December 18 - this day in history

On December 18, 1898, Gaston de Chaslup-Loba set the first officially registered vehicle speed record in Asher Park near Paris: he reached a speed of 39.245 mph (about 64 km/h) on a Jeantaud with an electric motor and alkaline batteries.

1912 - after three years of excavation in the area of ​​the Pildaun plain (Sussex, England), Charles Dawson announced a sensational discovery of two cheekbones of a primitive humanoid creature. Most experts have identified the Pildown creature as a representative of the dead-end branch of the evolutionary transition from ape to man.

1917 - The Ukrainian State Academy of Arts was opened in Kiev, the first its rector was the schedule Georgy Narbut.

1920 - The Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic adopted a resolution “On Accounting for Musical Instruments” - one of the normative acts that guided the kobza players.

1940 - approved the "Plan of Barbarossa" attack by Nazi Germany on the USSR. The plan received its name from the nickname of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa, famous for his wars of conquest.

1957 - The Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine adopted a decree on the publication of the Ukrainian Soviet Encyclopedia.

1972 - President Richard Nixon ordered the bombing of North Vietnam, the most severe during the entire period of the American-Vietnamese war.

1976 - David Selznick film "King Kong" with the Jessica Lange in the lead role.