1769 Baron von Humboldt – German scientist who explored Central and South America, collecting data for 30 volumes which form the foundation of the study of earth science, which he initiated
1849 Ivan Pavlov – Russian physiologist and psychologist who specialised in behaviour and developed Pavlov's Theory (Pavlov’s dogs)
1867 Charles Dana Gibson – US artist and illustrator who created The Gibson Girl. This idealised view of American femininity set a new standard at the turn of the century. His wife was the model for these pen and ink drawings which appeared in Collier’s Weekly, earning him an unprecedented $50,000 a year
1910 Jack Hawkins – British actor (The Cruel Sea, The Bridge on the River Kwai, The League of Gentleman, Ben-Hur, Lawrence of Arabia) In 1966 cancer of the larynx cost him his distinctive voice, and his voice was dubbed in his later films by Charles Gray of Mycroft Holmes fame
1914 Clayton Moore - Actor (The Lone Ranger, Jesse James Rides Again, Down Laredo Way)
1914 Kay Medford – Actress (Lola, Funny Girl, Butterfield 8, The Rat Race, To Rome with Love)
1930 Allan Bloom - Author (The Closing of the American Mind, Love and Friendship)
1936 Walter Koenig - Actor (Star Trek, Antony and Cleopatra, Babylon 5)
1938 Nicol Williamson – Scottish actor (Excalibur, Black Widow, The Wilby Conspiracy, Robin and Marian, The Cheap Detective) He was in The Bofors Gun with John Thaw He also played Sherlock Holmes in the movie The Seven-Per-Cent Solution
1944 Joey Heatherton - Actress (Dean Martin Presents, Cry-Baby, Bluebeard) She is the daughter of Ray Heatherton of Tropicana Orange Juice fame
1947 Sam Neill – Irish-born actor (Crusoe, In the Mouth of Madness, Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book, The Piano, Jurassic Park, The Hunt for Red October, Ivanhoe, The Final Conflict, Career, Reilly: Ace of Spies)
1959 Mary Crosby - Actress (Dallas, North and South II, Pearl) She is the daughter of Bing Crosby
1960 Melissa Leo – Actress (Homicide: Life on the Street, Hide and Seek, Scarlett, Always)
1960 Callum Keith Rennie – British-born Canadian actor (Battlestar Galactica, The Killing, Shattered, Harper’s Island, Blade: Trinity, The Butterfly Effect, Da Vinci’s Inquest, Due South)
1964 Faith Ford - Actress (Murphy Brown, thirtysomething, Maggie Winters, Hope & Faith, The Pacifier)
1968 Michelle Stafford – Actress (The Young and the Restless, General Hospital, Double Jeopardy, Pacific Palisades)
Died this Day
AD258 St Cyprian – Bishop of Carthage, the first bishop-martyr of Africa. He was condemned to death and beheaded by the Emperor Valerian, in a bout of persecution
1759 Louis-Joseph, Marquis de Montcalm, age 47 – Commander in Chief of the French forces in Canada during the Seven Year’s War. He died of wounds received in battle at the Plains of Abraham in Quebec the previous day
1851 James Fennimore Cooper – US author (The Leatherstocking Tales: The Deerslayer, The Last of the Mohicans, The Pathfinder, The Pioneers, The Prairie) He died the day before his 62nd birthday
1852 Arthur Wellesley, The Duke of Wellington, age 83 - Irish born British commander who was known as the Iron Duke. He defeated Napoleon at Waterloo, and was British Prime Minister from 1828 to 1830. He was given one of the biggest state funerals ever seen in London
1901 William McKinley, age 58 – 25th US President, died of gunshot wounds inflicted by an assassin eight days earlier at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, NY. Upon his death Vice-President Theodore Roosevelt was elevated to the White House
1927 Isadora Duncan, age 49 - Modern US dance pioneer, died in Nice, in the south of France. She was riding in a red Bugatti sports car, when the fringe of her shawl became entangled in the rear wheel. As the car pulled away, her neck was broken, and she died instantly
1982 Grace Kelly, age 52 – US born Princess Grace of Monaco, and former actress (The Country Girl, Rear Window, Dial M for Murder, High Society, The Bridges at Toko-Ri, High Noon) She died of injuries sustained in a car crash on the mountain road between Nice and Monaco
1984 Janet Gaynor – US actress (A Star is Born, The Johnstown Flood, Seventh Heaven, Sunrise, State Fair) She died in Palm Springs, California, three weeks before her 78th birthday
On this Day
1535 Jacques Cartier, on his second voyage, explored the St. Lawrence River and reached the Iroquois village of Stadacona, now Québec City. He was greeted with the Iroquois word 'Kanata' or 'Cantha,' meaning 'settlement of huts.' It is the first recorded use of the name that would eventually become Canada
1741 After working for 23 uninterrupted days, composer George Handel completed his famous Messiah
1759 The earliest dated English board game, A Journey Through Europe or the Play of Geography, was sold from this day by John Jeffreys at his house in Chapel Street, Westminster. It was priced at 8 shillings
1812 The Russians set fire to Moscow before Napoleon Bonaparte's triumphant march into the city. One week after winning a bloody victory over the Russian army at the Battle of Borodino, Napoleon's Grande Armée entered Moscow, only to find the population evacuated and the Russian army in retreat. Just after midnight, fires broke out across the city, apparently set by Russian patriots. With the firestorm spreading, Napoleon and his entourage were forced to flee down burning streets to Moscow's outskirts and narrowly avoided being asphyxiated. When the flames died down three days later, more than two-thirds of the city was destroyed
1814 Francis Scott Key composed the lyrics to The Star-Spangled Banner, after witnessing the massive British bombardment of Fort McHenry in Maryland during the War of 1812. The three day attack by the British was to retaliate for the US burning of York, now Toronto, and Newark, now Niagara. Key, a US lawyer, watched the siege while under detainment on a British ship and penned the famous words after observing that the US flag over Fort McHenry had survived the 1,800-bomb assault. After circulating as a handbill, the patriotic lyrics were published in a Baltimore newspaper on September 20. Set to the tune of To Anacreon in Heaven, an English drinking song written by the British composer John Stafford Smith, it soon became popular throughout the nation. Throughout the 19th century, The Star-Spangled Banner was regarded as the national anthem by the US armed forces and other groups, but it was not until 1916, and the signing of an executive order by President Woodrow Wilson, that it was formally designated as such. In 1931, President Herbert Hoover signed a Congressional act confirming Wilson's presidential order
1847 During the Mexican-American War, US forces under General Winfield Scott entered Mexico City and raised the US flag over the Hall of Montezuma, concluding a devastating advance that began with an amphibious landing at Vera Cruz six months earlier. The Mexican-American War began with a dispute over the US government's 1845 annexation of Texas. In January 1846, President James K. Polk, a strong advocate of westward expansion, ordered General Zachary Taylor to occupy disputed territory between the Nueces and Rio Grande Rivers. Mexican troops attacked Taylor's forces, and on May 13, 1846, Congress approved a declaration of war against Mexico. In March 1847, US forces under General Winfield Scott invaded Mexico three miles south of Vera Cruz. They encountered little resistance from the Mexicans massed in the fortified city of Vera Cruz, and by nightfall the last of Scott's 10,000 men came ashore without the loss of a single life. It was the largest amphibious landing in US history and not surpassed until World War II. By the end of March, with very few casualties, Scott's forces had taken Vera Cruz and its massive fortress, San Juan de Ulua. On September 14, Scott's forces reached the Mexican capital. In February 1848, representatives from the US and Mexico signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, formally ending the Mexican War, recognising Texas as part of the US, and extending the boundaries of the US west to the Pacific Ocean
1886 The first typewriter ribbon was patented by George Anderson of Memphis, Tennessee. The first practical typewriter was patented in 1868 and was available for purchase in 1873
1940 The US Congress passed the Selective Service Act, providing for the first peacetime draft in US history
1948 A groundbreaking ceremony took place in New York at the site of the United Nations' world headquarters
1959 The Soviet space probe Luna 2 became the first man-made object to reach the moon as it crashed onto the lunar surface
1960 The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC, was founded at the Baghdad Conference of 1960, established by five original core members: Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela
1975 Elizabeth Ann Seton was canonised by Pope John XXIII at the Vatican in Rome, becoming the first US-born Catholic saint. Born in New York City in 1774, Elizabeth Bayley was the daughter of an Episcopalian physician. She devoted much of her time to charity work with the poor and in 1797 founded the Society for the Relief of Poor Widows with Small Children in New York. She married William Seton, and in 1803 she travelled with him to Italy, where she was exposed to the Roman Catholic Church. After she herself was widowed and left with five children in 1803, she converted to Catholicism and in 1808 went to Baltimore to establish a Catholic school for girls. In 1809, she founded the United States' first religious order, the Sisters of Mercy of St. Joseph. A few months later, Mother Seton and the sisters of the order moved to a poor parish where they provided free education to poor children. Mother Seton's order grew rapidly, and she continued to teach until her death in 1821. In 1856, Seton Hall University was named for her
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