Today In The Past
Events
1479 BC – Thutmose III ascends to the throne of Egypt, although power effectively shifts to Hatshepsut (according to the Low Chronology of the 18th Dynasty).
1184 BC – The Greeks enter Troy using the Trojan Horse (traditional date).
858 – Nicolaas I succeeds Benedict III as pope
1066 – Halley’s Comet sparks English monk to predict country’ll be destroyed
1185 – Battle at Danoura: Yoshitsune Minamoto’s fleet beats imperial fleet
1288 – Jews of Yroyes France are accused of ritual murder
1311 – Gen Malik Kafur returns to Delhi after campaign in South India
1364 – Pope Urbabus V names John V van Virneburg as bishop of Utrecht
1524 – Duke of Bourbon drives admiral Bonnivet out of Milan
1547 – Battle of Muhlberg: Emperor Karel V vs ruler Johan F the Brave
1570 – Battles between Spanish troops & followers of sultan Suleiman
1704 – “Boston News-Letter,” 1st successful newspaper in US, forms
1800 – Library of Congress established with $5,000 allocation
1833 – Jacob Evert & George Dulty patent 1st soda fountain
1863 – Skirmish at Okolona/Birmingham, Mississippi (Grierson’s Raid)
1867 – Black demonstrators stage ride-ins on Richmond Va streetcars
1872 – Volcano Vesuvius erupts
1877 – Last federal occupying troops withdraw from south (New Orleans)
1877 – Russo-Turkish War, 1877-1878: Russia declares war on Ottoman Empire.
1884 – National Medical Association of Black physicians organizes (Atlanta)
1888 – Eastman Kodak forms
1894 – French cyclist Henri Desgrange rides 100km in world record 2:39:18
1895 – Joshua Slocum completes around-the-world voyage in 11-m boat
1898 – US fleet under commodore Dewey sails from Hong Kong to Philippines
1898 – Spanish-American War: Spain declares war after rejecting US ultimatum to withdraw from Cuba
1900 – Passing of Andrew Halliday, cable car pioneer
1905 – Senators execute a triple-play & beat Yankees 4-3
1907 – Hersheypark, founded by Milton S. Hershey for the exclusive use of his employees, is opened.
1908 – Mr & Mrs Jacob Murdock become 1st to travel across US by car, they leave LA in a Packard & arrive in NYC in 32d-5h-25m
1913 – The skyscraper Woolworth Building in New York City is opened.
1915 – German army fires chloroform gas in Ieper
1915 – Massacre of Armenians by Turks starts (Armenian Martyrs Day)
1916 – Easter rebellion of Irish against British occupation begins
1916 – Ernest Shackleton and five men of the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition launch a lifeboat from uninhabited Elephant Island in the Southern Ocean to organise a rescue for ice-trapped ship Endurance.
1920 – British Mandate over Palestine goes into effect (lasts 28 years)
1925 – 88°F highest temperature ever recorded in Cleveland in April
1928 – Fathometer, which measures underwater depth, patented
1929 – 1st non-stop England to India flight takes-off
1932 – German national election (NSDAP 36.3% in Prussia)
1933 – 1st major league to get 4 consecutive doubles in 9 inn (Dick Bartell)
1941 – British army begins evacuation of Greece
1941 – Dutch Prince Bernhard becomes an RAF pilot
1944 – 1st Boeing B-29 arrives in China “over the Hump”
1944 – RAF bombs Munich
1944 – United Negro College Fund incorporates
1945 – Delegates of 46 countries gather in SF (to discuss UN)
1954 – 1st American, civilian pilot, P.R. Holden, wounded in Indochina
1960 – Heavy earthquake strikes South Persia, 500 killed
1960 – Record 4 grand slams hit today
1961 – JFK accepts “sole responsibility” following Bay of Pigs
1961 – Vasa, which sunk on her maiden voyage in 1628, is raised
1961 – The 17th century Swedish ship Vasa is salvaged.
1962 – 1st Lockheed A-12 is taxi tested
1962 – MIT sends TV signal by satellite for 1st time: CA to MA
1962 – Sandy Koufax’s 2nd 18-strikeout game
1965 – NY Met Casey Stengel wins his 3,000 game as manager
1967 – Vietnam War: American General William Westmoreland says in a news conference that the enemy had “gained support in the United States that gives him hope that he can win politically that which he cannot win militarily.”
1968 – Leftist students take over Columbia University, NYC
1969 – Lebanese army in battle with Palestinians
1969 – US B-52’s drop 3,000 ton bombs at Cambodian boundary
1970 – China PR launches its 1st satellite transmitting song “East is Red”
1978 – Angels Nolan Ryan strikes out 15 Mariners, 20th time he has 15 in game
1980 – US military operation (Eagle Claw) to save 52 hostages in Iran, fails, 8 die
1981 – Bill Shoemaker wins his 8,000th race, 2000 more than any other jockey
1981 – IBM-PC computer introduced
1981 – San Antonio blocks 20 Golden State shots to set NBA reg game record
1981 – US ends grain embargo against USSR
1982 – 150 Khomeini followers assault student dormitory in West Germany
1984 – Oiler’s Wayne Gretzky is 3rd to score on a Stanley Cup penalty shot
1987 – Howard Stern holds a free speech rally at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza NYC
1989 – 10s of thousands of students strikes in Beijing China
1990 – Security law violator Michael Milken pleads guilty to 6 felonies
1990 – Gruinard Island, Scotland, is officially declared free of the anthrax disease after 48 years of quarantine.
1991 – Freddie Stowers is awarded the posthumous Medal of Honor for which he had been recommended in 1918.
1993 – 1000 kg heavy IRA car bomb explodes in London, killing 1
1993 – An IRA bomb devastates the Bishopsgate area of London.
1994 – Bomb attack in center of Johannesburg, 9 killed
1995 – Court orders Darryl Strawberry to pay back $350,000 in taxes
1995 – Dow Jones Index hits record 4303.98
1995 – Package bomb, linked to Unabomber, blows up killing Gilbert B Murray
1996 – Highest scoring baseball game in 17 years – Twins 24, Tigers 11
2004 – The United States lifts economic sanctions imposed on Libya 18 years previously, as a reward for its cooperation in eliminating weapons of mass destruction.
2005 – Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is inaugurated as the 265th Pope of the Roman Catholic Church taking the name Pope Benedict XVI.
2007 – Iceland announces that Norway will shoulder the defense of Iceland during peacetime.
Births
1533 – William I of Orange (d. 1584)
1538 – Gugliemo Gonzaga, composer
1581 – Vincent de Paul, French saint (d. 1660)
1620 – John Graunt, statistician, founder of science of demography
1743 – Edmund Cartwright, England, cleric, inventor (power loom)
1750 – Simon-Antoine-Jean Lhuillier, Swiss mathematician
1766 – Robert Bailey Thomas, founder (Farmer’s Almanac)
1784 – Peter Vivian Daniel, Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (d. 1860)
1804 – Thomas Oliver Selfridge, Comm (Union Navy)
1807 – Charles Ferguson Smith, Major General (Union volunteers), died in 1862
1814 – Angela Burdett-Coutts, philanthropist extrordinaire
1815 – Anthony Trollope, England, novelist/poet (Barchester Towers)
1815 – James Edward Harrison, Brigadier General (Confederate Army), died in 1875
1822 – Erastus Barnard Tyler, Bvt Major General (Union volunteers)
1828 – Robert Brank Vance, Brigadier General (Confederate Army), died in 1899
1829 – George Peabody Estey, Brigadier General (Union volunteers), died in 1881
1849 – Joseph S Gallieni, general (Battle of Marne)/milt governor (Paris)
1867 – Fannie Thomas, became oldest known American (113 y 273 d at death)
1874 – John Russell Pope, US, architect (Jefferson Memorial)
1876 – Erich Raeder, German naval commander (d. 1960)
1882 – Hugh Dowding, commander of RAF Fighter Command during the Battle of Britain (d. 1970)
1887 – Denys Finch Hatton, English big-game hunter (d. 1931)
1889 – [Richard] Stafford Cripps, Engl min of Plane-manufacturing (1942-45)
1895 – S Constantine Timoshenko, Russian marshal/people’s commissioner
1899 – Oscar Zariski, Russian-born mathematician (d. 1986)
1904 – Willem De Kooning, Rotterdam Netherlands, artist (North Atlantic Light)
1905 – Robert Penn Warren, 1st US poet laureate (All the King’s Men)
1911 – Karl O Schiller, German economist (Minister of Economics)
1914 – Justin Wilson, cajun chef (Wise Potato Chips)
1927 – Josy Barthel, Luxembourg, 1500m runner (Olympic-gold-1952)
1927 – Pasqualino de Santis, cinematographer
1930 – Conn Findlay, Stockton California, coxswain (Oly-2 gold/bronze-56, 64, 76)
1932 – Vladimir Yengibaryan, Yerevan, Armenia, welterweight boxer (Olympic gold, 1956), (d. 2013)
1933 – Freddie Scott, US songwriter/singer (Cry to Me)
1934 – Shirley MacLaine, Richmond Va, actress/mystic (Irma la Douce)
1936 – Jill Ireland, London, actress (Breakout, Assassination, Chino)
1937 – Joe Henderson, American jazz saxophonist (d. 2001)
1940 – Sue Grafton, American author
1941 – John Williams, Melbourne Australia, guitarist (Acad Award)
1942 – Valeri Abramovich Voloshin, Russian cosmonaut
1945 – Doug Clifford, rock drummer (Creedence Clearwater Revival-Proud Mary)
1947 – Roger D. Kornberg, American chemist, Nobel-prized
1948 – Benzion Freshwater, English multi-millionaire
1953 – Eric Bogosian, Woburn MA, actor (Talk Radio)
1955 – Michael O’Keefe, NJ, actor (Caddyshack, Ironweed, Slugger’s Wife)
1963 – Billy Gould, LA California, rock bassist (Faith No More)
1963 – Joey Vera, heavy metal rocker (Armored Saint-Aftermath)
1964 – Cedric the Entertainer, American comedian and actor
1967 – Leslie M Marx, Ft Belvoir Va, fencer-epee (Olympics-96)
1971 – Mauro Pawlowski, Belgian guitarist and singer
1973 – Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar, cricketer (prodigy at 16, Indian capt at 23)
1977 – Carlos Beltran, Puerto Rican baseball player
1982 – Kelly Clarkson, Fort Worth, Texas, American singer and winner of the inaugural season of TV series American Idol
Deaths
624 – Mellitus, third Archbishop of Canterbury
709 – Wilfrid, English bishop and saint, dies at about 76
729 – Egbert[us], English bishop/saint, dies in Iona at 89
1077 – Geza I, King of Hungary (1074-7), dies
1185 – Antoku Taira, emperor of Japan (1180-85), drowns
1338 – Marquis Theodore I of Montferrat (b. 1291)
1530 – Jacopo Sannazaro, Italian poet (De partu Virginis), dies
1622 – Fidelis of Sigmaringen, Swiss friar, martyr, and saint (b. 1577)
1656 – Thomas Fincke, Danish mathematician and physicist (b. 1561)
1731 – Daniel Defoe, English novelist (Robinson Crusoe), dies
1779 – Eleazar Wheelock, American founder of Dartmouth College (b. 1711)
1891 – Count Helmuth K B von Moltke, Prussian gen/fieldmarshal, dies
1947 – Willa Cather, American writer (b. 1873)
1964 – Gerhard Domagk, German bacteriologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (declined) (b. 1895)
1965 – Louise Dresser, actress (State Fair, Ship Comes In, Mammy), dies at 86
1968 – Tommy Noonan, actor (Gentlemen Perfer Blondes), dies at 45
1974 – Bud Abbott, comedian (Abbott & Costello), dies at 78
1983 – Rolf Stommelen, German race car driver (b. 1943)
1986 – Bessie Wallis Warfield Simpson, (Edward abdicated for her), dies at 89
1993 – Oliver R Tambo, chairman (African National Congress), dies at 75
1996 – Erma Bombeck, columnist (Septic Tank is Always Greener), dies
1997 – Pat Paulsen, comedian (Smothers Brothers Show), dies at 69
2004 – Estée Lauder, American cosmetics entrepreneur (b. 1906)
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