Return to Calendar Main Page.

January | February | March | April | May | June | July | August | September | October | November | December

1

• Every year - All Saints' Day.

• 1755 - The Great Earthquake hits Lisbon, Portugal.

• 1805 - Napoleon Bonaparte invades Austria.

• 1884 - The world is divided into time zones. A moment from the Chronology of Time.

• 1906 - The North Staffordshire Symphony Orchestra give their first concert in Hanley.

• 1935 - The Marx Brothers' film A Night at the Opera is released.

• 1941 - US photographer Ansel Adams takes a picture of a moonrise over the town of Hernandez, New Mexico, that would become one of the most famous images in the history of photography.

• 1952 - The US drop the first hydrogen bomb.

• 1956 - In response to the Hungarian Uprising, Imre Nagy decides reforms are necessary to preserve peace.

• 1963 - President Diem of South Vietnam is deposed.

• 1963 - Rick Allen, Def Leppard's famous one-armed drummer, is born.

• 1977 - Passenger services begin for the Tu-144 - World's First Supersonic Transport Aircraft.

2

• 1483 - The Duke of Buckingham is executed after the Third War of the Roses.

• 1909 - The Washington Free Speech Campaign's designated free speech day.

• 1930 - The funeral for Ali Tarrabain is held in the newly-completed Al Rashid Mosque in Edmonton, Canada.

• 1944 - British keyboardist and composer Keith Emerson, of Emerson, Lake and Palmer fame, is born.

• 1952 - Bentley and Craig set on to rob a confectionery warehouse in Croydon, UK.

• 1959 - The first section of the M1 motorway, the first inter-urban motorway in the UK, is opened, along with the M10 and M45.

• 1983 - Operation Able Archer, an exercise which simulates a coordinated nuclear strike against the USSR, begins.

• 2000 - Collation of data appeared to confirm the scientists at CERN were on the trail of the 'holy grail of particle physics'.

3

• Every year - Approximate date of the South Taurids meteor shower.

• 1493 - Christopher Columbus' fleet lands on the small island of Dominicana.

• 1640 - The 'Long Parliament' sits from this date, for 13 years, prior to the outbreak of the English Civil War.

• 1794 - William Cullen Bryant, known as the 'Father of American Poetry', is born in Cummington, Massachusetts.

• 1952 - Roseanne Barr, the US actor and comedian, is born.

• 1957 - Russia puts a dog into space.

• 1969 - US president Richard Nixon addresses the nation on television and radio, asking the 'silent majority' to support his policies in Vietnam.

4

• 1605 - Guy Fawkes, the Gunpowder Plotter, is caught red-handed.

• 1740 - The Reverend Toplady, creator of the Rock of Ages, is born.

• 1776 - In the Battle of New York City, USA, General Howe turns south.

• 1955 - Russian tanks bombard Budapest.

• 1956 - The Soviets put on a huge show of force as masses of tanks return to Budapest's streets in response to the Hungarian Uprising.

• 1970 - Genie, a 13-year-old feral child, was found in Los Angeles, California, having been locked in her bedroom for most of her life.

• 1976 - The first production order for the French High-speed Train Service is placed.

• 1994 - The first conference to focus exclusively on the commercial potential of the World Wide Web opens in San Francisco.

• 2001 - The film Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone receives its UK premiere.

5

• Every year - here's plenty to remember on 5 November. You might be Planning for Guy Fawkes Night, or cooking Bonfire Night Cuisine while remembering who Guy Fawkes was.

• 1580 - The naval blockade of Fort Del Oro begins.

• 1743 - Joseph-Nicolas Delisle coordinates scientific observations of the transit of Mercury.

• 1778 - Giovanni Battista Belzoni, tomb raider and archaeologist, is born in Padua, Italy to Giacomo, a barber, and Teresa.

• 1814 - The Americans withdraw from the Niagra Peninsula in the War of 1812.

• 1956 - The Supersonic Transport Aircraft Committee is established.

• 1916 - The Kingdom of Poland is proclaimed by the emperors of Germany and Austria-Hungary.

• 1967 - A London rail disaster at Hither Green causes 49 deaths when a train derails after hitting a small wedge of metal at 70mph.

• 1974 - Campaigner Karen Silkwood finds evidence of her exposure to radiation.

6

• 1935 - The Hawker Hurricane makes its maiden flight.

• 1947 - Four people are killed and 34 are injured in a London rail disaster when two trains collide at Motspur Park in heavy fog.

• 1986 - Sir Alex Ferguson is appointed manager of an underachieving football club called Manchester United.

• 1999 - Australians vote in a referendum to keep the British monarch as head of state.

• 2002 - The United Buddy Bears project is dissolved.

7

• 1580 - The bombardment of Fort Del Oro begins.

• 1872 - Captain Briggs sets sail from New York aboard The Mary Celeste.

• 1917 - First day of the Bolshevik Revolution.

• 1918 - A world influenza epidemic spreads to Western Samoa, killing 7,542 people (about 20 per cent of the population) by the end of the year.

• 1939 - The HMS Swordfish leaves Portsmouth, never to be heard from again.

• 1942 - The Memphis Belle is sent into active duty for the first time.

• 1993 - Formula One driver Eddie Irvine debuts for Team Jordan at the Australian Grand Prix in Adelaide.

• 2000 - The US Drug Enforcement Administration discovers one of the largest LSD labs inside a converted missile silo in Wamego, Kansas.

• 2001 - The Concorde is back up and running following a fatal accident.

8

• 1519 - Hernán Cortés enters Tenochtitlán and Aztec ruler Moctezuma welcomes him with great a celebration as would befit a returning god.

• 1674 - Poet John Milton dies in London.

• 1847 - Author Bram Stoker is born in Dublin.

• 1895 - While experimenting with electricity, Wilhelm Röntgen discovers the X-ray.

• 1917 - The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics - second day of the Bolshevik Revolution.

• 1935 - Charles Kingsford-Smith dies in an air crash while he attempts a new England to Australia speed record with his Lockheed Altair and runs into a monsoon.

• 1939 - Georg Elser attempts to assassinate Adolf Hitler.

• 1942 - Anne Frank and her Diary - News arrives of English landings in Tunis, Algiers, Casablanca and Oran.

• 1960 - John Fitzgerald Kennedy beats Nixon and Lodge to win the election.

• 1967 - BBC Local Radio goes on the air with Radio Leicester.

• 1971 - Led Zeppelin release their (untitled) fourth album.

• 2000 - A decision is made to discontinue the The Higgs Boson experiment.

9

• 959 - Constantine Porphyrogenitus, Emperor of Byzantium, dies aged 54.

• 1580 - In the Siege of Fort Del Oro, English soldiers are allowed into the fort to accept the surrender of their enemy.

• 1841 - Queen Victoria's Children and the Royalty of Europe. Albert Edward, Prince of Wales and future King Edward VII, is born.

• 1864 - The Marx Brothers' mother, Miene Schonberg, is born.

• 1874 - The Central Park Zoo Scare of 1874 - editor James Gordon Bennett publishes his hoax story in the New York Herald.

• 1966 - The day conspiracy theorists believe Paul McCartney is killed in a car crash.

• 1970 - Charles de Gaulle dies, as mentioned in Billy Joel's song We Didn't Start the Fire.

• 1985 - The Soviet Union's Garry Kasparov, 22, becomes the youngest World Chess Champion.

• 1989 - The Berlin Wall is brought down, as mentioned in Great Dates in History. Following this event, German Cancellor Helmut Kohl implemented Germany's reunification.

• 2003 - A suicide attack in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, kills 17 people.

10

• 1842 - The USS Somers reaches Liberia.

• 1938 - Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founder of the Republic of Turkey, dies.

• 1947 - Greg Lake, the British musician of King Crimson and then Emerson, Lake and Palmer fame, is born.

• 1965 - Formula One driver Eddie Irvine is born.

• 1967 - Surveyor 6 finally lands in the moon's Sinus Medii.

• 1975 - The SS Edmund Fitzgerald sinks, and Singer/Songwriter Gordon Lightfoot writes his well-known ballad commemorating the men claimed in its sinking.

11

• Every year - the beginning of the fifth season, aka Carnival in Germany.

• Every year - The Long Weekend - reference to Armistice Day.

• Every year - Remembrance Day - Poppy Day.

• 1675 - Gottfried Leibniz demonstrates integral calculus for the first time.

• 1853 - Poet Alfred Tennyson agrees to rent Farringford.

• 1918 - The WWI Armistice is signed, eventually leading to the Scuttling of the German High Seas Fleet in 1919.

• 1920 - The funeral of The Unknown Warrior is held.

• 1922 - A unique voice of American literature, author Kurt Vonnegut is born in Indianapolis.

• 1965 - In Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), the white minority government of Ian Smith declares independence.

• 1967 - Astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Jim Lovell are launched in Gemini XII.

• 1997 - The band Led Zeppelin release their BBC Sessions album.

• 1998 - The Middle Wallop Camera Obscura is used to successfully view Jupiter and Venus.

12

• 1630 - Marie de Medici fails in her attempt to have Cardinal Richelieu removed, on the 'Day of Dupes'.

• 1656 - Poet John Milton marries Katherine Woodcock.

• 1929 - Actress Grace Kelly, later to be Princess Grace of Monaco, is born, as mentioned in Billy Joel's song 'We Didn't Start the Fire'.

• 1936 - An incident at the General Motors plant triggers the Sit-down strike in Flint, Michigan.

• 1981 - The Space Shuttle Columbia becomes the first spacecraft to be launched twice.

• 1982 - Yury Andropov is elected chairman of the The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics' central committee.

1988 - A rail crash - two collisions involving three trains - at Clapham Junction in London kills 35 people and injures hundreds.

13

• 1002 - English king Ethelred orders the killing of all Danes in England, known as the St Brice's Day massacre.

• 1642 - During the English Civil War, the Battle of Turnham Green takes place, possibly the most decisive non-battle in English history.

• 1945 - The Glenn Miller band play their last ever concert, despite the disappearance of their bandleader.

• 1974 - Karen Silkwood is killed in a car crash.

• 2000 - Vice-president Al Gore effectively concedes defeat in the US presidential elections.

14

• 565 - Emperor of Byzantium Justinian dies aged 82, having reigned 38 years.

• 1907 - Author Astrid Lindgren is born.

• 1922 - The first daily broadcasts by the BBC started from Marconi's studio in London.

• 1930 - Wrestler Big Daddy is born Shirley Crabtree Junior.

• 1939 - The HMS Britisher is driven on to Brighstone Ledge in a fierce gale.

• 1940 - During World War II, the UK city of Coventry is heavily bombed by the German Luftwaffe. The cathedral is almost completely destroyed.

• 1948 - Prince Charles, firstborn son of Their Royal Highnesses Princess Elizabeth, Duchess of Edinburgh and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, is born at Buckingham Palace, London.

• 1956 - The Hungarian Uprising ends after ten days of fighting, with a new Soviet-backed government in power.

• 1957 - The Apalachin Meeting outside Binghamton, New York, is raided by law enforcement officers and many high-level Mafia figures arrested.

• 1959 - John Fitzgerald Kennedy writes an article for TV Guide Magazine about TV as 'a force that has changed the political scene'.

• 1972 - War and Protest - the US in Vietnam (1972 - 1975) - Nixon sends a letter to President Thieu, pre-empting severe military action.

• 1974 - Amityville Horror or Fantasy - The Defeo Murders are committed.

15

• 1871 - The Cassandra is driven ashore.

• 1932 - Author Luke Rhinehart is born George Cockcroft.

• 1941 - Heinrich Himmler issues orders that all homosexuals in Germany be deported to concentration camps, with the exception of certain top Nazi officials.

• 1967 - Gemini XII re-enters the Earth's atmosphere.

• 1988 - The first Fairtrade label, Max Havelaar, is launched in the Netherlands.

16

• 1776 - General Howe's forces attack Fort Washington in the Battle of New York City.

• 1820 - The Wreck of Whaleship Essex - Owen Chase's whaleboat is wrecked by the tail of a sperm whale.

• 1945 - Unesco is founded.

• 1971 - Edie Sedgwick's life ends as it had proceeded, in the shadowlands between accident and suicide.

• 1984 - Vic Dickenson, the US trombonist, dies.

17

• Every year - Approximate date of the Leonids meteor show.

• 1919 - King George V of the UK proclaims Armistice Day (later Remembrance Day) as 11 November. The idea was first suggested by Edward George Honey.

• 1934 - Lyndon Baines Johnson marries Claudia Alta Taylor.

• 1938 - Singer/Songwriter Gordon Lightfoot is born.

• 1957 - Thought by many to be the inspiration for the Norman Bates character in Psycho, Ed Gein is arrested.

• 1997 - In Luxor, Egypt, 62 people are killed by Islamic militants outside the Temple of Hatshepsut. It becomes known as the Luxor Massacre. The police kill the six assailants.

18

• 1421 - A seawall at the Zuiderzee dyke breaks, flooding 72 villages and killing about 10,000 people in the Netherlands.

• 1901 - The first public performance of Mahler's fourth symphony takes place in Munich, Germany.

• 1920 - The grave of The Unknown Warrior is closed, a week after the funeral.

• 1939 - Writer Margaret Atwood is born.

• 1948 - A train driver and a passenger are killed in a London rail disaster when a train crashes into the back of another after it passes a red signal.

• 1967 - Lunar Orbiter 2 begins operations.

• 1987 - 31 people are killed in a fire at the London Underground station King's Cross, which was caused by a dropped cigarette butt.

• 1991 - In Lebanon, Anglican Church envoys Terry Waite and Thomas Sutherland are finally set free by their Shiite Muslim kidnappers.

19

• 1493 - Christopher Columbus discovers an island and names it San Juan Bautista (now Puerto Rico).

• 1794 - The Quasi-war Between the United States and France 1797 - 1800 - the rights of navigation for American ships are further defined and protected by treaty.

• 1863 - US President Abraham Lincoln delivers the The Gettysburg Address.

• 1913 - Spanish conductor Ataúlfo Argenta is born as a son of a railway official in the northern coastal village of Castro-Urdiales.

• 1915 - Joe Hill - is executed.

• 1921 - US baseball star Roy Campanella is born, as mentioned in Billy Joel's song 'We Didn't Start the Fire'.

• 1959 - The Ford Edsel car (named after Henry Ford's son) is removed from production, as mentioned in Billy Joel's song 'We Didn't Start the Fire'.

• 1969 - Apollo 12 astronauts Pete Conrad and Alan Bean land at Oceanus Procellarum ('Ocean of Storms') and become the third and fourth people to walk on the Moon.

• 1974 - War and Protest - the US in Vietnam (1972 - 1975) - Lieutenant William Calley is freed after serving three-and-a-half years for the murder of 22 Vietnamese villagers.

• 1982 - Led Zeppelin release their 'left-overs' album, Coda.

20

• 1515 - Marie de Guise, Queen Consort of James V, is born.

• 1820 - The Whaleship Essex is holed and capsizes after being rammed twice by a huge whale.

• 1859 - Billy the Kid is probably born on this day.

• 1889 - The first public performance of Mahler's first Symphony takes place in Budapest, Hungary.

• 1912 - The Conflict in Western Sahara - the Spanish-Moroccan Treaty is signed.

• 1916 - The Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, UK: the Role of Women Workers - a protest concerning canteen conditions takes place.

• 1943 - The Cocoa Bean Bowl Trophy is first presented.

• 1947 - HRH Princess Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor (later Queen Elizabeth II) marries naval officer Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten (later Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh).

• 1969 - Native Americans land on Alcatraz with a plan to build a cultural centre.

• 1970 - Emerson Lake and Palmer's self-titled first album is released in the UK.

• 1992 - A fire breaks out at Windsor Castle, England, rages for 15 hours, and seriously damages the north-west side of the building.

• In Switzerland, an aircraft is diverted to Ohrid due to poor weather conditions at Skopje airport and, on landing, crashes into Mount Trojani. All eight crew members and 115 of the 116 passengers are killed.

21

• 1694 - The French philosopher Voltaire is born (d. 1778).

• 1791 - Colonel Napoléon Bonaparte is promoted to full general and appointed commander-in-chief of the armies of the French republic.

• 1840 - Queen Victoria's Children and the Royalty of Europe - Victoria gives birth to her eldest child, Victoria.

• 1920 - The Blacks and Tans commit Ireland's first 'Bloody Sunday'.

• 1960 - George Harrison is deported from Germany for being too young to be in a nightclub.

• 1963 - Alcatraz inmate Robert 'Birdman' Stroud dies.

22

• 1493 - Christopher Columbus discovers Hispaniola (finding the destroyed settlement on 28 November).

• 1817 - John Keats writes a letter to Benjamin Bailey.

• 1820 - The crew of the Essex abandon the wreck.

• 1890 - Charles de Gaulle is born, as mentioned in Billy Joel's song 'We Didn't Start the Fire'.

• 1933 - The Marx Brothers' film Duck Soup is released.

• 1940 - Terry Gilliam, the comedian, writer, film director and animator, is born.

• 1963 - John Fitzgerald Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Texas, and Lyndon Baines Johnson becomes President.

• 1963 - The Beatles' second album With the Beatles is released in the UK.

• 1990 - The UK's first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, resigns.

23

• 1499 - In the Third War of the Roses, imposter/invader Perkin Warbeck is hanged.

• 1859 - Billy the Kid is possibly born on this day.

• 1914 - The US army retreats from Mexico.

• 1963 - The first episode of Doctor Who is broadcast.

• 1973 - Luckily nobody is fatally injured in a London rail disaster at Paddington station, when a high speed service from Penzance derails after failing to slow down two miles brefore reaching Paddington.

• 1980 - A series of earthquakes in southern Italy kills approximately 4,800 people.

• 1984 - Many passengers are hopitalised with smoke inhalation after a fire breaks out on the London Underground Oxford Circus station.

• 2001 - Moral Crusader Mary Whitehouse dies.

24

• 1639 - Jeremiah Horrocks - Father of British Astronomy - Occurrence of the first transition of Venus across the face of the sun, since the invention of the telescope.

• 1642 - Dutch explorer Abel Janszoon Tasman sights Tasmania.

• 1815 - Grace Darling, the English heroine, is born.

• 1942 - Comedian Billy Connolly is born to Mary and William Connolly in Anderston, Glasgow.

• 1969 - The Apollo 12 command module lands safely in the Pacific Ocean, ending the second manned mission to the Moon.

• 1991 - Made in Heaven - Queen's Last Album - singer/songwriter Freddie Mercury dies.

• 1995 - The Offshore Radio Revolution in Britain 1964-2004 - DJ Stuart Henry loses his battle with multiple sclerosis.

• 2002 - Passengers of a train travelling from Swansea to Paddington narrowly escape a London rail disaster when the fifth carriage derails.

25

• 1638 - Catarina Henriqueta de Bragança, Princess of Portugal and later Queen Catherine of England, is born on St Catherine's Day in Vila Vicosa, Alto Alentejo, Portugal.

• 1853 - Poet Alfred Tennyson and his wife, Emily, move into Farringford.

• 1870 - French painter Maurice Denis is born in Granville, a coastal town in Normandy.

• 1872 - On the Mary Celeste, Captain Briggs, along with his family and crew, mysteriously abandons ship.

• 1959 - Charles Kennedy, former leader of British political party the Liberal Democrats, is born.

• 1960 - John Fitzgerald Kennedy's son John Fitzgerald is born.

• 1961 - 'Black Sunday' for Coventry City Football Club, as the team loses to a non-league side in the FA Cup competition.

• 1963 - John Fitzgerald Kennedy is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

• 1984 - Musicians gather in a Notting Hill studio in London to record Band Aid's 'Do They Know It's Christmas', to raise money for famine relief in Ethiopia.

26

• 1504 - Juana (la Loca) of Castille's daughter Isabella dies.

• 1842 - On the USS Somers, Commander Mackenzie is made aware of a mutiny plot, and makes an arrest.

• 1870 - Nine people are killed in a London rail disaster at Harrow when a train passes a red signal and crashes into the back of another train.

• 1922 - Cartoonist Charles M Schulz, creator of the legendary Peanuts comic strips, is born.

• 1951 - The 'Little Armistice' is declared in the Korean War, as mentioned in Billy Joel's song 'We Didn't Start the Fire'.

• 1983 - In London, 6,800 gold bars worth nearly £26 million are stolen from the Brinks Mat vault at Heathrow Airport.

• 2003 - Concorde makes its final flight over Bristol, England.

27

• 1095 - Great Dates in History - Pope Urban II delivers his sermon at Clermont calling upon Christians to march upon the Holy Land and 'exterminate' the invading Turks. He claimed the message had come directly from God.

• 1701 - Anders Celsius, the Swedish inventor and astronomer who invented the celsius temperature scale, is born.

• 1842 - On the USS Somers Commander Mackenzie arrests two further crew members.

• 1912 - In the Conflict in Western Sahara the Spanish and French make a border demarcation agreement.

• 1942 - Musician Jimi Hendrix is born.

• 1957 - John Fitzgerald Kennedy's daughter Caroline Bouvier is born.

• 1957 - Dollar's singer David Van Day is born.

• 1965 - War and Protest - the US in Vietnam (1965 - 1967) - 35,000 anti-war protesters encircle the White House before marching on to the Washington Monument.

• 1967 - The ninth album of the Beatles, Magical Mystery Tour, is released in the USA.

• 1968 - War and Protest - the US in Vietnam (1968) - President Nixon asks Henry Kissinger to become his National Security Adviser.

• 2006 - The Canadian House of Commons endorses prime minister Stephen Harper's motion to declare Québécois a nation within a unified Canada.

28

• 1499 - In the Third War of the Roses, the Earl of Warwick is beheaded.

• 1757- Poet and painter William Blake is born.

• 1772 - Luke Howard, 'godfather of clouds' is born in London.

• 1956 - Twenty One - the Game Show - Quiz show cheat Charles Van Doren goes on the air for the first time.

• 1957 - David Van Day, British singer with the band Dollar, is born.

• 1961 - North American Aviation are awarded the prime contract for the Apollo spacecraft.

• 1994 - Voters in Norway reject European Union membership.

29

• 1817 - The first steam-powered Staten Island Ferry Nautilus makes its maiden voyage, eventually pushing the sail-powered ferries out of business.

• 1898 - Author and academic CS Lewis is born.

• 1908 - Adam Clayton Powell Jr - Activist and Politician is born.

• 1950 - United Nations forces are forced to retreat from North Korea.

• 1954 - Joel Coen, the US film director, producer and writer, is born.

• 1975 - Britain's famous racing driver Graham Hill dies in an air crash when he is piloting his Piper Aztec from France to a party in London.

30

• 1835 - Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain is born.

• 1965 - War and Protest - the US in Vietnam (1965 - 1967) - Defense Secretary McNamara privately warns of American casualties of up to 1000 dead per month.

• 1982 - Michael Jackson releases 'Thriller'.

• 1999 - In the Congolese Civil War, the DRC establishes its peace-keeping mission, MONUC.

• 2001 - The Beatles' singer/guitarist George Harrison dies.

Next Month