< Back 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 Next >

1947–Britain’s future Queen, Princess Elizabeth, marries Philip Mountbatten, Duke of Edinburgh, in a ceremony broadcast worldwide from Westminster Abbey in London, England.


284–Diocletian is chosen as emperor of Rome.

762–During the An Shi Rebellion, the Tang dynasty, with the help of Huihe tribe, recaptures Luoyang from the rebels.

1194–Palermo is conquered by Henry VI, Holy Roman Emperor.

1407–A truce between John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, and Louis of Valois, Duke of Orléans is agreed upon under the auspices of John, Duke of Berry. Orléans would be assassinated three days later by Burgundy.

1695–Zumbi, the last of the leaders of Quilombo dos Palmares, in early Brazil, is executed by the forces of Portuguese bandeirante, Domingos Jorge Velho.

1739–The Battle of Porto Bello begins between British and Spanish forces during the War of Jenkins' Ear.

1776–During the American Revolutionary War, British forces land at the Palisades, then attack Fort Lee. The Continental Army starts to retreat across New Jersey.

1789–New Jersey becomes the first U.S. state to ratify The Bill of Rights.

1805–Beethoven's only opera, Fidelio, premieres in Vienna, Austria.

1820–An 80-ton sperm whale attacks the Essex (a whaling ship from Nantucket, Massachusetts) 2,000 miles from the western coast of South America.

1861–A secession ordinance is filed by the state of Kentucky's Confederate government.

1900–Cartoonist, Chester Gould, is born in Pawnee, Oklahoma. He created the “Dick Tracy” comic strip.

1903–Wild West bounty hunter, Tom Horn, dies by hanging for murder in Cheyenne, Wyoming, at age 42. Horn had been convicted of killing 14-year-old Willie Nickell, whose father was involved in a sheep vs. cattle range war. Many historians believe that Horn did not commit the murder and the incident is still debated today.

1907–Fran Allison, of Kukla, Fran & Ollie, is born Frances Helen Allison in La Porte City, Iowa.

1910–Francisco I. Madero issues the Plan de San Luis Potosí, denouncing Mexican President, Porfirio Díaz, calling for a revolution to overthrow the government of Mexico and effectively starting the Mexican Revolution.

1910–Novelist, philosopher, and religious mystic, Leo Tolstoy, dies of pneumonia in Astapovo, Russian Empire, at age 82. According to some sources, Tolstoy spent the last hours of his life preaching love and non-violence towards his fellow passengers on a train. He is best known for his novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina.

1917–Ukraine is declared a republic.

1919–Actress, Phyllis (St. Felix) Thaxter, is born in Portland, Maine. She was seen on dozens of TV shows, including The Loretta Young Show, Kraft Theatre, Playhouse 90, Wagon Train, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Rawhide, The Twilight Zone, and The Fugitive. She appeared in the films Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, Week-End at the Waldorf, The Sea of Grass, Tenth Avenue Angel, Blood on the Moon, Act of Violence, The Breaking Point, Jim Thorpe: All American, Come Fill the Cup, Springfield Rifle, Women’s Prison, The World of Henry Orient, and Superman. She was married to TV executive James T. Aubrey, Jr. Their daughter is actress, Skye Aubrey.

1925–Singer, June Christy, is born Shirley Luster in Springfield, Illinois. She is known for her work in the cool jazz genre and for her silky smooth vocals. Her success as a singer began with The Stan Kenton Orchestra.

1925–Robert F. Kennedy is born in Brookline, Massachusetts.

1925–Alexandra of Denmark dies of a heart attack in Sandringham House, Norfolk, England, at age 80.

1929–Dick Clark, host of American Bandstand, is born Richard Augustus Wagstaff Clark Jr. in Mt. Vernon, New York. American Bandstand debuted nationally on August 5, 1957. The show took off, due to Clark's natural rapport with the live teenage audience and dancing participants, as well as the non-threatening image he projected to television audiences. As a result, many parents were introduced to rock and roll music. Due to his perennial youthful appearance, Clark was often referred to as "America's oldest teenager." He appeared in the films Because They’re Young, The Young Doctors, and Killers Three.

1932–Actor, Richard Dawson, is born Colin Lionel Emm in Gosport, Hampshire, England. He co-starred in the popular TV series Hogan’s Heroes, then became the host of the TV game show Family Feud. He appeared in the films King Rat, Out of Sight, Munster, Go Home!, The Devil’s Brigade, and The Running Man. He was married to actress, Diana Dors.

1936–José Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder of the Falange, is killed by a republican execution squad.

1939–Dick Smothers, of The Smothers Brothers, is born Richard Remick Smothers in New York, New York. The Smothers Brothers have appeared on numerous television shows since the 1960s, including two shows of their own: The Smothers Brothers Show (a sit-com from 1965 to 1966) and The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, a controversial variety show in 1967. His older brother is Tom Smothers.

1940–Hungary becomes a signatory of the Tripartite Pact, officially joining the Axis powers.

1942–Musician, Norman Greenbaum, is born in Malden, Massachusetts. He had a big hits with The Eggplant That Ate Chicago and Spirit in the Sky.

1944–Record producer, Mike Vernon, is born in Harrow, England.

1945–Trials against 24 Nazi war criminals begin at the Palace of Justice at Nuremberg, Germany.

1946–Musician, (Howard) Duane Allman, is born in Nashville, Tennessee. He was a founding member of The Allman Brothers Band.

1947–Britain’s future Queen, Princess Elizabeth, marries Philip Mountbatten, Duke of Edinburgh, in a ceremony broadcast worldwide from Westminster Abbey in London, England.

1947–Rocker, Joe Walsh, is born Joseph Fidler Walsh in Wichita, Kansas. He was a member of the country-rock band, The Eagles.

1951–The first U.S. underground atomic explosion is conducted at Frenchman Flat, Nevada.

1954–Pilot, Clyde Cessna, dies in Wichita, Kansas, at age 74. He was an aircraft designer, aviator, and founder of the Cessna Aircraft Corporation.

1959–The United Nations General Assembly adopts the Declaration of the Rights of the Child: the annual anniversary is observed as Universal Children's Day.

1962–The Cuban Missile Crisis ends. In response to the Soviet Union agreeing to remove its missiles from Cuba, President John F. Kennedy ends the quarantine of the Caribbean nation.

1967–A chart topper: Incense and Peppermints by The Strawberry Alarm Clock.

1968–A total of 78 miners are killed in an explosion at the Consolidated Coal Company’s No. 9 mine in Farmington, West Virginia.

1969–The Plain Dealer publishes explicit photographs of dead villagers from the My Lai Massacre in Vietnam.

1969–Native American activists seize control of Alcatraz Island, near San Francisco, California, until they are ousted by the U.S. Government on June 11, 1971.

1974–The U.S. Department of Justice files its final anti-trust suit against AT&T Corporation. The suit will lead to the breakup of AT&T and its Bell System.

1975–Politician, Francisco Franco, dies of Parkinson's disease in Madrid, Spain, at age 82. He was dictator of Spain (which he declared a totalitarian state) during World War II.

1977–Egyptian President, Anwar Sadat, becomes the first Arab leader to officially visit Israel, when he meets Israeli Prime Minister, Menachem Begin, and speaks before the Knesset in Jerusalem, seeking a permanent peace settlement.

1979–About 200 Sunni Muslims revolt in Saudi Arabia at the site of the Kaaba in Mecca during the pilgrimage, taking about 6,000 hostages. The Saudi government receives help from Pakistani special forces to put down the uprising.

1980–Lake Peigneur drains into an underlying salt deposit. A misplaced Texaco oil probe had been drilled into the Diamond Crystal Salt Mine, causing water to flow down into the mine, eroding the edges of the hole.

1982–The General Union of Ecuadorian Workers (UGTE) is founded.

1984–SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) is founded.

1985–Microsoft Windows 1.0 is released.

1989–The number of protesters assembled in Prague, Czechoslovakia, swells from 200,000 the day before to an estimated 500,000.

1989–Mega Channel, the first Greek privately owned television channel, is launched.

1990–Andrei Chikatilo, one of the Soviet Union's most prolific serial killers, is arrested. He eventually confesses to 56 murders.

1991–An Azerbaijani MI-8 helicopter, carrying 19 peacekeeping mission team with officials and journalists from Russia, Kazakhstan, and Azerbaijan, is shot down by Armenian military forces in Khojavend District of Azerbaijan.

1992–Fire erupts at Windsor Castle, Queen Elizabeth’s official residence west of London, England, causing much damage. The Queen and Prince Andrew pitch in to help save priceless artworks and other valuables housed in the fortress. The fire burns for 15 hours, damaging or destroying nine principal rooms and over 100 other rooms. It took a million and a half gallons of water to put out the blaze. The next five years would be spent restoring the Castle to its former glory.

1992–Twenty paintings by Adolf Hitler go unsold at an auction after they failed to attract a single bid.

1993–The U.S. Senate Ethics Committee issues a stern censure of California Senator, Alan Cranston, for his "dealings" with savings and loan executive, Charles Keating.

1994–The Angolan government and UNITA rebels sign the Lusaka Protocol in Zambia, ending 19 years of civil war.

1994–Singer, David Crosby, receives a liver transplant.

1998–A court in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan declares accused terrorist, Osama bin Laden, "a man without a sin" in regard to the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania.

1998–The first module of the International Space Station, Zarya, is launched.

2001–President George W. Bush dedicates the United States Department of Justice headquarters building as the Robert F. Kennedy Justice Building in Washington, D.C., honoring the late Robert F. Kennedy on what would have been his 76th birthday.

2003–A second day of the Istanbul bombings occurs in Istanbul, Turkey, destroying the Turkish head office of HSBC Bank AS and the British consulate.

2006–Film director, Robert Altman, dies of complications from leukemia in West Hollywood, California, at age 81. He is consistently ranked as one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers in history. His films include M*A*S*H, Nashville, A Wedding, Quintet, Popeye, Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean, Streamers, Vincent & Theo, The Player, Short Cuts, Ready to Wear, Gosford Park, The Company, and A Prairie Home Companion.

2008–After critical failures in the U.S. financial system began to build up after mid-September, the Dow Jones Industrial Average reaches its lowest level since 1997.

2013–Psychic, Sylvia Browne, dies of heart trouble in San Jose, California, at age 77. Browne claimed she started seeing visions at the age of five, and that her grandmother, a psychic medium, helped her understand what they meant. Browne also claimed her great-uncle was a psychic medium. She started to give psychic readings in 1974, and performed thousands of one-on-one readings for a wide variety of groups and individuals. She appeared regularly on television and radio, including The Montel Williams Show and Larry King Live.

2015–Following a hostage siege, at least 19 people are killed in Bamako, Mali, during a terrorist attack.

2015–Kitanoumi Toshimitsu, Japanese sumo wrestler, dies of colorectal cancer and multiple organ failure in Fukuoka, Japan, at age 62. He was the 55th Yokozuna. Kitanoumi was promoted to Yokozuna at age 21, becoming the youngest ever to achieve sumo's top rank, and he remained a Yokozuna for a record 63 tournaments.

2016–At least 16 people are killed and 50 others are wounded in clashes between rival tribes in Sabha, Libya, after a monkey pulls off a girls' headscarf.

2016–At least 142 people are killed and over 200 others are injured as the Indore-Patna Express derails near Pukhrayan, in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.


PHOTOS TOP TO BOTTOM: Diocletian; Chester Gould; Phyllis Thaxter; Dick Clark; Duane Allman; Incense and Peppermints by The Strawberry Alarm Clock; an array of dishes belonging to SETI; and Robert Altman.
< Back 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 Next >