EVENTS:
- 1780 – The University of Münster in Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany is founded.
- 1853 – The first passenger rail opens in India, from Bori Bunder, Bombay to Thane.
- 1910 – The oldest existing indoor ice hockey arena still used for the sport in the 21st century, Boston Arena, opens for the first time.
- 1912 – Harriet Quimby becomes the first woman to fly an airplane across the English Channel.
- 1919 – Mohandas Gandhi organizes a day of “prayer and fasting” in response to the killing of Indian protesters in the Jallianwala Bagh massacre by the British colonial troops three days earlier.
- 1953 – Queen Elizabeth II launches the Royal Yacht HMY Britannia.
- 1972 – Apollo program: The launch of Apollo 16 from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
- 1990 – The “Doctor of Death”, Jack Kevorkian, participates in his first assisted suicide.
- 2001 – India and Bangladesh begin a five-day border conflict, but are unable to resolve the disputes about their border.
- 2012 – The Pulitzer Prize winners were announced, it was the first time since 1977 that no book won the Fiction Prize.
- 2013 – A 7.8-magnitude earthquake strikes Sistan and Baluchestan Province, Iran, killing at least 35 people and injuring 117 others.
- 2014 – The MV Sewol ferry carrying more than 450 people capsizes near Jindo Island off South Korea, leaving 295 passengers and crew dead and 9 more missing.
- 2016 – Ecuador’s worst earthquake in nearly 40 years kills 676 and injures more than 230,000.
- 2024 – The historic Børsen in Copenhagen, Denmark, is severely damaged by a fire.
BIRTHS:
- 1844 – Anatole France, French journalist, novelist, and poet, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1924)
- 1848 – Kandukuri Veeresalingam, Indian author and activist (d. 1919)
- 1918 – Spike Milligan, Irish actor, singer, screenwriter, and author (d. 2002)
- 1924 – Madanjeet Singh, Indian diplomat, author, and philanthropist (d. 2013)
- 1939 – John Amabile, American football player and coach (d. 2012)
- 1951 – M. S. Narayana, Indian actor and director
- 1961 – Jarbom Gamlin, Indian lawyer and politician, 7th Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh (d. 2014)
- 1963 – Saleem Malik, Pakistani cricketer
- 1978 – Lara Dutta, Indian model and actress, Miss Universe 2000
- 1996 – Taylor Townsend, American tennis player
HOLIDAYS and OBSERVANCES:
