TODAY is Friday, July 21, the 202nd day of 2006. There are 163 days left in the year.

ON THIS DATE:

In 1831, Belgium became independent as Leopold I was proclaimed King of the Belgians.

In 1899, author Ernest Hemingway was born in Oak Park, Ill.; poet Hart Crane was born in Garrettsville, Ohio.

In 1925, the so-called “Monkey Trial” ended in Dayton, Tenn., with John T. Scopes convicted of violating state law for teaching Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. (The conviction was later overturned.)

In 1944, American forces landed on Guam during World War II.

In 1954, the Geneva Accords divided Vietnam into northern and southern entities.

In 1955, during the Geneva summit, President Eisenhower presented his “open skies” proposal under which the US and the Soviet Union would trade information on each other’s military facilities.

In 1969, Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin blasted off from the moon aboard the lunar module.

In 1980, draft registration began in the United States for 19- and 20-year-old men.

THOUGHT FOR TODAY:<$>

“There is no bigotry like that of ‘free thought’ run to seed.” — Horace Greeley, American journalist (1811-1872).