IRA kills Tory MP Ian Gow
1990 - British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher joined the widow of Ian Gow at a service in his parish church for the Conservative MP murdered by an Irish Republican Army (IRA) car bomb as he left home near Eastbourne, his parliamentary constituency on the south coast of England. She went to the church where Gow had been churchwarden until recently, after spending almost an hour with Jane Gow, who was in the couple’s house in the village of Hankham when the bomb exploded. After seeing Mrs Gow, Thatcher, looking pale, urged all those in public life who knew they were at risk to remain vigilant against terrorist attacks. Gow, chairman of the Tory backbench Northern Ireland committee, died at the wheel of his Austin Montego as he prepared to drive.
July 30
1709 - British forces under Duke of Marlborough and Savoy’s Prince Eugene defeat French at Tournai in Belgium.
1894 - Cornflakes are invented by Kellogg brothers Will Keith and John Harvey.
1907 - Elections are held in the Philippines for its first assembly.
1928 - George Eastman shows first colour motion pictures.
1930 - Host Uruguay wins first football World Cup, beating Argentina 4-2.
1945 - The USS Indianapolis is torpedoed by a Japanese submarine, killing 880 people.
1966 - England wins Fifa World Cup after beating West Germany in the final in London.
1971 - Japanese Boeing 727 collides with an F-86 fighter killing 162 people.
1976 - Giulio Andreotti is sworn in as premier of Italy.
1980 - Vanuatu gains independence from Britain and France.
1987 - Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi is attacked with a rifle while reviewing a guard of honour in Colombo.
1999 - The worst blackout in Taiwanese history cuts off electricity to 7 million households.
2005 - Two astronauts float out of shuttle Discovery’s airlock for the mission’s first spacewalk and get busy testing repair techniques.
2006 - Millions of voters go to the polls in Congo after years of misrule and war.
2009 - Brazilian swimmer Cesar Cielo Filho becomes the first man to break the 47-second barrier in men’s 100-metre freestyle.
2012 - A fire sweeps through a train packed with sleeping passengers in Hyderabad, India, killing at least 32 people.
2013 - Pakistan elects businessman Mamnoon Hussain as its 12th president.
