1204 - Crusaders occupy
Constantinople
1517 - Osmaanse army occupies Cairo
1556 - Portuguese Marranos who revert back to Judaism burned alive by order of
Pope
1598 - In an extraordinary act of religious tolerance, Henry IV of France passed
the Edict of Nantes, which granted political and religious rights to Huguenots.
to freely exercise their religion in many parts of the kingdom, except Paris.
1668 - John Dryden (36) becomes 1st English poet laureate
1741 - Dutch people protest bad quality of bread
1742 - The first public performance of George Frideric Handel's
"Messiah" took place in Dublin, Ireland.
1796 - 1st elephant arrives in US from India
1796 - Battle at Millesimo Italy: Napoleon beats Austrians
1808 - William Henry Lane ("Juda") perfects tap dance
1829 - English Emancipation Act grants freedom of religion to Catholics
1834 - HMS Beagle anchors at river mouth of Rio Santa Cruz, Patagonia
1860 - 1st Pony Express reaches Sacramento Calif
1861 - After 34 hours of bombardment, Ft Sumter surrenders to Confederates under
command of Gen PGT Beuregard
1863 - Battle of Irish Bend, LA (Ft Bisland)
1863 - Hospital for Ruptured & Crippled in NY is 1st orthopedic hospital
1865 - Sherman's troops take Raleigh, NC
1869 - Steam power brake patented (George Westinghouse)
1870 - Metropolitan Museum of Art forms in NYC
1873 - Colfax Massacre in Grant Parish Louisiana (60 blacks killed)
1882 - Anti-Semitic League forms in Prussia
1883 - Alfred Packer convicted of cannibalism
1895 - Start of Sherlock Holmes "Adventure of Solitary Cyclist"
1902 - J C Penney opens his 1st store in Kemmerer, Wyo
1906 - Mutiny on Portuguese battleships Dom Carlos & Vasco da Gama
1912 - Royal Flying Corps forms (later RAF)
1918 - Electrical fire kills 38 mental patients at Oklahoma State Hospital
1919 - Amritsar Massacre -- British Army kill 100s of Indian Nationalists [H]
1934 - 4.7 million US families report receiving welfare payments
1939 - W Saroyan's "My Heart's in the Highlands," premieres in NYC
1940 - 2nd battle of Narvik-8 German destroyers, destroyed
1941 - Heavy German assault on Tobruk
1941 - Russian-Japan no-attack treaty goes into effect
1943 - President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the Thomas Jefferson Memorial
in Washington, D.C.
1943 - Nazi's discover mass grave of Polish officers near Katyn
1944 - SC rejects black suffrage
1945 - Red Army occupy Vienna
1945 - US marines conquer Minna Shima off Okinawa
1954 - Robert Oppenheimer accused of being a communist
1957 - 11th Tony Awards: Long Day's Journey into Night & My Fair Lady win
1957 - Due to lack of funds, Saturday mail delivery in US is temp halted
1958 - 12th Tony Awards: Sunrise at Campobello & Music Man win
1959 - Vatican edict forbids Italian Roman Catholics from for voting for
communists
1961 - "Carnival!" opens at Imperial Theater NYC for 719 performances
1961 - UN General Assembly condemns South-Africa's apartheid
1962 - US steel industry forced to give up price increases
1964 - 36th Academy Awards - "Tom Jones," Sidney Poitier &
Patricia Neal win
1964 - Ian D Smith becomes premier of Rhodesia
1965 - Beatles record "Help"
1966 - Pan Am places $525,000,000 order for 25 Boeing 747s
1970 - Greek composer Mikis Theordorakis freed
1970 - Apollo 13 announces "Houston, we've got a problem!" as
Beech-built oxygen tank explodes en route to Moon
1972 - 1st baseball players' strike ends after 13 days
1975 - Christian Falange kills 27 Palestinians, begins Lebanese civil war
1976 - $2 bill re-introduced as US currency
1980 - "Grease" closes at Broadhurst Theater NYC after 3,388
performances
1980 - US boycotts Summer Olympics in Moscow
1981 - Wash Post Janet Cooke wins Pulitzer Prize (later admits story a hoax)
1984 - Pete Rose becomes 1st NL to get get 4,000 hits in a career
1986 - Pope John Paul II met Rome's Chief Rabbi Elio Toaff at Rome synagogue
1987 - Portugal signs agreement to return Macau to China (in 1999)
1990 - Soviets admit to Katyn Massacre
1992 - Crystal Pepsi begins test marketing in Providence, Denver & Dallas
1992 - Great Chicago Flood - Chicago's underground tunnels flood
1992 - Nelson Mandela announces he will seek divorce from Winnie
1993 - Tom Stoppard's "Arcadia," premieres in London
1994 - President guard at Kigali Rwanda, chops 1,200 church members to death
1997 - Tiger Woods wins his first Major by winning the
prestigious Masters Tournament
Birthdays
Today
1519 - Catherine de' Medici,
Queen of Spain/daughter of Henry II
1545 - Elisabeth van Valois, French queen of Spain/daughter of Henri II
1721 - John Hanson, Maryland, 1st President under Articles of Confederation
1732 - Frederick North, (C) British PM (1770-82)
1743 - Thomas Jefferson (3rd U.S. President [1801-1809]; drafted the Declaration
of Independence)
1762 - Karl Friedrich Horn, composer
1771 - Richard Trevithick, Cornwall, inventor (steam locomotive)
1832 - James Wimshurst, British designer/inventor (electricstatic generator)
1852 - F.W. (Frank W.) Woolworth (merchant: created the five and ten cent store
[1879 in Lancaster, PA]: headed F.W. Woolworth & Co. with over 1,000 stores,
funded NY's Woolworth Building)
1866 - Butch Cassidy (Robert Leroy Parker) (old west outlaw: leader of The Wild
Bunch gang) [H]
1892 - Arthur ("Bomber") Harris, Cheltenham, Marshal of the RAF
1899 - Alfred Moser Butts, game inventor (Scrabble)
1902 - Philippe de Rothschild, Paris, manager (Bordeaux Vineyard)
1906 - Bud (Lawrence) Freeman (jazz musician: tenor sax: China Boy, Easy to Get,
I've Found a New Baby, The Eel, Mr. Toad)
1906 - Samuel Beckett (author, critic, playwright: Waiting for Godot, The
Unnamable, Eleutheria, Malone Dies, Malloy, Endgame)
1907 - Harold Stassen, W St Paul Minn, (Gov-R-Minn) perennial pres candidate
1909 - Eurora Welty (poet: Delta Wedding, Losing Battles)
1911 - Nino Sanzogno, composer
1919 - Howard Keel (Harold Leek) (actor: Dallas; singer, actor: Oklahoma, Annie
Get Your Gun, Show Boat, Lovely to Look At, Kiss Me Kate, Calamity Jane,
Rose-Marie, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Deep in My Heart, Saratoga, No
Strings)
1919 - Madalyn Murray O'Hair, American atheist (opppsed prayer in school)
1924 - Stanley Donen, SC, film director/producer (Bedazzled, Damn Yankees)
1925 - Jules Irving (actor)
1928 - Teddy Charles (musician)
1929 - Marilyn Smith (golfer)
1931 - Dan Gurney (auto racer: Indianapolis Speedway Hall of Famer; 1st driver
to win all 4 major categories: Formula One, Indy Cars, NASCAR stock and sports
cars; team owner: builds All-American Eagle)
1935 - Lyle Waggoner (actor: The Carol Burnett Show, The Jimmie Rodgers Show,
Wonder Woman)
1937 - Edward Fox, London England, actor (M-Never Say Never Again, The Day of
the Jackal)
1937 - Lanford Wilson, US playwright (Hot L Baltimore)
1939 - Paul Sorvino (actor: Law and Order, Reds, Oh! God, The Day of the
Dolphin, Dick Tracy, Goodfellas, A Touch of Class)
1939 - Seamus Heaney, poet
1940 - Jose Napoles (boxer)
1940 - Lester Chambers (singer, musician: harmonica: group: The Chamber
Brothers: Time Has Come Today)
1941 - Margaret Price, Tredegar Wales, soprano (Pamlina-Die Zauberflote)
1942 - Bill Conti, Providence RI, composer (For Your Eyes Only, Rocky IV)
1946 - Al Green (singer, songwriter: Tired of Being Alone, Let's Stay Together,
You Ought to be with Me, Here I Am, Call Me)
1946 - Wayne Colman (football)
1951 - Max Weinberg (musician: drummer: E Street Band)
1963 - Gary Kimovich Kasparov, USSR, world chess champion
Famous
deaths
1517 - Tuman Bey, last
Mamelukken sultan of Egypt, hanged
1638 - Henri II, duke of Rohan-Gi'Â, French Hugenot leader, dies at 58
1695 - Jean de La Fontaine, poet, dies
1728 - Johann Christoph Schmidt, composer, dies at 63
1742 - Giovanni Veneziano, composer, dies at 59
1756 - Johann T Gottlieb Goldberg, German klavecinist/composer, dies at 29
1806 - Jean-Jacques Bachelier, French painter, dies at about 82
1822 - Gaetano Valeri, composer, dies at 61
1826 - Franz Danzi, composer, dies at 62
1959 - Eduard A van Beinum, Dutch musician/conductor, dies at 57
1984 - Christopher Wilder, FBI's "most wanted man," kills himself
1992 - Wallace Stegner, novelist (Pulitzer 1972), dies at 84
1996 - James "Jimmy the Gent" Burke, criminal, dies at 64
1997 - George Wald, scientist (Nobel Prize, vitamin A in retina), dies at 80
