08 October History


Month:                           Date:     

  • 876    -    Charles the Bald is defeated at the Battle of Andernach.
  • 1690    -    Belgrade is retaken by the Turks.
  • 1840    -    King William I of Holland abdicates.
  • 1855    -    Arrow, a ship flying the British flag, is boarded by Chinese who arrest the crew, thus beginning the Second Chinese War.
  • 1862    -    The Union is victorious at the Battle of Perryville, the largest Civil War combat to take place in Kentucky.
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  • 1871    -    The Great Chicago Fire begins in southwest Chicago, possibly in a barn owned by Patrick and Katherine O'Leary. Fanned by strong southwesterly winds, the flames raged for more than 24 hours, eventually leveling three and a half square miles and wiping out one-third of the city. Approximately 250 people were killed in the fire; 98,500 people were left homeless; 17,450 buildings were destroyed.
  • 1897    -    Journalist Charles Henry Dow, founder of the Wall Street Journal, begins charting trends of stocks and bonds.
  • 1900    -    Maximilian Harden is sentenced to six months in prison for publishing an article critical of the German Kaiser.
  • 1906    -    Karl Ludwig Nessler first demonstrates a machine in London that puts permenant waves in hair. The client wears a dozen brass curlers, each wearing two pounds, for the six-hour process.
  • 1919    -    The U.S. Senate and House of Representatives pass the Volstead Prohibition Enforcement Bill.
  • 1922    -    Lilian Gatlin becomes the first woman pilot to fly across the United States.
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  • 1956    -    Don Larson of the New York Yankees pitched the first perfect game in World Series history against the Brooklyn Dodgers.
  • 1968    -    U.S. forces in Vietnam launch Operation Sealord, an attack on North Vietnamese supply lines and base areas.

  • 08 October Birthdays

  • 1810    -    James Wilson Marshall, discoverer of gold in California.
  • 1890    -    Eddie Rickenbacker, U.S. fighter pilot in World War I, aviation pioneer.
  • 1895    -    Juan Peron, Argentinean dictator.
  • 1917    -    Rodney Porter, British biochemist and Nobel Proze winner.
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  • 1926    -    Cesar Milstein, molecular biologist.
  • 1941    -    Jesse Jackson, civil rights leader.