Michaelmas Day The feast day of Saint Michael, the patron saint of policeman, grocers, paratroopers, and radiologists.

1992 Patriot missile success rate disputed The General Accounting Office reports a 9% success rate during the Gulf War as opposed to the Army's initial report of 80%

1992 Magic Johnson comes out of retirement to play for the Los Angeles Lakers after retiring less than a year earlier. He retired again for good before the season started.

1992 Dr. Benjamin Spock recommends that people should not drink cow's milk.

1988 Discovery launched The space shuttle takes off, ending the 32-month U.S. absence from space since the Challenger disaster.

1987 thirtysomething debuts on ABC, showing us the everyday lives of baby-boomers.

1982 Tylenol murders The first of seven Chicago-area residents die from cyanide-laced Tylenol capsules. The killer has never been caught.

1980 Jimmy's World The Washington Post publishes a story by Janet Cooke about an eight-year-old heroin addict, for which she would win a Pulitzer prize. It was later revealed that she made the story up.

1977 First woman to judge a heavyweight boxing championship Eva Shain referees the Muhammad Ali vs. Earnie Shavers fight at Madison Square Garden. Source: Famous First Facts

1960 Cold War At a United Nations conference, Premier of the Soviet Union Nikita Khrushchev twice interrupts a speech by British prime minister Harold Macmillan by shouting out and pounding his desk. Macmillan famously commented, "I should like that to be translated if he wants to say anything."

1953 Make Room for Daddy debuts on ABC, starring Danny Thomas. It ran for 18 years.

1911 Italy declares war on the Ottoman (Turkish) Empire Italy alleged that its citizens had been mistreated in Libya.

1892 First U.S. football night game Mansfield State Normal School ties Wyoming Seminary (0-0).

1879 Ute War The week-long Battle of Mill Creek in northwestern Colorado between the Ute Indians and the U.S. soldiers begins. The Utes were fighting to preserve their reservation.

1829 Scotland Yard The Greater London's Metropolitan Police - now known as Scotland Yard - go on patrol.

1955 Ken Weatherwax American actor. TV: The Addams Family (Pugsley).

1948 Bryant Gumbel American TV sportscaster and Today show host.

1943 Lech Walesa Polish union leader. He formed the labor union Solidarity (1980).

1942 Madeline Kahn American actress, Paper Moon (1973), Blazing Saddles (1974), Young Frankenstein (1974), and History of the World - Part I (1981).

1941 Jon Brower Minnoch d. 1983 American heavyweight, world's heaviest human weighing in at 1,387 pounds. Source: Guinness Book of World Records

1939 Larry Linville American actor. TV: M*A*S*H (Maj. Frank Burns).

1935 Jerry Lee Lewis American rock 'n' roll singer. Music: Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On (1957, #1) and Great Balls of Fire (1957, #1). He created a scandal in 1957 by marrying his 13-year-old cousin. Source: Great Balls of Fire: The Uncensored Story of Jerry Lee Lewis

1931 Anita Ekberg Swedish voluptuous actress, Mrs. Sweden (1951). Film: La Dolce Vita (1959).

1926 Charles "Chuck" Cooper d. 1984 American basketball player. He was the first black drafted by the NBA (1950, Boston Celtics).

1916 Trevor Howard d. 1988 English Emmy-winning actor. Film: Brief Encounter (1945) and Sons and Lovers (1960). TV: The Invincible Mr. Disraeli (1963, Emmy).

1913 Stanley Kramer American Oscar-winning film producer, director. Film: High Noon (1952), It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963), and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967).

1912 Michelangelo Antonioni Italian award-winning film director, The Red Desert (1964) and Blow-Up (1966, featuring its ball-less tennis match). His films, using minimal plots and dialogues, are known for using their sets and long lingering shots to reveal their character's innermost feelings.

1910 Virginia Bruce d. 1982 American actress. Film: The Great Ziegfeld (1936) and The Invisible Woman (1941).

1908 Greer Garson Irish-born Oscar-winning actress, Goodbye Mr. Chips (1939) and Mrs. Miniver (1942, Oscar).

1907 Gene Autry d. 1998 American actor, the singing cowboy. He wrote and recorded more than 200 songs.

1901 Enrico Fermi d. 1954 Italian-born American physicist, one of the pioneers of the nuclear age. He led the team which performed the first controlled nuclear chain reaction (1942).

1900 Miguel Alemán d. 1983 Mexican president (1946-52). As the first non-military candidate ever elected president of Mexico, he promoted industrialization and agriculture.

1895 Joseph Banks Rhine d. 1980 American parapsychologist. He created the familiar "extrasensory perception" (ESP) cards (picturing wavy lines, square, circle, and cross), and co-edited Parapsychology Today.

1810 Elizabeth Gaskell d. 1865 English novelist, one of the most popular of the Victorian novelists, Mary Barton (1848) and Cranford (1853).

1758 Horatio Nelson d. 1805 British naval commander. He died while leading the British fleet in the Battle of Trafalgar in which he defeated the Spanish and French fleets ending Napoleon's threat of invading England.

1725 Baron Clive of Plassey d. 1774 (Robert Clive), British soldier, founder of the British Indian empire.

1547 Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra d. 1616 Spanish author. Writings: Don Quixote (1605).

1989 August Anheuser Busch Jr b. 1899 American beer-company executive, built the world's largest brewery.

1927 Willem Einthoven b. 1860 Dutch physiologist, his work on the string galvanometer led to the invention of the electrocardiograph, for which he received the 1924 Nobel prize.

1913 Rudolf Diesel b. 1858 German engineer and inventor of the diesel engine (1892).

1833 Ferdinand VII b. 1784 King of Spain (1808-33). It was during his rule that most of the Spanish possessions in Latin America rebelled and won their independence.

48 B.C. Pompey the Great b. 106 B.C. Roman general. With Caesar and Crassus, he formed the first triumvirate (60 B.C.). In 49 B.C. he began the civil war against Caesar, in which he was defeated and killed by one of his old centurions while fleeing to Egypt.

<< Previous | Today | Pick a Day | My Birthday | Surprise Me | Next >>

Celebritize Yourself
Add YOURSELF
or Someone You Love
to THIS Trivia List

Amaze Your Friends with
Your/Their Celebrity Status

Add Trivia to Your Website