EVENTS:
- 1538 – The first university in the New World (in present-day Dominican Republic), the Universidad Santo Tomás de Aquino, is established.
- 1636 – A vote of the Great and General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony establishes the first college in what would become the United States, today known as Harvard University.
- 1707 – The 1707 Hōei earthquake causes more than 5,000 deaths in Honshu, Shikoku and Kyūshū, Japan.
- 1891 – The Mino-Owari earthquake, the largest inland earthquake in Japan’s history, strikes Gifu Prefecture.
- 1918 – A new Polish government in Western Galicia is established.
- 1971 – Britain launches the satellite Prospero into low Earth orbit atop a Black Arrow carrier rocket, the only British satellite to date launched by a British rocket.
- 2009 – The 28 October 2009 Peshawar bombing kills 117 and wounds 213.
- 2009 – NASA successfully launches the Ares I-X mission, the only rocket launch for its later-cancelled Constellation program.
- 2013 – Five people are killed and 38 are injured after a car crashes into barriers just outside the Forbidden City in Tiananmen Square, Beijing, China.
- 2014 – Britain withdraws from Afghanistan after the end of Operation Herrick which started on June 20, 2002 after 12 years four months and seven days.
- 2018 – Jair Bolsonaro is elected president of Brazil with 57 million votes, with Workers’ Party candidate Fernando Haddad as the runner-up. It is the first time in 16 years that a Workers’ Party candidate is not elected president.
- 2023 – The 2023 Rugby World Cup final is held at the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, France. It saw South Africa defeat New Zealand 11 to 12, claiming their fourth Webb Ellis Cup, becoming the first nation to do so.
BIRTHS:
- 1881 – Vin Coutie, Australian footballer (d. 1951)
- 1914 – Richard Laurence Millington Synge, English biochemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1994)
- 1933 – Garrincha, Brazilian footballer (d. 1983)
- 1946 – Wim Jansen, Dutch footballer and manager
- 1955 – Bill Gates, American businessman, co-founded Microsoft
- 1966 – Steve Atwater, American football player
- 1972 – Terrell Davis, American football player and sportscaster
- 1980 – Alan Smith, English footballer and coach
- 1986 – Anthony Griffith, English footballer
- 1996 – Jack Eichel, American Professional ice hockey player
- 2001 – Sonay Kartal, British tennis player
- 2006 – Yoon Do-young, South Korean footballer
HOLIDAYS and OBSERVANCES:
