Archives

392: Roman Emperor Theodosius declares Christian religion the state religion 1519: 1st meeting of Aztec Emperor Moctezuma II and Spanish Conquistador Hernán Cortés in Tenochtitlan, Mexico 1701: William Penn presents Charter of Privileges, guaranteed religious freedom for the colony in Pennsylvania 1734: Vincent la Chapelle, master cook to various nobility and royalty, forms Free Masons Lodge in Netherlands 1895: German physicist Wilhelm Röntgen produces and detects electromagnetic […]

1492: Ensisheim Meteorite strikes a wheat field near the village of Ensisheim in Alsace, France. Oldest meteorite with a known date of impact. 1872: Cargo ship Mary Celeste sails from Staten Island for Genoa; mysteriously found abandoned four weeks later 1917: [OS Oct 25] October Revolution in Russia; Lenin and the Bolsheviks seize power, capture the Winter Palace and overthrow the Provisional […]

1813: Chilpancingo congress declares Mexico independent of Spain 1860: Republican Abraham Lincoln of Illinois elected the 16th President of the United States of America 1913: Mahatma Gandhi arrested for leading Indian miners’ march in South Africa 1917: [OS Oct 24] Bolshevik revolution begins with bombardment of the Winter Palace in Petrograd during the Russian October Revolution 1978: Shah of Iran Mohammad Reza Pahlavi places the country […]

1492: Christopher Columbus 1st learns about growing and harvesting maize (corn) from Cuba’s indigenous population 1556: Second Battle of Panipat: Hindu Emperor of north India Hem Chandra Vikramaditya defeated by forces of Mughal Emperor Akbar, who captures and later beheads Hem Chandra 1605: Gunpowder Plot: Catholic conspirator Guy Fawkes attempts to blow up King James I and the British Parliament. Plot discovered, Guy Fawkes […]

1576: Eighty Years’ War: In Flanders, Spanish defeat Walloon and capture Antwerp 1841: First wagon train arrives in California 1845: First nationally observed uniform election day in the Unites States, the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November 1862: American inventor Richard Jordan Gatling patents the hand cranked Gatling machine gun in Indianapolis 1879: African American inventor Thomas Elkins patents the Refrigerating Apparatus […]

644: Umar ibn al-Khattab, second Muslim caliph, is killed in Medina by Lu’lu, an enslaved Persian captive 1534: English parliament passes the Act of Supremacy making Henry VIII and all subsequent monarchs the Head of the Church of England 1620: Great Patent granted to Plymouth Colony 1640: English Long Parliament forms 1906: International Radiotelegraph Conference in Berlin selects “SOS” (· · · […]

1875: Verney Cameroon reaches Benguela in Angola, from Africa’s east coast, 1st European to cross equatorial Africa 1917: Balfour Declaration proclaims support for a Jewish state in Palestine 1930: Coronation of Ras Tafari Makonnen as Haile Selassie I, 225th Emperor of Ethiopian Solmonic Dynasty 1949: The Netherlands recognizes its former colony Indonesia as a sovereign state 1966: The Cuban Adjustment Act comes into […]

1755: Lisbon earthquake kills more than 50,000 in Portugal 1814: Congress of Vienna opens to re-draw the European political map after the defeat of France, in the Napoleonic Wars 1894: Vaccine for diphtheria announced by Dr Roux of Paris 1916: Paul Miliukov delivers in the Russian State Duma the famous “stupidity or treason” speech, precipitating the downfall of the Boris […]

1517: Martin Luther sends his 95 Theses to Albrecht von Brandenburg, the Archbishop of Mainz, precipitating The Protestant Reformation 1541: Michelangelo Buonarroti finishes painting “The Last Judgement” in the Sistine Chapel, Vatican City 1876: Great Backerganj Cyclone of 1876 ravages British India (Modern-day Bangladesh), over 200,000 killed 1918: Spanish Flu kills 21,000 people in the US in a single week 2011: The world population […]

1340: Battle of Rio Salado (or Tarifa): King Afonso IV of Portugal and King Alfonso XI of Castile defeat Sultan Abu al-Hasan ‘Ali of Morocco and Yusuf I of Granada, last Marīnids invasion of Iberian Peninsula 1899: Battle of Ladysmith, Natal: Boers defeat the British, leading to the Siege of Ladysmith 1905: “October Manifesto” Russian Tsar Nicholas II grants civil […]