14th July

1789: The Bastille, the state prison in Paris, was stormed by the citizens of Paris and burned to the ground at the start of the French Revolution.

1858: Suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst was born in Manchester.

1867: Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel first demonstrated the use of dynamite.

1888: The first record company, the North American Phonograph Company, was founded in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, by businessman Jesse L Lippincott.

1902: The Campanile of St Mark’s Cathedral in Venice collapsed during a safety inspection.

1940: The Soviet Union annexed Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

1946: Dr Benjamin Spock’s famous baby book – Baby And Child Care – was published, and became a best-seller. Twenty-eight years later he said he no longer supported his own theories.

1958: King Faisal of Iraq was assassinated in a military coup led by General Kassem, and a Republic was established.

1959: Grock, described as the “greatest clown on earth”, died in Italy.

1967: Parliament voted to legalise abortion.

ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: Investigators at the scene of an explosion which killed five men and left another seriously injured found chemicals suggesting that alcohol was being produced illegally.