This Day in History

[Gravdigr]

October18

1009 – The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, a Christian church in Jerusalem, is completely destroyed by the Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, who hacks the Church's foundations down to bedrock.

1356 – Basel earthquake, the most significant historic seismological event north of the Alps, destroys the town of Basel, Switzerland.

1386 – Opening of Heidelberg University.

1540 – Spanish conquistador Hernando de Soto's forces destroy the fortified town of Mabila in present-day Alabama, killing Tuskaloosa.

1648 – Boston Shoemakers form first American labor organization.

1775 – African-American poet Phillis Wheatley is freed from slavery.

1851 – Herman Melville's Moby-Dick is first published as The Whale by Richard Bentley of London.

1867 – United States takes possession of Alaska after purchasing it from Russia for $7.2 million. Celebrated annually in the state as Alaska Day.

1898 – The United States takes possession of Puerto Rico from Spain.

1922 – The British Broadcasting Company (later Corporation) is founded by a consortium, to establish a nationwide network of radio transmitters to provide a national broadcasting service.

1929 – The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council overrules the Supreme Court of Canada in Edwards v. Canada when it declares that women are considered "Persons" under Canadian law.

1945 – The USSR's nuclear program receives plans for the United States plutonium bomb from Klaus Fuchs at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

1945 – Argentine military officer and politician Juan Perón marries actress Eva "Evita" Duarte.

1954 – Texas Instruments announces the first transistor radio.

1963 – Félicette, a black and white female Parisian stray cat becomes the first cat launched into space.

Births

1785 – Thomas Love Peacock; 1919 – Anita O'Day; 1919 – Pierre Trudeau; 1921 – Jesse Helms; 1923 – Jessie Mae Hemphill; 1926 – Chuck Berry; 1926 – Klaus Kinski; 1927 – George C. Scott; 1928 – Keith Jackson; 1934 – Inger Stevens; 1935 – Peter Boyle; 1938 – Dawn Wells; 1939 – Mike Ditka; 1939 – Lee Harvey Oswald; 1945 – Huell Howser; 1946 – Howard Shore; 1947 – Joe Morton; 1950 – Wendy Wasserstein; 1951 – Pam Dawber; 1951 – Terry McMillan; 1952 – Chuck Lorre; 1954 – Arliss Howard; 1955 – David Twohy; 1956 – Martina Navratilova; 1958 – Thomas Hearns; 1960 – Jean-Claude Van Damme; 1960 – Erin Moran; 1961 – Wynton Marsalis; 1962 – Vincent Spano; 1984 – Lindsey Vonn; 1987 – Zac Efron

Deaths

1931 – Thomas Edison; 1966 – Elizabeth Arden; 1966 – S. S. Kresge; 1973 – Walt Kelly; 1982 – Bess Truman; 2008 – Dee Dee Warwick; 2013 – Tom Foley; 2013 – Bum Phillips

[glatt]

Originally Posted by Gravdigr

October18
1356 – Basel earthquake, the most significant historic seismological event north of the Alps, destroys the town of Basel, Switzerland.

That explains why it looked like such a new city when I was there.


Thanks for posting these, even if you are dropping the hyperlinks. you slacker.

[Gravdigr]

October 19

1469 – Ferdinand II of Aragon marries Isabella I of Castile, a marriage that paves the way to the unification of Aragon and Castile into a single country, Spain.

1781 – At Yorktown, Virginia, representatives of British commander Lord Cornwallis handed over Cornwallis' sword and formally surrendered to George Washington and the comte de Rochambeau.

1789 – Chief Justice John Jay is sworn in as the first Chief Justice of the United States.

1812 – Napoleon Bonaparte retreats from Moscow.

1813 – The Battle of Leipzig concludes, giving Napoleon Bonaparte one of his worst defeats.

1900 – Max Planck discovers the law of black-body radiation (Planck's law).

1917 – Love Field in Dallas is opened.

1943 – The cargo vessel Sinfra is attacked by Allied aircraft at Souda Bay, Crete, and sunk. 2,098 Italian prisoners of war drown.

1943 – Streptomycin, the first antibiotic remedy for tuberculosis, is isolated by researchers at Rutgers University.

1950 – Iran becomes the first country to accept technical assistance from the United States under the Point Four Program.

1960 – Cold War: The United States government imposes a near-total trade embargo against Cuba.

1968 - 18 year old Peter Frampton meets Steve Marriott at a Small Faces show in London. After striking up a friendship, the two started planning a new group which emerged as Humble Pie the following April.

1973 – President Richard Nixon rejects an Appeals Court decision that he turn over the Watergate tapes.

1988 – The British government imposes a broadcasting ban on television and radio interviews with members of Sinn Féin and eleven Irish republican and Ulster loyalist paramilitary groups.

1989 – The convictions of the Guildford Four are quashed by the Court of Appeal of England and Wales, after they had spent 15 years in prison.

2003 – Mother Teresa is beatified by Pope John Paul II.

2005 – Saddam Hussein goes on trial in Baghdad for crimes against humanity.

2005 – Hurricane Wilma becomes the most intense Atlantic hurricane on record with a minimum pressure of 882 mb.

Births

1605 – Thomas Browne; 1810 – Cassius Marcellus Clay; 1862 – Auguste Lumière; 1901 – Arleigh Burke; 1920 – LaWanda Page aka The Bronze Goddess Of Fire ('Aunt Esther' on Sanford & Son); 1931 – John le Carré; 1932 – Robert Reed; 1936 – Tony Lo Bianco; 1937 – Peter Max; 1940 – Michael Gambon; 1944 – Peter Tosh♪ ♫(The Wailers); 1945 – Gloria Jones♪ ♫; 1945 – John Lithgow; 1945 – Jeannie C. Riley♪ ♫; 1946 – Keith Reid♪ ♫; 1948 – James Howard Kunstler; 1948 – Patrick Simmons(Doobie Bros); 1962 – Evander Holyfield; 1965 – Ty Pennington; 1966 – Jon Favreau; 1967 – Amy Carter (daughter of POTUS Jimmy Carter); 1968 – Rodney Carrington; 1969 – Trey Parker (co-creator South Park); 1970 – Chris Kattan (SNL)

Deaths

1682 – Thomas Browne; 1745 – Jonathan Swift; 1897 – George Pullman; 1943 – Camille Claudel; 1945 – N. C. Wyeth; 1950 – Edna St. Vincent Millay; 1978 – Gig Young; 1988 – Son House; 1994 – Martha Raye; 2008 – Richard 'Mr.' Blackwell; 2008 – Rudy Ray Moore, "Dolemite"; 2009 – Joseph Wiseman ('Dr. No' in Dr. No); 2010 – Tom Bosley; 2014 - Raphael Ravenscroft (sax on Gerry Rafferty's "Baker Street")