William Doolittle Wright (1946 - 2009)

Refresh this page to see various historical events that occurred during William's lifetime.

In 1946, in the year that William Doolittle Wright was born, on July 4th, the Philippines gained independence from the United States. In 1964, Independence Day in the Philippines was moved from July 4th to June 12th at the insistence of nationalists and historians.

In 1956, at the age of just 10 years old, William was alive when on May 20th, the U.S. tested the first hydrogen bomb dropped from a plane over Bikini Atoll. Previously, hydrogen bombs had only been tested on the ground. The Atomic Age moved forward.

In 1967, William was 21 years old when on November 7th, President Johnson signed legislation passed by Congress that created the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which would later become PBS and NPR. The legislation required CPB to operate with a "strict adherence to objectivity and balance in all programs or series of programs of a controversial nature".

In 1970, William was 24 years old when on May 1st, US troops invaded Cambodia, expanding the Vietnam War. The invasion of Cambodia was a Nixon policy, although it was argued against by both his Secretary of State and his Secretary of Defense.

In 1994, when he was 48 years old, on May 6th, the Channel Tunnel or "Chunnel" was officially opened. The Chunnel is a railway tunnel beneath the English Channel that connects Great Britain to mainland France. Original plans for such a tunnel were developed in 1802 and approved by Napoleon Bonaparte but the British rejected the plan fearing that Napoleon would use the railway to invade.