On This Day

[Altobelli]

23 OCTOBER

42 BC Roman Republican civil wars: Second Battle of Philippi - Brutus's army is decisively defeated by Mark Antony and Octavian. Brutus commits suicide.

1641 The outbreak of the Irish Rebellion began as an attempted coup d'état by Irish Catholic gentry, who tried to seize control of the English administration in Ireland to force concessions for the Catholics living under English rule. However, the coup failed and the rebellion developed into an ethnic conflict between the native Irish Catholics and the English and Scottish Protestant settlers.

1642 The first major battle of the English Civil War took place at Edgehill in South Warwickshire. Charles I and Prince Rupert led the Royalists and the Earl of Es*** led the Parliamentarians. It was an inconclusive result that prevented either faction gaining a quick victory in the war, which eventually lasted four years.

1843 Nelson's Column in Trafalgar Square was finally completed. It commemorates Admiral Nelson's victory at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. Nelson was born at Burnham Thorpe, Norfolk.

1861 U.S. President Abraham Lincoln suspends the writ of habeas corpus in Washington, D.C., for all military-related cases.

1906 In Britain, women suffragettes, campaigning for the right to vote, held a demonstration at the House of Commons. Ten were arrested and sent to prison.

1915 Women's suffrage: In New York City, 25,000-33,000 women march on Fifth Avenue to advocate their right to vote.

1917 Lenin calls for the October Revolution.

1922 The shortest term of office this century for a British Prime Minister began on this day when Andrew Bonar Law took office. Due to ill health, he was replaced six months later by Stanley Baldwin.

1931 The birth of Diana Dors, an actress remembered for her '*** symbol' roles.

1939 The Japanese Mitsubishi G4M twin-engine "Betty" Bomber makes its maiden flight.

1942 During WW II, Britain launches major offensive at El Alamein, Egypt

1951 Conservative leader, Winston Churchill, wound up his election campaign by denying that he was a warmonger: "If I remain in public life at this juncture it is because I believe I may be able to make an important contribution to the prevention of a 3rd World War."

1954 Britain, the US, France and the USSR agreed to end the occupation of Germany. On the same day, the Western nations agreed to allow West Germany to enter NATO.

1958 The Smurfs, a fictional race of blue dwarves, later popularized in a Hanna-Barbera animated cartoon series, appear for the first time in the story La flute Ã* six schtroumpfs.

1966 John Surtees, British racing driver, won the Mexican Grand Prix.

1967 British farmers began slaughtering cattle following a severe outbreak of 'foot and mouth' disease.

1972 Access credit cards came into use in Britain.

1973 The Watergate scandal: US President Richard M. Nixon agrees to turn over subpoenaed audio tapes of his Oval Office conversations.

1973 A United Nations sanctioned cease-fire officially ends the Yom Kippur War between Israel and Syria.

1977 Paleontologist Elso Barghoorn announces discovery of a 3.4-billion year old one-celled fossil, the earliest life form

1981 US national debt hits $1 trillion

1987 Former Champion Jockey Lester Piggott was jailed for three years for tax evasion.

1991 The House of Lords ruled that husbands could legally be convicted of raping their wives.

1995 Yolanda SaldÃ*var is found guilty of first-degree murder in the shooting death of popular Latin singer Selena. Three days later, SaldÃ*var was sentenced to life in prison.


1998 Swatch Internet Time, a measure of 1000 "beats" per day was inaugurated by the Swatch Group.

2001 The Northern Ireland peace process reached an historic breakthrough as the IRA announced that they were decommissioning their weapons.

2009 BNP leader Nick Griffin complained to the BBC over his controversial appearance on Question Time, saying that he had faced a "lynch mob". He was robustly questioned about his views on race, immigration and the Holocaust from a largely hostile audience. He criticised Islam, defended a past head of the Ku Klux Klan but insisted that he was "not a Nazi". Critics said the show had given the BNP huge publicity and the BNP claimed 3,000 people registered to join the party during and after the broadcast.

2012 The switchover to digital televison in the UK was complete when the analogue TV signal in Northern Ireland was turned off on Tuesday night at 23:30 BST. Simultaneously BBC Ceefax, the world's first teletext service, launched on 23rd September 1974 took its final bow with a series of graphics on Ceefax's front page.

2013 Prince George, future king and future head of the Church of England was baptised at the Chapel Royal of St James's Palace.

2014 The death, aged 72, of the 1970s singing star Alvin Stardust. He died of metastatic prostate cancer

Famous Birthday's

Louis Riel
(1844 - 1885)

Pele
77th Birthday

Weird Al Yankovic
58th Birthday

Famous Deaths

Christian Dior
(1905 - 1957)

Maybelle Carter
(1909 - 1978)

Soong Mei-ling
(1897 - 2003)

Alvin Stardust
(1942 - 2014)

Famous Weddings

1918 Actor Charlie Chaplin (29) weds Mildred Harris (17)

1943 55th UK Prime Minister David Lloyd George (80) weds second wife Frances Stevenson

1996 American caricaturist Al Hirshfeld (93) weds Louise Kerz

2010 Singer-songwriter Katy Perry (25) weds actor-comedian Russell Brand (35) at luxury resort Aman-i-Khas in Northern India

[Altobelli]

24 OCTOBER

1260 Qutuz, Mamluk Sultans of Egypt (1259-60), is assassinated by Baibars, a fellow Mamluk leader, who seizes power for himself

1537 Henry VIII's 3rd wife, Jane Seymour, died following the birth of future king, Edward VI.

1648 Treaty of Westphalia ends The Thirty Year's War in the Holy Roman Empire; Switzerland's independence recognized

1842 The death (from consumption) aged just 26, of Grace Darling, an English lighthouse keeper’s daughter from the Longstone Lighthouse. She rowed out on 7th September 1838, to rescue survivors of the Forfarshire off the Farne Islands and became a national heroine.The Grace Darling memorial is within St. Aidan's churchyard, Bamburgh, Northumberland.

1857 The founding of the world's first official football club, Sheffield Football Club, in Yorkshire, by a group of former students from Cambridge University. The club's finest hour came in 1904 when they won the FA Amateur Cup, a competition conceived after a suggestion by Sheffield. They are commemorated by the English Football Hall of Fame for their significant place in football history.

1895 The birth of Jack Warner OBE, the English film and television actor who is closely associated with the role of PC George Dixon in the BBC television series Dixon of Dock Green, a part he played until the age of eighty.

1901 Annie Edson Taylor becomes the first person to go over Niagara Falls, in a barrel.

1908 Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughter Christabel were sent to prison for ‘inciting the public to rush the House of Commons’. Two Cabinet ministers were witnesses for the defence including Lloyd-George, then Chancellor of the Exchequer.

1922 George Cadbury, the English chocolate manufacturer, died aged 83.

1926 Harry Houdini's last performance takes place at the Garrick Theatre in Detroit.

1929 "Black Thursday", start of stock market crash, Dow Jones down 12.8%

1931 The George Washington Bridge opens to public traffic.

1945 The United Nations was formed with the aim to 'save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.'

1946 A camera on board the V-2 No. 13 rocket takes the first photograph of earth from outer space.

1961 Malta was granted independence from Britain.

1962 Cuban missile crisis: Soviet ships approach but stop short of the US blockade of Cuba

1969 British actor Richard Burton bought his wife, American actress Elizabeth Taylor, a 69.42 carat diamond costing more than half a million pounds. Born at Pontrhydyfen, this Richard Burton sculpture is on the Richard Burton Trail in the Afan Forest Park in Neath - Port Talbot

1976 British Formula One driver James Hunt won the Japanese Grand Prix and secured the world championship.

1983 Civil servant Dennis Nilsen, from North London, went on trial accused of six murders and two attempted murders.

1985 The birth of Wayne Rooney, English footballer. He made his senior international debut in 2003 becoming the youngest player at that time to represent England.

1986 The UK government broke off diplomatic relations with Syria following revelations of complicity in a plot to blow up an El Al airliner.

1987 Heavyweight boxing champion Frank Bruno knocked out Joe Bugner in Britain's most hyped boxing match, held at White Hart Lane, London. Bruno took home £750,000, Bugner got £250,000.

1995 Britain's main church leaders attacked the setting up of Britain's first National Lottery, accusing it of undermining public culture and damaging society.

2002 Police arrest spree killers John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, ending the Beltway sniper attacks in the area around Washington, D.C.

2003 The legendary supersonic aircraft, Concorde, made its last commercial passenger flight amid emotional scenes at Heathrow airport. Concorde was retired after 27 years due to a general downturn in the aviation industry after the 11th September terrorist attacks in 2001 and a decision by Airbus to discontinue maintenance support.

2004 Arsenal Football Club loses to Manchester United, ending a row of unbeaten matches at 49 matches, which is the record in the Premier League.

2008 'Bloody Friday' saw many of the world's stock exchanges experience the worst declines in their history, with drops of around 10% in most indices.

2012 Sir Norman Bettison resigned as chief constable of West Yorkshire Police, saying that an inquiry into his role after the Hillsborough football tragedy of 1989 was 'a distraction' to the force. At the time he was a South Yorkshire Police inspector who attended the match as a spectator and later took part in an internal inquiry. He denied claims that he helped 'concoct' a false version of events.

Famous Birthday's

Domitian
(51 - 96)

Moss Hart
(1904 - 1961)

F. Murray Abraham
78th Birthday

Famous Deaths

Tycho Brahe
(1546 - 1601)

Jackie Robinson
(1919 - 1972)

Rosa Parks
(1913 - 2005)

Famous Weddings

1867 US Admiral George Dewey (29) weds daughter of New Hampshire's war governor Susan Goodwin

1969 "Love Story" actress Ali MacGraw (30) weds film producer Robert Evans (39)

1976 Pediatrician Benjamin Spock (73) weds Mary Morgan

2013 Country music singer-songwriter Ashley Monroe (27) weds MLB pitcher John Danks (28) at Blackberry Farm in Walland, Tennessee

2015 Comedian Tig Notaro (44) weds girlfriend Stephanie Allynne in Pass Christian, Mississippi