AUGUST 2 – 1945 Potsdam Conference ends; 1835 Elisha Grey, telephone inventor; 1987 Michael Andretti wins Marlboro 500; 1998 Barry Bonds hit by ball, charges mound; 1999 The 6th Sense movie premieres
AUGUST 2
1945 – Potsdam Conference ends. This was a meeting of the big three – the Soviet Union, the US and Great Britain. This was the third conference between these leaders; the first one was in Tehran in 1943 and the other one was in Yalta in February 1945. The representatives of each nation included Josef Stalin for the Soviets, Winston Churchill for Great Britain, who would later be replaced by the new Prime Minister Clement Attlee, and President Harry Truman. It began on July 17th and the topic was what to do with Germany.
The Treaty of Versailles from WWI had exacted very brutal reparation payments from Germany, and it was generally believed that these high reparations had handicapped Germany’s economy, which led to rise of the Nazi party. The Soviets wanted Germany to be completely disarmed, and Truman had his suspicions that the Soviets were looking to gain complete control of Germany and would eventually look to control all of Europe. The high point of the conference came when Truman suggested that the Americans had developed a weapon capable of unspeakable destruction, which Stalin already knew about from his Soviet intelligence network. So much for Truman’s leverage. When the Potsdam Conference was over, the Stalin believed the US and Great Britain were conspiring against the Soviet Union and Truman realized relations with the Soviet Union were beginning to quickly dissolve.
1835 – Happy Birthday Elisha Grey, who some say is the real inventor of the telephone. Grey co-0founded the Western Electrical Manufacturing company, and it was here in 1876 he developed the first phone prototype. He came up with the idea of the liquid transmitter, which Alexander Graham Bell has been accused of stealing from Grey. Some say he did some say he didn’t. I don’t know what else to tell you about that other than Alexander Bell’s telephone patent was getting held up in many court decisions. Oddly enough, while August 2nd is Grey’s birthday, it’s also the day Bell passed away in 1922.
1987 – Michael Andretti races to win the Marlboro 500 at the Michigan International Speedway in Brooklyn, MI, going about 171mph. His dad Mario was a racing legend, a 3-time IndyCar champion and 1978 Formula One world champion. Michael would win the Marlboro 500 again in 1989 and 1991 won the Championship Auto Racing Teams, or CART title. Michael Andretti in fact won the CART 42 times. In the Indianapolis 500 he only won one time however. Michael retired in 2003 to work on his racing business. His son Marco, who was born in 1987, continues the Andretti racing dynasty, finishing second in the his first Indianapolis 500.
1998 – San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds is hit by a pitch and charges the mound, causing a bench-clearing brawl.
1999 – The Sixth Sense, a movie known for the famous line I See Dead People and starring Bruce Willis premieres