Conference – At Potsdam, President Harry S. Truman, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, the three main Allied leaders, begin their final summit of the war. The meeting will end on August 2.
- 1955 – Disneyland televises its grand opening in Anaheim, California.
- 1962 – Nuclear testing: The "Small Boy" test shot Little Feller I becomes the last atmospheric test detonation at the Nevada Test Site.
- 1975 – Apollo–Soyuz Test Project: An American Apollo and a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft dock with each other in orbit marking the first such link–up between spacecraft from the two nations.
- 1981 – Hyatt Regency walkway collapse in Kansas City, Missouri killing 114 people and injuring more than 200 caused by structural failure.
- 1989 – First flight of the B-2 Spirit Stealth Bomber.
- 1996 – Off the coast of Long Island, New York, a Paris–bound Boeing 747 carrying TWA flight 800 explodes, killing all 230 on board.
- 1997 – The F.W. Woolworth Company closes after 117 years in business.