August 22

August 22 is the 235th day of the year, and the American record for it runs from 1777 to 2007 — a span of 230 years. The entry that anchors it: Theodore Roosevelt becomes the first President of the United States to make a public appearance in an automobile, 1902.

The revolutionary generation left its own mark on the date. In 1777, American Revolutionary War — Benedict Arnold used a ruse to convince the British that a much larger force was arriving, causing them to abandon the siege of Fort Stanwix. The same year, British forces abandon the Siege of Fort Stanwix after hearing rumors of Continental Army reinforcements.

The early twentieth century brought industry, air travel and war to the date. In 1902, Theodore Roosevelt becomes the first President of the United States to make a public appearance in an automobile.

After 1945 the date reflects a country operating at global scale. In 1965, Juan Marichal, pitcher for the San Francisco Giants, strikes John Roseboro, catcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers, on the head with a bat, sparking a 14-minute brawl, one of the most violent on-field incidents in sports history. Eight years on, in 1973, the Congress of Chile votes in favour of a resolution condemning President Salvador Allende's government and demands that he resign or else be unseated through force and new elections. Five years on, in 1978, the District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment is passed by the U.S. Congress, although it is never ratified by a sufficient number of states.

The most recent entries fall within living memory. In 2003, Roy Moore, Alabama's chief justice, was suspended after refusing to comply with a U.S. federal court order to remove a rock inscribed with the Ten Commandments from the lobby of the Supreme Court of Alabama building. Four years on, in 2007, the Texas Rangers defeat the Baltimore Orioles 30–3, the most runs scored by a team in modern Major League Baseball history.

The date is also a birthday. Among the Americans born on August 22: James Kirke Paulding (1778), American poet, playwright, and politician, 11th United States Secretary of the Navy; Samuel Pierpont Langley (1834), American physicist and astronomer; Archibald Willard (1836), American soldier and painter; George W. De Long (1844), American Naval officer and explorer; and William Lewis Douglas (1845), American businessman and politician, 42nd Governor of Massachusetts.

August 22 is also a date of endings. Among the Americans who died on it: Kate Chopin (1904), American novelist and poet; Charles William Eliot (1926), American academic; Kirk Bryan (1950), American geologist and academic; and Jim Tabor (1953), American baseball player.

The date carries formal observance as well — International Day Commemorating the Victims of Acts of Violence Based on Religion or Belief. What holds these 8 entries together is nothing more than the calendar, and nothing less. 230 years separate the earliest from the latest, and each was once simply the present day.