05 May History
- 1494 - Christopher Columbus lands on the island of Jamaica, which he names Santa Gloria.
- 1814 - British attack the American forces at Ft. Ontario, Oswego, New York.
- 1821 - Napoleon Bonaparte dies in exile on the island of St. Helena.
- 1834 - The first mainland railway line opens in Belgium.
- 1862 - Union and Confederate forces clash at the Battle of Williamsburg, part of the Peninsula Campaign.Eyewitness to War
- 1862 - Mexican forces loyal to Benito Juarez defeat troops sent by Napoleon III in the Battle of Puebla.
- 1865 - The 13th Amendment is ratified, abolishing slavery.
- 1886 - A bomb explodes on the fourth day of a workers' strike in Chicago.
- 1912 - Soviet Communist Party newspaper Pravda begins publishing.
- 1916 - U.S. Marines invade the Dominican Republic.
- 1917 - Eugene Jacques Bullard becomes the first African-American aviator when he earns a flying certificate with the French Air Service.
- 1920 - Anarchists Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Visetti are arrested for murder.
- 1935 - American Jesse Owens sets the long jump record.
- 1942 - General Joseph Stilwell learns that the Japanese have cut his railway out of China and is forced to lead his troops into India.
- 1945 - Holland and Denmark are liberated from Nazi control.
- 1961 - Alan Shepard becomes the first American in space.
- 1968 - U.S. Air Force planes hit Nhi Ha, South Vietnam in support of attacking infantrymen.
05 May Birthdays
- 1813 - Soren Kierkegaard, Danish philosopher.
- 1818 - Karl Marx, German philosopher (The Communist Manifesto, Das Kapital).
- 1830 - John B. Stetson, American hat maker.
- 1861 - Peter Cooper Hewitt, electrical engineer, inventor of the mercury-vapor lamp.
- 1883 - Charles Albert "Chief" Bender, baseball player.
- 1890 - Christopher Morley, writer (Kitty Foyle).
- 1899 - Freeman F. Gosden, radio comedy writer and performer (Amos 'n' Andy).
- 1908 - Rex Harrison, actor (My Fair Lady).
- 1909 - Carlos Baker, biographer.
- 1943 - Michael Palin, actor and screenwriter (Monty Python's Flying Circus).