Today in History

Today in History

1492 Christopher Columbus and his crew land in the Bahamas.

1576 Rudolf II, the king of Hungary and Bohemia, succeeds his father, Maximilian II, as Holy Roman Emperor.

1702 Admiral Sir George Rooke defeats the French fleet off Vigo.

1722 Shah Sultan Husayn surrenders the Persian capital of Isfahan to Afghan rebels after a seven month siege.

1809 Meriwether Lewis, of the Lewis and Clark expedition, dies under mysterious circumstances in Tennessee.

1899 The Anglo-Boer War begins.

1872 Apache leader Cochise signs a peace treaty with General Howard in Arizona Territory.

1915 Despite international protests, Edith Cavell, an English nurse in Belgium, is executed by Germans for aiding the escape of Allied prisoners.

1943 The U.S. Fifth Army begins an assault crossing of the Volturno River in Italy.

1944 The Axis occupation of Athens comes to an end. The occupation has ruined the Greek economy and brought about terrible hardships for the Greek civilian population, more than 40,000 of whom have died in Athens alone from starvation. [From MHQ—The Quarterly Journal of Military History]

1960 Inejiro Asanuma, leader of the Japan Socialist Party, is assassinated during a live TV broadcast.

1964 The USSR launches Voskhod I, the first spacecraft with a multi-person crew; it is also the first mission in which the crew does not wear space suits.

1970 President Richard Nixon announces the pullout of 40,000 more American troops in Vietnam by Christmas.

1971 The House of Representatives passes the Equal Rights Amendment 354-23.

1984 The Provisional Irish Republican Army detonates a bomb at the Grand Hotel in Brighton, England, in an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher; 5 people are killed and 31 wounded.

1999 Chief of Army Staff Pervez Musharraf seizes power in Pakistan through a bloodless military coup.

2000 Suicide bombers at Aden, Yemen, damage the USS Cole; 17 crew members are killed and over 35 are wounded.

2002 Terrorist bombers kill over 200 and wound over

300 more at the Sari Club in Kuta, Bali.

Born

1537 Edward VI, the only son of Henry VIII by his third wife Jane Seymour.

1868 Charles Sumner Greene, architect.

1929 Richard Coles, child psychologist and author.

1932 Dick Gregory, comedian and social activist.

1935 Luciano Pavarotti, Italian opera tenor.

1944 Angela Rippon, first female journalist to present BBC national television news on a permanent basis.

1947 Chris Wallace, former host/moderator of Meet the Press, currently (2013) host of Fox News Sunday; the three-time Emmy winner is the only person thus far to host more than one major Sunday political talk show.

1949 Carlos the Jackal (Ilich Ramirez Sanchez), one of the most infamous political terrorists of the 1970s; currently (2013) serving a life term in France.

1955 Ante Gotovina, Croatian lieutenant general; convicted in 2011 of war crimes during the Croatian civil war, his conviction was overturned in 2012.

1968 Hugh Jackman, actor; well known for his recurring role as Wolverine in the X-Men films, his many awards include a Golden Globe (Les Miserables, 2013) and a Tony Award Special Award for Extraordinary Contribution to the Theatre Community (2012).

History