This day in history: First US gymnastics gold & Guns N’ Roses arrive
You would be amazed that the history of various nations is yet to be unfolded. History often amazes us as to how unaware we are about milestones of the past. Here are events that carved a niche in history on July 23.
FollowYou would be amazed that the history of various nations is yet to be unfolded. History often amazes us as to how unaware we are about milestones of the past. Here are events that carved a niche in history on July 23:
1996: US Women took home gymnastics gold for the first time
On July 23, 1996, at the Summer Olympics in Atlanta, the US women's gymnastics team won its first-ever team gold. The 1996 US women's team, also known as "Mag 7", was made up of seven immensely talented girls. The team included Amanda Borden, Amy Chow, Dominique Dawes, Shannon Miller, Dominique Moceanu, Jaycie Phelps and Kerri Strug.
The team was considered the nation's best shot ever at an Olympic team gold and had entered the games with the expectations of an entire country heaped on their young shoulders.
To win the gold in 1996, the U.S. women faced a battle with perennial contender Russia and Romania, the two-time defending world champions.
1998: Guns N’ Roses made a popular breakthrough with “Sweet Child O’ Mine”
In the 1980s, in Los Angeles on any given night inside clubs, you could not only hear bands like Hanoi Rocks and Mötley Crüe, but you could also witness an expression of that lifestyle as decadent as any the music world had seen.
The rise of “grunge” bands like Nirvana and alternative rock effectively put an end to that scene in the early 1990s, but the first blow was struck by one of their own: Guns N’ Roses, the band that made its big popular breakthrough on July 23, 1988, when their first hit single, “Sweet Child O’ Mine” entered the Billboard Top 40.
Originally formed out of the ashes of two other groups—L.A. Guns and Hollywood Rose—Guns N’ Roses played in a style that owed much more to the pure hard rock of the 1970s than to the showy heavy metal of the 1980s. Signed to Geffen in 1986, GN’R released their first full-length album, Appetite For Destruction and it took nearly a year of touring and the release of a second single, “Sweet Child O’ Mine,” to earn Guns N’ Roses a place in music history.
“Sweet Child O’ Mine” went on to become not just a #1 hit on this day in 1988, but is also a true rock classic today.
