EVENTS:
- 1174 – Saladin enters Damascus, and adds it to his domain.
- 1644 – John Milton publishes Areopagitica, a pamphlet decrying censorship.
- 1936 – Life magazine is reborn as a photo magazine and enjoys instant success.
- 1946 – French naval bombardment of Hai Phong, Vietnam, kills thousands of civilians. This was to lead to the First Indochina War.
- 1963 – The BBC broadcasts “An Unearthly Child” (starring William Hartnell), the first episode of the science-fiction television serial of the same name and the first episode of Doctor Who, which is now the world’s longest running science fiction drama.
- 1972 – The Soviet Union makes its final attempt at successfully launching the N1 rocket.
- 1978 – Cyclone kills about 1000 people in Eastern Sri Lanka.
- 1980 – A series of earthquakes in southern Italy kills approximately 3,000 people.
- 1992 – The first smartphone, the IBM Simon, is introduced at COMDEX in Las Vegas, Nevada.
- 1993 – Rachel Whiteread wins both the £20,000 Turner Prize award for best British modern artist and the £40,000 K Foundation art award for the worst artist of the year.
- 2006 – A series of bombings kills at least 215 people and injures 257 others in Sadr City, making it the second deadliest sectarian attack since the beginning of the Iraq War in 2003.
- 2009 – The Maguindanao massacre occurs in Ampatuan, Maguindanao, Philippines
- 2015 – Blue Origin’s New Shepard space vehicle became the first rocket to successfully fly to space and then return to Earth for a controlled, vertical landing.
- 2018 – Founders of Italian fashion brand Dolce & Gabbana issue an apology following a series of offensive advertisements on social media promoting a fashion show in Shanghai, China, which was canceled.
- 2019 – The last Sumatran rhinoceros in Malaysia, Imam, dies, making the species officially extinct in the country.
BIRTHS:
- 1837 – Johannes Diderik van der Waals, Dutch physicist and thermodynamicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1923)
- 1860 – Hjalmar Branting, Swedish journalist and politician, 16th Prime Minister of Sweden, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1925)
- 1926 – Sathya Sai Baba, Indian guru and philosopher (d. 2011)
- 1930 – Geeta Dutt, Indian singer and actress (d. 1972)
- 1941 – Alan Mullery, English footballer and manager
- 1946 – Giorgos Koudas, Greek footballer and manager
- 1948 – Frank Worthington, English footballer and manager
- 1950 – Nrisingha Prasad Bhaduri, Indian indologist, author, and academic
- 1967 – Gary Kirsten, South African cricketer and coach
- 1971 – Sajid Khan, Indian actor and singer
- 1977 – David Lucas, English footballer
- 1984 – Amruta Khanvilkar, Indian actress and dancer
- 1985 – Mike Tolbert, American football player
- 1991 – Ahmed Shehzad, Pakistani cricketer
HOLIDAYS and OBSERVANCES:
