Timeline Bermuda
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1505 Juan de
Bermudez of Spain first reported on the island of Bermuda.
(SFC, 5/2/98, p.E4)(http://tinyurl.com/y3jr4z)
1609 Jul 25, Admiral William
Somers, head of a 7-ship fleet enroute to Virginia, spied land after
being blown off course and soon drove his ship, the Sea Venture,
onto the reefs of Bermuda. William Strachey (1572-1621), was also
aboard the Sea Venture and later sent a letter to England that
described the event. The letter is thought by many to have been the
inspiration for Shakespeare’s "Tempest." Strachey became secretary
of the colony at Jamestown, Virginia, after his arrival there on May
23, 1610. In 2009 Hobson Woodward authored: A Brave Vessel: The True
Tale of the Castaways Who Rescued Jamestown and Inspired
Shakespeare’s “The Tempest.”
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_Venture)(AM,
May/Jun 97 p.29)(SFC, 8/18/09, p.E2)
1612 St. George, Bermuda, was
first settled.
(SSFC, 12/7/14, p.G5)
1680 Bermuda became
self-governing, though still a British colony.
(Econ, 11/11/06, p.46)
1918 Mar 6, US naval boat
"Cyclops" disappeared in "Bermuda Triangle."
(MC, 3/6/02)
1930 Jun 11, William Beebe, of
the New York Zoological Society, in a diving chamber called a
bathysphere, dived to a record-setting depth of 1,426 feet off the
coast of Bermuda.
(HN, 6/11/98)
1934 William Beebe and inventor
Otis Barton descended more than a half a mile into the ocean off
Bermuda in the 4,500 lb. bathysphere.
(SFEC, 11/17/96, BR p.4)(PacDis, Winter ’97,
p.42)
1951 Jan 8, A cahow, thought
extinct since 1615, was rediscovered in Bermuda. David Wingate (15)
helped 2 scientists discover the cahow, aka Bermuda petrel, a
nocturnal seabird thought to have been extinct since the 17th
century. Wingate proceeded to make a life time goal of saving the
bird from extinction.
(WSJ, 12/19/00, p.A1)(MC, 1/8/02)
1957 Mar 21, US President
Eisenhower and British PM Harold Macmillan began a four-day
conference in Bermuda.
(AP, 3/21/07)
1961 Dec 21, JFK & British
PM MacMillan met in Bermuda.
(MC, 12/21/01)
1986 Apr 11, Dodge Morgan
(1932-2010), American businessman, landed at St. George, Bermuda,
completing a 27,000 solo nonstop sail around the world in 150 days.
This broke a 292-day record set in 1971 by British sailor Chay
Blyth.
(http://outdoors.mainetoday.com/news/050410dodge.shtml)(SFC,
9/20/10, p.C4)
1986 Oct 3, The Soviet nuclear
submarine K-219 suffered an explosion and fire in a missile tube
northeast of Bermuda; the vessel sank three days later.
(AP, 10/4/06)
1990 Nov 13, Secretary of State
James A. Baker III told reporters in Hamilton, Bermuda, the Persian
Gulf crisis threatened world recession and the loss of American
jobs. Members of Congress demanded a larger role in US Gulf policy
following President Bush’s decision to send more US troops to the
region.
(AP, 11/13/00)
1995 Aug 18, Premier John Swan
of Bermuda promised to resign after voters rejected a vote for
independence from Britain with 76% voice.
(WSJ, 8/18/95, p.A1)
1996 Rebecca Middleton (17) of
Ontario, Canada, died after being raped, tortured and stabbed on a
beach in Bermuda. A suspect, Kirk Orlando Mundy, was allowed to
strike a plea bargain deal with police in which he admitted to being
an accessory after the fact and was sentenced to five years. The
case against the other suspect, Justis Raham Smith, collapsed after
a judge in Bermuda said there was insufficient evidence.
(Reuters, 4/1/06)
1997 Jul, Tyco Corp. under CEO
Dennis Kozlowski merged with ADT Ltd., a Bermuda corporation, and
began relocating employees to headquarters in Boca Raton, Flo.
(WSJ, 4/5/04, p.A8)
1998 In Bermuda the Progressive
Labor Party took power, promising a better deal for blacks.
(AP, 12/19/07)
2000 Mar 23, A 776-foot Greek
cargo ship, Leader L, sank in the Atlantic 400 miles off of Bermuda.
31 Filipino crew members were forced into life boats. 13 men were
rescued with Canadian Sea King helicopters. 6 bodies were found and
12 were presumed dead as the ship pulled down one life raft.
(SFC, 3/24/00, p.D3)(SFC, 3/25/00, p.A12)(WSJ,
3/27/00, p.A1)
2000 Apr 27, Some 288 migrant
Haitians were rescued from Flamingo Cay in the Bermuda Islands after
their boat ran aground. 2-14 of the migrants died of exposure and
dehydration while awaiting rescue.
(SFC, 4/28/00, p.D4)(SFC, 4/29/00, p.A12)
2002 Oct 29, In Bermuda some
6,000 children stayed home from school as teachers continued to
strike to demand salaries on par with government officials.
(AP, 10/29/02)
2003 Jul 27, In Bermuda Premier
Jennifer Smith stepped down after retaining her seat by just eight
votes and watching her governing party narrowly win elections in the
British territory. Members of the center-left Progressive
Labor Party endorsed Alex Scott (63) to replace her.
(AP, 7/28/03)
2003 Sep 5, Hurricane Fabian
slammed into Bermuda killing 4 people. [see Sep 6]
(AP, 9/5/08)
2003 Sep 6, Fabian, the most
powerful hurricane to hit Bermuda in 50 years pushed away from the
British territory after deadly winds split trees and swept trucks
off roads. Four people were missing and feared dead.
(AP, 9/6/03)
2003 Sep 29, Dennis Kozlowski,
CEO of Tyco Int'l., and financial chief Mark Swartz went on trial on
charges that they stole over $600 million from their Bermuda-based
conglomerate.
(WSJ, 2/4/04, p.C2)
2003 Dec 18, Charles Berlitz
(90), linguist and author, died in Florida. His books included "The
Bermuda Triangle" (1974), and "Native Tongues," a compendium of
language history.
(SFC, 1/5/04, p.B5)
2004 Jun 1, The US Dept. of
Homeland Security awarded a contract, valued as much as a $10
billion, to a group of companies led by a unit of Accenture Ltd., a
Bermuda-based business consultancy.
(WSJ, 6/2/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 20, Bermuda-based
Bacardi Limited agreed to purchase Grey Goose vodka, distilled and
bottled in France, from Sidney Frank Importing Co. for roughly $2
billion.
(AP, 6/21/04)
2006 Sep 10, Florence
intensified into the second hurricane of the Atlantic season as it
headed for Bermuda, where residents installed storm shutters and
hauled their yachts onto beaches.
(AP, 9/10/06)
2006 Sep 12, Hurricane Florence
headed toward north Atlantic shipping lanes after blowing out
windows, peeling away roofs and knocking out power to thousands in
Bermuda.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 28, It was reported
that Merck saved some $1.5 billion in US taxes by transferring
patents and income to an offshore holding in Bermuda called Project
Ryland from 1993-2003. In 2006 the IRS challenged the transactions.
(WSJ, 9/28/06, p.A1)
2006 Nov 11, At this time about
35% of Bermuda’s population was white.
(Econ, 11/11/06, p.46)
2007 Feb 24, Bermuda was cited
as the world’s richest country with a GDP per person estimated at
$70,000.
(Econ, 2/24/07, SR p.4)
2007 Dec 18, Bermuda's ruling
party won a third term in general elections shadowed by racial
resentment and allegations of corruption. Premier Ewart Brown's
Progressive Labor Party won 22 seats compared with 14 seats for the
United Bermuda Party.
(AP, 12/19/07)
2007 Blacks comprised about 60%
of Bermuda's 62,000 people.
(AP, 12/19/07)
2008 Jul 15, Tropical Storm
Bertha headed back out over open ocean and away from the US mainland
after it battered Bermuda, knocking out electricity to thousands on
the Atlantic tourist island. Bertha entered its 13th day becoming
the longest-lived July tropical storm in history.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2009 Jun 11, Four Guantanamo
detainees, Uighurs from predominantly Muslim western China, were
transferred to Bermuda, marking an unexpected new chapter in their
odyssey.
(AP, 6/11/09)
2009 Aug 20, Drug developer
Warner Chilcott, which focuses on women's healthcare and
dermatology, completed its move to Ireland from Bermuda.
(AP, /21/09)
2010 Sep 20, Hurricane Igor
swept past Bermuda, lashing at the Atlantic island with high winds
and furious waves as power failed in many areas, plunging people
hunkered down at home into darkness and leaving officials waiting
for sunrise to assess damage.
(AP, 9/20/10)
2013 May 2, Britain’s
Chancellor George Osborne said tax havens such as Bermuda and the
Cayman Islands will work more closely with Britain and other
European countries to fight tax evasion.
(Reuters, 5/2/13)
2013 Jun 15, Britain clinched a
deal with its major offshore tax havens on Saturday that will see 10
British overseas territories and crown dependencies sign up to
international protocols on information sharing. Those included were
Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Gibraltar,
Anguilla, Montserrat, Turks and Caicos Islands, Jersey, Guernsey and
the Isle of Man.
(Reuters, 6/15/13)
2014 Oct 17, Hurricane Gonzalo
crushed trees, flattened power lines and damaged Bermuda's main
hospital during an hours-long battering, but the tiny, wealthy
British territory suffered no deaths.
(AP, 10/18/14)
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