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1963–The Beatles travel to Ireland during their British tour to make their only two appearances there. They are interviewed upon their arrival at the airport in Dublin. With the boys is screenwriter, Alun Owen, who has been appointed to write the screenplay for The Beatles’ first (as yet untitled) motion picture. Owen spends three days with the boys observing their hectic, chaotic lifestyle, which will serve as the basis for A Hard Day’s Night.


335–Athanasius is banished to Trier, on the charge that he prevented a grain fleet from sailing to Constantinople.

680–The Sixth Ecumenical Council commences in Constantinople.

1426–Lam So’n rebels emerge victorious against the Ming army in present-day Hanoi.

1492–The Ensisheim meteorite, the oldest meteorite with a known date of impact, strikes the Earth around noon in a wheat field outside the village of Ensisheim, Alsace, France.

1619–Elizabeth Stuart is crowned Queen of Bohemia.

1665–The London Gazette, the oldest surviving journal, begins publication.

1775–John Murray, the Royal Governor of the Colony of Virginia, starts the first mass emancipation of slaves in North America by issuing Lord Dunmore's Offer of Emancipation, which offers freedom to slaves who abandoned their colonial masters to fight with Murray and the British.

1786–The oldest musical organization in America is founded as the Stoughton Musical Society.

1805–Explorers, Lewis & Clark, see the Pacific Ocean for the first time.

1811–The Battle of Tippecanoe is fought near present-day Battle Ground, Indiana.

1820–James Monroe is re-elected the 5th President of the United States.

1827–Maria Theresa of Austria dies in Leipzig, Saxony, Germany, at age 60.

1837–In Alton, Illinois, abolitionist printer, Elijah P. Lovejoy, is shot dead by a mob while attempting to protect his printing shop from being destroyed a third time.

1848–Zachary Taylor is elected the 12th President of the United States.

1861–During American Civil War: Union forces, led by General Ulysses S. Grant, overrun a Confederate camp in Belmont, Missouri, but are forced to retreat when Confederate reinforcements arrive.

1874–A cartoon by Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly, is considered the first important use of an elephant as a symbol for the U.S. Republican Party.

1885–The completion of Canada's first transcontinental railway is symbolized by the Last Spike ceremony at Craigellachie, British Columbia.

1893–Women in Colorado are granted the right to vote, the second U.S. state to adopt that priviledge.

1900–In the Battle of Leliefontein, the Royal Canadian Dragoons win three Victoria Crosses.

1900–The People's Party is founded in Cuba.

1907–Delta Sigma Pi is founded at New York University.

1907–Jesús García saves the entire town of Nacozari de García, by driving a burning train full of dynamite 3.7 miles away before it can explode.

1908–Outlaw, Butch Cassidy, dies in a shootout near San Vicente, Bolivia, at age 42. The facts surrounding Cassidy's death are uncertain. In a 1960 interview, Josie Bassett claimed that Cassidy came to visit her in the 1920s "after returning from South America," and that "Butch died in Johnnie, Nevada, about 15 years ago." Locals of Cassidy's hometown of Circleville, Utah, claimed that Cassidy worked in Nevada until his death. Butch Cassidy was a notorious train robber, bank robber, and leader of the Wild Bunch gang in the American Old West, who fled to Bolivia with his partner, The Sundance Kid.

1910–The first air freight shipment (from Dayton, Ohio, to Columbus, Ohio) is undertaken by the Wright brothers and department store owner, Max Moorehouse.

1912–The Deutsche Opernhaus (present-day Deutsche Oper Berlin) opens in the neighborhood of Charlottenburg in Berlin, Germany, with a production of Beethoven's Fidelio.

1913–The first day of the Great Lakes Storm of 1913, a massive blizzard that ultimately killed 250 people and caused over $5 million in damage.

1914–The first issue of The New Republic is published.

1914–The German colony of Kiaochow Bay and its center at Tsingtao are captured by Japanese forces.

1916–Woodrow Wilson is re-elected the 28th President of the United States.

1916–Jeannette Rankin is the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress.

1916–Radio station 2XG, located in the Highbridge section of New York City, makes the first audio broadcast of presidential election returns.

1917–The Bolsheviks storm the Winter Palace.

1917–In World War I, British forces capture Gaza from the Ottoman Empire.

1918–The 1918 influenza epidemic spreads to Western Samoa, killing 7,542 people (about 20% of the population) by the end of the year.

1918–Kurt Eisner overthrows the Wittelsbach dynasty in the Kingdom of Bavaria.

1919–The first Palmer Raid is conducted on the second anniversary of the Russian Revolution. Over 10,000 suspected communists and anarchists are arrested in 23 different U.S. cities.

1920–Patriarch Tikhon of Moscow issues a decree that leads to the formation of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.

1922–Trumpeter, Al Hirt, is born Alois Maxwell Hirt in New Orleans, Louisiana.

1926–Opera singer, Joan (Alston) Sutherland, is born in Sydney, Australia. She is noted for her contribution to the renaissance of the bel canto repertoire from the late 1950s through the 1980s.

1929–The Museum of Modern Art (MOMA)in New York City opens to the public. It is the world's foremost museum devoted solely to modern art and is considered to have the best collection of Modern and contemporary masterpieces in the world. The collection is comprised of more than 150,000 individual pieces of fine art, in addition to approximately 22,000 films and four million film stills. MoMA's library and archives collection consists of more than 300,000 books, artist books, and periodicals, as well as files on more than 70,000 artists. More than 2.5 million people visit the museum annually.

1931–The Chinese Soviet Republic is proclaimed on the anniversary of the October Revolution.

1933–Fiorello H. La Guardia is elected the 99th Mayor of New York City.

1936–Composer, Jimmie Haskell, is born Sheridan Pearlman in Brooklyn, New York. His films include Love in a Goldfish Bowl, I'll Take Sweden, Zachariah, Night of the Lepus, Dirty Mary Crazy Larry, The Jayne Mansfield Story, and Hard Country.

1937–Mary (Allin) Travers, of Peter, Paul & Mary, is born in Louisville, Kentucky. The trio’s biggest hit was Puff The Magic Dragon. She was married to freelance photographer, Barry Feinstein, and National Lampoon publisher, Gerald Taylor.

1940–In Tacoma, Washington, the original Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapses in a windstorm, just four months after its completion.

1941–The Soviet hospital ship Armenia is sunk by German planes while evacuating refugees, wounded military, and staff of several Crimean hospitals. Over 5,000 people die in the sinking.

1943–Folksinger, Joni Mitchell, is born Roberta Joan Anderson in Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in Saskatchewan and Western Canada, and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto. In 1965, she moved to America, settling in the Laurel Canyon area of Los Angeles, California. Her songs include Chelsea Morning, Both Sides Now, The Circle Game, Big Yellow Taxi, Help Me, Free Man in Paris, Woodstock, and Raised on Robbery.

1944–A passenger train derails in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, from excessive speed when descending a hill. Sixteen people are killed and 50 others are injured.

1944–Soviet spy, Richard Sorge, a half-Russian/half-German World War I veteran, is hanged by his Japanese captors along with 34 others of his ring.

1944–Franklin D. Roosevelt is elected for a record fourth term as President of the United States of America.

1949–The first oil is taken in Oil Rocks (Neft Daslari), the oldest offshore oil platform.

1956–In the Suez Crisis, the United Nations General Assembly adopts a resolution calling for the United Kingdom, France, and Israel to immediately withdraw their troops from Egypt.

1957–The Gaither Report calls for more American missiles and fallout shelters.

1962–Former First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, dies in New York, New York, at age 78.

1963–The Beatles travel to Ireland during their British tour to make their only two appearances there. They are interviewed upon their arrival at the airport in Dublin. With the boys is screenwriter, Alun Owen, who has been appointed to write the screenplay for The Beatles’ first (as yet untitled) motion picture. Owen spends three days with the boys observing their hectic, chaotic lifestyle, which will serve as the basis for A Hard Day’s Night.

1964–Child actress, Dana Plato, is born Dana Michelle Strain in Maywood, California. She co-starred in the TV sitcom Diff’rent Strokes.

1967–Carl B. Stokes is elected as Mayor of Cleveland, Ohio, becoming the first African American mayor of a major U.S. city.

1967–President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967, establishing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

1972–Richard M. Nixon is re-elected as President of the United States, in a landslide over Democrat George McGovern.

1973–The U.S. Congress overrides President Richard M. Nixon's veto of the War Powers Resolution, which limits presidential power to wage war without congressional approval.

1975–In Bangladesh, a joint force of people and soldiers takes part in an uprising, led by Colonel Abu Taher, which ousts and kills Brigadier Khaled Mosharraf, freeing the then house-arrested army chief and future president Maj-Gen. Ziaur Rahman.

1980–Actor, Steve McQueen, dies of malignant mesothelioma in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico, at age 50. Called "The King of Cool," his "anti-hero" persona made him a top box-office draw of the 1960s and 1970s. He starred in the hit TV Western series Wanted: Dead or Alive. He appeared in the films The Blob, Never So Few, The Magnificent Seven, Hell Is for Heroes, The War Lover, The Great Escape, Soldier in the Rain, Love with the Proper Stranger, Baby the Rain Must Fall, The Cincinnati Kid, Nevada Smith, The Sand Pebbles, The Thomas Crown Affair, Bullitt, The Reivers, Le Mans, Junior Bonner, The Getaway, Papillon, The Towering Inferno, An Enemy of the People, Tom Horn, and The Hunter.

1981–American historian, author, Will Durant, dies of natural causes in Los Angeles, California, at age 96. He is best known for The Story of Civilization.

1983–A bomb explodes inside the U.S. Capitol. No one is injured, but damage is estimated to be $250,000.

1987–In Tunisia, President Habib Bourguiba is overthrown and replaced by Prime Minister Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

1987–Singapore's first Mass Rapid Transit line opens.

1989–Douglas Wilder wins the governor's seat in Virginia, becoming the first elected African-American governor in the United States.

1989–David Dinkins becomes the first African-American to be elected Mayor of New York City.

1989–East German Prime Minister, Willi Stoph, along with his entire cabinet, is forced to resign after huge anti-government protests.

1990–Mary Robinson becomes the first woman to be elected President of the Republic of Ireland.

1991–Frank Zappa is diagnosed with prostate cancer.

1991–Backetball player, Magic Johnson, announces that he is infected with HIV and retires from the NBA.

1994–WXYC, the student radio station of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, provides the world's first internet radio broadcast.

1994–Jazz trumpeter, Shorty Rogers, dies of melanoma in Van Nuys, California, at age 70. He was one of the principal creators of West Coast jazz.

1996–NASA launches the Mars Global Surveyor.

1996–Yoko Ono opens an exhibit of John Lennon lithographs and serigraphs at the Promenade Mall in Woodland Hills, California. Hand-signed artworks are available for purchase, all from limited editions of 325. Prices range from $200 to $12,000 (for lithographs from the 1969 “Bag One” collection). When asked if she truly thinks a shopping mall is a suitable location for such an exhibit, Yoko replies that John created his art for the people, and that his work is already hanging in the Museum of Modern Art. She also points out that more people go to shopping malls than art galleries.

2000–The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration discovers one of the country’s largest LSD labs inside a converted military missile silo in Wamego, Kansas.

2000–Hillary Clinton is elected to the U.S. Senate, becoming the first First Lady (former or current) to win a competitive election for public office in the United States.

2000–The controversial U.S. Presidential election is held. It is later resolved in the Bush v. Gore Supreme Court Case.

2001–SABENA, the national airline of Belgium, goes bankrupt.

2002–Iran bans advertising of American products.

2002–Actress, Peg Phillips, dies of pulmonary disease in Seattle, Washington, at age 84. She is best known for the role of storekeeper Ruth-Anne Miller on the TV series Northern Exposure.

2004–The interim government of Iraq calls for a 60-day "state of emergency," as U.S. forces storm the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah.

2004–Actor, Howard Keel, dies of colon cancer in Palm Desert, California, at age 85. He appeared in the films Annie Get Your Gun, Show Boat, Callaway Went Thataway, Lovely to Look At, Calamity Jane, Kiss Me Kate, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, and Kismet.

2007–A shooting at the Jokela school in Tuusula, Finland, results in the death of nine people.

2011–Boxer, Joe Frazier, dies of liver cancer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, at age 67. He was Heavyweight Boxing Champion (1968-1973).

2012–An earthquake off the Pacific coast of Guatemala kills at least 52 people.

2016–The leaders of northern and southern Cyprus meet in Switzerland to restart talks about reuniting the island.

2016–A Cambodian opposition senator is sentenced to seven years in prison for a post he made on Facebook.

2016–The Iraqi Army discovers at least 100 beheaded bodies as they retake Hamam al-Alil, the last major settlement south of Mosul, Iraq.

2016–Singer-songwriter, Leonard Cohen, dies in Los Angeles, California, at age 82. He is best known for the songs Suzanne, So Long Marianne, Bird on a Wire, Joan of Arc, Hallelujah, and Famous Blue Raincoat.

2016–Politician, Janet Reno, dies of Parkinson's disease in Miami, Florida, at age 78. She served as the Attorney General of the United States under President Bill Clinton from 1993 until 2001. Reno was the first woman to serve as Attorney General.


PHOTOS TOP TO BOTTOM: An artist's depiction of the Ensisheim meteorite that struck in a wheat field outside the village of Ensisheim, Alsace, France; Harper's Weekly cover with the first use of the elephant as the symbol of the Republican Party; Butch Cassidy; Woodrow Wilson; Al Hirt; Joni Mitchell; Eleanor Roosevelt; Steve McQueen; Family Tree by John Lennon; and Howard Keel.
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