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1999–Singer, Ella Mae Morse, dies of respiratory problems in Bullhead City, Arizona, at age 75. She recorded Capitol Records first million-selling single, Cow Cow Boogie, in 1942.



385–Fu Jian, Rmperor of the Chinese Di state Former Qin, dies at age 47.

456–Magister militum Ricimer defeats Emperor Avitus at Piacenza and becomes master of the Western Roman Empire.

690–Empress Wu Zetian ascends to the throne of the Tang dynasty and proclaims herself ruler of the Chinese Empire.

1355–Louis, King of Sicily, dies of the plague in Catania, Sicily, at age 17.

1384–Jadwiga is crowned King of Poland, although she is a woman.

1430–James II of Scotland is born at Holyrood Abbey in in Edinburgh, Scotland. He was popular with the commoners, with whom he socialised often, in times of peace and war.

1590–Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa and Count of Conza, murders his wife, Donna Maria d'Avalos, and her lover Fabrizio Carafa, the Duke of Andria, at the Palazzo San Severo in Naples, Italy.

1591–Pope Gregory XIV dies from a large gallstone in Rome, Papal States, at age 56.

1758–Lexicographer, Noah Webster, is born in West Hartford, Connecticut. His great work, the American Dictionary of the English Language, was published in 1828, with 70,000 entries. Webster also wrote a standard medical text (History of Pestilential Diseases), helped found Amherst College, and served in the Massachusetts legislature. After he died, his dictionary was put out by the Merriam Company, but his name went into the public domain and today Webster's is a synonym for “dictionary.”

1780–Royalton and Tunbridge in Vermont, are the last major raids of the American Revolutionary War.

1793–Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, dies by the guillotine at Place de la Révolution (present-day Place de la Concorde), Paris, France. Her last words were "Pardon me, sir, I meant not to do it," spoken to Henri Sanson, the executioner, whose foot she had accidentally stepped on after climbing the scaffold. Her body was thrown into an unmarked grave in the Madeleine Cemetery, (which was closed the following year).

1813–The Sixth Coalition attacks Napoleon Bonaparte in the Battle of Leipzig.

1834–Much of the ancient structures of the Palace of Westminster in London, England, is burnt to the ground.

1841–Queen's University is founded in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.

1843–Sir William Rowan Hamilton comes up with the idea of quaternions, a non-commutative extension of complex numbers.

1846–William T.G. Morton demonstrates ether anesthesia for the first time at the Massachusetts General Hospital in the Ether Dome.

1847–The novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte is published in London, England.

1854–Writer, Oscar Wilde, is born Fingal O'Flahertie Wilde, in Dublin, Ireland. He established himself in “literary London” in the 1880s, a witty and flamboyant character dressed in a velvet jacket and trousers, with black silk stockings. In the 1890s, he published The Picture of Dorian Gray, his only novel, and his hit plays A Woman of No Importance, Lady Windermere's Fan, and The Importance of Being Earnest. He was convicted of sodomy, after a romance with the Marquess of Queensbury's son, and sent to Reading prison for two years. Oscar Wilde once said, "There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about and that is not being talked about."

1859–John Brown leads a raid on Harpers Ferry, West Virginia.

1869–The Cardiff Giant, one of the most famous American hoaxes, is "discovered."

1869–Girton College, is founded in Cambridge, becoming England's first residential college for women.

1872–Acrobat, Otto Witte, is born in Germany. He claimed to have been crowned the King of Albania in 1913. He also claimed to have founded a political party and that he was a candidate for the German presidency in 1925. Although none of the above claims were proven to be true, the film, The Prisoner of Zenda, is based on Witte’s accounts.

1875–Brigham Young University is founded in Provo, Utah.

1882–The “Nickel Plate Railroad” opens for business. The New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad would serve a large area, including trackage in the states of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri. Its primary connections included Buffalo, Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Indianapolis, St. Louis, and Toledo.

1886–Politician, David Ben-Gurion, is born David Grün in Pionsk, Congress Poland, Russian Empire. He was was the primary founder of the State of Israel and the first Prime Minister of Israel. On May 14, 1948, he formally proclaimed the establishment of the State of Israel, and was the first to sign the Israeli Declaration of Independence, which he had helped to write.

1888–Playwright, Eugene (Gladstone) O'Neill, is born in a hotel room in Longacre Square (present-day Times Square), New York. He dropped out of Princeton after a year to go to sea for six years, during which time he came down with tuberculosis. He had to spend six months in a sanitarium in Connecticut, and that is when he began to write plays. Four years later, his first full-length play, Beyond the Horizon, opened on Broadway and won the Pulitzer Prize. O'Neill is credited with introducing dramatic realism to the American audience: his plays are known as some of the first to feature characters from the marginalized side of society. He was a ferocious worker and turned out 20 long plays, some of them double or triple length, between 1920 and 1943, including The Hairy Ape, The Emperor Jones, Desire Under the Elms, Strange Interlude, Mourning Becomes Electra, Ah Wilderness, and Long Day's Journey Into Night.

1905–The Partition of Bengal takes place in India.

1906–Varina Davis, wife of Jefferson Davis, dies of double pneumonia in her room at the Hotel Majestic in New York, New York, at age 80. Jefferson Davis became President of the Confederate States of America in 1861. She served as the First Lady of the new nation at its capital in Richmond, Virginia.

1909–William Howard Taft and Porfirio Díaz hold a summit, a first between a U.S. and a Mexican president, and they only narrowly escape assassination.

1916–The first birth control clinic in the U.S. is opened by Margaret Sanger in Brooklyn, New York.

1923–The Walt Disney Company is founded by Walt Disney and his brother, Roy Disney.

1923–Actress, Linda Darnell, is born Monetta Eloyse Darnell in Dallas, Texas. She appeared in the films Star Dust, Brigham Young, The Mark of Zorro, Blood and Sand, The Song of Bernadette, Sweet and Low-Down, Anna and the King of Siam, and A Letter to Three Wives.

1923–Composer and arranger, Bert Kaempfert, is born in Barmbek, Hamburg, Germany. He made easy listening and jazz-oriented records and wrote the music for a number of well-known songs, including Strangers in the Night and Moon Over Naples. His biggest hit was Wonderland By Night. Over the next few years, he revived pop tunes such as Tenderly, Red Roses for a Blue Lady, Three O'Clock in the Morning, and Bye Bye Blues. As a producer, Kaempfert also played a part in the rise of The Beatles, when he signed a Liverpool-based singer named Tony Sheridan, who was performing in Hamburg, and needed to recruit a band to play behind him. He auditioned and signed The Beatles, and recorded two tracks with them during his sessions for Sheridan: Ain't She Sweet (sung by rhythm guitarist John Lennon) and the instrumental Cry for a Shadow, co-written by Lennon and lead guitarist, George Harrison. Kaempfert's recording of The Beatles, even as a backing band for Sheridan, provided an impetus to their eventual success, even though none of the Kaempfert-recorded songs resembled the music for which they became famous.

1927–Novelist, Gunter (Wilhelm) Grass, is born in Danzig-Langfuhr, Free City of Danzig (present-day Gdansk, Poland). He is known for his novel Die Blechtrommel (The Tin Drum), which was followed by Hundejahre (Dog Years). In 1995, four years before he received the Nobel Prize, he caused a great controversy in Germany with his novel, Ein Weites Feld (A Wide Field), in which he was critical of German reunification, portraying greedy tycoons of the West taking over the people's property of the East. He thought that a united Germany would be a danger to the world.

1928–Actress, Ann Morgan Guilbert, is born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is best known for the role of Millie Helper on The Dick Van Dyke Show. She appeared in the films You’re Only Young Once, Two for the Seasaw, The Man from the Diner’s Club, A Guide for the Married Man, How Sweet It Is!, Earth Girls Are Easy, and Grumpier Old Men.

1934–Chinese Communists begin the Long March. It will end a year and four days later, by which time Mao Zedong had regained his title as party chairman.

1938–Nico, of the Velvet Underground, is born Christa Päffgen in Cologne, Germany. She was a singer-songwriter, lyricist, composer, musician, fashion model, and actress, who became famous as a Andy Warhol superstar in the 1960s. She appeared in the films La Dolce Vita and Chelsea Girls.

1939–During World War II, the No. 603 Squadron RAF intercepts the first Luftwaffe raid on Britain.

1940–The Warsaw Ghetto is established.

1942–Aaron Copland’s ballet, Rodeo, premieres in New York City.

1942–Dave Lovelady, drummer for The Fourmost, is born David Lovelady in Litherland, Liverpool, England.

1943–The Raid of the Ghetto of Rome takes place.

1944–Wally Walrus, Woody Woodpecker's first steady foil, debuts in the The Beach Nut, a Walter Lantz's cartoon.

1945–The Food and Agriculture Organization is founded in Quebec City, Canada.

1946–Actress, Suzanne Somers, is born Suzanne Marie Mahoney in San Bruno, California. She is best known for the role of Chrissy Snow on the sitcom Three's Company. She appeared in the films American Graffiti, Magnum Force, Zuma Beach, and Serial Mom. She was married to producer and television host, Alan Hamel.

1947–The Republic of the Philippines takes over the administration of the Turtle Islands and the Mangsee Islands from the United Kingdom.

1947–Bob Weir, guitarist for The Grateful Dead, is born Robert Hall Parber in San Francisco, California. During his career with The Grateful Dead, Weir played mostly rhythm guitar and sang many of the band's rock-n-roll tunes.

1949–Nikos Zachariadis, leader of the Communist Party of Greece, announces a "temporary cease-fire," ending the Greek Civil War.

1949–Diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and the German Democratic Republic are established.

1950–The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis is published, beginning The Chronicles of Narnia series.

1951–The first Prime Minister of Pakistan, Liaquat Ali Khan, is assassinated in Rawalpindi.

1951–Little Richard attends his first recording session in Atlanta, Georgia.

1951–Politician, Liaquat Ali Khan, dies from assassination by Sa’ad Babrack in Rawalpindi, Punjab, Pakistan. He was the first Prime Minister of Pakistan. He is Pakistan's longest serving Prime Minister, spending 1,524 days in power, a record which has stood for 63 years (since 1951).

1954–Elvis Presley performs for the first time on the Louisiana Hayride radio show.

1956–Elvis Presley’s first film, Love Me Tender, premieres.

1958–Actor-director, Tim Robbins, is born Timothy Francis Robbins in West Covina, California. He appeared in the films No Small Affair, Toy Soldiers, The Sure Thing, Howard the Duck, Top Gun, Tapeheads, Bull Durham, Twister, Jacob’s Ladder, Jungle Fever, Bob Roberts, The Player, Short Cuts, I.Q., Ready to Wear, The Shawshank Redemption, Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, Arlington Road, Mission to Mars, Mystic River, and The Lucky Ones. He was married to actress, Susan Sarandon.

1964–Harold Wilson becomes British Prime Minister.

1964–Soviet leaders, Leonid Brezhnev and Alexei Kosygin, are inaugurated as General Secretary of the CPSU and as Premier, and the collective leadership is established.

1964–China detonates its first atomic bomb, becoming the world’s fifth nuclear power.

1966–Folk singer, Joan Baez, is one of 124 anti-draft protesters arrested at a military induction center in Oakland, California. Baez will spend 10 days in jail.

1968–American athletes, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, are kicked off the U.S. team for participating in the 1968 Olympics Black Power salute.

1968–Kingston, Jamaica, is rocked by the Rodney riots, inspired by the barring of Walter Rodney from the country.

1968–Yasunari Kawabata becomes the first Japanese person to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

1969–Wendy Wilson, of the vocal group Wilson Phillips, is born in Los Angeles, California. She is the daughter of musician, Brian Wilson. Her older sister is Carnie Wilson.

1969–Chess Records founder, Leonard Chess, dies of a heart attack in Chicago, Illinois, at age 52.

1970–In response to the October Crisis terrorist kidnapping, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau of Canada invokes the War Measures Act.

1972–Creedence Clearwater Revival disbands.

1973–Henry Kissinger is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

1973–Jazz drummer and bandleader, Gene Krupa, dies of leukemia in Yonkers, New York, at age 64. His story is told in the film The Gene Krupa Story starring Sal Mineo.

1975–The Balibo Five, a group of Australian-based television journalists based in the town of Balibo in the then Portuguese Timor (present-day East Timor), are killed by Indonesian troops.

1975–Rahima Banu, a two-year-old girl from the village of Kuralia, Bangladesh, is the last known person to be infected with naturally occurring smallpox.

1975–The Australian Coalition opposition parties, using their senate majority, vote to defer the decision to grant supply of funds for the Whitlam Government's annual budget, sparking the 1975 Australian constitutional crisis.

1978–Karol Wojtyla is elected Pope John Paul II after the October 1978 Papal conclave, the first non-Italian pontiff since 1523.

1978–Wanda Rutkiewicz is the first Pole and European woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest.

1984–The Bill debuts on ITV, eventually becoming the longest-running police procedural in British television history.

1984–Desmond Tutu is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

1985–Intel introduces a 32-bit 80386 microcomputer chip.

1991–George Hennard runs amok in Killeen, Texas, killing 23 people and wounding 20 others in a Luby's Cafeteria.

1992–Actress, Shirley Booth, dies after years of ill health in North Chatham, Massachusetts, at age 94. She is best known for her starring role in the sitcom Hazel. Shea ppeared in the films Come Back Little Sheba, Main Street to Broadway, About Mrs. Leslie, Hot Spell, and The Matchmaker.

1993–An anti-Nazism riot breaks out in Welling, Kent, England, after police stop protesters approaching the British National Party headquarters.

1995–The Million Man March takes place in Washington, D.C.

1995–The Skye Bridge is opened.

1996–Eighty-four people are killed and more than 180 others are injured, as 47,000 football fans attempt to squeeze into the 36,000-seat Estadio Mateo Flores in Guatemala City.

1998–Former Chilean dictator, General Augusto Pinochet, is arrested in London, England, on a warrant from Spain requesting his extradition on murder charges.

1999–Singer, Ella Mae Morse, dies of respiratory problems in Bullhead City, Arizona, at age 75. She recorded Capitol Records first million-selling single, Cow Cow Boogie, in 1942.

1999–Computer scientist, Jon Postel, dies from complications of heart surgery in Santa Monica, California, at age 55. He made many significant contributions to the development of the Internet, particularly with respect to standards. He is known principally for being the Editor of the Request for Comment (RFC) document series, and for administering the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA). In his lifetime he was known as the "god of the Internet" for his comprehensive influence on the medium.

2002–Bibliotheca Alexandrina, a commemoration of the Library of Alexandria that was lost in antiquity, is officially inaugurated in Alexandria, Egypt.

2003–Princess Kritika of Nepal is born Kritika Rajya Laxmi Devi in Kathmandu, Nepal.

2004–Newsman, Pierre Salinger, dies of heart failure in Cavaillon Hospital near his home, La Bastide Rose, in Le Thor, France, at age 79. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. He was Press Secretary for Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. Salinger served as a U.S. Senator in 1964, and was campaign manager for the Robert F. Kennedy presidential campaign.

2007–Actress, Deborah Kerr, dies of Parkinson's disease in Botesdale, Suffolk, England, at age 86. She appeared in the films Love on the Dole, I See a Dark Stranger, Black Narcissus, The Hucksters, King Solomon’s Mines, Quo Vadis, The Prisoner of Zenda, From Here to Eternity, The End of the Affair, The King and I, Tea and Sympathy, Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison, An Affair to Remember, Separate Tables, The Sundowners, The Chalk Garden, The Night of the Iguana, and Witness for the Prosecution.

2010–Actress, Barbara Billingsley, dies of polymyalgia in Los Angeles, California, at age 94. She is best known for the role of June Cleaver on the TV sitcom Leave It to Beaver.

2012–The extrasolar planet Alpha Centauri Bb is discovered.

2013–Lao Airlines Flight 301 crashes on approach to Pakse International Airport in Laos, killing 49 people.

2013–Character actor, Ed Lauter, dies of melanoma in Los Angeles, California, at age 74. He appeared in the films Bad Company, Dirty Little Billy, Lolly-Madonna XXX, The Last American Hero, The Longest Yard, Breakheart Pass, How the West Was Won, Cujo, Born on the Fourth of July, Leaving Las Vegas, and Seabiscuit.

2014–Vocalist, Tim Hauser, dies of cardiac arrest in Sayre, Pennsylvania, at age 72. He was a founding member of the singing group, The Manhattan Transfer.

2016–The Simpsons, the longest-running prime time, scripted television series, airs its 600th episode.

2016–Around 200 people walk out of an Amy Schumer comedy show in Tampa, Florida, when the perfomer launches into a putdown of presidential candidate, Donald Trump.

2016–WikiLeaks blames Ecuador for cutting off founder Julian Assange's internet access while he is holed up at the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, Engand. His group was in the process of releasing thousands of emails from Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman.

2016–An arsonist fire-bombs a Republican Party office in Hillsborough, North Carolina, leaving a graffiti message that reads, "Nazi Republicans get out of town or else."

2016–The collapse of a footbridge connecting the islands of Lembongan and Ceningan, near Bali, Indonesia, kills nine people and injures 30 others.

2017–Researchers discover a vulnerability in the WPA2 protocol, leaving devices running Microsoft Windows, Mac OS, iOS, Android, Linux, and OpenBSD operating systems vulnerable to attack over wireless connections.

2017–Russian President Vladimir Putin signs a decree to implement UNSC sanctions on North Korea.

2017–New Zealand is hit by an acute shortage of potatoes, badly affecting the production of chips, or crisps, in what has been dubbed a "chipocalypse."

2017–Singer, Ed Sheeran, breaks his arm after being knocked off his bicycle in and accident in London, England.

2017–At least 31 people die in a series of wildfires in Portugal, which are worsened by strong winds brought by Hurricane Ophelia.


PHOTOS TOP TO BOTTOM: Noah Webster; Oscar Wilde; Eugene O'Neill; Linda Darnell; Bob Weir; Tim Robbins; Leonard Chess; Ella Mae Morse; and Barbara Billingsley.

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