Today in History

[lliam]

3 March
=========

National Day of Morocco. Feast day of St Ailred of Rievaulx, St Cunegund, empress, St Marinus of Caesarea, St Non, St Winwaloe, St Anselm of Nonantola, St Artelais, St Chef, and St Emeterius.


"As far as I am concerned I have not been defeated and neither have the working-class communities of Britain."
[Arthur Scargill, President of the National Union of Mineworkers, whose members returned to work on 3 March 1985 after voting to end their unsuccessful year-long strike.]

Events
-------

1770 A brawl broke out between civilians and troops in Boston (annually celebrated as the Boston Massacre).

1802 Beethoven's 'Moonlight Sonata' published.

1820 Maine entered the Union as a free state to counteract the impending entrance of Missouri as a slave state.

1875 The first performance of Bizet's opera Carmen was staged at the Opéra Comique, Paris.

1931 'The Star-Spangled Banner' was adopted as the US national anthem.

1969 US spacecraft Apollo 9 was launched.

1985 British miners voted to go back to work after a year of striking over pit closures.

1991 Latvia and Estonia voted to secede from the Soviet Union.

1995 The last remaining 2,400 UN peace-keeping troops in Somalia departed from Mogadishu, the Somali capital.

1995 The British House of Commons unanimously passed a bill that would largely prohibit game hunting in the country. The proposed legislation, known as the Wild Mammals (Protection) Bill, mainly targets fox, stag, and hare hunting.

1997 An express train jumped its tracks in eastern Punjab, Pakistan, killing at least 126 people and injuring another 175.

Births
--------

1831 George Pullman, US designer of luxury railway carriages

1847 Alexander Graham Bell, Scottish-born inventor of the telephone

1911 Jean Harlow, US film actress

1920 Ronald Searle, English artist and cartoonist

1958 Miranda Richardson, English actress

1961 Fatima Whitbread, English javelin champion

Deaths
--------

1703 Robert Hooke, English physicist

1792 Robert Adam, Scottish architect

1804 Giandomenico Tiepolo, Italian artist

1959 Lou Costello, US comedian

1983 Arthur Koestler, Hungarian-born writer and supporter of euthanasia, committed suicide

1987 Danny Kaye, US comedian

1993 Albert Sabin, Russian-born US microbiologist

[lliam]

4 March
=========

1968 - Tennis authorities voted to admit professional players to Wimbledon, previously open only to amateur players.


"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it."
[Abraham Lincoln's first inaugural address,
4 March 1861.]

Feast day of St Peter of Cava, St Casimir of Poland, and St Adrian and his Companions.

Events
---------

1681 King Charles II granted a Royal Charter to William Penn, entitling Penn to establish a colony in North America.

1861 Abraham Lincoln was sworn in as the 16th president of the USA.

1877 The Russian Imperial Ballet staged the first performance of the ballet Swan Lake in Moscow.

1882 Britain's first electric trams came into operation in Leytonstone, East London.

1890 The Forth railway bridge, Scotland, was officially opened.

1968 Tennis authorities voted to admit professional players to Wimbledon, previously open only to amateur players.

1974 Edward Heath resigned after Liberals refused to enter coalition.

1987 President Reagan accepted full responsibility for the Iran-Contra scandal.

1996 The American computer company Apple was sued over 'wild' pay to its chief executive by a Californian lawyer shareholder.

Births
-----

1394 Prince Henry the Navigator, Portuguese patron of explorers

1678 Antonio Vivaldi, Italian composer

1928 Patrick Moore, English astronomer

1929 Bernard Haitink, Dutch conductor

1931 Miriam Makeba, South African singer

1951 Kenny Dalgleish, Scottish footballer

Deaths
--------

1193 Saladin, Kurdish-born Muslim leader who defeated the Crusaders

1470 Thomas Malory, English writer of the Morte d'Arthur

1832 Jean-François Champollion, French Egyptologist

1852 Nikolai Gogol, Russian novelist and playwright

1963 William Carlos Williams, US poet

[lliam]

5 March
==========

1946 - The term 'iron curtain' was first used, by Winston Churchill in a speech in Missouri, USA.


"From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an Iron Curtain has descended across the Continent ... The Dark Ages may return on the gleaming wings of science. Beware, I say. Time may be short."
[Winston Churchill speaks at Fulton, Missouri, on 5 March 1946, and gives currency to an epithet first used in the 1920s.]

Feast day of St Piran, St Gerasimus, Saints Adrian and Eubulus, St Eusebius, St John Joseph of the Cross, St Kieran of Saighir, St Phocas of Antioch, and St Virgil of Arles.

Events
--------

1461 King Henry VI of England was deposed; he was succeeded by Edward IV.

1770 British troops killed five civilians when they fired into a crowd of demonstrators in Boston; the incident became known as the 'Boston Massacre'.

1850 English engineer Robert Stephenson's tubular bridge was opened, linking Anglesey with mainland Wales.

1933 The Nazi Party won almost half the seats in the German elections.

1936 The British fighter plane Spitfire made its first test flight from Eastleigh, Southampton.

1946 The term 'iron curtain' was first used, by Winston Churchill in a speech in Missouri, USA.

1976 The pound falls below $2 for the first time ever.

1995 The Inkatha Freedom Party agreed at a party meeting to end its boycott of South Africa's parliament. Zulu chief Buthelezi had led his Inkatha party in a walkout from the nation's multiparty parliament.

1997 In a New York City hotel, US and North and South Korean officials began talks aimed at formally ending the Korean War. It was the first time since 1972 that North and South Koreans sat in the same room to talk peace.

1997 The Swiss government announced plans to create a fund providing financial compensation to victims of the Holocaust and of other catastrophes and human-rights violations.

Births
--------

1133 Henry II, King of England

1512 Gerardus Mercator, Flemish cartographer

1852 Augusta Gregory, Irish playwright

1887 Heitor Villa-Lobos, Brazilian composer

1908 Rex Harrison, English actor

1952 Elaine Page, English musical actress

Deaths
--------

1534 Antonio Correggio, Italian painter

1815 Friedrich Mesmer, Austrian physician and founder of mesmerism, or 'animal magnetism'

1827 Alessandro Volta, Italian physicist

1953 Joseph Stalin, Soviet dictator

1953 Sergei Prokofiev, Russian composer

1984 Tito Gobbi, Italian operatic baritone

1993 Nicholas Ridley, British Conservative politician

[lliam]

6 March
==========

1836 - The 12-day siege of the Alamo ended, with only six survivors


"The town of Norfolk has been bombarded by the King's ships and great part of it burnt down, upon which the natives set fire to the other part, so that the town is all laid in ruins except three houses which are standing."
[An incident in the American War of Independence, as reported in The Town and Country Magazine of 6 March 1776.]

National Day of Ghana. Feast day of Saints Baldred and Billfrith, St Chrodegang, St Colette, St Conon, St Cyneburga, St Fridolin, and St Tibba.

Events
--------

1480 By the Treaty of Toledo, Ferdinand and Isabella recognize Afonso's African conquests, while he cedes the Canaries to Spain.

1836 The 12-day siege of the Alamo ended, with only six survivors out of the original force of 155.

1899 Aspirin was patented by chemist Felix Hoffman.

1930 Clarence Birdseye's first frozen foods went on sale in Springfield, Massachusetts, USA.

1957 Ghana became independent, the first British colony to do so.

1987 A cross-channel ferry left Zeebrugge, Belgium, with its bow doors open; it capsized suddenly outside the harbour, killing over 180 passengers.

1988 British SAS men shot dead three IRA members in a street in Gibraltar, claiming that they had been about to attack a military parade.

1995 Adrianus Jacobs, chairman of the Dutch financial conglomerate Internationale Nederlanden Groep NV (ING), in London announced that his company would buy most of Barings PLC, a 223-year-old bank that had collapsed earlier in 1995, for the nominal price of £1.00/$1.60.

1996 The Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan was fined for burning a cross in his garden and infringing Californian clean-air regulations.

1997 More than 200 people were killed when Tamil Tiger guerrillas overran a military base and attacked the air force's eastern headquarters.

1997 Tête de Femme, an impressionistic portrait painted by Pablo Picasso in 1939, and priced at £650,000, was stolen from the Lefevre Gallery in London's Mayfair.

Births
--------
1619 Cyrano de Bergerac, French novelist and playwright

1806 Elizabeth Barrett Browning, English poet

1922 Frankie Howerd, English comedian

1926 Andrzej Wajda, Polish film director

1937 Valentina Tereshkova, Soviet astronaut

1944 Kiri Te Kanawa, New Zealand soprano

Deaths
-------

1888 Louisa May Alcott, US novelist

1900 Gottlieb Daimler, German motor engineer who invented the motorcycle

1951 Ivor Novello, Welsh composer and actor

1961 George Formby, English entertainer

1971 Pearl Buck, US novelist

1984 Donald Maclean, English-born Soviet spy

1994 Merlina Mercouri, Greek actress and politician

[lliam]

7 March
=========

1876 - Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone.


"An amazing invention - but who would ever want to use one?"
[US president Rutherford B Hayes makes a call from Washington to Pennsylvania with Alexander Graham Bell's telephone, patented on 7 March 1876.]

Feast day of St Eosterwine, St Perpetua, and St Felicitas.

Events
------

1838 Swedish singer Jenny Lind gave her debut performance in Der Freischutz.

1857 The decision of the Supreme Court in the Dred Scott case in connection with position of a slave in a free state rendered the Missouri compromise unconstitutional.

1876 Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone.

1912 French aviator Henri Seimet made the first non-stop flight from Paris to London.

1926 A radio-telephone link was established between London and New York.

1969 The Victoria line was opened as part of London's underground railway.

1971 Women in Switzerland achieved the right to vote and hold federal office.

1995 The directors of the pharmaceutical giant Wellcome PLC advised the company's shareholders to accept a hostile £9.4 billion/$15 billion takeover bid from rival Glaxo PLC after failing to receive better offers.

1997 The USA vetoed the adoption of a proposed UN Security Council resolution that urged Israel to refrain from implementing its plans to build a Jewish settlement in Arab East Jerusalem.

1997 Adrian Targett, a 42-year-old history teacher in Cheddar, Somerset, was shown by DNA tests to be a direct descendant of 'Cheddar Man', the oldest complete skeleton ever found in Britain.

Births
--------
1850 Tomás Masaryk, Czech leader

1872 Piet Mondrian, Dutch painter

1875 Maurice Ravel, French composer

1952 Viv Richards, Antiguan cricketer

1958 Rik Mayall, English comedian

1960 Ivan Lendl, Czech tennis player

Deaths
--------

AD 161 Antoninus Pius, Roman emperor

1274 St Thomas Aquinas, Christian philosopher

1953 Herman Mankiewicz, US screenwriter

1957 Percy Wyndham Lewis, English writer and artist

1971 Stevie Smith, English poet and novelist

[lliam]

8 March
=======

1917 - The February Revolution began in Petrograd (St Petersburg), Russia.


"To the gentleman in the velvet waistcoat."
[The death of William III on 8 March 1702, thrown from his horse after it stumbled on a molehill, was commemorated in this Jacobite toast: the accession of the childless Anne, daughter of James II, revived the hopes of the 'Old Pretender', James Edward Stewart.]

Feast day of St Felix of Dunwich, St Duthac, St Julian of Toledo, St Pontius of Carthage, St Veremund, St Senan, and St John of God.

Events
--------

1702 Anne became queen of Britain after William III died in a riding accident.

1910 The first pilot's licences were issued, to an Englishman, J T C Moore Brabazon, and a Frenchwoman, Elise Deroche.

1917 The February Revolution began in Petrograd (St Petersburg), Russia.

1930 In India, a campaign of civil disobedience began, led by Mahatma Gandhi.

1965 3,500 US marines landed in South Vietnam.

1971 US boxer Muhammad Ali was defeated by Joe Frazier.

1995 Heavy rains began spurring severe flooding in much of California, USA. The disaster claimed the lives of at least 15 people and caused an estimated $2 billion in damage. The state's last major floods had hit California in Jan, causing 11 Deaths and resulting in $1.3 billion in damage

Births
-----------

1859 Kenneth Grahame, Scottish author of The Wind in the Willows

1879 Otto Hahn, German physicist and chemist

1930 Douglas Hurd, British politician

1931 James Dean, US film actor

1939 Lynn Seymour, Canadian ballet dancer

1941 Norman Stone, English historian

Deaths
-------
1717 Abraham Darby, English ironmaster, the first to use coke for smelting iron

1869 Hector Berlioz, French composer

1889 John Ericsson, Swedish-born US inventor of the screw propeller

1930 William Howard Taft, 27th president of the USA

1961 Thomas Beecham, English conductor

1971 Harold Lloyd, US comedian and silent-film actor

1993 Billy Eckstine, US jazz singer, bandleader, and trumpeter

[lliam]

9 March
===========

1923 - Lenin retired as Soviet leader after suffering a severe stroke; he died the following year.



"Stalin's rudeness is becoming unbearable in the office of the General Secretary. Therefore, I propose the comrades should think of ways of removing him from that post."
[After suffering a stroke earlier in the year, V I Lenin retires as Soviet leader and dictates a memo on 9 March 1923; he died the following year.]

Feast day of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste, St Frances of Rome, St Bosa, St Constantine, St Gregory of Nyssa, St Pacianus, and St Dominic Savio.


Events
-------

1074
Pope Gregory VII excommunicated all married priests.


1796
French army commander Napoleon Bonaparte married Josephine de Beauharnais.


1831
The French Foreign Legion was founded in Algeria; its headquarters moved to France in 1962.


1918
The Russian capital was transferred from Petrograd (St Petersburg) to Moscow.


1923
Lenin retired as Soviet leader after suffering a severe stroke; he died the following year.


1935
Hitler notified the Western Powers of the existence of the German Air Force.


1956
Archbishop Makarios of Cyprus was deported to the Seychelles to prevent his involvement in terrorist activities.


1961
Russian dog Laika was launched into space aboard the spacecraft Sputnik 9.


1995
Canadian authorities captured a Spanish trawler off the coast of Newfoundland and arrested the ship's captain, after chasing the vessel for four hours and firing warning shots from a machine gun.


1997
More than 50,000 opponents of Serbian President Milosevic rallied in Belgrade in support of more democracy and freedom for the media.




Births
-------

1763
William Cobbett, author and politician


1890
Vyacheslav Molotov, Soviet politician


1892
Vita Sackville-West, English novelist


1934
Yuri Gagarin, Soviet astronaut, the first man in space


1943
Bobby Fischer, US chess champion


1952
Bill Beaumont, English rugby player




Deaths
-------

1566
David Rizzio, secretary to Mary Queen of Scots, murdered


1661
Jules Mazarin, French cardinal and politician


1888
Wilhelm I of Prussia


1918
Frank Wedekind, German playwright


1993
Bob Crosby, US bandleader


1993
Cyril Parkinson, English writer and historian


1994
Charles Bukowski, German-born US writer and poet


1994
Fernando Rey, Spanish actor

[shostakovich]

I remember Laika. I wonder how long he lasted in space. His spacecraft was dubbed "Muttnik".

Bothered By Animal Abuse In the Name of Science

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

Laika. She landed alive and well.

[GreatCarouser]

"Well...how do you Laika that"....?

[Trumpetmaster]

Did some research and found this....
Laika was first animal to "Orbit" earth.
There were other animals in space before Laika...



While other animals had made suborbital flights, Laika was the first animal to go into orbit. She suffered no ill effects while she was alive in an orbit at an altitude near 2,000 miles.

Laika had been a stray dog — mostly a Siberian husky and around three years old — rounded up from the Moscow streets and trained for spaceflight. She was carried aloft in a capsule which remained attached to the converted SS-6 intercontinental ballistic missile which rocketed her to orbit.

The 1,120-lb. Sputnik 2 was outfitted with scientific gauges, life-support systems, and padded walls, but was not designed for recovery. Laika was supported inside the satellite by a harness that allowed some movement and access to food and water. Electrodes transmitted vital signs including heartbeat, blood pressure and breathing rate.

The American press nicknamed the dog Muttnik. She captured the hearts of people around the world as the batteries that operated her life-support system ran down and the capsule air ran out. Life slipped away from Laika a few days into her journey. Later, Sputnik 2 fell into the atmosphere and burned on April 14, 1958.

Today, Laika again captures the hearts of people with a monument to her erected 40 years after her spaceflight by the Russians to honor fallen cosmonauts at Star City outside Moscow. The likeness of Laika can be seen peeping out from behind the cosmonauts in the monument.

Laika also is remembered on a plaque at the Moscow research center where she was trained.

<small>[ 03-10-2006, 07:04 AM: Message edited by: TrumpetMaster ]</small>

[lliam]

11 March
===========

1941 - US Congress passed the Lend-Lease Bill, authorizing huge loans to Britain to finance World War II.


"PEACE OR WAR? Which will you choose? Should we fight for England? Let's stop the Rush toward War!"
[The passing by Congress on 11 March 1941 of President Franklin D Roosevelt's 'Lend-Lease' Scheme to finance Britain's war effort after the fall of France drew attacks from the America First Committee.]

Feast day of St Oengus, St Vindician, St Sophronius of Jerusalem, St Constantine of Cornwall, St Eulogius of Cordova, St Aurea, St Benedict of Milan, and St Teresa Margaret Redi.

Events
--------

1682 The Royal Chelsea Hospital for soldiers was founded by Charles II.

1702 The first successful English daily newspaper, the Daily Courant was published in London.

1941 US Congress passed the Lend-Lease Bill, authorizing huge loans to Britain to finance World War II.

1985 Mikhail Gorbachev became leader of the USSR.

1989 A South African law commission published a working paper calling for the abolition of apartheid and introduction of universal franchise.

1990 US tennis player Jennifer Capriati, aged 13, became the youngest-ever finalist in a professional contest.

1990 Lithuania declared independence from USSR.

Births
---------

1811 Urbain Leverrier, French astronomer

1885 Malcolm Campbell, English speed record holder

1916 Harold Wilson, British politician

1931 Rupert Murdoch, Australian newspaper proprietor

1932 Nigel Lawson, British politician

1952 Douglas Adams, English author of The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Deaths
---------

1915 Rolf Boldrewood, Australian author

1936 David Beatty, British admiral

1955 Alexander Fleming, Scottish bacteriologist who discovered penicillin

1957 Richard Evelyn Bird, US aviator and explorer

1970 Erle Stanley Gardner, US lawyer and crime writer

[lliam]

12 March
==========

1940 - The Russo-Finnish war ended with Finland signing over territory to the USSR.



"I repudiate this law and regard it as my sacred duty to break the mournful monotony of compulsory peace that is choking the heart out of the nation for want of a free vent."
[Mahatma Gandhi, leader of the Indian Congress Party, sets out on a 300-mile 'Salt March' on 12 March 1930; at the end of it he picked up some salt crystal (afterwards auctioned for 1600 rupees), thereby breaking the British government monopoly. He was afterwards arrested.]

Feast day of St Alphege, St Bernard of Winchester, St Gregory, St Maximilian of Theveste, St Mura, St Paul Aurelian, St Theophanes, and St Pionius.

Events
-------

1609 Bermuda became a British colony.

1881 France made Tunisia a protectorate.

1904 Britain's first mainline electric train ran from Liverpool to Southport.

1912 The Girl Guides movement (later called Scouts) was founded in the USA.

1930 Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi began his walk to the sea, known as the Salt March, in defiance of the British government's tax on salt and monopoly of the salt trade in India.

1938 Germany annexed Austria.

1940 The Russo-Finnish war ended with Finland signing over territory to the USSR.

1947 US president Harry Truman outlined the 'Truman Doctrine'.

1993 Janet Reno became the first woman to be appointed attorney general of the USA.

1994 32 female deacons were ordained in London as the first female priests of the Church of England.

1997 Susie Maroney, a 22-year-old Australian, became the first woman to swim the Florida Straits, from Cuba to Key West, Florida; the swim took 25 hours.

Births
-------

1626 John Aubrey, English antiquary and author of Brief Lives

1710 Thomas Arne, English composer who wrote 'Rule Britannia'

1881 Kemal Ataturk, Turkish leader

1890 Vaslav Nijinsky, Russian ballet dancer

1908 Max Wall, English actor and comedian

1946 Liza Minnelli, US film actress and singer

Deaths
--------

604 St Gregory, pope

1507 Cesare Borgia, Italian cardinal and politician

1925 Sun Yat-sen, Chinese revolutionary leader

1945 Anne Frank, Dutch Jewish diarist, died in a Nazi concentration camp

1955 Charlie Parker, US jazz saxophonist

1985 Eugene Ormandy, US conductor

1993 Zhen Wang, Chinese communist political leader

[lliam]

13 March
========

1619 - death of Richard Burbage, English actor who built the Globe Theatre.


"For three-quarters of an hour I was the only person in the world who knew where Pluto was. It electrified me. I realised I'd be world famous and turn the scientific world upside-down."
[US astronomer Clyde Tombaugh, who discovered the planet on 13 March 1930.]

Feast day of St Gerald of Mayo, St Mochoemoc, St Nicephorus of Constantinople, Saints Roderic and Salomon, St Ansovinus, and St Euphrasia.

Events
---------

1781 German-born British astronomer William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus.

1881 Tsar Alexander II of Russia died after a bomb was thrown at him in St Petersburg.

1894 The first public striptease act was performed in Paris.

1928 450 people drowned when a dam burst near Los Angeles, USA.

1930 US astronomer Clyde Tombaugh discovered the planet Pluto; its existence had been predicted 14 years earlier by US astronomer Percy Lowell.

1979 A Marxist coup led by Maurice Bishop took place in Grenada while the prime minister Edward Gairy was in New York at a meeting of the United Nations.

1996 Sixteen children aged five and six, together with their teacher, were shot dead by Thomas Hamilton at a school in Dunblane, Scotland.

1997 A lone Jordanian soldier armed with an automatic rifle fired on a group of 80 Israeli schoolgirls at a border site in the northern Jordan Valley, killing seven of the girls and wounding six other group members, including a teacher.

1997 Sister Nirmala, a 63-year-old nun who left her wealthy Indian army family to join the Missionaries of Charity, was elected Superior General of the order and succeeded Mother Teresa, 83, who retained the title of Mother General.

Births
--------

1733 Joseph Priestley, English scientist

1855 Percy Lowell, US astronomer

1884 Hugh Walpole, English novelist

1898 Henry Hathaway, US film director

1939 Neil Sedaka, US singer and songwriter

1950 Joe Bugner, Hungarian-born British boxer

Deaths
--------

1619 Richard Burbage, English actor who built the Globe Theatre

1906 Susan Anthony, US feminist

1943 Stephen Benet, US poet who wrote 'John Brown's Body'

1947 Angela Brazil, English writer of stories about girls' schools

1957 John Middleton Murry, English writer and critic

[lliam]

14 March
---------

"In this country we find it pays to shoot an admiral from time to time to encourage the others." [In Candide, Voltaire satirizes the execution on 14 March 1757 of Admiral Byng.]


Feast day of St Matilda, St Eutychius, and St Leobinus.

Events
---------

1492 Queen Isabella of Castile ordered the expulsion of 150,000 Jews from Spain, unless they accepted Christian baptism.

1757 British admiral John Byng was executed by firing squad at Plymouth, for having failed to relieve Minorca from the French fleet.

1864 English explorer Samuel Baker was the first European to see the lake he named Lake Albert.

1885 Gilbert and Sullivan's Mikado was first performed at the Savoy Theatre, London.

1891 The submarine Monarch laid the first underwater telephone cable.

1983 OPEC agreed to cut oil prices for first time since its formation in 1961.

1991 In Britain the 'Birmingham Six' are released after an Appeal Court finds their conviction in 1974 for IRA pub bombings in Birmingham 'unsafe and unsatisfactory'.

1996 President Clinton promised Israel $100 million to help fight terrorism.

Births
----------

1681 Georg Telemann, German composer

1836 Mrs Isabella Beeton, English cookery writer

1868 Maxim Gorky, Russian playwright and novelist

1879 Albert Einstein, German-born Swiss physicist

1933 Michael Caine, English film actor

1946 Jasper Carrott, English comedian

Deaths
---------

1823 John Jervis, English admiral

1883 Karl Marx, German philosopher

1932 George Eastman, inventor of the Kodak camera

1938 Nikolai Bukharin, Russian politician

1976 Busby Berkeley, US film choreographer

1995 William Fowler, US astrophysicist

[lliam]

15 March
=========

44 BC - Julius Caesar, Roman emperor, assassinated.


"You may now consign your clothing coupons to the appropriate salvage channel."
[President of the Board of Trade (and future Prime Minister) Harold Wilson announces the end of clothes rationing on 15 March 1949, though price controls remained in force.]

Feast day of St Longinus, St Louise de Marillac, St Zacharias, pope, St Lucretia, St Matrona, and St Clement Mary Hofbauer.

Events
--------

1892 US inventor Jesse Reno patented the first escalator.

1909 US entrepreneur G S Selfridge opened Britain's first department store in Oxford Street, London.

1917 Tsar Nicholas II of Russia abdicated.

1933 Nazi leader Adolf Hitler proclaimed the Third Reich in Germany; he also banned left-wing newspapers and kosher food.

1949 Clothes rationing in Britain ended.

1964 Actors Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton were married in Montreal.

1990 Gorbachev was sworn in as the first executive president of the USSR.

1997 Rebels in Zaire captured Kisangani.

1997 A report from the Meat and Livestock Commission (MLC) revealed that all stages of food handling in Britain, from the abattoir to the plate, were to some degree suspect.

Births
---------

1767 Andrew Jackson, seventh president of the USA

1779 William Lamb, Viscount Melbourne, British prime minister

1813 John Snow, English physician who pioneered the use of ether as an anaesthetic

1854 Emil von Behring, German bacteriologist

1941 Mike Love, US pop singer, member of the Beach Boys

1947 Ry Cooder, US guitarist

Deaths
----------

44 BC Julius Caesar, Roman emperor, assassinated

1898 Henry Bessemer, English metallurgist who invented the Bessemer converter

1975 Aristotle Onassis, Greek shipping tycoon

1983 Rebecca West, English novelist

1984 Tommy Cooper, English comedian

1990 Farzad Barzoft, Iranian-born journalist working for the Observer, hanged as a spy in Iraq

1994 Mai Zetterling, Swedish actress and director

[lliam]

16 March
=========

1872 - The Wanderers beat the Royal Engineers 1 - 0 in the first FA Cup Final, at Kennington Oval.


"What an artist dies with me!"
[According to Suetonius, the last words of the Emperor Nero, assassinated on 16 March AD37.]

Feast day of St Finan Lobur, St Abraham Kidunaia, St Julian of Antioch, St Eusebia of Hamage, St Heribert of Cologne, and St Gregory Makar.

Events
-------

1660 The Long Parliament of England was dissolved, after sitting for 20 years.

1802 The US Military Academy was established at West Point, New York State.

1872 The Wanderers beat the Royal Engineers 1 - 0 in the first FA Cup Final, at Kennington Oval.

1917 On Western Front, German troops withdrew to the specially constructed 'Hindenburg Line' between Arras and Soissons.

1926 The first rocket fuelled by petrol and liquid oxygen was successfully launched by US physicist Robert Goddard.

1973 The new London Bridge was opened.

1978 Red Brigade terrorists kidnapped former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro.

1993 In Britain, Chancellor Norman Lamont announced the imposition of the Value Added Tax on domestic fuel.

1996 British boxer Frank Bruno lost his world heavyweight boxing title to the American Mike Tyson.

Births
------

1774 Matthew Flinders, English navigator who explored the coast of Australia

1787 Georg Ohm, German physicist

1920 Leo McKern, Australian actor

1926 Jerry Lewis, US comedy actor

1941 Bernardo Bertolucci, Italian film director

Deaths
--------

AD 37 Tiberius Claudius Nero, Roman emperor

1898 Aubrey Beardsley, English illustrator

1930 Miguel Primo de Rivera, Spanish politician and dictator

1937 Austen Chamberlain, British politician who negotiated the Locarno Pact

1963 William Henry Beveridge, English economist who wrote the report on which the British welfare state was founded

[lliam]

17 March
=========

National Day of Ireland - Feast day of St Patrick, St Withburga, St Gertrude of Nivelles, St Joseph of Arimathea, St Paul of Cyprus, and the Martyrs of the Serapaeum.


"We intend to remain alive. Our neighbours want to see us dead. This does not leave much room for compromise."
[Golda Meir becomes Israel's first woman prime minister on 17 March 1969.]

Events
--------

1897 English-born New Zealand boxer Bob Fitzsimmons won the heavyweight title from US champion Jim Corbett.

1899 The first-ever radio distress call was sent, summoning assistance to a merchant ship aground on the Goodwin Sands, off the Kent coast.

1921 English doctor Marie Stopes opened the Mothers' Clinic in London, to advise women on birth-control.

1948 France, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxemburg, and Britain signed the Brussels Treaty, for 50-year alliance against armed attack in Europe and providing for economic, social, and military cooperation.

1969 Golda Meir, aged 70, took office as prime minister of Israel, the first woman to do so.

1978 The oil tanker Amoco Cadiz ran aground on the coast of Brittany, France, spilling over 220,000 tons of crude oil and causing extensive pollution.

1990 The Bastille opera house, Paris, was opened.

1995 President Clinton in Washington DC met with Gerry Adams, leader of Sinn Fein, in the second of two controversial meetings in two days.

1997 British Prime Minister John Major announced that a general election would be held on 1 May and expressed confidence in the chances of his Conservative Party.

Births
--------

1787 Edmund Kean, English actor

1846 Kate Greenaway, English children's book illustrator

1919 Nat 'King' Cole, US singer

1933 Penelope Lively, English children's novelist

1938 Rudolf Nureyev, Russian ballet dancer

1939 Robin Knox-Johnston, the first person to sail single-handed, non-stop around the world

Deaths
--------

AD 180 Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor

1782 Daniel Bernoulli, Swiss mathematician and physicist

1853 Christian Doppler, Austrian physicist

1912 Lawrence Oates, English Antarctic explorer, a member of Scott's expedition, who walked into a blizzard, saying 'I am just going outside, and may be some time'

1958 George Wilkins, Australian polar explorer

1986 John Glubb (Glubb Pasha), English soldier, founder of the Arab Legion

1993 Helen Hayes, US film and theatre actress

[lliam]

18 March
==========

1834 - Six farm labourers from Tolpuddle, Dorset, were sentenced to transportation to Australia for forming a trade union.


"One of the men asked if we were ready. We said, yes. One of them said, 'Then bind your eyes,' and we took out handkerchieves and bound over our eyes. Someone then read a paper, but I don't know what the meaning of it was."
[John Lock, of Half Puddle in Dorset, gives evidence at the trial of six farm workers from Tolpuddle for 'administering unlawful oaths' in the formation of an agricultural workers' Trade Union; they were sentenced to transportation on 18 March 1834.]

Feast day of St Cyril of Jerusalem, St Alexander of Jerusalem, St Christian, St Edward the Martyr, St Finan of Aberdeen, St Anselm of Lucca, St Frigidian, and St Salvator of Horta.

Events
---------

1662 The first public bus service began operating, in Paris.

1834 Six farm labourers from Tolpuddle, Dorset, were sentenced to transportation to Australia for forming a trade union.

1891 The London -Paris telephone link came into operation.

1922 Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi was jailed for six years for sedition.

1930 In USA, Clyde Tombaugh discovered the planet Pluto.

1931 The first electric razors were manufactured in the USA.

1965 Soviet astronaut Alexei Leonov made the first 'walk' in space.

1994 Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia signed an accord creating a federation of Bosnian Muslims and Croats.

1995 Former US National Basketball Association superstar guard Michael Jordan announced that he would return to professional basketball after a 17-month hiatus.

1997 The CNN television network launched broadcasts from its news bureau in Havana, Cuba. It was the first time in 28 years that a US media outlet had worked from a permanent bureau on the island.

Births
--------

1844 Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Russian composer

1858 Rudolf Diesel, German engineer who invented the engine named after him

1869 Neville Chamberlain, British prime minister who tried unsuccessfully to make peace with Hitler

1889 Lavrenti Beria, Soviet chief of secret police

1893 Wilfred Owen, English World War I poet

1905 Robert Donat, English film actor

Deaths
-------

978 Edward the Martyr, king of England, murdered at Corfe Castle

1455 Fra Angelico, Italian monk and painter

1584 Ivan IV, 'the Terrible'

1745 Robert Walpole, first prime minister of Britain

1768 Laurence Sterne, Irish novelist

1988 Percy Thrower, English gardener and broadcaster

[lliam]

19 March
=========

1932 - The Sydney Harbour Bridge, New South Wales, Australia, was opened; it was the world's longest single-span arch bridge, at 503 m/1,650 ft.


"Wm and Basil and I walked to the hilltops, a very cold bleak day. We were met on our return by a severe hailstorm. William wrote some lines describing a stunted thorn."
[From the Journal of Dorothy Wordsworth, 19 March 1798.]

Feast day of St Alcmund, St Joseph, St John of Panaca, and St Landoald.

Events
--------

721 BC The first-ever recorded solar eclipse was seen from Babylon.

1628 The New England Company was formed in Massachusetts Bay.

1913 Russian composer Modest Mussorgsky's opera Boris Godunov was first performed in full at the Metropolitan Opera, New York.

1932 The Sydney Harbour Bridge, New South Wales, Australia, was opened; it was the world's longest single-span arch bridge, at 503 m/1,650 ft.

1969 British troops landed on the Caribbean island of Anguilla, after the island declared itself a republic; they were well received, and the island remained a UK dependency.

1970 The first-ever meeting of East and West German heads of government, Willi Stoph and Willy Brandt, took place at Erfurt.

1992 Buckingham Palace announced the separation of the Duke and Duchess of York (married 1986).

1996 South African president Nelson Mandela was granted a divorce from his estranged wife Winnie after 38 years of marriage.

1996 In Manila, the Philippines, 150 died in a pregraduation disco inferno.

Births
-------

1593 Georges de la Tour, French painter

1721 Tobias Smollett, Scottish physician and author

1813 David Livingstone, Scottish missionary and explorer

1821 Richard Burton, English explorer and scholar

1848 Wyatt Earp, US law officer

1872 Sergei Diaghilev, Russian ballet impresario

1947 Glenn Close, US actress

Deaths
---------

1683 Thomas Killigrew, English playwright

1847 Mary Anning, English paleontologist who discovered the first ichthyosaurus

1930 Arthur James Balfour, British prime minister

1950 Edgar Rice Burroughs, US novelist who wrote the Tarzan stories

1965 Alan Badel, English actor