SortStack #3040 — 2034-10-05

By year · Order from earliest to most recent.

1. England defeats the Spanish Armada 1588

   Storms did more damage than English guns — far more Spanish ships wrecked on the coasts of Scotland and Ireland than were sunk in battle.

2. Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay become the first to summit Everest 1953

   News of the climb reached London on the morning of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation — billed by the press as a double celebration.

3. Star Wars premieres in cinemas 1977

   It opened in just a few dozen theaters because studios doubted it. George Lucas skipped the premiere and was vacationing in Hawaii with Steven Spielberg as it exploded.

4. The Berlin Wall falls 1989

   A flustered official misread new travel rules at a press conference, saying they took effect 'immediately.' Crowds swamped the checkpoints within hours.

5. IBM's Deep Blue defeats world chess champion Garry Kasparov 1997

   Kasparov was reportedly unnerved by one inexplicable move — which some engineers later suggested may have been the result of a software bug.

6. Steve Jobs unveils the first iPhone 2007

   The demo units were so buggy that engineers mapped a single 'golden path' of actions for Jobs to follow on stage — deviating risked a crash.

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