On This day in History May 31

May 31 – Events:

• 1279 BC – Rameses II (The Great) (19th dynasty) becomes pharaoh of Ancient Egypt.
• 1223 – Mongol invasion of the Cumans: Battle of the Kalka River – Mongol armies of Genghis Khan lead by Subutai defeat Kievan Rus and Cumans.
• 1578 – Martin Frobisher sails from Harwich, England to Frobisher Bay, Canada, eventually to mine fool’s gold, used to pave streets in London.
• 1669 – Citing poor eyesight, Samuel Pepys records the last event in his diary.
• 1678 – The Godiva procession through Coventry begins.
• 1759 – The Province of Pennsylvania bans all theater productions.
• 1775 – American Revolutionary War: The Mecklenburg Resolutions adopted urging the American Colonies to declare independence from Great Britain.
• 1790 – Alferez Manuel Quimper explores the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
• 1790 – The United States enacts its first copyright statute, the Copyright Act of 1790.
• 1813 – In Australia, Lawson, Blaxland and Wentworth, reached Mount Blaxland, effectively marking the end of a route across the Blue Mountains.
• 1862 – American Civil War Peninsula Campaign: Battle of Seven Pines or (Battle of Fair Oaks) – Confederate forces under Joseph E. Johnston & G. W. Smith engage Union forces under George B. McClellan outside Richmond, Virginia.
• 1864 – American Civil War Overland Campaign: Battle of Cold Harbor – The Army of Northern Virginia under Robert E. Lee engages the Army of the Potomac under Ulysses S. Grant & George G. Meade.
• 1866 – In the Fenian Invasion of Canada, John O’Neill leads 850 Fenian raiders across the Niagara River at Buffalo, New York/Fort Erie, Ontario, as part of an effort to free Ireland from the English. Canadian militia and British regulars repulse the invaders in over the next three days, at a cost of 9 dead and 38 wounded to the Fenian’s 19 dead and about 17 wounded.
• 1889 – Johnstown Flood: Over 2,200 people die after a dam break sends a 60-foot (18-meter) wall of water over the town of Johnstown, Pennsylvania.
• 1902 – Second Boer War: The Treaty of Vereeniging ends the war and ensures British control of South Africa.
• 1910 – Creation of the Union of South Africa.
• 1911 – R.M.S. Titanic launched.
• 1916 – World War I: Battle of Jutland – The British Grand Fleet under the command of Sir John Jellicoe & Sir David Beatty engage the Kaiserliche Marine under the command of Reinhard Scheer & Franz von Hipper in the largest naval battle of the war, which proves indecisive.
• 1921 – Tulsa Race Riot: A civil unrest in Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA, the official death toll is 39.
• 1924 – The Soviet Union signs an agreement with the Peking government, referring to Outer Mongolia as an “integral part of the Republic of China,” whose “sovereignty” therein the Soviet Union promises to respect.
• 1927 – The last Ford Model T rolls off the assembly line after a production run of 15,007,003 vehicles.
• 1931 – 7.1 magnitude Earthquake destroys Quetta in modern-day Pakistan: 40,000 dead.
• 1942 – World War II: Imperial Japanese Navy midget submarines begin a series of attacks on Sydney, Australia.
• 1961 – Republic of South Africa created.
• 1962 – The West Indies Federation dissolves.
• 1970 – The Ancash earthquake causes a landslide that buries the town of Yungay, Peru; more than 47,000 people are killed.
• 1971 – In accordance with the Uniform Monday Holiday Act passed by the U.S. Congress in 1968, observation of Memorial Day occurs on the last Monday in May for the first time, rather than on the traditional Memorial Day of May 30.
• 1973 – The United States Senate votes to cut off funding for the bombing of Khmer Rouge targets within Cambodia, hastening the end of the Cambodian Civil War.
• 1977 – The Trans-Alaska Pipeline System completed.
• 1985 – United States-Canadian Outbreak: Forty-one tornadoes hit Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, and Ontario, leaving 76 dead.
• 1985 – Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) became a Schedule I drug in the United States.
• 1987 – Athena 98.4 FM, the first legal private radio station starts broadcasting in Greece.
• 1997 – The Confederation Bridge opens, linking Prince Edward Island with mainland New Brunswick.

May 31 – Birthdays:

• 1048 – Omar Khayyám, Persian philosopher (d. 1131)
• 1443 – Lady Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII of England (d. 1509)
• 1469 – Manuel I of Portugal (d. 1521)
• 1522 – Guido de Bres, Belgian theologian (d. 1587)
• 1535 – Alessandro Allori, Italian painter (d. 1607)
• 1557 – Feodor I of Russia (d. 1598)
• 1613 – John George II, Elector of Saxony (d. 1680)
• 1640 – Michal Wisniowiecki, King of Poland (d. 1673)
• 1656 – Marin Marais, French composer (d. 1728)
• 1753 – Pierre Victurnien Vergniaud, French revolutionary (d. 1793)
• 1754 – Andrea Appiani, Italian painter (d. 1817)
• 1773 – Ludwig Tieck, German writer (d. 1853)
• 1801 – Johann Georg Baiter, Swiss philologist (d. 1887)
• 1818 – John Albion Andrew, 25th Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1867)
• 1819 – Walt Whitman, American poet (d. 1892)
• 1835 – Hijikata Toshizo, Japanese military leader (d. 1869)
• 1838 – Henry Sidgwick, English philosopher (d. 1900)
• 1852 – Francisco Moreno, Argentine explorer (d. 1919)
• 1857 – Pope Pius XI (d. 1939)
• 1860 – Walter Sickert, English painter (d. 1942)
• 1863 – Francis Younghusband, British explorer (d. 1942)
• 1872 – Heath Robinson, English cartoonist (d. 1944)
• 1882 – Sándor Graf Festetics, Hungarian politician (d. 1956)
• 1883 – Lauri Kristian Relander, 2nd President of Finland (d. 1942)
• 1885 – Alois Hudal, bishop, helped Nazis escape trial (d. 1963)
• 1887 – Saint-John Perse, French diplomat, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1975)
• 1892 – Michel Kikoine, Belarus painter (d. 1968)
• 1892 – Konstantin Georgiyevich Paustovsky, Russian writer (d. 1968)
• 1894 – Fred Allen, American comedian (d. 1956)
• 1898 – Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, American clergyman (d. 1993)
• 1901 – Alfredo Antonini, American conductor and composer (d. 1983)
• 1905 – Florence Desmond, English actress and comedian (d. 1993)
• 1908 – Don Ameche, American actor (d. 1993)
• 1908 – Nils Poppe, Swedish actor (d. 2000)
• 1909 – Aurore Gagnon, French Canadian victim of child abuse (d. 1920)
• 1911 – Maurice Allais, French economist, Nobel Prize laureate
• 1912 – Alfred Deller, English countertenor (d. 1979)
• 1916 – Bert Haanstra, Dutch filmmaker (d. 1997)
• 1921 – Alida Valli, Italian actress (d. 2006)
• 1921 – Howard Reig, American radio and television announcer
• 1922 – Denholm Elliott, English actor (d. 1992)
• 1923 – Rainier III, Prince of Monaco (d. 2005)
• 1930 – Clint Eastwood, American film director and actor
• 1931 – John Robert Schrieffer, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• 1931 – Shirley Verrett, American soprano
• 1932 – Jay Miner, American microchip designer (d. 1994)
• 1935 – Jim Bolger, 35th Prime Minister of New Zealand
• 1938 – Johnny Paycheck, American singer (d. 2003)
• 1938 – John Prescott, Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
• 1938 – Peter Yarrow, American folk singer (Peter, Paul and Mary)
• 1939 – Terry Waite, British humanitarian
• 1940 – Gilbert Shelton, American underground comics illustrator
• 1941 – Louis J. Ignarro, American pharmacologist, Nobel Prize laureate
• 1943 – Sharon Gless, American actress
• 1943 – Joe Namath, American football player
• 1945 – Rainer Werner Fassbinder, German film director (d. 1982)
• 1945 – Bernard Goldberg?, American journalist
• 1946 – Ted Baehr, American media critic
• 1948 – John Bonham, British musician (Led Zeppelin) (d. 1980)
• 1949 – Tom Berenger, American actor
• 1949 – Nancy Shade, American soprano
• 1950 – Gregory Harrison, American actor
• 1952 – Karl Bartos, German musician (Kraftwerk, Electronic)
• 1953 – Pirkka-Pekka Petelius, Finnish actor
• 1954 – Vicki Sue Robinson, American singer (d. 2000)
• 1954 – Thomas Mavros, Greek footballer
• 1956 – Fritz Hilpert, German musician and sound engineer (Kraftwerk)
• 1957 – Jim Craig, American hockey player
• 1959 – Andrea de Cesaris, Italian racing driver
• 1960 – Greg C. Adams, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1960 – Chris Elliott, American comedian
• 1961 – Ray Cote, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1961 – Lea Thompson, American actress
• 1962 – Corey Hart, Canadian musician
• 1962 – Sebastian Koch, German actor
• 1963 – Teresa Cheung, Hong Kong socialite
• 1963 – Hugh Dillon, Canadian musician and actor
• 1963 – Viktor Orbán, Hungarian politician
• 1963 – Wesley Willis, American musician (d. 2003)
• 1964 – Leonard Asper, Canadian businessman
• 1964 – Scotti Hill, American rock guitarist
• 1964 – Darryl McDaniels, American musician (Run-D.M.C.)
• 1965 – Brooke Shields, American model
• 1966 – Jeremy Hotz, Canadian stand-up comedian
• 1966 – Nick Scotti, American actor and singer
• 1967 – Sandrine Bonnaire, French actress
• 1967 – Phil Keoghan, New Zealand television personality
• 1967 – Kenny Lofton, American baseball player
• 1967 – Vampiro, Canadian professional wrestler
• 1972 – Frode Estil, Norwegian cross-country skier
• 1972 – Sarah Murdoch, English model
• 1972 – Karl Geary, Irish actor
• 1972 – Dave Roberts, American baseball player
• 1974 – Chad Campbell, American golfer
• 1974 – Zsolt Erdei, Hungarian light heavyweight boxer
• 1974 – Adrian Tomine, American cartoonist
• 1975 – Sienna Guillory, English actress
• 1976 – Colin Farrell, Irish actor
• 1977 – Theodoros Baev, Bulgarian-born Greek volleyball player
• 1977 – Debbie King, English TV presenter
• 1977 – Scott Klopfenstein, American musician (Reel Big Fish)
• 1980 – Andy Hurley, American musician (Fall Out Boy)
• 1981 – Jake Peavy, American baseball player
• 1983 – Dustin Wells, New Zealand footballer
• 1983 – Reggie Yates, English television presenter
• 1984 – Nate Robinson, American basketball player
• 1984 – Jason Smith, Australian actor
• 1985 – Ian Vouyoukas, Greek basketball player
• 1986 – Sopho Khalvashi, Georgian musical artist
• 1986 – Melissa McIntyre, Canadian actress
• 1986 – Robert Gesink, Dutch cyclist
• 1988 – Hope Partlow, American Singer

May 31 – Deaths:

• 1246 – Isabella of Angouleme, queen of John of England
• 1349 – Thomas Wake, English politician (b. 1297)
• 1408 – Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, Japanese shogun (b. 1358)
• 1410 – King Martin I of Aragon (b. 1356)
• 1495 – Cecily Neville, mother of Edward IV of England and Richard III of England (b. 1415)
• 1558 – Philip Hoby, English politician (b. 1505)
• 1594 – Tintoretto, Italian painter (b. 1518)
• 1680 – Joachim Neander, German clergyman (b. 1650)
• 1740 – King Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia (b. 1688)
• 1747 – Andrei Osterman, Russian statesman (b. 1686)
• 1799 – Pierre Lemonnier, French astronomer (b. 1715)
• 1809 – Joseph Haydn, Austrian composer (b. 1732)
• 1809 – Jean Lannes, French marshal (b. 1769)
• 1831 – Samuel Bentham, British mechanical engineer (b. 1757)
• 1832 – Évariste Galois, French mathematician (b. 1811)
• 1837 – Joseph Grimaldi, British clown (b. 1779)
• 1846 – Philip Marheineke, German clergyman (b. 1780)
• 1847 – Thomas Chalmers, Scottish pastor (b. 1780)
• 1848 – Eugénie de Guérin, French writer (b. 1805)
• 1908 – Louis-Honoré Fréchette, French Canadian poet (b. 1839)
• 1910 – Elizabeth Blackwell, American physician (b. 1821)
• 1945 – Odilo Globocnik, Austrian nazi (b. 1904)
• 1957 – Leopold Staff, Polish poet (b. 1878)
• 1960 – Willem Elsschot, Flemish writer (b. 1882)
• 1960 – Walther Funk, Nazi leader (b. 1890)
• 1961 – Walter Little, Canadian politician (b. 1877)
• 1962 – Henry Fountain Ashurst, American politician (b. 1874)
• 1967 – Billy Strayhorn, American composer, pianist and arranger (b. 1915)
• 1970 – Terry Sawchuk, hockey player (b. 1929)
• 1972 – Walter Freeman, American physician (b. 1895)
• 1976 – Jacques Monod, French biologist, Nobel laureate (b. 1910)
• 1977 – William Castle, American director (b. 1914)
• 1978 – József Bozsik, Hungarian footballer (b. 1925)
• 1983 – Jack Dempsey, American boxer (b. 1895)
• 1986 – Jane Frank (Jane Schenthal Frank), American artist (b. 1918)
• 1986 – James Rainwater, American physicist, Nobel laureate (b. 1917)
• 1987 – John Abraham (Director), Indian film director
• 1993 – Spuds Mackenzie, American advertisement dog
• 1994 – Herva Nelli, Italian-born soprano (b. 1909)
• 1996 – Timothy Leary, American professor and LSD advocate (b. 1920)
• 1997 – James Bennett Griffin, American archaeologist (b. 1905)
• 1998 – Charles Van Acker, Belgian racing driver (b. 1912)
• 2000 – Tito Puente, American musician (b. 1923)
• 2000 – Johnnie Taylor, American singer (b. 1938)
• 2001 – Arlene Francis, American television personality (d. 1907)
• 2004 – Robert Quine, American guitarist (b. 1941)
• 2004 – Étienne Roda-Gil, French songwriter and screenwriter (b. 1941)
• 2006 – Ryan Bennett, broadcast commentator (b. 1970)
• 2006 – Miguel Berrocal, sculptor (b. 1933)
• 2006 – Raymond Davis Jr., American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1914)
• 2006 – Lula Mae Hardaway, American songwriter (b. 1930), mother of singer Stevie Wonder

May 31 – Holidays:

• The Godiva procession.
• World No Tobacco Day.
• Syaday (Discordianism).
• The Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
• Memorial Day in USA (last Monday in May)

On This Day in History May 30

May 30 – Events:

• 1416 – The Council of Constance, called by the Emperor Sigismund, a supporter of Antipope John XXIII, burns Jerome of Prague following a trial for heresy.
• 1431 – Hundred Years’ War: In Rouen, France, 19-year-old Joan of Arc burned at the stake by an English-dominated tribunal.
• 1434 – Hussite Wars (Bohemian Wars): Battle of Lipany – effectively ending the war, Utraquist forces led by Diviš Borek of Miletínek defeat and almost annihilated Taborite forces led by Prokop the Great.
• 1536 – King Henry VIII of England marries Jane Seymour, a lady-in-waiting to his first two wives.
• 1539 – In Florida, Hernando de Soto lands at Tampa Bay with 600 soldiers with the goal of finding gold.
• 1574 – Henry III becomes King of France.
• 1588 – The last ship of the Spanish Armada sets sail from Lisbon heading for the English Channel.
• 1635 – Thirty Years’ War: Peace of Prague (1635) signed.
• 1806 – Andrew Jackson kills Charles Dickinson in a duel after the man had accused Jackson’s wife of bigamy.
• 1814 – Napoleonic Wars: War of the Sixth Coalition – Treaty of Paris (1814) signed returning French borders to their 1792 extent.
• 1832 – The Rideau Canal in eastern Ontario is first opened.
• 1854 – The Kansas-Nebraska Act becomes law establishing the US territories of Nebraska and Kansas.
• 1868 – Decoration Day (the predecessor of the modern “Memorial Day”) observed in the United States for the first time.
• 1871 – The Paris Commune falls.
• 1876 – Ottoman sultan Abd-ul-Aziz is deposed and succeeded by his nephew Murat V.
• 1879 – New York City’s Gilmores Garden is renamed Madison Square Garden by William Henry Vanderbilt and is opened to the public at 26^th Street and Madison Avenue.
• 1879 – An F4 tornado strikes Irving, Kansas, killing 18 and injuring 60.
• 1883 – In New York City, a rumor that the Brooklyn Bridge is going to collapse causes a stampede which crushes twelve people.
• 1911 – At the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the first Indianapolis 500 ends with Ray Harroun becoming the first winner of the 500-mile auto race in his Marmon Wasp.
• 1913 – First Balkan War: Treaty of London, 1913 signed ending the war. Albania becomes an independent nation.
• 1914 – New and then largest Cunard ocean liner RMS Aquitania, 45,647 tons, sails on her maiden voyage from Liverpool, England to New York City.
• 1917 – Alexander I becomes king of Greece.
• 1922 – In Washington, D.C., the Lincoln Memorial is dedicated.
• 1935 – Babe Ruth plays in his last baseball game, in the uniform of the Boston Braves.
• 1941 – World War II: Germany captures Crete.
• 1941 – World War II: Manolis Glezos and Apostolos Santas climb on the athenian Acropolis, tear down the Nazi swastika and replace it with the Greek flag.
• 1942 – World War II: 1000 British bombers launch a 90-minute attack on Cologne, Germany.
• 1948 – A dike along the flooding Columbia River breaks, obliterating Vanport, Oregon within minutes. Fifteen people die and tens of thousands are left homeless.
• 1953 – The Auckland Harbour Bridge was officially opened today in Auckland, New Zealand.
• 1956 – Composer Karlheinz Stockhausen premieres his piece Gesang der Jünglinge in Cologne.
• 1958 – Memorial Day: The remains of two unidentified American servicemen, killed in action during World War II and the Korean War, are buried at the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington National Cemetery.
• 1966 – Former Congolese Prime Minister Evariste Kimba and several other politicians are publicly executed in Kinshasa on the orders of President Joseph Mobutu.
• 1967 – At the Ascot Park in Gardena, California, daredevil Evel Knievel jumps his motorcycle over 16 cars lined-up in a row.
• 1967 – The Nigerian Eastern Region declares independence as the Republic of Biafra, sparking a civil war.
• 1969 – Riots on the Caribbean island of Curaçao
• 1971 – Mariner program: Mariner 9 launched to Map 70% of the surface and study temporal changes in the atmosphere and surface of Mars.
• 1972 – The Angry Brigade goes on trial over a series of 25 bombings throughout Britain.
• 1972 – In Tel Aviv, members of the Japanese Red Army carry out the Lod Airport Massacre, killing 24 people and injuring 78 others.
• 1982 – Spain becomes the 16th member of NATO and the first nation to enter the alliance since West Germany’s admission in 1955.
• 1989 – Tiananmen Square protests of 1989: The 33-foot high “Goddess of Democracy” statue is unveiled in Tiananmen Square by student demonstrators.
• 1998 – A magnitude 6.6 earthquake hits northern Afghanistan, killing up to 5,000.

May 30 – Birthdays:

• 1010 – Emperor Renzong of China (d. 1063)
• 1423 – Georg Purbach, German mathematician and astronomer (d. 1461)
• 1623 – John Egerton, 2nd Earl of Bridgewater, English politician (d. 1686)
• 1653 – Claudia Felicitas of Austria, Empress consort of Germany (d. 1676)
• 1672 – Peter the Great, Tsar of Russia (d. 1725)
• 1713 – Princess Caroline Elizabeth of Great Britain (d. 1757)
• 1718 – Wills Hill, 1st Marquess of Downshire, English politician (d. 1793)
• 1719 – Roger Newdigate, English politician (d. 1806)
• 1757 – Henry Addington, 1st Viscount Sidmouth, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1844)
• 1814 – Mikhail Bakunin, Russian anarchist (d. 1876)
• 1814 – Eugène Charles Catalan, Belgian mathematician (d. 1894)
• 1819 – William McMurdo, British army officer (d. 1894)
• 1820 – Pierre-Joseph-Olivier Chauveau, French Canadian politician (d. 1890)
• 1845 – King Amadeo I of Spain (d. 1890)
• 1846 – Carl Faberge, Russian goldsmith and jeweler (d. 1920)
• 1858 – Siegfried Alkan, German composer (d. 1941)
• 1875 – Giovanni Gentile, Italian philosopher (d. 1944)
• 1878 – Mike Donlin, baseball player (d. 1933)
• 1879 – Colin Blythe, English cricketer (d. 1917)
• 1881 – Georg von Küchler, German field marshal (d. 1968)
• 1882 – Wyndham Halswelle, Scottish runner (d. 1915)
• 1886 – Randolph Bourne, American writer (d. 1918)
• 1895 – Maurice Tate, English cricketer (d. 1956)
• 1896 – Howard Hawks, American film director (d. 1977)
• 1899 – Irving Thalberg, American film producer (d. 1936)
• 1901 – Cornelia Otis Skinner, American writer and actress (d. 1979)
• 1902 – Stepin Fetchit, American dancer and actor (d. 1985)
• 1903 – Countee Cullen, American writer (d. 1946)
• 1906 – Bruno Gröning, German faith healer (d. 1959)
• 1907 – Elly Beinhorn, German pilot
• 1908 – Hannes Alfvén, Swedish physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1995)
• 1908 – Mel Blanc, American voice actor (d. 1989)
• 1909 – Benny Goodman, American clarinetist and bandleader (d. 1986)
• 1910 – Ralph Metcalfe, American athlete (d. 1978)
• 1910 – Inge Meysel, German actress (d. 2004)
• 1912 – Julius Axelrod, American biochemist and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2004)
• 1912 – Erich Bagge, German physicist
• 1912 – Hugh Griffith, Welsh actor (d. 1980)
• 1918 – Guadalupe “Pita” Amor, Mexican poet (d. 2000)
• 1918 – Bob Evans, American restaurateur (d. 2007)
• 1919 – René Barrientos, President of Bolivia (d. 1969)
• 1920 – Franklin Schaffner, American film director (d. 1989)
• 1922 – Hal Clement, American writer (d. 2003)
• 1926 – Christine Jorgensen, American transsexual activist (d. 1989)
• 1927 – Clint Walker, American actor
• 1928 – Agnès Varda, French director
• 1928 – Pro Hart, Australian artist (d. 2006)
• 1930 – Mark Birley, British nightclub owner (d. 2007)
• 1930 – Robert Ryman, American painter
• 1932 – Pauline Oliveros, American composer and accordionist
• 1934 – Aleksei Leonov, Russian cosmonaut
• 1934 – Alketas Panagoulias, Greek footballer and coach
• 1936 – Keir Dullea, American actor
• 1939 – Michael J. Pollard, American actor
• 1939 – Dieter Quester, Austrian racing driver
• 1940 – Gilles Villemure, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1943 – James Chaney, American civil rights activist (d. 1964)
• 1943 – Gale Sayers, American football player
• 1944 – Meredith MacRae, American actress (d. 2000)
• 1945 – Norman Eshley, English actor
• 1947 – Jocelyne Bourassa, French Canadian LPGA golfer
• 1948 – Michael Piller, American screenwriter (d. 2005)
• 1949 – P.J. Carlesimo, American basketball coach
• 1950 – Bertrand Delanoë, French politician
• 1950 – Paresh Rawal, Indian actor
• 1951 – Stephen Tobolowsky, American actor
• 1951 – Zdravko Colic, Yugoslav-Bosnian singer
• 1953 – Colm Meaney, Irish actor
• 1955 – Topper Headon, British musician (The Clash)
• 1956 – Robert F. Newmyer, American film producer (d. 2005)
• 1958 – Marie Fredriksson, Swedish singer and songwriter (Roxette)
• 1958 – Steve Israel, American politician, member of the United States House of Representatives (D-New York)
• 1959 – Frank Vanhecke, Belgian politician
• 1961 – Harry Enfield, British comedian
• 1962 – Kevin Eastman, American comic book creator
• 1962 – Tonya Pinkins, American actress
• 1964 – Wynonna Judd, American Country/Bluegrass Singer
• 1964 – Tom Morello, American guitarist (Audioslave, Rage Against the Machine)
• 1964 – Andrea Montermini, Italian racing driver
• 1966 – Stephen Malkmus, American musician (Pavement)
• 1967 – Tim Burgess, English singer (The Charlatans)
• 1968 – Zacarias Moussaoui, French citizen found guilty relating to September 11, 2001 attacks
• 1970 – Flora Chan, Hong Kong television actress
• 1970 – Ness Wadia, Indian industrialist
• 1971 – Idina Menzel, American actress and singer
• 1972 – Manny Ramírez, Major League Baseball player
• 1972 – Soichiro Hoshi, Japanese seiyuu
• 1973 – Leigh Francis, British comedian
• 1974 – Cee-Lo, American musician
• 1974 – Big L, American rapper (d. 1999)
• 1974 – Konstantinos Chalkias, Greek footballer
• 1974 – Shin Ha-kyun, South Korean actor
• 1974 – David Wilkie, American ice hockey player
• 1975 – Andrew Farrell, English rugby league and union footballer
• 1976 – Radoslav Nesterovic, Slovenian basketball player
• 1976 – Magnus Norman, Swedish tennis player
• 1977 – Akwá, Angolan footballer
• 1977 – Rachael Stirling, British actress
• 1979 – Mike Bishai, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1979 – Kugimiya Rie, Japanese seiyuu (voice actress)
• 1980 – Steven Gerrard, English footballer
• 1981 – Devendra Banhart, American singer and songwriter
• 1981 – Blake Bashoff, American actor
• 1981 – Gianmaria Bruni, Italian racing driver
• 1981 – Ahmad Elrich, Australian footballer
• 1982 – Eddie Griffin, American basketball player (d. 2007)
• 1984 – Matt Maguire, Australian rules footballer

May 30 – Deaths:

• 1159 – Wladislaus II the Exile of Poland (b. 1105)
• 1252 – King Ferdinand III of Castile
• 1416 – Jerome of Prague, Czech theologian (executed) (b. 1379)
• 1431 – Joan of Arc, French heroine and saint (burned at the stake) (b. 1412)
• 1434 – Prokop the Great, Hussite general
• 1469 – Lope de Barrientos —a powerful bishop in Castile
• 1574 – King Charles IX of France (b. 1550)
• 1576 – Harada Naomasa, Japanese retainer and samurai
• 1593 – Christopher Marlowe, English playwright (b. 1564)
• 1640 – Peter Paul Rubens, Flemish painter (b. 1577)
• 1696 – Henry Capell, 1st Baron Capell, First Lord of the British Admiralty (b.1638)
• 1718 – Arnold Joost van Keppel, 1st Earl of Albemarle, Dutch favorite of William III of England (b. 1670)
• 1730 – Arabella Churchill, English mistress of James II of England (b. 1648)
• 1744 – Alexander Pope, English writer (b. 1688)
• 1770 – François Boucher, French painter (b. 1703)
• 1778 – Voltaire, French philosopher and author (b. 1694)
• 1865 – John Catron, United States Supreme Court Justice
• 1868 – Souji Okita, 1st Captain of the Shinsengumi (b. 1823)
• 1901 – Victor D’Hondt, Belgian mathematician (b. 1841)
• 1912 – Wilbur Wright, aviation pioneer (Wright Brothers) (b. 1867)
• 1918 – Georgi Plekhanov, Russian revolutionary and Marxist theoretician (b. 1856)
• 1925 – Arthur Moeller van den Bruck, German historian (b. 1876)
• 1926 – Vladimir Steklov, Russian physicist (b. 1864)
• 1934 – Togo Heihachiro, Japanese admiral (b. 1848)
• 1939 – Floyd Roberts, Auto racer, killed during 1939 Indianapolis 500 (b. 1904)
• 1941 – Prajadhipok, Rama VII, king of Thailand (b. 1893)
• 1946 – Louis Slotin, Canadian Scientist at Los Alamos (b. 1910)
• 1947 – Georg Ritter von Trapp, World War I Austrian submarine commander (b. 1880)
• 1951 – Hermann Broch, Austrian author (b. 1886)
• 1953 – Dooley Wilson, American musician and actor (b. 1886)
• 1955 – Bill Vukovich, Auto racer, killed during 1955 Indianapolis 500 (b. 1918)
• 1960 – Boris Pasternak, Russian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (declined) (b. 1890)
• 1961 – Rafael Leónidas Trujillo, dictator of the Dominican Republic (b. 1891)
• 1964 – Leó Szilárd, Hungarian-born nuclear physicist (b. 1898)
• 1964 – Eddie Sachs and Dave MacDonald, American auto racers, killed during 1964 Indianapolis 500 (b. 1927)
• 1967 – Claude Rains, English actor (b. 1889)
• 1971 – Marcel Dupré, French organist and composer (b. 1886)
• 1975 – Steve Prefontaine, American runner (b. 1951)
• 1975 – Michel Simon, French actor (b. 1895)
• 1980 – Carl Radle, American bass guitarist (b. 1942)
• 1981 – Don Ashby, Canadian ice hockey player (b. 1955)
• 1981 – Ziaur Rahman, President of Bangladesh (b. 1936)
• 1986 – Perry Ellis, American fashion designer (b. 1940)
• 1993 – Sun Ra, American musician (b. 1914)
• 1994 – Marcel Bich, French industrialist (Société Bic) (b. 1914)
• 1995 – Ted Drake, former English footballer (b. 1912)
• 1995 – Lofty England, English automotive engineer and race team manager (b.1911)
• 1995 – Bobby Stokes, former English footballer (b. 1951)
• 2000 – Tex Beneke, American bandleader, singer, and saxophone player (b. 1914)
• 2000 – Doris Hare, Welsh actress (b. 1905)
• 2003 – Mickie Most, English record producer (b. 1938)
• 2005 – Fazal Mahmood, Pakistani cricketer (b. 1927)
• 2005 – Tomasz Pacynski, Polish writer (b. 1958)
• 2006 – Shohei Imamura, Japanese film director (b. 1926)
• 2006 – Robert Sterling, American actor (b. 1917)
• 2006 – David Lloyd, New Zealand biologist (b. 1938)
• 2007 – Jean-Claude Brialy, French actor, director, screenwriter and author (b. 1933)

May 30 – Holidays:

• Trinidad and Tobago – Indian Arrival Day (National Holiday).

On This Day in History May 29

May 29- E vents:

• 363 – Roman Emperor Julian defeats the Sassanid army in the Battle of Ctesiphon, under the walls of the Sassanid capital, but is unable to take the city.
• 1167 – Battle of Monte Porzio – A Roman army supporting Pope Alexander III is defeated by Christian of Buch and Rainald of Dassel
• 1176 – Battle of Legnano, in which the Lombard League defeats Emperor Frederick I.
• 1414 – Council of Constance.
• 1453 – Byzantine-Ottoman Wars: Ottoman armies under Sultan Mehmed II Fatih capture Constantinople after a siege, ending the Byzantine Empire.
• 1592 – At the Battle of Sacheon, the Korean navy led by Admiral Yi Sun Shin, repel a Japanese army which outnumbers them nearly 3 to 1.
• 1660 – English Restoration: Charles II (on his birthday – see below) is restored to the throne of Great Britain.
• 1677 – Treaty of Middle Plantation establishes peace between the Virginia colonists and the local Indians.
• 1727 – Peter II becomes Tsar of Russia.
• 1733 – Right of Canadians to keep Indian slaves upheld at Quebec City.
• 1765 – Patrick Henry in a speech denouncing the Stamp Act is believed to have said, “If this be treason, make the most of it!”
• 1780 – Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton brutally massacred Colonel Abraham Buford’s continentals even after the continentals surrendered. 113 Americans were killed.
• 1790 – Rhode Island becomes the last of the original United States colonies to ratify the Constitution and is admitted as the 13th U.S. state.
• 1848 – Wisconsin is admitted as the 30th U.S. state.
• 1864 – Emperor Maximilian of Mexico arrives in Mexico for the first time.
• 1867 – Austro-Hungarian agreement called Ausgleich (“the Compromise”) is born through Act 12, which established the Austro-Hungarian Empire; on June 8 Emperor Franz Joseph was crowned King of Hungary.
• 1868 – The assassination of Michael Obrenovich III, Prince of Serbia, in Belgrade.
• 1886 – Chemist John Pemberton places his first advertisement for Coca-Cola, the ad appearing in the Atlanta Journal.
• 1903 – May coup d’etat: Alexander Obrenovich, King of Serbia, and Queen Draga, are assassinated in Belgrade by the Black Hand (Crna Ruka) organization.
• 1913 – Igor Stravinsky’s ballet score The Rite of Spring is premiered in Paris.
• 1914 – Ocean liner Empress of Ireland sinks in the Gulf of St. Lawrence; 1,024 lives lost.
• 1919 – Einstein’s theory of general relativity is tested (later confirmed) by Arthur Eddington’s observation of a total solar eclipse in Principe and by Andrew Crommelin in Sobral, Ceará, Brazil.
• 1924 – AEK Athens FC is established on the anniversary of the siege of Constantinople by the Turks.
• 1932 – World War I Veterans begin to assemble in Washington, DC in the Bonus Army to request cash bonuses promised to them to be paid in 1945.
• 1942 – Bing Crosby, the Ken Darby Singers and the John Scott Trotter Orchestra record Irving Berlin’s “White Christmas”, the best-selling Christmas album in history.
• 1950 – St. Roch, first ship to circumnavigate North America, arrives in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
• 1953 – Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay are the first people to reach the summit of Mount Everest, on Tenzing Norgay’s 39th birthday.
• 1954 – First of the annual Bilderberg conferences.
• 1964 – The Arab League meets in East Jerusalem to discuss the Palestinian situation in Israel which leads to the formation of the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
• 1968 – Manchester United wins the European Cup, the first English Club to do so.
• 1972 – 26 people are killed and dozens more injured when three Japanese gunmen opened fire on crowds at Lod International Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel.
• 1973 – Tom Bradley is elected the first black mayor of Los Angeles, California.
• 1982 – Pope John Paul II becomes the first pontiff ever to visit Canterbury Cathedral.
• 1985 – Heysel Stadium disaster: In Brussels, Belgium, 39 football fans die and hundreds are injured by Liverpool fans at a European Cup match.
• 1985 – Amputee Steve Fonyo completes cross-Canada marathon at Victoria, British Columbia, after 14 months.
• 1988 – U.S. President Ronald Reagan begins his first visit to the Soviet Union as he arrives in Moscow for a superpower summit with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
• 1990 – Boris Yeltsin is elected president of the Russian SFSR by the Russian parliament.
• 1999 – Olusegun Obasanjo takes office as President of Nigeria, the first elected and civilian head of state in Nigeria after 16 years of military rule.
• 1999 – Space Shuttle Discovery completes the first docking with the International Space Station.
• 2001 – U.S. Supreme Court rules that disabled golfer Casey Martin could use a cart to ride in tournaments.
• 2004 – The World War II Memorial is dedicated in Washington, D.C.
• 2004 – The Al-Khobar massacres in Saudi Arabia kill 22.
• 2005 – France, one of the founders of a united Europe, resoundingly rejects the European Constitution.

May 29 – Birthdays:

• 1594 – Gottfried Heinrich Graf zu Pappenheim, Bavarian general (d. 1632)
• 1627 – Anne, Duchess of Montpensier, French writer (d. 1693)
• 1630 – Charles II of England (d. 1685)
• 1675 – Humphry Ditton, English mathematician (d. 1715)
• 1716 – Louis-Jean-Marie Daubenton, French naturalist (d. 1800)
• 1722 – James FitzGerald, 1st Duke of Leinster, Irish politician (d. 1773)
• 1736 – Patrick Henry, American patriot, statesman, and orator (d. 1799)
• 1773 – Princess Sophia of Gloucester (d. 1844)
• 1823 – John H. Balsley, American carpenter (d. 1895)
• 1860 – Isaac Albéniz, Spanish composer (d. 1909)
• 1863 – Arthur Mold, English cricketer (d. 1921)
• 1874 – G. K. Chesterton, English novelist (d. 1936)
• 1880 – Oswald Spengler, German philosopher (d. 1936)
• 1892 – Alfonsina Storni, Argentine writer (d. 1938)
• 1893 – Max Brand, American author and war correspondent (d. 1944)
• 1894 – Beatrice Lillie, Canadian actress (d. 1989)
• 1894 – Josef von Sternberg, Austrian-born writer and film director (d. 1969)
• 1897 – Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Austrian composer (d. 1957)
• 1903 – Bob Hope, British-born comedian and actor (d. 2003)
• 1905 – Sebastian Shaw, English actor (d. 1994)
• 1906 – T.H. White, British author (d. 1964)
• 1907 – Hartland Molson, Canadian businessman and senator (d. 2002)
• 1911 – Armida, Mexican-American stage, vaudeville and film star (d. 1989)
• 1913 – Tony Zale, American boxer (d. 1997)
• 1914 – Stacy Keach, Sr., American actor (d. 2003)
• 1915 – Karl Münchinger, German conductor (d. 1990)
• 1917 – John Fitzgerald Kennedy, 35th President of the United States (d. 1963)
• 1920 – John Harsanyi, Hungarian-born economist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2000)
• 1922 – Iannis Xenakis, Greek composer and architect, major contributor to musical modernism (d. 2001)
• 1926 – Charles Denner, French actor (d. 1995)
• 1927 – Jean Coutu, Quebec businessman (Jean Coutu Group)
• 1932 – Richie Guerin, former basketball player
• 1932 – Paul R. Ehrlich, American biologist and author who founded the group Zero Population Growth
• 1933 – Helmuth Rilling, German conductor
• 1937 – Charles W. Pickering, American judge
• 1937 – Irmin Schmidt, German musician (Can)
• 1938 – Fay Vincent, baseball commissioner
• 1939 – Al Unser, Sr., American race car driver
• 1940 – Farooq Leghari, President of Pakistan
• 1942 – Pierre Bourque, Former mayor of Montreal
• 1942 – Kevin Conway, American actor
• 1943 – Robert W. Edgar, Theologian
• 1945 – Gary Brooker, musician (Procol Harum)
• 1946 – Fernando Buesa, Basque politician (d. 2000)
• 1947 – Gene Robinson, American ecclesiastic
• 1947 – Anthony Geary, American actor
• 1949 – Brian Kidd, English footballer
• 1950 – Rebbie Jackson, American musician
• 1951 – Peter Chernin, President of News Corporation
• 1953 – Danny Elfman, American musician (Oingo Boingo)
• 1953 – Aleksandr Abdulov, Russian actor (d. 2008)
• 1955 – John Hinckley, Jr., American attempted assassin
• 1955 – Sut Jhally, Kenyan-born American educator
• 1955 – Ken Schrader, American race car driver
• 1956 – LaToya Jackson, American musician
• 1957 – Jeb Hensarling, American politician
• 1957 – Ted Levine, American actor
• 1958 – Annette Bening, American actress
• 1958 – Willem Holleeder, Dutch criminal
• 1959 – Rupert Everett, English actor
• 1959 – Adrian Paul, English actor
• 1961 – Melissa Etheridge, American musician
• 1962 – Eric Davis, American baseball player
• 1962 – John D. LeMay, American actor
• 1963 – Blaze Bayley, British singer (ex-Iron Maiden)
• 1963 – Ukyo Katayama, Japanese racing driver
• 1963 – Lisa Whelchel, American actress
• 1967 – Noel Gallagher, English musician (Oasis)
• 1967 – Mike Keane, Canadian hockey player
• 1969 – Chan Kinchla, Canadian musician (Blues Traveler)
• 1972 – Közi, Japanese visual kei artist
• 1973 – Mark Lee, American musician (guitarist for Third Day)
• 1973 – Alpay Özalan, Turkish footballer
• 1974 – Myf Warhurst, Australian radio presenter on Triple J and TV personality on Spicks and Specks
• 1975 – Melanie Brown, English musician and actress
• 1975 – Anthony Wall, English golfer
• 1976 – David Buckner, American musician (Papa Roach)
• 1976 – Caçapa, Brazilian footballer
• 1976 – Jerry Hairston Jr., American baseball player
• 1976 – Yusuke Iseya, Japanese model and actor
• 1977 – Antonio Lebo-Lebo, Angolan footballer
• 1978 – Lorenzo Odone, Adrenoleukodystrophy victim
• 1978 – Pelle Almqvist, Swedish musician (The Hives)
• 1978 – Sébastien Grosjean, French tennis player
• 1979 – Brian Kendrick, American professional wrestler
• 1979 – Arne Friedrich, German soccer player
• 1979 – John Rheinecker, Major League Baseball player
• 1979 – Casey Sheehan, American soldier; son of Cindy Sheehan (d. 2004)
• 1982 – Ana Beatriz Barros, Brazilian model
• 1982 – Matt Macri, American baseball player
• 1983 – Rama Claproth, Indonesian blues guitarist
• 1984 – Carmelo Anthony, American basketball player
• 1986 – Dylan Postl, American professional wrestler
• 1987 – Alessandra Toreson, American actress

May 29 – Deaths:

• 1259 – King Christopher I of Denmark (b. 1219)
• 1379 – King Henry II of Castile (b. 1334)
• 1405 – Philippe de Mézières, advisor to Charles V of France
• 1425 – Hongxi Emperor of China (b. 1378)
• 1453 – Constantine XI Palaeologus, last Byzantine Emperor (b. 1404)
• 1500 – Bartolomeu Dias, Portuguese explorer
• 1546 – David Beaton, Scottish Catholic cardinal
• 1593 – John Penry, Welsh Protestant leader (b. 1559)
• 1660 – Frans van Schooten, Dutch mathematician (b. 1615)
• 1691 – Cornelis Tromp, Dutch admiral (b. 1629)
• 1790 – Israel Putnam, American Revolutionary War general (b. 1718)
• 1796 – Carl Fredrik Pechlin, Swedish politician (b. 1720)
• 1814 – Joséphine de Beauharnais, Empress of France (b. 1763)
• 1829 – Humphry Davy, English chemist (b. 1778)
• 1847 – Emmanuel, marquis de Grouchy, French marshal (b. 1766)
• 1866 – Winfield Scott, American general (b. 1786)
• 1868 – Michael Obrenovich III, Prince of Serbia (b. 1823)
• 1882 – Vasily Perov, Russian painter (b. 1833)
• 1892 – Bahá’u’lláh, Persian founder of the Bahá’í Faith (b. 1817)
• 1896 – Gabriel Auguste Daubrée, French geologist (b. 1814)
• 1903 – Draga Mašin, Queen of Serbia (b. 1864)
• 1903 – Bruce Price, American architect (b. 1845)
• 1910 – Mily Balakirev, Russian composer (b. 1837)
• 1911 – William S. Gilbert, English dramatist (b. 1836)
• 1919 – Robert Bacon, American politician (b. 1860)
• 1935 – Josef Suk, Czech composer and violinist (b. 1874)
• 1939 – Ursula Julia Ledochowska, Polish-Austrian Catholic saint (b. 1865)
• 1942 – John Barrymore, American actor (b. 1882)
• 1946 – Martin Weiss, Commandant of Dachau concentration camp (b. 1905)
• 1948 – Dame May Whitty, English actress (b. 1865)
• 1951 – Fanny Brice, American singer/comedian (b. 1891)
• 1953 – Man Mountain Dean, American professional wrestler (b. 1891)
• 1958 – Juan Ramón Jiménez, Spanish writer, Nobel laureate (b. 1881)
• 1970 – John Gunther, American writer (b. 1901)
• 1972 – Moe Berg, American baseball player and spy (b. 1902)
• 1972 – Stephen Timoshenko, Ukrainian-born mechanical engineer (b. 1878)
• 1977 – Ba Maw, Burmese politician (b. 1893)
• 1979 – Mary Pickford, Canadian-born American actress and studio founder (b. 1892)
• 1979 – John H. Wood, Jr., American federal judge (b. 1916)
• 1982 – Romy Schneider, Austrian actress (b. 1938)
• 1983 – Arvids Pelše, Soviet Latvian statesman (b. 1899)
• 1989 – John Cipollina, American musician (Quicksilver Messenger Service) (b. 1943)
• 1993 – Billy Conn, American boxer (b. 1917)
• 1994 – Erich Honecker, leader of East Germany (b. 1912)
• 1996 – Tamara Toumanova, Ballet star and actress (b. 1919)
• 1997 – Jeff Buckley, American musician (b. 1966)
• 1997 – George Fenneman, American radio and television announcer (b. 1919)
• 1998 – Barry M. Goldwater, U.S. Senator from Arizona and presidential candidate (b. 1909)
• 2002 – Mildred Benson, American writer (b. 1905)
• 2003 – David Jefferies, British motorcycle racer (b. 1972)
• 2004 – Archibald Cox, Watergate special prosecutor (b. 1912)
• 2004 – Samuel Dash, American Congressional counsel (b. 1925)
• 2005 – George Rochberg, American composer (b. 1918)
• 2006 – Steve Mizerak, American pool player (b. 1944)
• 2006 – Jacques Bouchard, Quebec advertising executive (b. 1930)
• 2007 – Lois Browne-Evans, Legendary Bermudian Politician (b. 1927)
• 2007 – Posteal Laskey, American convicted murderer widely believed to be the Cincinnati Strangler (b. 1938)

May 29-Holidays

• Nigeria: Democracy Day
• United Kingdom: Oak Apple Day.

On This Day in History May 28

May 28 – Events:

• 585 BC – A solar eclipse occurs, as predicted by Greek philosopher and scientist Thales, while Alyattes is battling Cyaxares in the Battle of the Eclipse, leading to a truce. This is one of the cardinal dates from which other dates can be calculated.
• 1503 – James IV of Scotland and Margaret Tudor are married by Pope Alexander VI according to Papal Bull.
• 1503 – The Treaty of Everlasting Peace between Scotland and England is signed, which would actually last 10 years.
• 1533 – The Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer declares the marriage of King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn valid
• 1588 – The Spanish Armada, with 130 ships and 30,000 men, begins to set sail from Lisbon heading for the English Channel. (It will take until May 30 for all ships to leave port).
• 1644 – Bolton Massacre by Royalist troops under the command of the Earl of Derby.
• 1754 – French and Indian War: In the first engagement of the war, Virginia militia under 22-year-old Lieutenant Colonel George Washington defeat a French reconnaissance party in the Battle of Jumonville Glen in what is now Fayette County in southwestern Pennsylvania.
• 1774 – American Revolutionary War: The first Continental Congress convenes.
• 1830 – President Andrew Jackson signs The Indian Removal Act which relocates Indians
• 1863 – American Civil War: The 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, the first African American regiment, leaves Boston, Massachusetts, to fight for the Union.
• 1892 – In San Francisco, California, John Muir organizes the Sierra Club.
• 1905 – Russo-Japanese War: The Battle of Tsushima ends with the destruction of the Russian Baltic Fleet by Admiral Togo Heihachiro and the Imperial Japanese Navy.
• 1918 – The Democratic Republic of Armenia and Azerbaijan Democratic Republic declare their independence from the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic.
• 1926 – Ditadura Nacional established in Portugal to suppress the unrest of the First Republic.
• 1930 – The Chrysler Building in New York City officially opens.
• 1934 – Near Callander, Ontario, the Dionne quintuplets are born to Olivia and Elzire Dionne, later becoming the first quintuplets to survive infancy.
• 1934 – The Glyndebourne festival in England is inaugurated.
• 1936 – Alan Turing submits On Computable Numbers for publication.
• 1937 – The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, California, is officially opened by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in Washington, DC, who pushes a button signaling the start of vehicle traffic over the span.
• 1937 – Neville Chamberlain becomes British Prime Minister.
• 1940 – World War II: Belgium surrenders to Germany.
• 1940 – World War II: Norwegian, French, Polish and British forces recapture Narvik. First allied infantry victory in World War II.
• 1942 – World War II: In retaliation for the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, Nazis in Czechoslovakia kill over 1,800 people.
• 1952 – Memphis Kiddie Park opens in Brooklyn, Ohio. The park’s Little Dipper roller coaster would become the oldest operating steel roller coaster in North America.
• 1952 – The women of Greece gain the suffrage.
• 1955 – Henry Bolte becomes Premier of the state of Victoria.
• 1961 – Peter Benenson’s article “The Forgotten Prisoners” is published in several internationally read newspapers. This will later be thought of as the founding of the human rights organization Amnesty International.
• 1964 – The Palestine Liberation Organization is formed.
• 1970 – The formerly united Free University of Brussels officially splits into two separate entities, the French-speaking Université Libre de Bruxelles and the Dutch-speaking Vrije Universiteit Brussel.
• 1974 – Northern Ireland’s power-sharing Sunningdale Agreement collapses following a general strike by loyalists.
• 1975 – Fifteen West African countries sign the Treaty of Lagos, thus creating the Economic Community of West African States.
• 1977 – In Southgate, Kentucky, the Beverly Hills Supper Club is engulfed in fire, killing 165 people inside.
• 1978 – Second round of the presidential elections in Upper Volta. Elections won by incumbent Sangoulé Lamizana.
• 1979 – Constantine Karamanlis signs the full treaty of the accession of Greece with the European Economic Community.
• 1982 – Falklands War: British forces defeat the Argentines at the Battle of Goose Green.
• 1987 – 19-year-old West German pilot Mathias Rust evades Soviet Union air defenses and lands a private plane in Red Square in Moscow. He is immediately detained and is not released until August 3, 1988.
• 1987 – A robot probe finds the wreckage of the USS Monitor near Cape Hatteras, North Carolina.
• 1991 – The capital city of Addis Ababa, falls to the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front, ending both the Derg regime in Ethiopia and the Ethiopian Civil War.
• 1996 – U.S. President Bill Clinton’s former business partners in the Whitewater land deal, James McDougal and Susan McDougal, and Arkansas Governor Jim Guy Tucker, are convicted of fraud.
• 1998 – Nuclear testing: Pakistan responds to a series of Indian nuclear tests with five of its own, prompting the United States, Japan, and other nations to impose economic sanctions.
• 1999 – In Milan, Italy, after 22 years of restoration work, Leonardo da Vinci’s newly-restored masterpiece “The Last Supper” is put back on display.
• 1999 – Two Swedish police officers are murdered with their own fire arms by the bank robbers Jackie Arklöv and Tony Olsson after a dramatic car chase.
• 2002 – NATO declares Russia a limited partner in the Western alliance.
• 2003 – Peter Hollingworth becomes the first Governor-General of Australia to resign his office as a result of criticism of his conduct.
• 2004 – The Iraqi Governing Council chooses Ayad Allawi, a longtime anti-Saddam Hussein exile, to become prime minister of Iraq’s interim government.

May 28 – Birthdays:

• 1140 – Xin Qiji, Chinese poet (d. 1207)
• 1371 – John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy (d. 1419)
• 1524 – Selim II, Ottoman Sultan (d. 1574)
• 1582 – William Fiennes, 1st Viscount Saye and Sele, English statesman (d. 1662)
• 1588 – Pierre Seguier, Chancellor of France (d. 1672)
• 1641 – Janez Vajkard Valvasor, Slovenian polymath (d. 1693)
• 1660 – King George I of Great Britain (d. 1727)
• 1676 – Jacopo Riccati, Italian mathematician (d. 1754)
• 1692 – Joseph Butler, English philosopher (d. 1752)
• 1738 – Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, French physician (d. 1814)
• 1759 – William Pitt the Younger, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1806)
• 1779 – Thomas Moore, Irish poet (d. 1852)
• 1807 – Louis Agassiz, Swiss-born zoologist and geologist (d. 1873)
• 1818 – Pierre Beauregard, American Confederate general (d. 1893)
• 1836 – Alexander Mitscherlich, German chemist (d. 1918)
• 1837 – George Ashlin, Irish architect (d. 1921)
• 1837 – Tony Pastor, American vaudeville performer (d. 1908)
• 1853 – Carl Larsson, Swedish painter (d. 1919)
• 1858 – Carl Rickard Nyberg, Swedish inventor (d. 1939)
• 1872 – Marian Smoluchowski, Polish physicist (d. 1917)
• 1878 – Paul Pelliot, French sinologist (d. 1945)
• 1883 – Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, Indian freedom fighter (d. 1966)
• 1883 – Clough Williams-Ellis, Welsh architect (d. 1978)
• 1884 – Edvard Beneš, Czech politician (d. 1948)
• 1888 – Jim Thorpe, American athlete (d. 1953)
• 1889 – Richard Réti, Austrian-Czech chess grandmaster (d. 1929)
• 1892 – Sepp Dietrich, German SS officer (d. 1966)
• 1900 – Tommy Ladnier, American musician (d. 1939)
• 1908 – Ian Fleming, English author (d. 1964)
• 1909 – Red Horner, Canadian hockey star (d. 2005)
• 1910 – T-Bone Walker, American singer (d. 1975)
• 1910 – Lady Rachel Kempson, English actress (d. 2003)
• 1911 – Thora Hird, British actress (d. 2003)
• 1911 – Fritz Hochwälder, Austrian author (d. 1986)
• 1912 – Patrick White, Australian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d.1990)
• 1912 – Herman Johannes, Indonesian professor, scientist and politician (d. 1992)
• 1914 – W. G. G. Duncan Smith, British World War II pilot (d. 1996)
• 1915 – Joseph Greenberg, American linguist (d. 2001)
• 1916 – Walker Percy, American author (d. 1990)
• 1917 – Papa John Creech, American musician (d. 1994)
• 1918 – Johnny Wayne, Canadian comedian (Wayne and Shuster) (d. 1990)
• 1921 – Heinz G. Konsalik, German author (d. 1999)
• 1922 – Lou Duva, American boxing trainer
• 1923 – György Ligeti, Hungarian composer (d. 2006)
• 1923 – Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao, Indian actor,director,producer and politician (d. 1998)
• 1925 – Bülent Ecevit, Prime Minister of Turkey (d. 2006)
• 1925 – Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, German baritone
• 1931 – Carroll Baker, American actress
• 1934 – Dionne quintuplets (Emilie d. 1954, Marie d. 1970, Yvonne d. 2001)
• 1936 – Betty Shabazz, American civil rights leader (d. 1997)
• 1936 – Claude Forget, Quebec politician
• 1938 – Jerry West, American basketball player
• 1938 – Prince Buster, Jamaican musician
• 1941 – Beth Howland, American actress (“Vera” on Alice)
• 1942 – Stanley B. Prusiner, American scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or  Medicine
• 1943 – Terry Crisp, NHL coach
• 1943 – Elena Souliotis, Greek soprano (d. 2004)
• 1944 – Rudy Giuliani, ex-Mayor of New York City
• 1944 – Gladys Knight, American singer, actress, author and humanitarian
• 1944 – Patricia Quinn, Northern Irish actress
• 1944 – Billy Vera, American actor and musician
• 1944 – Faith Brown, British actress
• 1945 – John Fogerty, American musician (Creedence Clearwater Revival)
• 1945 – Gary Stewart, American singer (d. 2003)
• 1945 – Hunter “Patch” Adams, American doctor
• 1945 – John N. Bambacus, American politician
• 1946 – Satchidanandan, Indian-born poet
• 1946 – Skip Jutze, baseball player
• 1947 – Sondra Locke, American actress
• 1947 – Zahi Hawass, Egyptologist
• 1949 – Wendy O. Williams, American musician (The Plasmatics) (d. 1998)
• 1950 – Ian Bradley, British writer, academic and theologian
• 1950 – Jim Harris, American professional wrestler
• 1952 – Russell J. Wintner, American Hollywood executive
• 1953 – Arto Lindsay, American guitarist and singer
• 1954 – John Tory, Leader: Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario
• 1954 – Youri Egorov, Soviet classical pianist (d.1988)
• 1955 – John McGeoch, Scottish musician (Siouxsie and the Banshees) (d. 2004)
• 1955 – Mark Howe, Professional ice hockey player
• 1956 – Julie Peasgood, British actress
• 1956 – Jerry Douglas (musician), American dobro player
• 1956 – Markus Höttinger, Austrian racing driver (d. 1980)
• 1957 – Kirk Gibson, baseball player
• 1957 – Ben Howland, NCAA basketball coach
• 1959 – John Morgan, etiquette expert (d. 2000)
• 1962 – Brandon Cruz, American actor
• 1962 – Roland Gift, English musician (Fine Young Cannibals)
• 1962 – James Michael Tyler, actor-best known as Gunther on “Friends”.
• 1963 – Houman Younessi, Iranian-born scientist
• 1963 – Gavin Harrison, British drummer
• 1964 – Jeff Fenech, Australian boxer
• 1964 – Christa Miller, American actress
• 1964 – David Baddiel, English comedian, novelist and television presenter
• 1964 – Phil Vassar, country music artist
• 1965 – Chris Ballew, American musician
• 1967 – Glen Rice, American basketball player
• 1968 – Kylie Minogue, Australian actress and singer
• 1969 – Mike DiFelice, baseball player
• 1969 – Justin Kirk, American actor
• 1970 – Morgan Fox, Canadian model and 1990 Playboy playmate
• 1970 – Ian Cashmore, UK actor, tv presenter & paranormal investigator
• 1970 – Glenn Quinn, Irish actor
• 1971 – Isabelle Carré, French actress
• 1971 – Ekaterina Gordeeva, Russian Olympic and World Figure Skating Champion
• 1972 – Michael Boogerd, Dutch cyclist
• 1972 – Guidoni Junior Doriva, Brazilian footballer
• 1975 – Charmaine Sheh, Hong Kong actress
• 1976 – Liam O’Brien, American voice actor
• 1976 – Alexei Nemov, Russian gymnast
• 1976 – Glenn Morrison, Rugby League Player
• 1977 – Jeremy Borash, American professional wrestling announcer
• 1977 – Elisabeth Hasselbeck, American television panelist (The View)
• 1979 – Jesse Bradford, American actor
• 1979 – Monica Keena, American actress
• 1979 – Ronald Curry, American Football Player
• 1980 – Mark Feehily, Irish musician (Westlife)
• 1980 – Miguel Pérez, Spanish footballer
• 1981 – Adam Green, American singer and songwriter
• 1981 – Daniel Cabrera, Dominican baseball player
• 1982 – Alexa Davalos, American actress
• 1982 – Jhonny Peralta, Dominican baseball player
• 1983 – Humberto Sanchez, Dominican baseball player
• 1985 – Colbie Caillat, American American acoustic-folk singer-songwriter
• 1986 – Charles N’Zogbia, French footballer
• 1986 – Jaslene Gonzalez, American model and reality show contestant

May 28 – Deaths:

• 1357 – King Afonso IV of Portugal (b. 1291)
• 1556 – Saito Dosan, Japanese daimyo (b. 1494)
• 1672 – John Trevor, English politician (b. 1626)
• 1747 – Luc de Clapiers, marquis de Vauvenargues, French writer (b. 1715)
• 1750 – Emperor Sakuramachi of Japan (b. 1720)
• 1787 – Leopold Mozart, Austrian composer (b. 1719)
• 1805 – Luigi Boccherini, Italian composer (b. 1743)
• 1808 – Richard Hurd, English bishop and writer (b. 1720)
• 1811 – Henry Dundas, British minister (b. 1742)
• 1816 – Ras Wolde Selassie, Ethiopian warlord
• 1828 – Daikokuya Kodayu, Japanese castaway (b. 1751)
• 1843 – Noah Webster, American author, politician, and lexicographer (b. 1758)
• 1849 – Anne Brontë, English author (b. 1820)
• 1878 – John Russell, 1st Earl Russell, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1792)
• 1916 – Ivan Franko, Ukrainian writer (b. 1856)
• 1927 – Boris Kustodiev, Russian painter (b. 1878)
• 1937 – Alfred Adler, Austrian psychologist (b. 1870)
• 1940 – Friedrich Karl von Hessen (b. 1868)
• 1947 – August Eigruber, Austrian war criminal (b. 1907)
• 1948 – Unity Mitford, English fascist sympathizer (b. 1914)
• 1953 – Hori Tatsuo, Japanese writer (b. 1904)
• 1968 – Fyodor Matveyevich Okhlopkov, Yakut-born Soviet sniper (b. 1908)
• 1971 – Audie Murphy, American actor and war hero (b. 1924)
• 1971 – Jean Vilar, French actor (b. 1912)
• 1972 – King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom (b. 1894
• 1975 – Ezzard Charles, Heavyweight champion (b. 1921)
• 1976 – Steffan Danielsen, Faroese painter (b. 1922)
• 1978 – Arthur Brough, English actor (b. 1905)
• 1980 – Rolf Nevanlinna, Finnish mathematician (b. 1895)
• 1981 – Stefan Cardinal Wyszynski, Archbishop of Warsaw (b. 1901)
• 1982 – Lt. Col. ‘H’. Jones VC, British soldier (Falklands War) (b. 1940)
• 1984 – Eric Morecambe, British comedian (Morecambe and Wise) (b. 1926)
• 1988 – Sy Oliver, Jazz trumpeter, composer and bandleader (b. 1910)
• 1993 – Billy Conn, American boxer and actor (b. 1917)
• 1994 – Julius Boros, American golfer (b. 1920)
• 1994 – Ely Jacques Kahn, Jr., American writer (b. 1916)
• 1998 – Phil Hartman, Canadian actor, comedian (b. 1948)
• 2001 – Francisco Varela, Chilean biologist and philosopher (b. 1946)
• 2001 – Joe Moakley, American politician (b. 1927)
• 2002 – Jean Berger, German-born composer (b. 1909)
• 2003 – Oleg Makarov, cosmonaut (b. 1933)
• 2003 – Ilya Prigogine, Russian-born physicist and chemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (b. 1917)
• 2003 – Martha Scott, American actress (b. 1912)
• 2004 – Umberto Agnelli, Swiss-born automobile executive (b. 1934)
• 2006 – Thorleif Schjelderup, Norwegian author and ski jumper (b. 1920)
• 2007 – Marquise Hill, American football player (b. 1982)
• 2007 – Toshikatsu Matsuoka, Japanese politician (b. 1945)

May 28-Holidays

• Republic Day in Azerbaijan and Armenia (both 1918).
• National Flag Day in the Republic of the Philippines.
• Feast day of the following saints in the Roman Catholic Church:

o   Germain of Paris

o   Augustine of Canterbury

o   William of Gellone

o   Bernard of Menthon

o   Lanfranc

On This Day in History May 27

May 27 – Events:

• 927 – Battle of the Bosnian Highlands Simeon I of Bulgaria decisively defeated by King Tomislav of Croatia.
• 1120 – Richard III of Capua anointed as prince a fortnight before his untimely death.
• 1153 – Malcolm IV becomes King of Scotland.
• 1328 – Philip VI is crowned King of France.
• 1647 – Peter Stuyvesant was inaugurated as Director-General of New Netherland.
• 1703 – Tsar Peter the Great founds the city of Saint Petersburg.
• 1798 – The Battle of Oulart Hill occurs in Wexford, Ireland.
• 1812 – South American Wars of Independence: In Bolivia, the battle of La Coronilla, in which the women from Cochabamba fought against the Spanish army.
• 1813 – War of 1812: In Canada, American forces capture Fort George.
• 1849 – The Great Hall of Euston station, London opened.
• 1860 – Giuseppe Garibaldi begins his attack on Palermo, Sicily, as part of the Italian Unification.
• 1883 – Alexander III is crowned Tsar of Russia.
• 1896 – The F4-strength St. Louis-East St. Louis Tornado hits in St. Louis, Missouri and East Saint Louis, Illinois, killing at least 255 people and incurring $2.9 billion in damages.
• 1905 – Russo-Japanese War: The Battle of Tsushima begins.
• 1907 – A Bubonic plague outbreak begins in San Francisco, California.
• 1908 – Maulana Hakeem Noor-ud-Din elected first Khalifa of Ahmadiyya Muslim Community
• 1919 – The NC-4 aircraft arrives in Lisbon after completing the first transatlantic flight.
• 1927 – The Ford Motor Company ceases manufacturing the Ford Model T and begins to retool plants to make Ford Model A’s.
• 1930 – The 1,046 feet (319 meters) tall Chrysler Building in New York (tallest man-made structure at the time) opens to the public.
• 1933 – New Deal: The U.S. Federal Securities Act is signed into law requiring the registration of securities with the Federal Trade Commission.
• 1933 – The Walt Disney Company releases the cartoon The Three Little Pigs, with its hit song “Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?”
• 1933 – The Century of Progress World’s Fair opens in Chicago.
• 1935 – New Deal: The Supreme Court of the United States declares the National Industrial Recovery Act to be unconstitutional in the case A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States, (295 U.S. 495).
• 1937 – In California, the Golden Gate Bridge opens to pedestrian traffic, creating a vital link between San Francisco and Marin County.
• 1939 – DC Comics publishes its second superhero in Detective Comics #27; he is Batman, one of the most topical comic book superheroes of all time.
• 1940 – World War II: 97 out of 99 members of a Royal Norfolk Regiment unit are massacred while trying to surrender at Dunkirk. The German commander, Captain Fritz Knoechlein, is eventually hanged for war crimes.
• 1941 – World War II: U.S. President Roosevelt proclaims an “unlimited national emergency.”
• 1941 – World War II: The German battleship Bismarck is sunk in the North Atlantic killing almost 2,100 men.
• 1942 – World War II: Operation Anthropoid – assassination of Reinhard Heydrich in Prague
• 1957 – Toronto’s 1050 CHUM AM becomes Canada’s first radio station to only broadcast top 40 Rock n’ Roll music format.
• 1958 – The F-4 Phantom II flies for the first time.
• 1960 – In Turkey, a military coup removed President Celal Bayar and the rest of the democratic government from office.
• 1963 – Folk music singer Bob Dylan releases The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan album, which features “Blowin’ in the Wind” and several other of his best-known songs.
• 1964 – Prime Minister of India Jawaharlal Nehru dies in office.
• 1965 – Vietnam War: United States warships begin bombardments of National Liberation Front targets within South Vietnam for the first time.
• 1967 – Australians vote in favor of a constitutional referendum granting the Australian government the power to make laws to benefit Indigenous Australians, and to count them in the national census.
• 1967 – The U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CV-67) is christened by Jacqueline Kennedy and her daughter Caroline.
• 1971 – The Dahlerau train disaster, the worst railway accident in West Germany, kills 46 people and injures 25 near Wuppertal.
• 1980 – The Gwangju Massacre: airborne and army troops of South Korea retake the city of Gwangju from civil militias, killing at least 207 and possibly many more.
• 1995 – In Charlottesville, Virginia, actor Christopher Reeve is paralyzed from the neck down after falling from his horse in a riding competition.
• 1996 – First Chechnya War: Russian President Boris Yeltsin meets with Chechnyan rebels for the first time and negotiates a cease-fire in the war.
• 1997 – The F5-strength Jarrell Tornado slams into the small town of Jarrell, Texas, killing 27 people.
• 1997 – The U.S. Supreme Court rules that Paula Jones can pursue her sex harassment lawsuit against President Bill Clinton while he is in office.
• 1998 – Oklahoma City bombing: Michael Fortier is sentenced to 12 years in prison and fined $200,000 for failing to warn authorities about the terrorist plot.
• 1999 – The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, Netherlands indicts Slobodan Miloševic and four others for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Kosovo.
• 2006 – The May 2006 Java earthquake strikes at 5:53:58 AM local time (22:53:58 UTC May 26) devastating Bantul and the city of Yogyakarta killing over 6,600 people.

May 27 – Birthdays:

• 1332 – Ibn Khaldun, Arab historian (d. 1406)
• 1519 – Girolamo Mei, Italian historian (d. 1594)
• 1576 – Caspar Schoppe, German scholar (d. 1649)
• 1601 – Antoine Daniel, Jesuit missionary and martyr (d. 1648)
• 1623 – William Petty, English scientist and philosopher (d. 1687)
• 1626 – William II, Prince of Orange (d. 1650)
• 1651 – Louis-Antoine, Cardinal de Noailles, French cardinal (d. 1729)
• 1652 – Liselotte von der Pfalz, Duchess of Orléans (d. 1722)
• 1738 – Nathaniel Gorham, American politician (d. 1796)
• 1756 – King Maximilian I of Bavaria (d. 1825)
• 1794 – Cornelius Vanderbilt, American entrepreneur (d. 1877)
• 1818 – Amelia Bloomer, American suffragette (d. 1894)
• 1819 – Julia Ward Howe, American composer (d. 1910)
• 1820 – Mathilde Bonaparte, French princess and socialite (d. 1904)
• 1827 – Samuel F. Miller, American politician (d. 1892)
• 1836 – Jay Gould, American financier (d. 1892)
• 1837 – Wild Bill Hickok, American gunfighter (d. 1876)
• 1837 – Ivan Kramskoi, Russian painter (d. 1887)
• 1860 – Manuel Teixeira Gomes, 7 President of Portugal (d. 1941)
• 1864 – Ante Trumbic, Croatian politician (d. 1938)
• 1867 – Arnold Bennett, British novelist (d. 1931)
• 1871 – Georges Rouault, French painter and graphic artist (d. 1958)
• 1876 – Ferdynand Antoni Ossendowski, Polish writer (d. 1945)
• 1879 – Hans Lammers, German SS officer (d. 1962)
• 1884 – Max Brod, Austrian author (d. 1968)
• 1888 – Louis Durey, French composer (d. 1979)
• 1891 – Claude Champagne, French-Canadian composer (d. 1965)
• 1893 – Hermann Dörnemann, German supercentarian (d. 2005)
• 1894 – Louis-Ferdinand Céline, French writer (d. 1961)
• 1894 – Dashiell Hammett, American author (d. 1961)
• 1897 – John Cockcroft, British physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1967)
• 1900 – Uladzimir Zylka, Belarusian poet (d. 1933)
• 1904 – Chuhei Nambu, Japanese athlete (d. 1997)
• 1907 – Rachel Carson, American biologist and science writer (d. 1964)
• 1911 – Hubert H. Humphrey, American politician (d. 1978)
• 1911 – Teddy Kollek, Austrian-born Israeli politician (d. 2007)
• 1911 – Vincent Price, American actor (d. 1993)
• 1912 – John Cheever, American author (d. 1982)
• 1912 – Sam Snead, American golfer (d. 2002)
• 1912 – Terry Moore, American baseball player (d. 1995)
• 1913 – Wols, German painter (d. 1951)
• 1915 – Herman Wouk, American writer
• 1918 – Yasuhiro Nakasone, Japanese politician
• 1921 – Caryl Chessman, American robber and rapist (d. 1960)
• 1922 – Christopher Lee, English actor
• 1923 – Henry Kissinger, United States Secretary of State, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize
• 1923 – Sumner Redstone, American entrepreneur
• 1925 – Tony Hillerman, American writer
• 1930 – John Barth, American novelist
• 1930 – William S. Sessions, American director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
• 1933 – Ted Rogers, Canadian entrepreneur
• 1934 – Harlan Ellison, American author
• 1935 – Lee Meriwether, Miss America and actress
• 1935 – Ramsey Lewis, American pianist
• 1935 – Mal Evans, British Beatles assistant (d. 1976)
• 1936 – Louis Gossett Jr., American actor
• 1936 – Marcel Masse, Canadian politician
• 1937 – Allan Carr, American film producer and writer (d. 1999)
• 1939 – Socratis Kokkalis, Greek businessman
• 1942 – Lee Baca, American law enforcement official
• 1943 – Cilla Black, English singer and presenter
• 1943 – Bruce Weitz, American actor
• 1944 – Christopher Dodd, American politician
• 1944 – Alain Souchon, French singer and songwriter
• 1945 – Bruce Cockburn, Canadian musician
• 1946 – Lewis Collins, English actor
• 1946 – Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen, Danish musician (d. 2005)
• 1947 – Branko Oblak, Slovenian footballer
• 1948 – Wubbo de Boer, Dutch civil servant
• 1951 – Ana Belén, Spanish singer and actress
• 1954 – Pauline Hanson, Australian politician
• 1954 – Jackie Slater, American football player
• 1955 – Richard Schiff, American actor
• 1955 – Eric Bischoff, American professional wrestling promoter
• 1956 – Cynthia McFadden, American television anchor
• 1957 – Siouxsie Sioux, English musician (Siouxsie and the Banshees)
• 1958 – Neil Finn, New Zealand singer and songwriter (Split Enz, Crowded House)
• 1958 – Linnea Quigley, American actress
• 1961 – Peri Gilpin, American actress
• 1962 – Ray Borner, Australian basketball player
• 1962 – Steven Brill, American film writer and director
• 1964 – Adam Carolla, American comedian and television personality
• 1967 – Paul Gascoigne, English footballer
• 1968 – Jeff Bagwell, American baseball player
• 1968 – Frank Thomas, American baseball player
• 1969 – Jeremy Mayfield, American race car driver
• 1970 – Tim Farron, British politician
• 1970 – Joseph Fiennes, English actor
• 1970 – Michele Bartoli, Italian cyclist
• 1971 – Paul Bettany, English actor
• 1971 – Wayne Carey, Australian rules footballer
• 1971 – Kaur Kender, Estonian author
• 1971 – Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes, American singer (TLC) (d. 2002)
• 1971 – Glenn Ross, Northern Irish strongman
• 1971 – Monika Schnarre, Canadian model
• 1972 – Ivete Sangalo, Brazilian singer
• 1972 – Todd Demsey, American golfer
• 1973 – Jack McBrayer, American actor and comedian
• 1974 – Derek Webb, American singer and songwriter (Caedmon’s Call)
• 1974 – Danny Wuerffel, American football player
• 1975 – André 3000, American musician (OutKast)
• 1975 – Michael Hussey, Australian cricketer
• 1975 – Jadakiss, American rapper (The Lox)
• 1975 – Jamie Oliver, British chef and television personality
• 1975 – RJD2, American hip-hop producer
• 1976 – Anita Blonde, Hungarian porn star
• 1977 – Abderrahmane Hammad, Algerian athlete
• 1977 – Mahela Jayawardene, Sri Lankan cricketer
• 1977 – Tommie van der Leegte, Dutch footballer
• 1978 – Adin Brown, American soccer player
• 1979 – Mile Sterjovski, Australian footballer
• 1981 – Özgür Çevik, Turkish singer and actor
• 1981 – Johan Elmander, Swedish footballer
• 1981 – Miloy, Angolan footballer
• 1981 – Fivos Constantinou, Cypriot distance runner
• 1983 – Bobby Convey, American soccer player
• 1984 – Kalle Spjuth, Swedish bandy player
• 1985 – Chien-Ming Chiang, Taiwanese baseball player
• 1990 – Ekaterina Zaikina, Russian figure-skater

May 27 – Deaths:

• 366 – Procopius, Roman usurper (b. 326)
• 735 – Bede, English historian and theologian (b. 672 or 673)
• 866 – Ordoño I of Asturias, King of Asturias (b. 831)
• 927 – Tsar Simeon I of Bulgaria (b. 864 or 865)
• 1039 – Dirk III, Count of Holland
• 1444 – John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset, English military leader (b. 1404)
• 1508 – Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan (b. 1452)
• 1525 – Thomas Muentzer, German rebel leader
• 1541 – Margaret Pole, 8th Countess of Salisbury (b. 1473)
• 1564 – John Calvin, French religious reformer (b. 1509)
• 1610 – François Ravaillac, French assassin of Henry IV of France (b. 1578)
• 1615 – Marguerite de Valois, queen of Henry IV of France (b. 1553)
• 1661 – Archibald Campbell, Scottish religious dissident (b. 1607)
• 1675 – Gaspard Dughet, French painter (b. 1613)
• 1690 – Giovanni Legrenzi, Italian composer (b. 1626)
• 1702 – Dominique Bouhours, French critic (b. 1628)
• 1707 – Marquise de Montespan, French mistress of Louis XIV of France (b. 1641)
• 1781 – Giovanni Battista Beccaria, Italian physicist (b. 1716)
• 1797 – François-Noël Babeuf, French revolutionary (b. 1760)
• 1831 – Jedediah Smith, American explorer (b. 1799)
• 1840 – Niccolò Paganini, Italian violinist and composer (b. 1782)
• 1896 – Aleksandr Grigorievich Stoletov, Russian physicist (b. 1839)
• 1910 – Robert Koch, German physician, Nobel laureate (b. 1843)
• 1919 – Kandukuri Veeresalingam, Indian social activist (b. 1848)
• 1926 – Srecko Kosovel, Slovenian poet (b. 1904)
• 1947 – Ed Konetchy, American baseball player (b. 1885)
• 1949 – Robert Ripley, American cartoonist (Ripley’s Believe It or Not!) (b. 1890)
• 1953 – Jesse Burkett, American baseball player (b. 1868)
• 1960 – James Montgomery Flagg, American illustrator (b. 1877)
• 1963 – Gregoris Lambrakis, Greek physician and politician (b. 1912)
• 1964 – Jawaharlal Nehru, Indian politician (b. 1889)
• 1967 – Ernst Niekisch, German politician (b. 1889)
• 1969 – Jeffrey Hunter, American actor (b. 1926)
• 1984 – Vincent James McMahon, was a U.S. professional wrestling promoter.
• 1986 – Isma’il Raji’ al-Faruqi, Palestinian-born philosopher (b. 1921)
• 1987 – John Howard Northrop, American chemist, Nobel laureate (b. 1891)
• 1989 – Arseny Tarkovsky, Russian poet (b. 1907)
• 1990 – Robert B. Meyner, American politician (b. 1908)
• 1991 – Leopold Nowak, Austrian musicologist (b. 1904)
• 1992 – Uncle Charlie Osborne, American fiddler (b. 1890)
• 1993 – Mary Philbin, American actress (b. 1903)
• 1993 – Werner Stocker, German actor (b. 1955)
• 2000 – Crawford Murray MacLehose of Beoch, British statesman (b. 1917)
• 2000 – Maurice Richard, Canadian hockey player (b. 1921)
• 2000 – Kazimierz Leski, Polish engineer, fighter pilot, intelligence and counter-intelligence officer  (b. 1912)
• 2001 – Ramon Bieri, American actor (b. 1929)
• 2003 – Luciano Berio, Italian composer (b. 1925)
• 2006 – Craig Heyward, American football player (b. 1966)
• 2006 – Paul Gleason, American actor (b. 1939)
• 2006 – Alex Toth, American cartoonist (b. 1928)
• 2006 – Rob Borsellino, American columnist (b. 1949)
• 2006 – Oduvil Unnikrishnan, Indian actor (b. 1944)
• 2007 – Izumi Sakai, Japanese singer (b. 1967)
• 2007 – Ed Yost, American inventor (b. 1919)
• 2007 – Gretchen Wyler, American actress (b. 1932)

May 27-Holidays

• Lag Ba’omer in Judaism (2005)
• Feast day of the following saints in the Christian Church:

o   Augustine of Canterbury

o   Venerable Bede

o   Saint Julius the Veteran

o   Pope John I

o   Hildebert

o   Bruno, Bishop of Würzburg

o   Eutropius

• Mother’s Day in Bolivia (Día de la Madre) and Sweden (Mors Dag)
• Children’s Day in Nigeria

On This Day in History May 26

May 26 – Events:

• 451 – The Battle of Avarayr between Armenian rebels and the Sassanid Empire takes place. The Armenians are defeated militarily but are guaranteed freedom to openly practice Christianity.
• 1293 – Earthquake strikes Kamakura, Japan, kills 30,000.
• 1328 – William of Ockham, Franciscan Minister-General Michael of Cesena and two other Franciscan leaders secretly leave Avignon, fearing a death sentence from Pope John XXII.
• 1538 – Geneva expels John Calvin and his followers from the city. Calvin lives in exile in Strasbourg for the next three years.
• 1637 – Pequot War: A combined Protestant and Mohegan force under German Captain John Mason attacks a Pequot village in Connecticut, massacring approximately 500 Native Americans.
• 1647 – Alse Young becomes the first person executed as a witch in the American colonies, when she is hanged in Hartford, Connecticut.
• 1670 – In Dover, Charles II of Great Britain and King Louis XIV of France sign the Secret Treaty of Dover.
• 1736 – Battle of Ackia: British and Chickasaw soldiers repel a French and Choctaw attack on the Chickasaw village of Ackia, near present-day Tupelo, Mississippi. The French, under Louisiana governor Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville, had sought to link Louisiana with Acadia and the other northern colonies of New France.
• 1770 – The Orlov Revolt, a first attempt to revolt against the Turks before the Greek War of Independence ends in disaster for the Greeks.
• 1805 – Napoléon Bonaparte (Napoleon I) assumes the title of King of Italy and is crowned with the Iron Crown of Lombardy in the Duomo di Milano gothic cathedral in Milan.
• 1828 – Mysterious feral child Kaspar Hauser is discovered wandering the streets of Nuremberg.
• 1830 – The Indian Removal Act is passed by the U.S. Congress; it is signed into law by President Andrew Jackson two days later.
• 1864 – Montana is organized as a United States territory.
• 1865 – American Civil War: Confederate General Edmund Kirby Smith, commander of the Confederate Trans-Mississippi division, is the last general of the Confederate Army to surrender, at Galveston, Texas.
• 1868 – The impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson ends, with Johnson being found not guilty by one vote.
• 1869 – Boston University is chartered by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
• 1879 – Russia and the United Kingdom sign the Treaty of Gandamak establishing an Afghan state.
• 1889 – Opening of the first Eiffel Tower elevator to the public.
• 1896 – Nicholas II becomes Tsar of Russia.
• 1896 – Charles Dow publishes the first edition of the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
• 1896 – James Dunham murders six people in Campbell, California.
• 1906 – Vauxhall Bridge is opened in London.
• 1913 – Emily Duncan becomes the Britain’s first woman magistrate.
• 1917 – A powerful F4 tornado rips Mattoon, Illinois apart, killing 101 people and injuring 689. It was the world’s longest-lasting tornado, lasting for over 7 hours and traveling 293 miles, spreading death and destruction along its path.
• 1918 – The Democratic Republic of Georgia is established.
• 1928 – The first motion picture is projected publicly in Athens, Greece.
• 1936 – In the House of Commons of Northern Ireland, Tommy Henderson begins speaking on the Appropriation Bill. By the time he sat down in the early hours of the following morning, he had spoken for 10 hours.
• 1938 – The House Un-American Activities Committee begins its first session.
• 1940 – World War II: Battle of Dunkirk – In France, Allied forces begin a massive evacuation from Dunkirk.
• 1942 – World War II: Battle of Bir Hakeim.
• 1948 – The U.S. Congress passes Public Law 557 which permanently establishes the Civil Air Patrol as an auxiliary of the United States Air Force.
• 1966 – British Guiana gains independence, becoming Guyana.
• 1969 – Apollo program: Apollo 10 returns to earth after a successful eight-day test of all the components needed for the forthcoming first manned moon landing.
• 1970 – The Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 becomes the first commercial transport to exceed Mach 2.
• 1972 – Willandra National Park is established in Australia.
• 1972 – The United States and the Soviet Union sign the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
• 1977 – George Willig climbs the South Tower of New York City’s World Trade Center.
• 1978 – In Atlantic City, New Jersey, Resorts International, the first legal casino in the eastern United States, opens.
• 1981 – The Italian Prime Minister Arnaldo Forlani and his coalition cabinet resign following a scandal over membership of the pseudo-masonic lodge P2 (Propaganda Due).
• 1983 – Strong 7.7 magnitude earthquake strikes Japan, triggers a tsunami that kills at least 104 people, injures thousands.
• 1986 – The European Community adopts the European flag.
• 1991 – Zviad Gamsakhurdia becomes the first democratically elected President of the Republic of Georgia in the post-Soviet era.
• 1991 – Lauda Air Flight 004 explodes over rural Thailand, killing 223.
• 1992 – Charles Geschke, co-founder of Adobe Systems, Inc. was kidnapped at gunpoint from the Adobe parking lot in Mountain View, California for $650,000 and is held hostage in a rented house in Hollister, California. The FBI rescues him four days later.
• 1998 – The U.S. Supreme Court rules that Ellis Island, the historic gateway for millions of immigrants, is mainly in the state of New Jersey, not New York.
• 2002 – The Mars Odyssey finds signs of huge water ice deposits on the planet Mars.
• 2002 – Álvaro Uribe becomes President of Colombia.
• 2003 – Only three days after a previous record, Sherpa Lakpa Gelu climbs Mount Everest in 10 hours 56 minutes. The tourism ministry of Nepal confirms this record in July that year.
• 2004 – The New York Times publishes an admission of journalistic failings, claiming that its flawed reporting and lack of skepticism towards sources during the buildup to the 2003 war in Iraq helped promote the belief that Iraq possessed large stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.
• 2004 – Terry Nichols is found guilty of 161 state murder charges for helping carry out the Oklahoma City bombing.
• 2006 – The 2006 Java earthquake kills over 5,700 people, leaves 200,000 homeless.

May 26 – Birthdays:

• 1264 – Prince Koreyasu, Japanese shogun (d. 1326)
• 1478 – Pope Clement VII (d. 1534)
• 1566 – Mehmed III, Ottoman Emperor (d. 1603)
• 1602 – Philippe de Champaigne, French painter (d. 1674)
• 1650 – John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, British general (d. 1722)
• 1667 – Abraham de Moivre, French mathematician (d. 1754)
• 1669 – Sébastien Vaillant, French botanist (d. 1722)
• 1689 – Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, English writer (d. 1762)
• 1700 – Nicolaus Ludwig Zinzendorf, German religious and social reformer (d. 1760)
• 1764 – Edward Livingston, American jurist and statesman (d. 1836)
• 1799 – Aleksandr Pushkin, Russian author (d. 1837)
• 1822 – Edmond de Goncourt, French writer (d. 1896)
• 1863 – Robert Fitzsimmons, Boxing champion (d. 1917)
• 1865 – Robert W. Chambers, American artist (d. 1933)
• 1867 – Mary of Teck, wife of George V of the United Kingdom (d. 1953)
• 1873 – Olaf Gulbransson, Norwegian artist (d. 1958)
• 1877 – Isadora Duncan, American dancer (d. 1927)
• 1883 – Mamie Smith, American singer (d. 1946)
• 1886 – Al Jolson, American singer (d. 1950)
• 1893 – Norma Talmadge, American actress (d. 1957)
• 1893 – Eugène Aynsley Goossens, English conductor and composer (d. 1962)
• 1895 – Dorothea Lange, American photographer (d. 1965)
• 1895 – Paul Lukas, Hungarian actor (d. 1971)
• 1899 – Antonio Barrette, Quebec politician (d. 1968)
• 1904 – George Formby, English singer and comedian (d. 1961)
• 1904 – Vlado Perlemuter, Polish pianist (d. 2002)
• 1907 – Jean Bernard, French physician (d. 2006)
• 1907 – John Wayne, American actor (d. 1979)
• 1908 – Robert Morley, English actor (d. 1992)
• 1909 – Sir Matt Busby, Scottish footballer and manager (d. 1994)
• 1909 – Nikolay Guryanov, Russian Orthodox Christian mystic and priest (d. 2002)
• 1909 – Adolfo López Mateos, President of Mexico (d. 1969)
• 1911 – Ben Alexander, American actor (d. 1969)
• 1912 – János Kádár, Prime minister of Hungary (d. 1989)
• 1912 – Jay Silverheels, American actor (d. 1980)
• 1913 – Peter Cushing, English actor (d. 1994)
• 1914 – Frankie Manning, American Lindy Hop dancer
• 1915 – Sam Edwards, American actor (d. 2004)
• 1915 – Antonia Forest, British children’s author (d. 2003)
• 1916 – Moondog, American composer, musician and poet (d. 1999)
• 1916 – Henriette Roosenburg, Dutch journalist (d. 1972)
• 1917 – Eva Szorenyi, Hungarian actress, freedom activist for Hungary
• 1918 – Anton Christoforidis, Greek boxer (d. 1985)
• 1920 – Peggy Lee, American singer (d. 2002)
• 1923 – James Arness, American actor
• 1923 – Roy Dotrice, British actor
• 1926 – Miles Davis, American musician (d. 1991)
• 1935 – Sheila Steafel, South African-born British actress
• 1938 – William Bolcom, American composer
• 1938 – Lyudmila Petrushevskaya, Russian playwright and novelist
• 1938 – Teresa Stratas, Canadian soprano
• 1939 – Merab Kostava, Georgian anti-Soviet leader
• 1939 – Brent Musburger, American sports broadcaster
• 1940 – Monique Gagnon-Tremblay, Quebec politician
• 1940 – Levon Helm, American musician (The Band)
• 1941 – Reg Bundy, British performer (d. 2003)
• 1941 – Cliff Drysdale, South African tennis player
• 1941 – John Kaufman, sculptor
• 1943 – Erica Terpstra, President of the Dutch Olympic Committee
• 1944 – Sam Posey, American race car driver, TV commentator and author
• 1945 – Garry Peterson, Canadian drummer (The Guess Who)
• 1946 – Mick Ronson, English musician (d. 1993)
• 1948 – Stevie Nicks, American songwriter
• 1949 – Ward Cunningham, American inventor
• 1949 – Pam Grier, American actress
• 1949 – Philip Michael Thomas, American actor
• 1949 – Hank Williams Jr., American singer
• 1951 – Sally Ride, American astronaut
• 1951 – Madeleine Taylor-Quinn, Irish politician
• 1952 – David Meece, Christian musician
• 1953 – Michael Portillo, British politician
• 1954 – Alan Hollinghurst, British novelist
• 1954 – Danny Rolling, American murderer (d. 2006)
• 1955 – Masaharu Morimoto, Japanese chef
• 1955 – Wesley Walker, American football player
• 1956 – Frédéric Dutoit, French politician
• 1957 – Margaret Colin, American actress
• 1957 – François Legault, French Canadian politician
• 1957 – Kristina Olsen, American musician
• 1957 – Roberto Ravaglia, Italian racing driver
• 1957 – Pontso S.M. Sekatle, Lesotho academic and politician
• 1959 – Steve Hanley, English musician (The Fall, Tom Hingley and the Lovers)
• 1960 – Masahiro Matsunaga, Japanese racing driver
• 1960 – Rob Murphy, American baseball player
• 1962 – Genie Francis, American actress
• 1962 – Bobcat Goldthwait, American actor
• 1962 – Colin Vearncombe, English singer,(Black)
• 1964 – Caitlín R. Kiernan, Irish-American writer
• 1964 – Lenny Kravitz, American musician
• 1965 – Hazel Irvine, British television presenter
• 1966 – Helena Bonham Carter, English actress
• 1966 – Zola Budd, South African athlete
• 1967 – Phil Doyle, Australian writer
• 1968 – Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark
• 1968 – Pat Kenney, American professional wrestler
• 1968 – Steve Sedgley, English footballer
• 1969 – Musetta Vander, South African Actress
• 1970 – Nobuhiro Watsuki, Japanese cartoonist
• 1971 – Matt Stone, American television producer
• 1972 – Patsy Palmer, British actress
• 1974 – Lars Frölander, Swedish swimmer
• 1975 – Travis Lee, American baseball player
• 1976 – Justin Pierre, American singer (Motion City Soundtrack)
• 1977 – Mark Hunter, American musician (Chimaira)
• 1977 – Misaki Ito, Japanese actress
• 1977 – Luca Toni, Italian footballer
• 1978 – Phil Elverum, American Singer-Songwriter
• 1979 – Elisabeth Harnois, American actress
• 1979 – Mehmet Okur (Memo), Turkish basketball player
• 1979 – Ashley Massaro, American model and professional wrestler
• 1981 – Eda-Ines Etti, Estonian singer
• 1981 – Irini Merkouri, Greek singer
• 1982 – Yoko Matsugane, Japanese model
• 1988 – Joel Selwood, Australian footballer
• 1991 – Julianna Rose Mauriello, American actress

May 26 – Deaths:

• 604 – Augustine of Canterbury, Archbishop of Canterbury
• 818 – Ali ar-Rida, Shia Imam (b. 766)
• 946 – King Edmund I of England (b. 921)
• 1055 – Margrave Adalbert of Austria
• 1421 – Mehmed I, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1389)
• 1512 – Bayezid II, Ottoman Sultan
• 1536 – Francesco Berni, Italian poet
• 1595 – Philip Neri, Italian churchman (b. 1515)
• 1647 – Alse Young, American “witch”
• 1648 – Vincent Voiture, French poet (b. 1597)
• 1653 – Robert Filmer, English writer (b. 1588)
• 1679 – Ferdinand Maria, Elector of Bavaria (b. 1636)
• 1685 – Karl II, Elector Palatine (b. 1651)
• 1703 – Samuel Pepys, English civil servant and diarist (b. 1633)
• 1742 – Pylyp Orlyk, Ukrainian Zaporozhian Cossack starshina, diplomat (b. 1672)
• 1762 – Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten, German philosopher (b. 1714)
• 1799 – James Burnett, Lord Monboddo, Scottish judge (b. 1714)
• 1824 – Capel Lofft, English writer (b. 1751)
• 1831 – Ciro Menotti, Italian patriot (b. 1798)
• 1840 – Sidney Smith, British admiral (b. 1764)
• 1881 – Jakob Bernays, German philologist (b. 1824)
• 1883 – Abd al-Qadir, Algerian political and military leader (b. 1808)
• 1883 – Edward Sabine, Irish astronomer (b. 1788)
• 1902 – Almon Strowger, American inventor (b. 1839)
• 1904 – Georges Gilles de la Tourette, French neurologist (b. 1857)
• 1907 – Ida McKinley, First Lady of the United States (b. 1847)
• 1908 – Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, founder of the Ahmadiyya movement in Islam (b. 1835)
• 1924 – Victor Herbert, Irish composer (b. 1859)
• 1926 – Simon Petlyura, Ukrainian independence fighter (b. 1879)
• 1933 – Horatio Bottomley, British financier and politician (b. 1860)
• 1933 – Jimmie Rodgers, American singer (b. 1897)
• 1939 – Charles Horace Mayo, American medical practitioner (Mayo Clinic) (b. 1865)
• 1943 – Edsel Ford, American automobile executive (b. 1893)
• 1948 – Theodore Morell, Hitler’s personal physician (b. 1886)
• 1951 – Lincoln Ellsworth, American scientist (b. 1880)
• 1954 – Lionel Conacher, Canadian athlete (b. 1900)
• 1955 – Alberto Ascari, Italian race car driver and two-time F1 world champion (b. 1918)
• 1968 – Little Willie John, American singer (b. 1937)
• 1969 – Paul Hawkins, Australian racing driver (b. 1937)
• 1969 – Allan H. Loughead, American aviation pioneer (Lockheed Corporation; b. 1889)
• 1974 – Silvio Moser, Swiss racing driver (b. 1941)
• 1976 – Martin Heidegger, German philosopher (b. 1889)
• 1976 – Juan Maino, Chilean leader of MAPU, “disappeared.”
• 1977 – William Powell, American singer (The O’Jays) (b. 1942)
• 1978 – Cybele, Greek actress (b. 1887)
• 1979 – George Brent, British actor (b. 1899)
• 1989 – Don Revie, Former footballer and England and Leeds United Manager (b. 1927)
• 1999 – Paul Sacher, Swiss conductor (b. 1906)
• 1999 – Waldo Semon, American inventor (b. 1898)
• 2001 – Vittorio Brambilla, Italian racing driver (b. 1937)
• 2001 – Anne Haney, American actress (b. 1934)
• 2001 – Moven Enock Mahachi, Defence Minister of Zimbabwe (b. 1952)
• 2002 – Mamo Wolde, Ethiopian runner (b. 1932)
• 2003 – Kathleen Winsor, American writer (b. 1919)
• 2004 – Nikolai Stepanovich Chernykh, Russian astronomer (b. 1931)
• 2004 – Dullah Omar, South African lawyer (b. 1934)
• 2005 – Eddie Albert, American actor (b. 1906)
• 2005 – Chico Carrasquel, Venezuelan baseball player (b. 1928)
• 2006 – Kevin O’Flanagan, Irish athlete and physician (b. 1919)
• 2007 – J. Edward Oliver, cartoonist and composer (b. 1942)

May 26 – Holidays:

• Australia – National Sorry Day
• Poland – Mother’s Day
• Georgia – National Day
• In the Roman Catholic Church:

o   Saint Augustine of Canterbury

o   Saint Lambert (d. 1154)

o   Saint Philip Neri (d. 1595)

On This Day in History May 25

May 25 – Events:

• 1085 – Alfonso VI of Castile takes Toledo back from the Moors.
• 1420 – Henry the Navigator is appointed governor of the Order of Christ.
• 1521 – The Diet of Worms ends when Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, issues the Edict of  Worms, declaring Martin Luther an outlaw.
• 1659 – Richard Cromwell resigns as Lord Protector of England following the restoration of the Long Parliament, beginning a second brief period of the republican government called the Commonwealth.
• 1738 – A treaty between Pennsylvania and Maryland ends the Conojocular War with settlement of a boundary dispute and exchange of prisoners.
• 1787 – In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, delegates convene a Constitutional Convention to write a new Constitution for the United States. George Washington presides.
• 1810 – In the May Revolution, citizens of Buenos Aires expel the Viceroy during the Semana de Mayo.
• 1837 – The Patriots of Lower Canada (Quebec) rebel against the British for freedom
• 1865 – In Mobile, Alabama, 300 are killed when an ordnance depot explodes.
• 1895 – Playwright, poet, and novelist Oscar Wilde is convicted of “committing acts of gross indecency with other male persons” and sentenced to serve two years in prison.
• 1895 – The Republic of Formosa is formed, with Tang Ching-sung as the president.
• 1914 – The United Kingdom’s House of Commons passes Home Rule Act for devolution in Ireland.
• 1925 – Scopes Trial: John T. Scopes is indicted for teaching Darwin’s theory of evolution.
• 1926 – Sholom Schwartzbard assassinates Symon Petliura, the head of the Paris-based government-in-exile of Ukrainian People’s Republic.
• 1935 – Jesse Owens of Ohio State University breaks five world records and ties a sixth at the Big Ten Conference Track and Field Championships in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
• 1936 – The Remington Rand strike, led by the American Federation of Labor, begins.
• 1938 – Spanish Civil War: Bombing of Alicante, 313 deaths.
• 1940 – World War II: The Battle of Dunkirk begins.
• 1946 – The parliament of Transjordan makes Abdullah I of Jordan their king.
• 1953 – Nuclear testing: At the Nevada Test Site, the United States conducts its first and only nuclear artillery test.
• 1955 – In the United States, a night time F5 tornado strikes the small city of Udall, Kansas, killing 80 and injuring 273. It was the deadliest tornado to ever occur in the state and the 23rd deadliest in the U.S.
• 1961 – Apollo program: U.S. president John F. Kennedy announces before a special joint session of Congress his goal to initiate a project to put a “man on the moon” before the end of the decade.
• 1961 – King Hussein of Jordan marries Princess Muna al-Hussein (Antoinette Gardiner).
• 1963 – In Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the Organisation of African Unity is established.
• 1966 – Explorer program: Explorer 32 launches.
• 1966 – The first prominent DaZiBao during the Cultural Revolution in China was posted at Peking University.
• 1977 – George Lucas’s space opera Star Wars is released.
• 1979 – American Airlines Flight 191: In Chicago, a DC-10 crashes during takeoff at O’Hare International Airport killing 271 on board and two people on the ground.
• 1981 – In Riyadh, the Gulf Cooperation Council is created between Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
• 1982 – HMS Coventry is sunk during the Falklands War.
• 1985 – Bangladesh is hit by a tropical cyclone and storm surge, which kills approximately 10,000  people.
• 1995 – The Bosnian Serb Army kills 72 youngsters in the Bosnian city of Tuzla.
• 1997 – A military coup in Sierra Leone replaces President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah with Major Johnny Paul Koromah.
• 1999 – The United States House of Representatives released the Cox Report which detailed the People’s Republic of China’s nuclear espionage against the U.S. over the prior two decades.
• 2000 – Liberation Day of Lebanon. Israel withdraws its army from most of the Lebanese territory after 22 years of its first invasion in 1978.
• 2001 – 32-year-old Erik Weihenmayer, of Boulder, Colorado, becomes the first blind person to reach the summit of Mount Everest.
• 2002 – China Airlines Flight 611: A Boeing 747-200 breaks apart in mid-air and plunges into the Taiwan Strait killing 225 people.
• 2002 – A train crash in Tenga, Mozambique kills 197 people.
• 2003 – Néstor Kirchner becomes President of Argentina after defeating Carlos Menem. He is the first elected President since the economic crisis.
• 2007 – The Ostankino Tower in Moscow catches fire for the second time.

May 25 – Birthdays:

• 1048 – Emperor Shenzong of China (d. 1085)
• 1334 – Emperor Suko (d. 1398)
• 1458 – Mahmud Begada, Sultan of Gujarat (d. 1511)
• 1606 – Charles Garnier, French Jesuit missionary (d. 1649)
• 1661 – Claude Buffier, French philosopher and historian (d. 1737)
• 1713 – John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1792)
• 1725 – Samuel Ward, American politician (d. 1776)
• 1783 – Philip Pendleton Barbour, Virginia politician and U.S. Supreme Court justice (d. 1841)
• 1803 – Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, English novelist and playwright (d. 1873)
• 1803 – Ralph Waldo Emerson, American essayist and philosopher (d. 1882)
• 1818 – Jacob Burckhardt, Swiss historian (d. 1897)
• 1845 – Lip Pike, baseball player (d. 1883)
• 1846 – Princess Helena of the United Kingdom, daughter of Queen Victoria (d. 1923)
• 1846 – Naim Frashëri, Albanian poet and writer(d. 1900)
• 1852 – William Muldoon, wrestler (d. 1933)
• 1856 – Louis Franchet d’Espèrey, French general (d. 1942)
• 1860 – James McKeen Cattell, American psychologist (d. 1944)
• 1865 – John Mott, American YMCA leader, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1955)
• 1865 – Pieter Zeeman, Dutch physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1943)
• 1877 – Billy Murray, American singer (d. 1954)
• 1878 – Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, American entertainer (d. 1949)
• 1879 – Max Aitken, 1st Baron Beaverbrook, Canadian-born publisher (d. 1964)
• 1880 – Jean Alexandre Barré, French neurologist (d. 1967)
• 1882 – Marie Doro, American actress (d. 1956)
• 1886 – Philip Murray, U.S. (Scottish-born) labor leader (d. 1952)
• 1886 – Rash Behari Bose, leader against the British Raj in India (d. 1945)
• 1887 – Pio of Pietrelcina, Catholic saint (d. 1968)
• 1888 – Miles Malleson, English actor (d. 1969)
• 1889 – Igor Sikorsky, Russian inventor (d. 1972)
• 1892 – Josip Broz Tito, Yugoslav resistance leader and later dictator (d. 1980)
• 1897 – Gene Tunney, American heavyweight champion (d. 1978)
• 1898 – Bennett Cerf, American publisher, TV personality (d. 1971)
• 1899 – Kazi Nazrul Islam, Bengali poet, musician, revolutionary and philosopher (d. 1976)
• 1900 – Alain Grandbois, French Canadian poet (d. 1975)
• 1903 – Binnie Barnes, British actress (d. 1998)
• 1907 – U Nu, Burmese politician (d. 1995)
• 1909 – Alfred Kubel, German politician (d. 1999)
• 1909 – Marie Menken, American experimental filmmaker and socialite (d. 1970)
• 1912 – Princess Dukhye of Korea (d. 1989)
• 1913 – Richard Dimbleby, British journalist and broadcaster (d. 1965)
• 1917 – Steve Cochran, American actor (d. 1965)
• 1918 – Claude Akins, American actor (d. 1994)
• 1921 – Jack Steinberger, German-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• 1921 – Hal David, American lyricist and songwriter
• 1922 – Enrico Berlinguer, Italian politician (d. 1984)
• 1922 – Kitty Kallen, American big band singer
• 1924 – István Nyers, Hungarian footballer (d. 2005)
• 1925 – Rosario Castellanos, Mexican poet (d. 1974)
• 1925 – Jeanne Crain, American actress (d. 2003)
• 1925 – Don Liddle, baseball player (d. 2000)
• 1926 – Miles Davis, jazz musician (d. 1991)
• 1927 – Robert Ludlum, American writer (d. 2001)
• 1929 – Beverly Sills, American soprano (d. 2007)
• 1929 – Warren Frost, American actor
• 1931 – Georgi Grechko, cosmonaut
• 1931 – Aili Jõgi, Estonian freedom fighter
• 1932 – John Gregory Dunne, American writer (d. 2003)
• 1933 – Ray Spencer, English footballer
• 1935 – Cookie Gilchrist, American football player
• 1935 – Victoria Shaw, Australian-born American actress (d. 1988)
• 1936 – Tom T. Hall, American singer and songwriter
• 1938 – Raymond Carver, American writer (d. 1988)
• 1939 – Dixie Carter, American actress
• 1939 – Ian McKellen, English actor
• 1943 – Jessi Colter, American singer
• 1943 – John “Poli” Palmer, British rock musician (Family)
• 1944 – Frank Oz, English-born puppeteer and director
• 1944 – Pierre Bachelet, French singer and songwriter (d. 2005)
• 1944 – John Bunnell, former Sheriff of Multnomah County, Oregon and TV personality
• 1944 – Robert MacPherson, American mathematician
• 1946 – David A. Hargrave, RPG designer
• 1948 – Sgt. Slaughter, American professional wrestler
• 1948 – Klaus Meine, German musician (Scorpions)
• 1949 – Jamaica Kincaid, Antiguan-born novelist
• 1951 – Bob Gale, American screenwriter
• 1952 – Al Sarrantonio, American writer
• 1952 – Jeffrey Bewkes, American media executive
• 1953 – Eve Ensler, American playwright
• 1953 – Daniel Passarella, Argentine football player
• 1953 – Stan Sakai, Japanese-American cartoonist (Usagi Yojimbo)
• 1955 – Alistair Burt, British politician
• 1956 – Sugar Minott, Jamaican singer
• 1956 – David P. Sartor, American music composer
• 1956 – Tatsutoshi Goto, Japanese professional wrestler
• 1957 – Edward Lee, American writer
• 1957 – Robert Picard, French Canadian ice hockey player
• 1958 – Paul Weller, British musician
• 1959 – Manolis Kefalogiannis, Greek politician
• 1959 – Rick Wamsley, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1962 – Rick Nattress, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1963 – Mike Myers, Canadian actor and comedian
• 1964 – Ivan Bella, Slovak cosmonaut
• 1966 – Princess Laurentien of the Netherlands
• 1967 – Poppy Z. Brite, American author
• 1968 – Kendall Gill, American basketball player
• 1969 – Anne Heche, American actress
• 1969 – Stacy London, American fashion consultant
• 1969 – Glen Drover, Canadian guitar player (Megadeth)
• 1970 – Joey Eischen, baseball player
• 1970 – Lindsay and Sidney Greenbush, American actresses
• 1970 – Jamie Kennedy, American actor
• 1970 – Satsuki Yukino, Seiyuu
• 1971 – Sonya Smith, American actress
• 1971 – Justin Henry, American actor
• 1971 – Marco Cappato, Italian politician
• 1972 – Octavia Spencer, American actress
• 1973 – Demetri Martin, American comedian
• 1973 – Molly Sims, American supermodel and actress
• 1973 – Daz Dillinger, American hip-hop performer
• 1974 – Frank Klepacki, American musician
• 1975 – Lauryn Hill, American singer
• 1976 – Tarik Glenn, National Football League offensive lineman
• 1976 – Miguel Tejada, Dominican baseball player
• 1976 – Cillian Murphy, Irish actor
• 1978 – Brian Urlacher, American football player
• 1979 – Carlos Bocanegra, American soccer player
• 1979 – Jonny Wilkinson, English international and Newcastle Falcons rugby player
• 1979 – Caroline Ouellette, French Canadian ice hockey player
• 1979 – Sam Sodje, Nigerian footballer
• 1980 – Jae Hee, South Korean actor
• 1980 – David Navarro, Spanish footballer
• 1982 – Adam Boyd, English footballer
• 1982 – Daniel Braaten, Norwegian footballer
• 1982 – Ryan Gallant, American skateboarder
• 1983 – Kunal Khemu, Indian actor
• 1984 – Unnur Birna Vilhjálmsdóttir, 2005 Miss World
• 1984 – Kyle Brodziak, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1984 – Shawne Merriman, American football Player for the San Diego Chargers
• 1985 – Luciana Abreu, Portuguese singer and actress
• 1986 – Yoan Gouffran, French football player
• 1986 – Juri Ueno, Japanese actress
• 1987 – Timothy Derijck, Belgian football player
• 1999 – Maisy McLeod-Riera, New Zealand actress

May 25 – Deaths:

• 709 – Aldhelm, Bishop of Sherborne
• 735 – Bede, English historian and monk
• 967 – Murakami, Emperor of Japan (b. 926)
• 992 – Mieszko I first lord and knight of Poland, duke of Polans
• 1085 – Pope Gregory VII
• 1261 – Pope Alexander IV
• 1452 – John Stafford, Archbishop of Canterbury
• 1555 – Gemma Frisius, Dutch mathematician and cartographer (b. 1508)
• 1555 – Henry II of Navarre (b. 1503)
• 1595 – Valens Acidalius, German critic and poet (b. 1567)
• 1632 – Adam Tanner, Austrian mathematician and philosopher (b. 1572)
• 1667 – Gustaf Bonde, Swedish statesman (b. 1620)
• 1681 – Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Spanish playwright (b. 1600)
• 1693 – Marie-Madeleine Pioche de la Vergne, comtesse de la Fayette, French writer (b. 1634)
• 1741 – Daniel Ernst Jablonski, German theologian (b. 1660)
• 1786 – Peter III of Portugal, consort of Queen Maria I of Portugal (b. 1717)
• 1789 – Anders Dahl, Swedish botanist (b. 1751)
• 1797 – John Griffin Whitwell, 4th Baron Howard de Walden, British field marshal (b. 1719)
• 1805 – William Paley, English philosopher (b. 1743)
• 1848 – Annette von Droste-Hülshoff, German writer (b. 1797)
• 1849 – Benjamin d’Urban, British general and colonial administrator (b. 1777)
• 1899 – Rosa Bonheur, French realist painter and sculptor (d. 1822)
• 1912 – Austin Lane Crothers, American politician (b. 1860)
• 1917 – Maksim Bahdanovic, Belarusian poet (b. 1891)
• 1919 – Madame C.J. Walker, African American philanthropist and tycoon (b. 1867)
• 1924 – Lyubov Popova, Russian painter (b. 1889)
• 1926 – Symon Petlura, Ukrainian politician and statesman (b. 1879)
• 1927 – Payne Whitney, American businessman (b. 1876)
• 1930 – Randall Thomas Davidson, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1848)
• 1934 – Gustav Holst, English composer (b. 1874)
• 1935 – Sir Frank Watson Dyson, English astronomer (b. 1868)
• 1940 – Joe De Grasse, American film director (b. 1873)
• 1943 – Nils von Dardel, Swedish post-impressionist painter (b. 1888)
• 1951 – Paula von Preradovic, Croatian-born writer (b. 1887)
• 1954 – Robert Capa, Hungarian-born photojournalist (b. 1913)
• 1965 – Sonny Boy Williamson, (Alec “Rice” Miller) American Blues singer, songwriter, and musician (b. 1899)
• 1968 – Georg von Küchler, German field marshal (b. 1881)
• 1977 – Yevgenia Ginzburg, Russian writer (b. 1904)
• 1979 – John Arthur Spenkelink, American murderer (b. 1949)
• 1981 – Fredric Warburg, British publisher and author (b. 1898)
• 1983 – Jean Rougeau, French Canadian professional wrestler (b. 1925)
• 1983 – Black Jack Stewart,Canadian NHL hockey player
• 1986 – Chester Bowles, American politician (b. 1901)
• 1988 – Ernst Ruska, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1906)
• 1994 – Sonny Sharrock, American jazz guitarist (b. 1940)
• 1995 – Dany Robin, French actress (b. 1927)
• 1996 – Renzo De Felice, Italian historian (b. 1929)
• 1996 – Bradley Nowell, American singer and guitarist (Sublime) (b. 1968)
• 2000 – Nicholas Clay, British actor (b. 1946)
• 2002 – Pat Coombs, English actress (b. 1926)
• 2003 – Jeremy Michael Ward, American musician (The Mars Volta) (b. 1976)
• 2004 – Roger W. Straus, Jr., American publisher (b. 1917)
• 2005 – Sunil Dutt, Indian actor and politician (b. 1929)
• 2005 – Robert Jankel, British coachbuilder (b. 1938)
• 2005 – Graham Kennedy, Australian television personality (b. 1934)
• 2005 – Ruth Laredo, American pianist (b. 1937)
• 2005 – Gregory Scott Johnson, American murderer (b. 1965)
• 2006 – Desmond Dekker, Jamaican ska musician (b. 1941)
• 2007 – Charles Nelson Reilly, American actor and host (b. 1931)

May 25 – Holidays:

• Argentina – Day of May Revolution/National Day (1810)
• Africa Day commemorating the 1963 fouding of he AU’s precursor, OAU
• Chad, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe – African Liberation Day
• United States – National Tap Dance Day; celebrated on the birthday of Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, born in 1878.
• Lebanon, Liberation Day (2000)
• The former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia – Day of Youth
• Ancient Latvia – Urbanas Diena observed
• Towel Day – a tribute day by fans of the late author Douglas Adams writer of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy books. (Since 2001)
• Nerd Pride Day, proposed and organized since 2006 in Spain.
• Liturgical Feast days:

o   Saint Urban’s Day (d. 240)

o   Saint Bede the Venerable (d. 735)

o   Saint Augustine of Canterbury

o   Saint Bruno of Würzburg

o   Saint Frederic

o   Saint Pope Gregory VII (d. 1085)

o   Saint Hildebert

o   Saint Reinolf

o   Saint Marie-Madeleine-Sofie Barat (d. 1865)

On This Day in History May 24

May 24 – Events:

• 1218 – The Fifth Crusade leaves Acre for Egypt.
• 1276 – Magnus Ladulås crowned King of Sweden in Uppsala Cathedral.
• 1487 – Imposter Lambert Simnel is crowned as “King Edward VI” at Dublin.
• 1595 – Nomenclator of Leiden University Library appears, the first printed catalog of an institutional library.
• 1621 – Protestant Union formally dissolved.
• 1626 – Peter Minuit buys Manhattan.
• 1689 – The English Parliament passes the Act of Toleration protecting Protestants (Roman Catholics are intentionally excluded).
• 1738 – John Wesley is converted, essentially launching the Methodist movement; the day is celebrated annually by Methodists as Aldersgate Day.
• 1798 – Irish Rebellion of 1798 led by the United Irishmen against British rule begins.
• 1822 – Battle of Pichincha: Antonio José de Sucre secures the independence of the Presidency of Quito.
• 1830 – “Mary Had a Little Lamb” by Sarah Josepha Hale is published.
• 1830 – The first revenue trains in the United States begin service on the Baltimore and Ohio Rail Road between Baltimore and Ellicott’s Mills.
• 1832 – The First Kingdom of Greece is declared in the London Conference.
• 1844 – Samuel F. B. Morse sent the message “What hath God wrought” (a Bible quotation, Numbers 23:23) from the Old Supreme Court Chamber in the United States Capitol to his assistant, Alfred Vail, in Baltimore, Maryland.
• 1846 – Mexican-American War: General Zachary Taylor captures Monterrey.
• 1856 – John Brown and his men murder five slavery supporters at Pottawatomie Creek, Kansas.
• 1861 – American Civil War: Union troops occupy Alexandria, Virginia.
• 1881 – Turkey cedes Thessaly and Arta back to Greece.
• 1883 – The Brooklyn Bridge in New York is opened to traffic after 14 years of construction.
• 1895 – Henry Irving becomes the first personage from the theatre to be knighted.
• 1900 – Second Boer War: The United Kingdom annexes the Orange Free State.
• 1901 – 78 miners die in Caerphilly pit disaster in South Wales.
• 1911 – The New York Public Library opened.
• 1915 – World War I: Italy declares war on Austria-Hungary.
• 1921 – The trial of Sacco and Vanzetti opens.
• 1930 – Amy Johnson lands in Darwin, Northern Territory, becoming the first woman to fly from England to Australia (she left on May 5 for the 11,000 mile flight).
• 1940 – Igor Sikorsky performs the first successful single-rotor helicopter flight.
• 1941 – World War II: In the North Atlantic, the German Battleship Bismarck sinks the HMS Hood killing all but three crewmen on what was the pride of the Royal Navy.
• 1943 – Holocaust: Josef Mengele becomes chief medical officer in Auschwitz concentration camp.
• 1949 – The Soviet Union ends the 11-month Berlin Blockade.
• 1952 – Meher Baba and followers suffer auto accident in Prague, Oklahoma.
• 1956 – The first Eurovision Song Contest is held in Lugano, Switzerland and is won by the host nation.
• 1958 – United Press International is formed through a merger of the United Press and the International News Service.
• 1961 – American civil rights movement: Freedom Riders are arrested in Jackson, Mississippi for “disturbing the peace” after disembarking from their bus.
• 1961 – Cyprus enters the Council of Europe.
• 1962 – Project Mercury: American astronaut Scott Carpenter orbits the Earth three times in the Aurora 7 space capsule.
• 1968 – Students set fire to the Paris bourse.
• 1968 – FLQ separatists bomb the U.S. consulate in Quebec City.
• 1970 – The drilling of the Kola Superdeep Borehole begins in the USSR.
• 1973 – Earl Jellicoe resigns as Lord Privy Seal and Leader of the Lords.
• 1975 – A group of 80 reporters and cameramen are the first Westerners allowed to leave Saigon in South Vietnam since it fell to communist forces on April 29.
• 1976 – London to Washington, DC Concorde service begins.
• 1980 – The International Court of Justice calls for the release of United States embassy hostages in Tehran. The hostages would not be freed until the following January.
• 1981 – First International Women’s Day for Disarmament.
• 1982 – Liberation of Khorramshahr, Iranians recapture of the port city of Khorramshahr from the Iraqis during Iran-Iraq War.
• 1988 – Section 28 is passed as law by Parliament in the United Kingdom.
• 1989 – Sonia Sutcliffe, wife of the Yorkshire Ripper, is awarded a six-figure sum in damages after winning a libel action against Private Eye.
• 1990 – A car carrying American Earth First! activists Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney explodes in Oakland, California, critically injuring both.
• 1991 – Israel conducts Operation Solomon, evacuating Ethiopian Jews to Israel.
• 1992 – The last Thai dictator, General Suchinda Kraprayoon, resigns following pro-democracy protests.
• 1993 – Eritrea gains its independence from Ethiopia.
• 1994 – Four men convicted of bombing New York’s World Trade Center in 1993 are each sentenced to 240 years in prison.
• 1999 – Venezuela enters the Antarctic Treaty System.
• 2000 – Israeli troops withdraw from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation.
• 2001 – Mountain climbing: 15-year-old Sherpa Temba Tsheri becomes the youngest person to climb to the top of Mount Everest.
• 2001 – The Versailles wedding hall collapse in Jerusalem, Israel, kills 23 and injures over 200 in Israel’s worst-ever civil disaster.
• 2001 – The Democrats gain control of the U.S. Senate for the first time since 1994 when Senator James Jeffords of Vermont abandons the Republican Party and declares himself an independent.
• 2002 – Russia and the United States sign the Moscow Treaty.

May 24 – Birthdays:

• 15 BC – Julius Caesar Germanicus, Roman commander (d. 19)
• 1494 – Pontormo, Italian painter (d. 1557)
• 1522 – John Jewel, English bishop (d. 1571)
• 1544 – William Gilbert, English natural philosopher (d. 1603)
• 1616 – John Maitland, Duke of Lauderdale (d. 1682)
• 1671 – Gian Gastone de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (d. 1737)
• 1686 – Gabriel Fahrenheit, inventor and thermometer maker (d. 1736)
• 1689 – Daniel Finch, 8th Earl of Winchilsea, English politician (d. 1769)
• 1743 – Jean-Paul Marat, French revolutionary (d. 1793)
• 1794 – William Whewell, English scientist, philosopher, and historian of science (d. 1866)
• 1803 – Alexander von Nordmann, Finnish zoologist (d. 1866)
• 1810 – Charles Clark, Governor of Mississippi (d. 1877)
• 1810 – Abraham Geiger, German rabbi and scholar (d. 1874)
• 1816 – Emanuel Leutze, German-born painter (d. 1868)
• 1819 – Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom (d. 1901)
• 1830 – Alexei Savrasov, Russian painter (d. 1897)
• 1836 – Joseph Rowntree, British social reformer (d. 1925)
• 1854 – John Riley Banister, American law officer and cowboy (d. 1918)
• 1855 – Arthur Wing Pinero, English playwright (d. 1934)
• 1863 – George Grey Barnard, American sculptor (d. 1938)
• 1868 – Charles E. Taylor, First aircraft maintenance professional (d. 1956)
• 1870 – Benjamin Cardozo, American jurist (d. 1938)
• 1870 – Jan Christiaan Smuts, Prime Minister of South Africa (d. 1950)
• 1878 – Lillian Moller Gilbreth, American engineer (d. 1972)
• 1879 – H. B. Reese, American inventor of Reese’s and founder (d. 1956)
• 1886 – Paul Paray, French conductor and composer (d. 1979)
• 1887 – Edward “Mick” Mannock, Irish WWI flying ace (d. 1918)
• 1891 – William F. Albright, American archeologist and Biblical scholar (d. 1971)
• 1895 – Samuel Irving Newhouse, American publisher (d. 1979)
• 1899 – Suzanne Lenglen, French tennis player (d. 1938)
• 1899 – Henri Michaux, French poet (d. 1984)
• 1900 – Lionel Conacher, Canadian athlete and politician (d. 1954)
• 1900 – Eduardo De Filippo, Italian actor and screenwriter (d. 1984)
• 1901 – José Nasazzi, Uruguayan footballer (d. 1968)
• 1905 – Michail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov, Russian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1984)
• 1909 – Wilbur Mills, American politician (d. 1992)
• 1911 – Barbara West, 2nd to last living survivor from the Titanic sinking (d. 2007)
• 1914 – Lilli Palmer, German-born actress (d. 1986)
• 1914 – Giuseppe Valdengo, Italian baritone
• 1916 – Roden Cutler, Australian diplomat and war hero (d. 2002)
• 1923 – Siobhán McKenna, Irish actress (d. 1986)
• 1925 – Mai Zetterling, Swedish-born entertainer (d. 1994)
• 1926 – Stanley Baxter, Scottish actor
• 1928 – William Trevor, Irish writer
• 1930 – Hans-Martin Linde, German conductor
• 1931 – Michael Lonsdale, French actor
• 1932 – Arnold Wesker, English dramatist
• 1934 – Jane Byrne, Mayor of Chicago
• 1934 – Barry Rose, English choir-trainer and organist
• 1935 – Joan Micklin Silver, American director
• 1936 – Harold Budd, American musician
• 1938 – Tommy Chong, Canadian-born actor and comedian
• 1938 – David Viscott, American psychiatrist (d. 1996)
• 1940 – Joseph Brodsky, Russian-born poet, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1996)
• 1941 – Bob Dylan, American singer and songwriter
• 1943 – Gary Burghoff, American actor
• 1944 – Patti LaBelle, American singer
• 1945 – Priscilla Presley, American actress
• 1946 – Irena Kirszenstein-Szewinska, Russian-born Polish athlete
• 1947 – Martin Winterkorn, Chairman of Volkswagen AG and Scania AB
• 1949 – Jim Broadbent, English actor
• 1950 – Larry Seidlin, American judge
• 1953 – Alfred Molina, London-born Spanish-Italian actor
• 1955 – Rosanne Cash, American singer
• 1956 – Michael Jackson, Northern Irish clergyman
• 1959 – Pelle Lindbergh, Swedish professional goaltender (d. 1985)
• 1960 – Kristin Scott Thomas, English actress
• 1960 – Guy Fletcher, British keyboardist (Dire Straits)
• 1962 – Gene Anthony Ray, American actor (d. 2003)
• 1962 – Mo Willems, American author and screenwriter
• 1963 – Ivan Capelli, Italian racing driver
• 1963 – Michael Chabon, American author
• 1963 – Joe Dumars, American basketball player
• 1963 – Kathy Leander, Swiss singer
• 1963 – Rich Rodriguez, American football coach
• 1964 – Adrian Moorhouse, British swimmer
• 1964 – Pat Verbeek, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1965 – John C. Reilly, American actor
• 1965 – Shinichiro Watanabe, Japanese anime director
• 1966 – Eric Cantona, French footballer
• 1966 – Ricky Craven, American NASCAR driver
• 1967 – Carlos Hernández, baseball player
• 1967 – Steve McDonald, American bassist (Redd Kross)
• 1969 – Rich Robinson, American musician (Black Crowes)
• 1970 – Tommy Page, American singer
• 1971 – Kris Draper, Canadian ice hockey player (Detroit Red Wings)
• 1972 – Greg Berlanti, American television writer and producer
• 1973 – Bartolo Colón, Dominican Major League Baseball player
• 1973 – Dermot O’Leary, English television presenter
• 1973 – Ruslana, Ukrainian singer
• 1974 – Will Sasso, MADtv actor and comedian
• 1975 – Marc Gagnon, Canadian short track speed skater
• 1975 – Yannis Goumas, Greek footballer
• 1976 – Alessandro Cortini, Italian musician
• 1976 – Catherine Cox, Australian netballer
• 1977 – Kym Valentine. Australian actress
• 1978 – Brian Ching, American soccer player
• 1978 – Bryan Greenberg, American actor
• 1978 – Brad Penny, American baseball player
• 1979 – Tracy McGrady, American basketball player
• 1979 – Frank Mir, former UFC Heavyweight Champion
• 1980 – Cecilia Cheung, Hong Kong actress and singer
• 1981 – Marketa Janska, Czech model and Playboy Playmate of the month July 2003
• 1982 – Issah Ahmed, Ghana football player
• 1982 – DaMarcus Beasley, American soccer player
• 1984 – Sarah Hagan, American actress
• 1984 – Brodney Pool, American football player
• 1985 – Tim Bridgman, British racing driver
• 1986 – Jordan Metcalfe, English actor
• 1987 – Dominika Kasprzycka, Polish singer
• 1987 – Guillaume Latendresse, French Canadian ice hockey player
• 1988 – Billy Gilman, American singer
• 1989 – Tara Correa-McMullen, American actress (d. 2005)
• 1990 – Luke Temple, American Concert pianist
• 1991 – Erika Umeda, Japanese singer
• 1995 – Prince Joseph Wenzel of Liechtenstein

May 24 – Deaths:

• 1153 – King David I of Scotland (b. 1084)
• 1351 – Abu al-Hasan ‘Ali, Sultan of Morocco
• 1408 – Taejo of Joseon, ruler of Korea (b. 1335)
• 1425 – Murdoch Stewart, 2nd Duke of Albany, Scottish politician (b. 1362)
• 1456 – Ambroise de Loré, French military commander (b. 1396)
• 1543 – Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish astronomer (b. 1473)
• 1612 – Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, English statesman (b. 1563)
• 1627 – Luis de Góngora, Spanish poet (b. 1561)
• 1725 – Jonathan Wild, English criminal (b. 1682)
• 1734 – Georg Ernst Stahl, German physician and chemist (b. 1660)
• 1749 – Graf Valentin Potocki, Polish nobleman
• 1792 – George Brydges Rodney, 1st Baron Rodney, British naval officer (b. 1718)
• 1806 – John Campbell, 5th Duke of Argyll, British field marshal (b. 1723)
• 1843 – Sylvestre François Lacroix, French mathematician (b. 1765)
• 1861 – Elmer E. Ellsworth, American Civil War officer (b. 1837)
• 1872 – Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld, German painter (b. 1794)
• 1879 – William Lloyd Garrison, American abolitionist and publisher (b. 1805)
• 1881 – Samuel Palmer, English artist (b. 1805)
• 1883 – Abdel Kadir, Algerian leader (b. 1808)
• 1919 – Amado Nervo, Mexican poet (b. 1870)
• 1945 – Robert Ritter von Greim, German field marshal (b. 1892)
• 1947 – C. F. Ramuz, Swiss writer (b. 1878)
• 1948 – Jacques Feyder, Belgian director and screenwriter (b. 1885)
• 1949 – Aleksey Shchusev, Russian architect (b. 1873)
• 1950 – Archibald Wavell, British general (b. 1883)
• 1959 – John Foster Dulles, United States Secretary of State (b. 1888)
• 1963 – Elmore James, American musician (b. 1918)
• 1969 – Willy Ley, German-born rocket scientist (b. 1906)
• 1974 – Duke Ellington, American composer and musician (b. 1899)
• 1984 – Vincent J. McMahon, American pro wrestling promoter (b. 1914)
• 1991 – Gene Clark, American singer and songwriter (The Byrds) (b. 1944)
• 1991 – Miriam di San Servolo, Italian actress (b. 1912)
• 1992 – Hitoshi Ogawa, Japanese racing driver (b. 1956)
• 1995 – Harold Wilson, British politician (b. 1916)
• 1997 – Edward Mulhare, Irish actor (b. 1923)
• 1999 – Owen Hart, Professional Wrestler (b.1965)
• 2000 – Kurt Schork, American reporter (b. 1947)
• 2002 – Wallace Markfield, American writer (b. 1926)
• 2003 – Rachel Kempson, English actress (b. 1910)
• 2004 – Henry Ries, American photographer (b. 1917)
• 2004 – Milton Shulman, Canadian author and critic (b. 1913)
• 2004 – Edward Wagenknecht, American literary critic (b. 1900)
• 2005 – Carl Amery, German writer (b. 1922)
• 2005 – Arthur Haulot, Belgian journalist (b. 1913)
• 2005 – Vivian Liberto, first wife of Johnny Cash (b. 1934)
• 2006 – Henry Bumstead, American art director (b. 1915)
• 2006 – Michal Zyczkowski, Polish technician (b. 1930)
• 2007 – Bill Johnston, Australian cricket player (b. 1922)

May 24 – Holidays:

• Canada: Victoria Day, on this date if it falls on a Monday or the Monday before it. In Quebec, it is known as National Patriotes Day (Journée nationale des patriotes). In some provinces, the holiday is often referred to as “May Two-Four,” a “two-four” being slang for a case of beer with 24 bottles or cans.
• Saints Cyril and Methodius Day in Eastern Orthodox tradition. In addition, the following secular observances are recognized, in the association with the works of Cyril and Methodius Day:

o   Bulgaria: Bulgarian Education and Culture, and Slavonic Literature Day

o   Republic of Macedonia (FYROM): Saints Cyril and Methodius, Slavonic Enlighteners’ Day

o   Russia: Slavonic Literature and Culture Day

• Bermuda: Bermuda Day.
• Eritrea: National Day.
• Aldersgate Day (Methodism).
• China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and South Korea: Buddha’s Birthday
• Liturgical feasts:

o   Saint Sarah is celebrated in Camargue, France by the Roma people.

On This Day in History May 23

May 23 – Events:

• 1430 – Joan of Arc is captured by the Burgundians while leading an army to relieve Compiègne.
• 1498 – Girolamo Savonarola is burned at the stake, in Florence, Italy, on the orders of Pope Alexander VI.
• 1533 – The marriage of King Henry VIII to Catherine of Aragon is declared null and void.
• 1568 – Netherlands declared independence from Spain.
• 1568 – Dutch rebels led by Louis of Nassau, brother of William I of Orange, defeat Jean de Ligne, Duke of Aremberg and his loyalist troops in the Battle of Heiligerlee, opening the Eighty Years’ War.
• 1609 – Official ratification of the Second Charter of Virginia takes place.
• 1618 – The Second Defenestration of Prague precipitates the Thirty Years’ War.
• 1701 – After being convicted of piracy and of murdering William Moore, Captain William Kidd is hanged in London.
• 1706 – Battle of Ramillies – the John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough defeats a French army under Marshal Villeroi.
• 1805 – Napoleon Bonaparte is crowned King of Italy with the Iron Crown of Lombardy in the Cathedral of Milan.
• 1813 – South American independence leader Simón Bolívar enters Mérida, leading the invasion of Venezuela, and is proclaimed El Libertador (“The Liberator”).
• 1846 – Mexican-American War: Mexico declares war on the United States.
• 1863 – Organization of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Battle Creek, Michigan.
• 1863 – The Siege of Port Hudson starts.
• 1873 – The Canadian Parliament establishes the North West Mounted Police, the forerunner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
• 1900 – American Civil War: Sergeant William Harvey Carney becomes the first African American to be awarded the Medal of Honor, for his heroism in the Assault on the Battery Wagner.
• 1907 – Unicameral Parliament of Finland gathered for its first plenary session.
• 1911 – Dedication ceremony for the New York Public Library.
• 1915 – World War I: Italy joins the Allies after they declare war on Austria-Hungary.
• 1923 – Launch of Belgium’s SABENA airline.
• 1929 – The first talking cartoon of Mickey Mouse, The Karnival Kid, was released.
• 1933 – Seabiscuit, legendary American racehorse, is born.
• 1934 – American bank robbers Bonnie and Clyde were ambushed by police and killed in Black Lake, Louisiana.
• 1934 – The Auto-Lite Strike culminated in the “Battle of Toledo,” a five-day melee between 1,300 troops of the Ohio National Guard and 6,000 picketers.
• 1939 – The U.S. Navy submarine USS Squalus sinks off the coast of New Hampshire during a test dive, causing the death of 26 sailors. The remaining 32 crewmen and one passenger are rescued the following day.
• 1945 – World War II: Heinrich Himmler, the head of the SS, commits suicide while in Allied custody.
• 1945 – World War II: The Flensburg government under Reichspräsident Karl Dönitz was dissolved when its members were captured and arrested by British forces at Flensburg in Northern Germany.
• 1949 – The Federal Republic of Germany is established, and the Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany proclaimed.
• 1958 – Explorer 1 ceases transmission.
• 1960 – Prime Minister of Israel David Ben-Gurion announces that Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann has been captured.
• 1967 – Egypt closes the Straits of Tiran and blockades the port of Eilat at the northern end of the Gulf of Aqaba to Israeli shipping, laying the foundations for the Six Day War.
• 1970 – An outbreak of fire occurs in the Britannia Bridge over the Menai Straits in north Wales contributing to its partial destruction and amounting to approximately £1,000,000 worth of fire damage.
• 1977 – Two terrorist actions unfold in The Netherlands: Several dozen hostages are taken onboard a train, and about 100 others (mostly children) are held at a Dutch school. The train siege lasts until June 11.
• 1985 – U.S. engineer Thomas Patrick Cavanagh is sentenced to life in prison for attempting to sell stealth bomber secrets to the Soviet Union.
• 1995 – Oklahoma City bombing: In Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, what remains of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building is imploded.
• 1998 – The Good Friday Agreement is accepted in a referendum, with a high margin of three-fourth ‘yes’ votes to Northern Ireland.
• 2002 – The “55 parties” clause of the Kyoto protocol is reached after its ratification by Iceland. 2003 – The euro exceeds its initial trading value as it hits $1.18 for the first time since its introduction in 1999.
• 2004 – Part of Paris Charles De Gaulle International Airport Terminal 2E collapses, killing four people and injuring three others.
• 2007 – Parliament of Finland celebrated its 100th anniversary plenary session, with President Tarja Halonen and veterans in attendance.

May 23 – Birthdays:

• 1052 – King Philip I of France (d. 1108)
• 1100 – Emperor Qinzong of China (d. 1161)
• 1606 – Juan Caramuel y Lobkowitz, Spanish writer (d. 1682)
• 1617 – Elias Ashmole, English antiquarian (d. 1692)
• 1707 – Carolus Linnaeus, Swedish botanist (d. 1778)
• 1718 – William Hunter, Scottish anatomist (d. 1783)
• 1729 – Giuseppe Parini, Italian writer (d. 1799)
• 1734 – Franz Anton Mesmer, Austrian physician/hypnotist (d.1815)
• 1741 – Andrea Luchesi, Italian composer (d. 1801)
• 1790 – Jules Dumont d’Urville, French explorer (d. 1842)
• 1795 – Charles Barry , English architect (d. 1860)
• 1810 – Margaret Fuller, American journalist and feminist (d. 1850)
• 1820 – James Buchanan Eads, American engineer and inventor (d. 1887)
• 1820 – Lorenzo Sawyer, 9th Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of California (d. 1891)
• 1824 – Ambrose Burnside, American Union Civil War general (d. 1881)
• 1834 – Carl Heinrich Bloch, Danish painter (d. 1890)
• 1844 – `Abdu’l-Bahá, Successor to Prophet of the Bahá’í Faith (d. 1921)
• 1848 – Otto Lilienthal, German aviation pioneer (d. 1896)
• 1865 – Epitácio Pessoa, President of Brazil (d. 1942)
• 1875 – Alfred P. Sloan, American long-time president and chairman of General Motors (d. 1966)
• 1879 – Dezso Lauber, Hungarian sportsman (d. 1966)
• 1883 – Douglas Fairbanks, American actor (d. 1939)
• 1884 – Corrado Gini, Italian sociologist (d. 1965)
• 1887 – Thoralf Skolem, Norwegian mathematician (d. 1963)
• 1888 – Zack Wheat, American baseball player (d. 1972)
• 1889 – Ernst Niekisch, German politician (d. 1967)
• 1890 – Herbert Marshall, English actor (d. 1966)
• 1891 – Pär Lagerkvist, Swedish writer, Nobel laureate (d. 1974)
• 1893 – Ulysses S. Grant IV, American geologist and paleontologist (d. 1977)
• 1896 – Felix Martin Julius Steiner, German Heer and Waffen-SS officer (d. 1966)
• 1898 – Scott O’Dell, American author (d. 1989)
• 1900 – Hans Frank, German Nazi war criminal (d. 1946)
• 1908 – John Bardeen, American physicist, Nobel laureate (d. 1991)
• 1910 – Margaret Wise Brown, American author (d. 1952)
• 1910 – Sir Hugh Casson, British architect and painter (d. 1999)
• 1910 – Scatman Crothers, American actor and musician (d. 1986)
• 1910 – Artie Shaw, American clarinetist and bandleader (d. 2004)
• 1912 – Jean Françaix, French composer (d. 1997)
• 1912 – Betty Astell, English actress (d. 2005)
• 1912 – John Payne, American actor (d. 1989)
• 1913 – Ruth Fernandez legendary singer from Puerto Rico
• 1917 – Edward Norton Lorenz, American mathematician and meteorologist
• 1918 – Denis Compton, English cricketer (d. 1997)
• 1919 – Betty Garrett, American actress and dancer
• 1920 – Helen O’Connell, American singer (d. 1993)
• 1921 – James Blish, American author (d. 1975)
• 1921 – Humphrey Lyttelton, English musician
• 1923 – Alicia de Larrocha, Spanish pianist
• 1923 – Walter Wolfrum, German fighter pilot
• 1925 – Joshua Lederberg, American molecular biologist, Nobel laureate
• 1925 – Mac Wiseman, American musician
• 1928 – Jeannie Carson, English actress and comedian
• 1928 – Rosemary Clooney, American singer and actress (d. 2002)
• 1928 – Nigel Davenport, English actor
• 1928 – Pauline Julien, French Canadian singer (d. 1998)
• 1929 – Ulla Jacobsson, Swedish actress (d. 1982)
• 1930 – Friedrich Achleitner, German poet
• 1931 – Barbara Barrie, American actress
• 1933 – Joan Collins, English actress
• 1934 – Robert Moog, American inventor (d. 2005)
• 1936 – Ingeborg Hallstein, German opera singer
• 1936 – Charles Kimbrough, American actor
• 1938 – Peter Preston, English journalist and author
• 1939 – Reinhard Hauff, German film director
• 1939 – Michel Colombier, French composer and songwriter (d. 2004)
• 1942 – K. Raghavendra Rao, Indian film director
• 1942 – Gabriel Liiceanu, Romanian philosopher
• 1943 – General Norman Johnson, American singer (Chairmen of the Board)
• 1944 – John Newcombe, Australian tennis player
• 1945 – Padmarajan, Indian film director (d. 1991)
• 1946 – Frederik de Groot, Dutch actor
• 1946 – H. Paul Shuch, American SETI scientist
• 1947 – Bernard Comrie, English linguist
• 1947 – Ann Hui, Hong Kong film director
• 1948 – Reggie Cleveland, Canadian baseball player
• 1951 – Anatoly Karpov, Russian chess player
• 1951 – Antonis Samaras, Greek politician
• 1952 – Anne-Marie David, French singer
• 1952 – “Marvelous” Marvin Hagler, American boxer
• 1955 – Luka Bloom, Irish singer/songwriter
• 1956 – Ursula Plassnik, Austrian politician
• 1956 – Mark Shaw, New Zealand rugby footballer
• 1956 – Buck Showalter, American baseball player and manager
• 1957 – Baltimora, Northern Irish singer (d. 1995)
• 1958 – Mitch Albom, American writer
• 1958 – Drew Carey, American actor, comedian, and game show host
• 1958 – François Feldman, French singer
• 1962 – Imran Anwar, Pakistani Internet pioneer and American TV personality
• 1962 – Karen Duffy, American actress
• 1963 – Wally Dallenbach Jr., American race car driver and announcer
• 1963 – Gregg “Opie” Hughes, American radio personality (The Opie and Anthony Show)
• 1964 – Allan Kayser, American actor
• 1964 – Ruth Metzler-Arnold, member of the Swiss Federal Council
• 1965 – Tom Tykwer, German film director
• 1966 – Graeme Hick, English cricketer
• 1967 – Anna Ibrisagic, Swedish politician
• 1967 – Phil Selway, English drummer (Radiohead)
• 1970 – Yigal Amir, Israeli assassin of Yitzhak Rabin
• 1970 – Bryan Herta, American race car driver
• 1970 – Blake Schwendiman, American author
• 1972 – Rubens Barrichello, Brazilian formula one driver
• 1974 – Ken Jennings, American game show contestant
• 1974 – Matt Hindle, Canadian bobsledder
• 1974 – Jewel, American singer
• 1974 – Mónica Naranjo, Spanish singer
• 1974 – Charlie Yeung, Hong Kong actress and singer
• 1975 – Kim Sung-soo, South Korean actor
• 1976 – Kelly Monaco, American actress
• 1976 – Ricardinho, Brazilian footballer
• 1977 – Ilia Kulik, Russian figure skater
• 1978 – Mike González, American baseball player
• 1978 – Carolyn Moos, American model and professional basketball player
• 1978 – Scott Raynor, American drummer (formerly of blink-182)
• 1979 – Brian Campbell, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1979 – Kirk Saarloos, American baseball player
• 1979 – Rasual Butler, American basketball player
• 1980 – Theofanis Gekas, Greek footballer
• 1981 – Gwenno Saunders, Former Welsh dancer, now singer with The Pipettes
• 1982 – Cyrill Gloor, Swiss footballer
• 1982 – Malene Mortensen, Danish singer
• 1982 – Tristan Prettyman, American musician
• 1983 – Cristiano Bilanzola, Canadian musician and film-maker
• 1983 – Heidi Range, English singer (Sugababes)
• 1983 – Alex Shelley, American professional wrestler
• 1984 – Adam Wylie, American actor
• 1985 – Ross Wallace, Scottish footballer
• 1986 – Ruben Zadkovich, Australian soccer player
• 1988 – Morgan Pressel, American golfer

May 23 – Deaths:

• 1125 – Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 1081)
• 1304 – Jehan de Lescurel, French poet and composer
• 1498 – Girolamo Savonarola, Italian religious reformer and ruler of Florence (b. 1452)
• 1523 – Ashikaga Yoshitane, Japanese shogun (b. 1466)
• 1524 – Ismail I, Shah of Persia (b. 1487)
• 1662 – John Gauden, English bishop and writer (b. 1605)
• 1670 – Ferdinando II de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (b. 1610)
• 1691 – Adrien Auzout, French astronomer (b. 1622)
• 1701 – Captain Kidd, Scottish pirate (b. 1645)
• 1752 – William Bradford, English-born printer (b. 1663)
• 1754 – John Wood, the Elder, English architect (b. 1704)
• 1783 – James Otis, American lawyer and patriot (b. 1725)
• 1786 – Móric Benovský, Slovak officer and explorer, King of Madagaskar (b. 1746)
• 1813 – Geraud Duroc, French general (b. 1772)
• 1825 – Ras Gugsa of Yejju, Regent of the Emperor of Ethiopia
• 1841 – Franz Xaver von Baader, German philosopher and theologian (b. 1765)
• 1846 – Franciszek Ksawery Drucki-Lubecki, Polish politician (b. 1778)
• 1855 – Charles Robert Malden, English explorer (b. 1797)
• 1857 – Augustin Louis Cauchy, French mathematician (b. 1789)
• 1868 – Kit Carson, American trapper, scout, and Indian agent (b. 1809)
• 1886 – Leopold von Ranke, German historian (b. 1795)
• 1893 – Anton von Schmerling, Austrian statesman (b. 1805)
• 1895 – Franz Ernst Neumann, German mineralogist and physicist (b. 1798)
• 1906 – Henrik Ibsen, Norwegian writer (b. 1828)
• 1908 – François Coppée, French poet and novelist (b. 1842)
• 1920 – Svetozar Boroevic, Austrian field marshal (b. 1856)
• 1934 – Clyde Barrow, American outlaw (b. 1909)
• 1934 – Bonnie Parker, American outlaw (b. 1910)
• 1937 – John D. Rockefeller, American entrepreneur (b. 1839)
• 1945 – Heinrich Himmler, Nazi official (b. 1900)
• 1965 – Earl Webb, American baseball player (b. 1897)
• 1966 – Demchugdongrub, Mongolian politician (b. 1902)
• 1967 – Lionel Groulx, French Canadian priest and historian (b. 1878)
• 1975 – Moms Mabley, American comedian (b. 1894)
• 1981 – Gene Green, American baseball player (b. 1933)
• 1981 – Rayner Heppenstall, English novelist (d. 1911)
• 1981 – George Jessel, American actor (b. 1898)
• 1981 – David Lewis, Canadian labour lawyer and politician (b. 1909)
• 1986 – Sterling Hayden, American actor (b. 1916)
• 1989 – Georgy Tovstonogov, Russian theatre director (b. 1915)
• 1991 – Wilhelm Kempff, German pianist and composer (b. 1895)
• 1992 – Giovanni Falcone, Italian judge (b. 1939)
• 1994 – Ray Candy, American professional wrestler (b. 1951)
• 1996 – Patrick Cargill, English actor (b. 1918)
• 1999 – Owen Hart, Canadian professional wrestler (b. 1965)
• 2002 – Sam Snead, American golfer (b. 1912)
• 2003 – Jean Yanne, French actor and director (b. 1933)
• 2004 – Ramon Margalef, Spanish scientist (b. 1919)
• 2006 – Clifford Antone, American businessman (b. 1949)
• 2006 – Lloyd Bentsen, American politician (b. 1921)
• 2006 – Frits Bernard, American activist (b. 1920)
• 2006 – Kazimierz Górski, Polish footballer (b. 1921)

May 23-Holidays

• World Turtle Day
• Discordianism: Day of Disunity
• Aaron the Illustrious in the Syriac Orthodox Church
• Saint Desiderius
• Saint Guibert of Gemblours

On This Day in History May 22

May 22 – Events:

• 334 BC – The Greek army of Alexander the Great defeats Darius III of Persia in the Battle of the Granicus.
• 1176 – Murder attempt by the Hashshashin (Assassins) on Saladin near Aleppo.
• 1377 – Pope Gregory XI issues five papal bulls to denounce the doctrines of English theologian John Wycliffe.
• 1455 – Wars of the Roses: At the First Battle of St. Albans, Richard, Duke of York, defeats and captures King Henry VI of England.
• 1762 – Sweden and Prussia sign the Treaty of Hamburg.
• 1807 – A grand jury indicts former Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr on a charge of treason.
• 1809 – Second and last Day of the Battle of Aspern-Essling (near Vienna), Napoleon was repelled by an enemy army for the first time.
• 1819 – The SS Savannah leaves port at Savannah, Georgia, United States, on a voyage to become the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean. The ship arrived at Liverpool, England on June 20.
• 1840 – The transporting of British convicts to the New South Wales colony is abolished.
• 1842 – Farmers Lester Howe and Henry Wetsel discover Howe Caverns, when they stumble upon a large gaping hole in the ground.
• 1843 – Thousands of people and their cattle headed west via wagon train from Independence, Missouri to what would later become the Oregon Territory. It was part of the Great Migration, and they followed what is now known as the Oregon Trail.
• 1848 The abolition of slavery in Martinque.
• 1856 – Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina beats Senator Charles Sumner with a cane in the hall of the United States Senate for a speech Sumner had made attacking Southerners who sympathized with the pro-slavery violence in Kansas (“Bleeding Kansas”).
• 1872 – Reconstruction: U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant signs the Amnesty Act of 1872 into law restoring full civil rights to all but about 500 Confederate sympathizers.
• 1903 – Launch of the White Star Liner, SS Ionic.
• 1906 – The 1906 Summer Olympics, not now recognized as part of the official Olympic Games, opens in Athens.
• 1906 – Wright brothers are granted U.S. patent number 821,393 for their “Flying-Machine.”
• 1915 – Lassen Peak (California) erupts with a powerful force, and is the only mountain to erupt other than Mount St. Helens in the continental US during the 20th century.
• 1915 – Five trains collide in the Quintinshill rail crash near Gretna Green, Scotland, killing 227 people and injuring 246; the accident is found to be the result of non-standard operating practices during a shift change at a busy junction.
• 1933 – Emilian Dobrescu was born on this day in Romania
• 1936 – Aer Lingus (Aer Loingeas) is founded by the Irish government as the national airline of the Republic of Ireland.
• 1939 – World War II: Germany and Italy sign the Pact of Steel.
• 1942 – Mexico enters World War II on the side of the Allies.
• 1942 – The Steel Workers Organizing Committee disbands, and a new trade union, the United Steelworkers, is formed.
• 1942 – World War II: Ted Williams of the Boston Red Sox enlists in the United States Marine Corps as a flight instructor.
• 1947 – Cold War: In an effort to fight the spread of Communism, U.S. President Harry S. Truman signs an act into law that will later be called the Truman Doctrine. The act grants $400 million in military and economic aid to Turkey and Greece.
• 1960 – An earthquake measuring 9.5 on the moment magnitude scale, now known as the Great Chilean Earthquake, hits southern Chile. It is the most powerful earthquake ever recorded.
• 1962 – Continental Airlines Flight 11 crashes after bombs explode.
• 1963 – Assassination attempt of Greek left-wing politician Gregoris Lambrakis, who will die five days afterwards.
• 1964 – U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson announces the goals of his Great Society social reforms to bring an “end to poverty and racial injustice” in America.
• 1967 – The L’Innovation department store in the centre of Brussels, Belgium, burns down. It is the most devastating fire in Belgian history, which results in 323 dead and missing and 150 injured.
• 1968 – The nuclear-powered submarine the USS Scorpion sinks with 99 men aboard 400 miles southwest of the Azores.
• 1969 – Apollo 10’s lunar module flies within 8.4 nautical miles (16 km) of the moon’s surface.
• 1972 – Ceylon adopts a new constitution thus becoming a Republic, changes its name to Sri Lanka, and joins the Commonwealth of Nations.
• 1990 – North and South Yemen are unified to create the Republic of Yemen.
• 1990 – The Windows 3.0 operating system is released by Microsoft.
• 1992 – After 30 years, 66-year-old Johnny Carson hosts The Tonight Show for the last time.
• 1995 – Bangladesh Shahityacharcha Kendro established.
• 1997 – Kelly Flinn, US Air Force’s first female bomber pilot certified for combat, accepts a general discharge in order to avoid a court martial.
• 1998 – Lewinsky scandal: A federal judge rules that United States Secret Service agents can be compelled to testify before a grand jury concerning the scandal, involving President Bill Clinton.
• 2002 – In Washington, DC, the remains of the missing Chandra Levy are found in Rock Creek Park.
• 2002 – American civil rights movement: A jury in Birmingham, Alabama, convicts former Ku Klux Klan member Bobby Frank Cherry of the 1963 murders of four girls in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church.
• 2003 – In Fort Worth, Texas, Annika Sörenstam becomes the first woman to play the PGA Tour in 58 years.
• 2004 – Felipe, Prince of Asturias, of the Spanish Royal Family marries Letizia Ortiz Rocasolano.
• 2004 – The U.S. town of Hallam, Nebraska, is wiped out by a powerful F4 tornado that broke a width record at an astounding 2.5 miles wide. It also killed one local resident.
• 2006 – Results from the Montenegrin independence referendum, 2006 are announced. 55.4% of voters voted to become independent from the Serbia and Montenegro Union.

May 22 – Birthdays:

• 1381 – Saint Rita of Cascia, Italian Saint (d. 1457)
• 1622 – Louis de Buade de Frontenac, Governor of New France (d. 1698)
• 1715 – François-Joachim de Pierre de Bernis, French cardinal and statesman (d. 1794)
• 1724 – Marc-Joseph Marion du Fresne, French explorer (d. 1772)
• 1770 – Princess Elizabeth of the United Kingdom (d. 1840)
• 1772 – Ram Mohan Roy, Hindu reformer (d. 1833)
• 1808 – Gérard de Nerval, French writer (d. 1855)
• 1813 – Richard Wagner, German composer (d. 1883)
• 1823 – Solomon Bundy, American politician (d. 1889)
• 1823 – Isabella Glyn Dallas, British Shakepearean actress (d. 1889)
• 1841 – Catulle Mendès, French poet (d. 1909)
• 1844 – Mary Cassatt, American artist (d. 1926)
• 1849 – Louis Perrier, Swiss politician (d. 1913)
• 1859 – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, British physician and writer (d. 1930)
• 1874 – Daniel François Malan, Prime Minister of South Africa (d. 1959)
• 1879 – Warwick Armstrong, Australian cricketer (d. 1947)
• 1879 – Alla Nazimova, Ukrainian-born actress, scriptwriter, and producer (d. 1945)
• 1885 – Giacomo Matteotti, Italian politician (d. 1924)
• 1885 – Toyoda Soemu, Japanese admiral (d. 1957)
• 1891 – Eddie Edwards, American jazz trombonist (d. 1963)
• 1900 – Yvonne de Gaulle, wife of Charles de Gaulle (d. 1979)
• 1901 – Maurice J. Tobin, 56 Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1953)
• 1902 – Al Simmons, American baseball player (d. 1956)
• 1903 – Yves Rocard, French physicist (d. 1992)
• 1904 – Paul Viiding, Estonian poet (d. 1962)
• 1907 – Hergé, Belgian comic book creator (d. 1983)
• 1907 – Sir Laurence Olivier, English stage and screen actor and director (d. 1989)
• 1908 – Rattana Pestonji, Thai filmmaker (d. 1970)
• 1908 – Horton Smith. American golfer (d. 1963)
• 1910 – Johnny Olson, American game show announcer (d. 1985)
• 1911 – Anatol Rapoport, Russian-born mathematical psychologist, and pianist (d. 2007)
• 1912 – Herbert C. Brown, English-born chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2004)
• 1914 – Vance Packard, American author (d. 1996)
• 1914 – Sun Ra, American musician (d. 1993)
• 1917 – Georg Tintner, Austrian-born conductor (d. 1999)
• 1917 – Nathan Davis, American actor
• 1917 – Daniel Nagrin, American modern dancer and choreographer
• 1920 – Thomas Gold, Austrian astrophysicist (d. 2004)
• 1922 – Quinn Martin, American television producer (d. 1987)
• 1924 – Charles Aznavour, French singer, actor, and composer
• 1925 – James King, American tenor (d. 2005)
• 1925 – Jean Tinguely, Swiss artist (d. 1991)
• 1927 – George Andrew Olah, Hungarian-born chemist, Nobel laureate
• 1927 – Phil Tucker, American director
• 1930 – John Barth, American writer
• 1930 – Harvey Milk, American politician and civil rights activist (d. 1978)
• 1930 – Kenny Ball, British musician
• 1934 – Peter Nero, American musician
• 1936 – M. Scott Peck, American psychiatrist and writer (d. 2005)
• 1938 – Richard Benjamin, American actor
• 1938 – Susan Strasberg, American actress (d. 1999)
• 1940 – Bernard Shaw, American television journalist
• 1940 – Michael Sarrazin, Canadian actor
• 1941 – Paul Winfield, American actor (d. 2004)
• 1941 – Sir Menzies Campbell, UK Politician, Leader of the Liberal Democrats
• 1941 – Martha Langbein, German athlete
• 1942 – Theodore Kaczynski, American terrorist (The Unabomber)
• 1942 – Calvin Simon, American musician (P Funk)
• 1942 – Barbara Parkins, Canadian actress
• 1943 – Tommy John, American baseball player
• 1943 – Betty Williams, Northern Irish political activist, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize
• 1943 – Gesine Schwan, German politician and science professor
• 1946 – Howard Kendall, English footballer and football manager
• 1946 – George Best, Northern Irish footballer (d. 2005)
• 1950 – Alekos Alavanos, Greek politician
• 1950 – Bernie Taupin, English songwriter
• 1952 – Bernhard Brinkmann, German politician
• 1953 – Doris Barnett, German politician
• 1953 – Cha Bum-Kun, Korean footballer
• 1955 – Jimmy Lyon, American guitarist (Eddie Money)
• 1955 – Dale Winton, UK radio DJ and television presenter
• 1955 – Jerry Dammers, English musician (The Specials)
• 1956 – Al Corley, American actor and producer
• 1957 – Lisa Murkowski, American politician
• 1957 – Gary Sweet, Australian actor
• 1958 – Eric Carlson, American guitarist (The Mentors)
• 1959 – Steven Morrissey, English singer
• 1960 – Hideaki Anno, Japanese director
• 1962 – Brian Pillman, American professional wrestler (d. 1997)
• 1964 – Ashley Renee, American fetish model
• 1966 – Kenny Hickey, American guitarist (Type O Negative)
• 1966 – Jose Mesa, Dominican baseball player
• 1968 – Kevin Carolan, American actor and comedian
• 1970 – Naomi Campbell, English model and actress
• 1970 – Pedro Diniz, Brazilian Formula One driver
• 1971 – Manuel Ortiz, Mexican professional wrestler
• 1972 – Annabel Chong, Singapore actress
• 1972 – Anna Belknap, American Actress, CSI NY
• 1973 – Nikolaj Lie Kaas, Danish actor
• 1973 – Danny Tiatto, Australian footballer
• 1973 – Julián Tavárez, Dominican baseball player
• 1974 – John Bale, American baseball player
• 1974 – Sean Gunn, American actor
• 1974 – A. J. Langer, American actress
• 1975 – Janne Niinimaa, Finnish ice hockey player
• 1975 – Tracy Brookshaw, American professional wrestler and valet
• 1975 – Salvador Ballesta, Spanish Footballer.
• 1977 – Alastair Ralphs, Canadian professional wrestler
• 1977 – Seán Óg Ó hAilpín, Irish hurler
• 1977 – Dre Bly, American Football Player
• 1978 – Ginnifer Goodwin, American actress
• 1978 – Katie Price, British model
• 1979 – Nadia Khan, TV Presenter
• 1979 – Maggie Q, American actress
• 1980 – Rhett Fisher, actor/musician (lead singer for Manic Mind)
• 1980 – Steven Baker, Australian rules footballer
• 1980 – Chad Tracy, American baseball player
• 1981 – Bryan Danielson, American professional wrestler
• 1981 – Jürgen Melzer, Austrian tennis player
• 1982 – Apolo Anton Ohno, American short track speed skater
• 1982 – John Bobek, American actor
• 1983 – John Hopkins, Anglo-American motorcycling racer
• 1984 – Joe Lauzon, American Mixed-Martial Arts fighter
• 1985 – Marc-Antoine Pouliot, Canadian ice hockey player
• 1985 – Tranquillo Barnetta, Swiss footballer
• 1987 – Novak Ðokovic, Serbian tennis player
• 1992 – Chinami Tokunaga, Japanese singer

May 22 – Deaths:

• 337 – Constantine the Great, Roman Emperor (b. 272)
• 748 – Empress Gensho of Japan (b. 680)
• 1068 – Emperor Go-Reizei of Japan (b. 1025)
• 1455 – Henry Percy, 2nd Earl of Northumberland, English politician (killed in battle)
• 1455 – Edmund Beaufort, 2nd Duke of Somerset, English commander (killed in battle) (b. 1406)
• 1457 – Saint Rita of Cascia, Italian saint (b. 1381)
• 1538 – John Forrest, English Franciscan friar (martyred) (b. 1471)
• 1540 – Francesco Guicciardini, Italian historian (b. 1483)
• 1666 – Gaspar Schott, German scientist (b. 1608)
• 1667 – Pope Alexander VII (b. 1599)
• 1745 – François-Marie, 1st duc de Broglie, French military leader (b. 1671)
• 1746 – Thomas Southerne, Irish dramatist (b. 1660)
• 1760 – Israel ben Eliezer, Polish-born mystical rabbi (b. 1700)
• 1772 – Durastante Natalucci, Italian historian (b. 1687)
• 1795 – Ewald Friedrich, Count von Hertzberg, Prussian statesman (b. 1725)
• 1851 – Mordecai Manuel Noah, American writer, journalist (b. 1755)
• 1859 – King Ferdinand II of the Two Sicilies (b. 1810)
• 1868 – Julius Plücker, German mathematician and physicist (b. 1801)
• 1885 – Victor Hugo, French author (b. 1802)
• 1901 – Gaetano Bresci, Italian-American anarchist (b. 1869)
• 1910 – Jules Renard, French author (b. 1864)
• 1932 – Lady Gregory, Irish playwright (b. 1852)
• 1939 – Ernst Toller, German author (b. 1893)
• 1939 – Jiri Mahen, Czech author (b. 1882)
• 1965 – Christopher Stone, first disc jockey in the United Kingdom (b. 1882)
• 1966 – Tom Goddard, English cricketer (b. 1900)
• 1967 – Langston Hughes, American writer (b. 1902)
• 1972 – Cecil Day-Lewis, Irish poet and writer (b. 1904)
• 1972 – Margaret Rutherford, English actress (b. 1892)
• 1974 – Lefty Grove, American Baseball Player (b. 1900)
• 1983 – Albert Claude, Belgian biologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b.  1899)
• 1988 – Giorgio Almirante, Italian politician (b. 1914)
• 1989 – Steven DeGroote, South African classical pianist (b. 1953)
• 1990 – Rocky Graziano, American boxer (b. 1922)
• 1992 – Zellig Harris, American linguist (b. 1909)
• 1997 – Alfred Hershey, American biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1908)
• 1998 – José Enrique Moyal, mathematical physicist (b. 1910)
• 2003 – Ousmane Zongo, Burkinabé shooting victim
• 2004 – Richard Biggs, American actor (b. 1960)
• 2004 – Mikhail Voronin, Russian gymnast (b. 1945)
• 2005 – Charilaos Florakis, Greek politician, long-time General Secretary of the Communist Party of Greece (b. 1914)
• 2005 – Julia Randall, American poet (b. 1924)
• 2005 – Thurl Ravenscroft, American voice actor and singer (b. 1914)
• 2006 – Lee Jong-wook, Korean Director-General of the World Health Organization (b. 1945)
• 2006 – Heather Crowe, Canadian activist (b. 1945)

May 22 – Holidays:

• World Biodiversity Day.
• Republic of Yemen – National Day.
• National Maritime Day in the United States