Aug. 8 (UPI) -- On this date in history:
In 1911, newsreels became a standard part of U.S. movie screenings when the French film company Pathe began releasing weekly black-and-white features to theaters.
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1 of 3 | On Aug. 8, 1974, facing impeachment over the Watergate scandal, President Richard Nixon became the first U.S. president to resign. He left office the next day. File Photo by Ron Bennett/UPI
In 1940, the German Luftwaffe began a series of daylight air raids on Britain.
In 1945, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan, two days after an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and several days before Tokyo surrendered.
In 1956, a fire in a Belgian coal mine trapped and killed 262 workers in the worst mining disaster in the country's history.
In 1968, Richard Nixon won the Republican nomination for president. He was elected in November, defeating Democrat Hubert Humphrey and independent George Wallace.
In 1974, facing expected impeachment over the Watergate scandal, Richard Nixon became the first U.S. president to resign. He left office the next day. Listen to UPI Radio's original report.
In 1988, the first night game at Chicago's Wrigley Field was played. The park was the last major league stadium to add lights for night baseball.
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In 1990, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein annexed Kuwait.
File Photo by Ali Kaligh/UPI
In 2003, U.S. leaders of the Episcopal Church approved a landmark local-option resolution on the issue of same-sex marriages, leaving it to local dioceses whether to bless unions of gay and lesbian couples. Church leaders earlier in the week approved their first openly gay bishop.
In 2007, U.S. Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct on a charge of making sexual advances to an undercover police officer at a Minneapolis airport restroom.
In 2008, former U.S. Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., who ran for president in 2004 and dropped out of the 2008 race in January, admitted he had an affair in 2006 with a campaign worker.
File Photo by A.J. Sisco/UPI
In 2009, a sightseeing helicopter with six people aboard collided with a small plane carrying three people over the Hudson River in New York. There were no survivors.
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In 2010, U.N. officials estimated 1,600 people had been killed in monsoon-triggered flooding in Pakistan, and authorities said China's deadliest mudslides had claimed more than 1,100 lives. Hundreds of people were missing in the two disasters. In addition to flooding deaths, inclement weather factored into a deadly Airblue crash near Islamabad.
Pakistani relatives and officials lift a coffin carrying a plane crash victim's remains transported from PIMS hospital to Islamabad airport on July 29, 2010. Pakistan observed a day of mourning for the 152 people killed in its worst aviation disaster July 28, as a monsoon deluge delayed the search for the aircraft's black box in hilly woodland. File Photo by Sajjad Ali Qureshi/UPI
