today.nukz.net: Almanac

Andrés Segovia 1893-1987

Events

362 – Athanasius returns to Alexandria.
1245 – Thomas, the first known Bishop of Finland, is granted resignation after confessing to torture and forgery.
1440 – The Prussian Confederation is formed.
1543 – Battle of Wayna Daga – A combined army of Ethiopian and Portuguese troops defeats a Muslim army led by Ahmed Gragn.
1613 – Mikhail I is elected unanimously as Tsar by a national assembly, beginning the Romanov dynasty of Imperial Russia.
1804 – The first self-propelling steam locomotive makes its outing at the Pen-y-Darren Ironworks in Wales.
1808 – Without a previous declaration of war, Russian troops cross the border to Sweden at Abborfors in eastern Finland, thus beginning the Finnish war, in which Sweden will lose the eastern half of the country (i.e. Finland) to Russia.
1842 – John Greenough is granted the first U.S. patent for the sewing machine.
1848 – Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels publish The Communist Manifesto.
1862 – American Civil War: Battle of Valverde is fought near Fort Craig in New Mexico Territory.
1874 – The Oakland Daily Tribune publishes its first edition.
1878 – The first telephone book is issued in New Haven, Connecticut.
1885 – The newly completed Washington Monument is dedicated.
1913 – Ioannina is incorporated into the Greek state after the Balkan Wars.
1916 – World War I: In France, the Battle of Verdun begins.
1918 – The last Carolina Parakeet dies in captivity at the Cincinnati Zoo.
1919 – Kurt Eisner, German socialist, is assassinated. His death results in the establishment of the Bavarian Soviet Republic and parliament and government fleeing Munich, Germany.
1921 – Constituent Assembly of the Democratic Republic of Georgia adopts the country's first constitution.
1925 – The New Yorker publishes its first issue.
1937 – Initial flight of the first successful flying car, Waldo Waterman's Arrowbile.
1937 – The League of Nations bans foreign national "volunteers" in the Spanish Civil War.
1945 – World War II: Japanese Kamikaze planes sink the escort carrier Bismarck Sea and damage the Saratoga.
1947 – In New York City, Edwin Land demonstrates the first "instant camera", the Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America.
1948 – NASCAR is incorporated.
1952 – The British government, under Winston Churchill, abolishes identity cards in the UK to "set the people free".
1952 – "???? ???????", "Bengali Language Movement" occurred in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh).
1958 – The Peace symbol, commissioned by Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in protest against the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment, is designed and completed by Gerald Holtom.
1965 – Malcolm X is assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City by members of the Nation of Islam.
1970 – Swissair Flight 330: A mid-air bomb explosion and subsequent crash kills 38 passengers and nine crew members near Zürich, Switzerland.
1971 – The Convention on Psychotropic Substances is signed at Vienna.
1972 – President Richard Nixon visits the People's Republic of China to normalize Sino-American relations.
1972 – The Soviet unmanned spaceship Luna 20 lands on the Moon.
1973 – Over the Sinai Desert, Israeli fighter aircraft shoot down Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 jet killing 108.
1974 – The last Israeli soldiers leave the west bank of the Suez Canal pursuant to a truce with Egypt.
1975 – Watergate scandal: Former United States Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman are sentenced to prison.
1995 – Steve Fossett lands in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon.
2004 – The first European political party organization, the European Greens, is established in Rome.

Births

1484 – Elector Joachim I of Brandenburg (d. 1535)
1556 – Sethus Calvisius, German calendar reformer (d. 1615)
1621 – Rebecca Nurse, English colonist executed during Salem witch trials (d. 1692)
1675 – Franz Xaver Josef von Unertl, Bavarian politician (d. 1750)
1703 – Shah Waliullah, Islamic Scholar and Reformer (d. 1762)
1705 – Edward Hawke, 1st Baron Hawke, British naval officer (d. 1781)
1721 – John McKinly, American physician (d. 1796)
1723 – Louis-Pierre Anquetil, French historian (d. 1808)
1728 – Tsar Peter III of Russia, husband of Catherine the Great (d. 1762)
1783 – Princess Catharina of Württemberg, Queen consort of Westphalia (d. 1835)
1791 – Carl Czerny, Austrian composer (d. 1857)
1794 – Antonio López de Santa Anna, Mexican president (d. 1876)
1801 – John Henry Newman, English Catholic cardinal (d. 1890)
1817 – Jose Zorrilla y Moral, Spanish dramatist (d. 1893)
1821 – Charles Scribner I, American publisher (d. 1871)
1836 – Léo Delibes, French composer (d. 1891)
1844 – Charles-Marie Widor, French composer (d. 1937)
1860 – Karel Matej Capek-Chod, Czech journalist (d. 1927)
1860 – Goscombe John, Welsh sculptor (d. 1952)
1865 – John Haden Badley, English school founder (d. 1967)
1867 – Otto Hermann Kahn, German millionaire (d. 1934)
1875 – Jeanne Calment, French supercentenarian and longest-lived human on record (d. 1997)
1876 – Pyotr Konchalovsky, Russian painter (d. 1956)
1878 – Mirra Alfassa, Indian spiritual leader (d. 1973)
1880 – Waldemar Bonsels, German writer (d. 1952)
1885 – Sacha Guitry, Russian dramatist (d. 1957)
1888 – Clemence Dane, British novelist and playwright (d. 1965)
1893 – Celia Lovsky, Russian-born actress (d. 1979)
1893 – Andrés Segovia, Spanish guitarist (d. 1987)
1895 – Henrik Dam Danish biochemist, Nobel laureate (d. 1976)
1900 – Madeleine Renaud, French theater actress (d. 1994)
1903 – Fairfax M. Cone, American advertising executive (d. 1977)
1903 – Anaïs Nin, French diarist (d. 1977)
1903 – Raymond Queneau, French poet and novelist (d. 1976)
1907 – W. H. Auden, English poet (d. 1973)
1909 – Hans Erni, Swiss painter
1910 – Douglas Bader, British pilot (d. 1982)
1910 – Carmine Galante, American gangster (d. 1979)
1910 – Eddie Waring, British sports commentator (d. 1986)
1912 – Nikita Magaloff, Russian pianist (d. 1992)
1913 – Roger Laurent, Belgian racing driver (d. 1997)
1914 – Ilmari Juutilainen, Finnish fighter pilot (d. 1999)
1915 – Ann Sheridan, American actress (d. 1967)
1917 – Lucille Bremer, American actress (d. 1996)
1921 – John Rawls, American philosopher (d. 2002)
1924 – Robert Mugabe, Prime Minister of Zimbabwe 1980-1987; President of Zimbabwe 1987-present
1925 – Sam Peckinpah, American director (d. 1984)
1927 – Erma Bombeck, American humorist (d. 1996)
1927 – Hubert de Givenchy, French fashion designer
1927 – Pierre Mercure, French-Canadian musician and composer (d. 1966)
1929 – James Beck, English actor (d. 1973)
1929 – Roberto "Chespirito" Gómez Bolaños, Mexican actor
1930 – Pedro R. Dean, Filipino Metropolitan Archbishop-emeritus of Palo
1933 – Nina Simone, American singer (d. 2003)
1934 – Rue McClanahan, American actress (d. 2010)
1935 – Mark McManus, Scottish actor (d. 1994)
1935 – Jean Pelletier, French Canadian political operative
1936 – Barbara Jordan, American politician (d. 1996)
1937 – King Harald V of Norway
1937 – Gary Lockwood, American actor
1938 – Bobby Charles, American singer and songwriter (d. 2010)
1940 – Peter Gethin, British racing driver
1940 – John Lewis, American politician and civil rights activist
1940 – Wong Jim, Hong Kong composer (d. 2004)
1942 – Margarethe von Trotta, German actress and film director
1943 – David Geffen, American record producer
1945 – D'Anna Fortunato, American mezzo-soprano
1945 – Walter Momper, German politician
1945 – Paul Newton, British musician
1946 – Tyne Daly, American actress
1946 – Anthony Daniels, British actor
1946 – Alan Rickman, English actor
1946 – Bob Ryan, Boston sports columnist
1946 – Vito Rizzuto, Sicilian-born alleged Mafia boss
1947 – Johnny Echols, American musician
1947 – Olympia Snowe, American politician
1947 – Victor Sokolov, Russian journalist (d. 2006)
1949 – Jerry Harrison, American musician
1949 – Ronnie Hellström, Swedish footballer
1951 – Wolfgang Frank, German footballer
1951 – Vince Welnick, American musician (The Grateful Dead) (d. 2006)
1952 – Jean Jacques Burnel, British musician
1952 – Jeffrey Shaara, American novelist
1953 – Christine Ebersole, American actress
1953 – William Petersen, American actor
1954 – Mike Pickering, English disc jockey and musician
1954 – Ivo Van Damme, Belgian athlete (d. 1976)
1955 – Kelsey Grammer, American actor
1958 – Jake Burns, Irish singer
1958 – Mary Chapin Carpenter, American singer
1958 – Jack Coleman, American actor
1958 – Alan Trammell, baseball player and manager
1959 – José María Cano, Spanish musician
1959 – Emmett McAuliffe, American radio show host and lawyer
1960 – Laurent Petitguillaume, French radio and television host
1960 – Steve Wynn, American singer
1961 – Christopher Atkins, American actor
1961 – Bertha Faye, American wrestler (d. 2001)
1961 – Martha Hackett, American actress
1962 – Vanessa Feltz, British television presenter
1962 – Chuck Palahniuk, American writer
1962 – David Foster Wallace, American writer (d. 2008)
1963 – William Baldwin, American actor
1964 – Huw Higginson, British actor
1964 – Mark and Scott Kelly, American astronauts and identical twin brothers
1964 – Jane Tomlinson, British cancer campaigner (d. 2007)
1967 – Leroy Burrell, American runner
1969 – James Dean Bradfield, Welsh musician
1969 – Aunjanue Ellis, American actress
1969 – Corey Harris, American musician
1969 – Tony Meola, American footballer
1969 – Eric Wilson, American musician
1969 – Chen Wei, Chinese dissident
1970 – Michael Slater, Australian cricketer
1970 – Fat Pat, American rapper (Screwed Up Click) (d. 1998)
1971 – Randy Blythe, American musician
1972 – Seo Taiji, Korean musician
1973 – Jacob M. Appel, American bioethicist
1973 – Heri Joensen, Faroese musician
1973 – Brian Rolston, American ice hockey player
1973 – Justin Sane, American punk musician
1973 – Bowie Tsang, Taiwanese singer and TV host
1974 – Iván Campo, Spanish footballer
1974 – Roberto Heras, Spanish cyclist
1975 – Wish Bone, American rapper (Bone Thugs-N-Harmony)
1975 – Troy Slaten, American actor
1976 – Michael McIntyre English Comedian
1976 – Ryan Smyth, Canadian hockey player
1977 – Steve Francis, American basketball player
1977 – Chad Hutchinson, baseball and football player
1977 – Owen King, American writer and journalist
1977 – Kevin Rose, American television host and Internet entrepreneur
1978 – Park Eun-hye, South Korean actress
1978 – Kim Ha Neul, South Korean actress
1978 – Nicole Parker, American actress
1979 – Pascal Chimbonda, French footballer
1979 – Carly "Carlito" Colón, Puerto Rican professional wrestler
1979 – Lonnie Ford, American football player
1979 – Jennifer Love Hewitt, American actress
1980 – Brad Fast, Canadian ice hockey player
1980 – Tiziano Ferro, Italian singer
1980 – Yannick Lupien, Canadian freestyle swimmer
1980 – Parthiva Sureshwaren, Indian racing driver
1980 – Jim Vandermeer, Canadian ice hockey player
1980 – Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, 5th king of Bhutan
1981 – Jun Kaname, Japanese actor
1982 – Bernhard Auinger, Austrian racing driver
1982 – Andre Barrett, American basketball player
1982 – Chantal Claret, American musician
1983 – Braylon Edwards, American football player
1983 – Franklin Gutiérrez, Venezuelan baseball player
1983 – Mélanie Laurent, French actress and director
1984 – Andrew Ellis, New Zealand All Black rugby union player
1984 – David Odonkor, German footballer
1984 – Marco Paoloni, Italian footballer
1984 – Karina, Japanese model and actress
1984 – James Wisniewski, American ice hockey player
1985 – Jarrod Atkinson, Australian rules footballer
1985 – Bob Burton, American speedcuber
1985 – Simon Cusden, English cricketer
1985 – Georgios Samaras, Greek footballer
1985 – Jamaal Westerman, Canadian football player
1986 – Charlotte Church, Welsh singer
1986 – Prince Amedeo of Belgium, Archduke of Austria-Este
1987 – Ellen Page, Canadian actress
1987 – Ashley Greene, American model and actress
1987 – Enrique David Mateo, Brazilian footballer
1988 – Matthias de Zordo, German javelin thrower
1989 – Corbin Bleu, American actor and singer
1989 – Kristin Herrera, American actress
1989 – Jem Karacan, English-born Turkish footballer
1989 – Scout Taylor-Compton, American actress
1989 – Josh Walker, English footballer
1990 – Mattias Tedenby, Swedish ice hockey player
2001 – Isabella Acres, American actress

Deaths

1437 – King James I of Scotland (b. 1394)
1471 – John of Rokycan, Czech Hussite theologian
1513 – Pope Julius II (b. 1443)
1543 – Ahmed Gragn, Sultan of Adal
1554 – Hieronymus Bock, German botanist (b. 1498)
1595 – Robert Southwell, English Jesuit priest and poet
1668 – John Thurloe, English Puritan spy (b. 1616)
1677 – Baruch Spinoza, Dutch philosopher (b. 1632)
1715 – Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore, Governor of the Province of Maryland (b. 1637)
1730 – Pope Benedict XIII (b. 1649)
1788 – Johann Georg Palitzsch, German astronomer (b. 1723)
1821 – Georg Friedrich von Martens, German diplomat (b. 1756)
1824 – Eugène de Beauharnais, son of Napoleon's wife, Josephine (b. 1781)
1846 – Emperor Ninko of Japan (b. 1800)
1862 – Justinus Kerner, German poet (b. 1786)
1900 – Marthinus Nikolaas Ras, South African Gunmaker (b. 1853)
1901 – George Francis Fitzgerald, Irish mathematician (b. 1851)
1919 – Kurt Eisner, German socialist (assassinated), leader of socialist revolution of 1918 in Bavaria (b. 1867)
1920 – Jacinta Marto, witness of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Fatima (b. 1910)
1926 – Heike Kamerlingh Onnes, Dutch physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1853)
1934 – Augusto Nicolás Calderón Sandino, Nicaraguan revolutionary (b. 1895)
1938 – George Ellery Hale, American astronomer (b. 1868)
1941 – Frederick Banting, Canadian physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1891)
1944 – Ferenc Szisz, Hungarian-born race car driver (b. 1873)
1945 – Eric Liddell, Scottish runner (b. 1902)
1946 – José Streel, Belgian World War II collaborator (b. 1911)
1949 – Tan Malaka, Indonesian nationalist activist and communist leader (b. 1894)
1958 – Duncan Edwards, English footballer (b. 1936)
1960 – Jacques Becker, French film director and screenwriter (b. 1906)
1965 – Malcolm X, Black American civil rights leader (b. 1925)
1966 – Paul Comtois, French Canadian politician (b. 1895)
1967 – Charles Beaumont, American writer (b. 1929)
1968 – Howard Walter Florey, Australian-born pharmacologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1898)
1972 – Zhang Guohua, Chinese general and politician (b. 1914)
1972 – Bronislava Nijinska, Polish-Russian ballet dancer (b. 1891)
1972 – Eugène Tisserant, French Catholic Cardinal (b. 1884)
1974 – Tim Horton, Canadian hockey player (b. 1930)
1977 – Nolan Strong, a Detroit doo-wop singer with The Diablos (b. 1934)
1978 – Mieczyslaw Zywczynski, Polish historian and priest (b. 1901)
1980 – Alfred Andersch, German writer (b. 1914)
1981 – Erika Köth, German coloratura soprano (b. 1927)
1982 – Murray the K, American impresario and disc jockey (b. 1922)
1982 – Gershom Scholem, German-born Israeli Jewish philosopher and historian (b. 1897)
1984 – Michail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov, Russian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1905)
1985 – Louis Hayward, British actor (b. 1909)
1986 – Helen Hooven Santmyer, American writer (b. 1895)
1987 – Noel Odell, English mountaineer, last person to see Mallory and Irvine alive (b. 1890)
1989 – Alex Thépot, French footballer (b. 1906)
1991 – Dorothy Auchterlonie, Australian academic, literary critic and poet (b. 1915)
1991 – Nutan Behl, Indian actress (b. 1936)
1991 – Dame Margot Fonteyn, English ballet dancer (b. 1919)
1994 – Johannes Steinhoff, German fighter pilot & NATO commander (b. 1913)
1995 – Jorge José Emiliano dos Santos, Brazilian Football Referee (b. 1954)
1996 – Morton Gould, American composer (b. 1913)
1999 – Gertrude B. Elion, American scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1918)
1999 – Ilmari Juutilainen, Finnish fighter pilot (b. 1914)
1999 – Wilmer David Mizell, baseball player (b. 1930)
2000 – Antonio Díaz-Miguel, Spanish basketball coach (b. 1933)
2002 – Harold Furth, Austrian-born physicist (b. 1939)
2002 – John Thaw, English actor (b. 1942)
2003 – Eddie Thomson, Scottish football player and coach (b. 1947)
2004 – John Charles, Welsh footballer (b. 1931)
2004 – Albert Chartier, Canadian cartoonist (b. 1912)
2004 – Guido Molinari, Canadian artist (b. 1933)
2005 – Ara Berberian, American opera singer (b. 1930)
2005 – Gérard Bessette, French-Canadian novelist and poet (b. 1920)
2005 – Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Cuban novelist (b. 1929)
2005 – Eugene Scott, American religious broadcaster (b. 1929)
2008 – Ben Chapman, American actor (b. 1928)
2008 – Neil Chotem, Canadien conductor, composer and arranger (b. 1920)
2008 – Sunny Lowry, first British woman to swim the English Channel (b. 1911)
2011 – Bernard Nathanson, American abortionist turned pro-life activist (b. 1926)
2011 – Dwayne McDuffie, American writer of comic books and television (b. 1962)