July 2 is the 184th day of the year (185th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 181 days remaining until the end of the year.
1035 – William the Conqueror becomes the Duke of Normandy, reigning until 1087.
1754 – French and Indian War: George Washington surrenders Fort Necessity to French forces.
1767 Norway’s oldest newspaper, “Adresseavisen,” was first printed.
The newspaper is still in print under the Polaris Media Group.
1775 – American Revolutionary War: George Washington takes command of the Continental Army at Cambridge, Massachusetts.
1778 – American Revolutionary War: British forces massacre 360 men, women and children in the Wyoming Valley massacre.
1819 – The first savings bank in the United States (The Bank of Savings in New York City) opens.
1839 – The first state normal school in the United States, the forerunner to today's Framingham State College, opens in Lexington, Massachusetts with 3 students.
1848 – Slaves are freed in the Danish West Indies (now U.S. Virgin Islands) by Peter von Scholten.
1852 – Congress establishes the United States's 2nd mint in San Francisco, California.
1863 – U.S. Civil War: The final day of the Battle of Gettysburg culminates with Pickett's Charge.
1884 – Dow Jones published its first stock average.
1886 – The New York Tribune becomes the first newspaper to use a linotype machine, eliminating typesetting by hand.
1886 - The Benz Patent-Motorwagen, built in 1885 by the German engineer Karl Benz, is widely regarded as the first practical automobile and was the first car put into production. The original cost of the vehicle was 600 imperial German marks, approximately 150 US dollars (equivalent to $5,200 in 2024).
1887 – Gunfighter Clay Allison killed. Clay Allison, eccentric gunfighter and rancher, is believed to have died on July 3, 1887, in a freak wagon accident while hauling supplies to his ranch from Pecos. He was thrown from his heavily loaded wagon and fatally injured when run over by its rear wheel.
1890 – Idaho is admitted as the 43rd U.S. state.
1898 – A Spanish squadron, led by Pascual Cervera y Topete, is defeated by an American squadron under William T. Sampson in the Battle of Santiago de Cuba 1898 – Spanish fleet, led by Pascual Cervera y Topete, destroyed by the U.S. Navy in Santiago, Cuba during the Spanish–American War.
1913 – Confederate veterans at the Great Reunion of 1913 reenact Pickett's Charge; upon reaching the high-water mark of the Confederacy they are met by the outstretched hands of friendship from Union survivors.
1918 Mohammed V, sultan of Turkey, dies. With Turkish forces in the final months of fighting against the Allied powers during World War I, Mohammed V, sultan of the Ottoman Empire, dies at the age of 73.
1928 Scotsman John Logie Baird demonstrated the color television transmission in London for the first time.
1952 – Puerto Rico's Constitution is approved by the Congress of the United States.
1952 The ocean liner S.S. United States leaves New York on its maiden voyage to Le Havre, France, breaking the speed record for an eastbound Atlantic crossing. On its return trip it breaks the westbound record.
1969 -1971 Brian Jones (Rolling Stones) and Jim Morrison (The Doors) die, two years apart to the day. Jones apparently drown while Morrison died of heart failure in a bathtub in Paris.
1979 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter signs the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro–Soviet regime in Kabul.
1985 – Back to the Future is released in U.S. theaters.
1986 – U.S. President Ronald Reagan presides over the relighting of the renovated Statue of Liberty.
1988 – United States Navy warship USS Vincennes shoots down Iran Air Flight 655 over the Persian Gulf, killing all 290 people aboard.
1994 – The deadliest day in Texas traffic history, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety. Forty-six people were killed in crashes.
2013 – President of Egypt Mohamed Morsi is removed from office by the military after four days of protests all over the country calling for his resignation. Adly Mansour, is declared acting president until elections are held.