1312 BC – Mursili II launches a campaign against the Kingdom of Azzi-Hayasa.
217 BC – The Romans, led by Gaius Flaminius, are ambushed and defeated by Hannibal at the Battle of Lake Trasimene.
109 – Roman emperor Trajan inaugurates the Aqua Traiana, an aqueduct that channels water from Lake Bracciano, 40 kilometres (25 miles) northwest of Rome.
474 – Julius Nepos forces Roman usurper Glycerius to abdicate the throne and proclaims himself Emperor of the Western Roman Empire.
637 – The Battle of Moira is fought between the High King of Ireland and the Kings of Ulster and Dál Riata. It is claimed to be the largest battle in the history of Ireland.
972 – Battle of Cedynia, the first documented victory of Polish forces, takes place.
1128 – Battle of São Mamede, near Guimarães: Forces led by Afonso I defeat forces led by his mother Teresa of León and her lover Fernando Pérez de Traba.
1230 – The Siege of Jaén begins, in the context of the Spanish Reconquista.
1314 – First War of Scottish Independence: The Battle of Bannockburn concludes with a decisive victory by Scottish forces led by Robert the Bruce.
1340 – Hundred Years’ War: Battle of Sluys: The French fleet is almost completely destroyed by the English fleet commanded in person by King Edward III.
1374 – A sudden outbreak of St. John’s Dance causes people in the streets of Aachen, Germany, to experience hallucinations and begin to jump and twitch uncontrollably until they collapse from exhaustion.
1497 – John Cabot lands in North America at Newfoundland leading the first European exploration of the region since the Vikings.
1509 – Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon are crowned King and Queen of England.
1535 – The Dominion of Münster, a radical communal Anabaptist state in the independent German city of Münster, is conquered by Franz von Waldeck, the Catholic Prince-Bishopric of Münster in a night attack.
1571 – Miguel López de Legazpi founds Manila, the capital of the Philippines.
1604 – Samuel de Champlain discovers the mouth of the Saint John River, site of Reversing Falls and the present-day city of Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada.
1622 – Battle of Macau: The Dutch make a failed attempt to capture Macau.
1663 – The Spanish garrison of Évora capitulates, following the Portuguese victory at the Battle of Ameixial.
1717 – The Premier Grand Lodge of England is founded in London, the first Masonic Grand Lodge in the world (now the United Grand Lodge of England).
1762 – Battle of Wilhelmsthal: The British-Hanoverian army of Ferdinand of Brunswick defeats French forces in Westphalia.
1779 – American Revolutionary War: The Great Siege of Gibraltar begins.
1793 – The French Constitution of 1793 is formally adopted, although it is effectively suspended by the Committee of Public Safety.
1812 – Napoleonic Wars: Napoleon’s Grande Armée crosses the Neman river beginning the invasion of Russia.
1813 – Battle of Beaver Dams: A British and Indian combined force defeats the United States Army.
1821 – The Battle of Carabobo takes place. It is the decisive battle in the war of independence of Venezuela from Spain.
1859 – Battle of Solferino (Battle of the Three Sovereigns): Sardinia and France defeat Austria in Solferino, northern Italy.
1866 – Battle of Custoza: An Austrian army defeats the Italian army during the Austro-Prussian War.
1880 – First performance of O Canada at the Congrès national des Canadiens-Français. The song would later become the national anthem of Canada.
1894 – Marie François Sadi Carnot is assassinated by Sante Geronimo Caserio.
1902 – King Edward VII of the United Kingdom develops appendicitis, delaying his coronation.
1913 – Greece and Serbia annul their alliance with Bulgaria.
1916 – Mary Pickford becomes the first female film star to sign a million-dollar contract.
1918 – First airmail service in Canada from Montreal to Toronto.
1922 – The American Professional Football Association is renamed the National Football League.
1932 – A bloodless revolution instigated by the People’s Party ends the absolute power of King Prajadhipok of Siam (now Thailand).
1938 – Pieces of a meteorite land near Chicora, Pennsylvania. The meteorite is estimated to have weighed 450 metric tons when it hit the Earth’s atmosphere and exploded.
1939 – Siam is renamed Thailand by Plaek Phibunsongkhram, the country’s third prime minister.
1940 – World War II: Operation Collar, the first British Commando raid on occupied France, by No 11 Independent Company.
1943 – US military police attempt to arrest a black soldier in Bamber Bridge, England, sparking the Battle of Bamber Bridge mutiny that leaves one dead and seven wounded.
1947 – Kenneth Arnold makes the first widely reported UFO sighting near Mount Rainier, Washington, leading to the coining of the phrase “flying saucer”.
1948 – Cold War: Start of the Berlin Blockade: The Soviet Union makes overland travel between West Germany and West Berlin impossible.
1949 – The first television western, Hopalong Cassidy, starring William Boyd, is aired on NBC.
1950 – Apartheid: In South Africa, the Group Areas Act is passed, formally segregating races.
1954 – First Indochina War: Battle of Mang Yang Pass: Viet Minh troops belonging to the 803rd Regiment ambush G.M. 100 of France in An Khê.
1957 – In Roth v. United States, the U.S. Supreme Court rules that obscenity is not protected by the First Amendment.
1963 – The United Kingdom grants Zanzibar internal self-government.
1973 – The UpStairs Lounge, a gay bar in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana, is attacked by an arsonist during a church service, and 32 people die from smoke inhalation or fire.
1975 – Eastern Air Lines Flight 66 encounters severe wind shear and crashes on final approach to New York’s JFK Airport killing 113 of the 124 passengers on board, making it the deadliest U.S. plane crash at the time. This accident led to decades of research into downburst and microburst phenomena and their effects on aircraft.
1981 – The Humber Bridge opens to traffic, connecting Yorkshire and Lincolnshire. It remained the world’s longest bridge span for 17 years.
1982 – British Airways Flight 9 flies into a cloud of volcanic ash thrown up by the eruption of Mount Galunggung, resulting in the failure of all four engines.
1989 – Jiang Zemin succeeds Zhao Ziyang to become the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China after the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989.
1995 – Rugby World Cup: South Africa defeats New Zealand and Nelson Mandela presents Francois Pienaar with the Webb Ellis Cup in an iconic post-apartheid moment.
2002 – The Igandu train disaster in Tanzania kills 281, the worst train accident in African history.
2004 – In New York, capital punishment is declared unconstitutional.
2010 – At Wimbledon, John Isner of the United States defeats Nicolas Mahut of France, in the longest match in professional tennis history.
2010 – Julia Gillard assumes office as the first female Prime Minister of Australia.
2012 – Death of Lonesome George, the last known individual of Chelonoidis nigra abingdonii, a subspecies of the Galápagos tortoise.
2013 – Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is found guilty of abusing his power and engaging in sex with an underage prostitute, and is sentenced to seven years in prison.
Births on June 24
1210 – Count Floris IV of Holland (d. 1234)
1244 – Henry I, Landgrave of Hesse (d. 1308)
1254 – Floris V, Count of Holland (d. 1296)
1257 – Robert de Vere, 6th Earl of Oxford, English nobleman (probable; d. 1331)
1314 – Philippa of Hainault Queen of England (d. 1369)
1322 – Joanna, Duchess of Brabant (d. 1406)
1343 – Joan of Valois, Queen of Navarre (d. 1373)
1360 – Nuno Álvares Pereira, Portuguese general
1386 – John of Capistrano, Italian priest and saint (d. 1456)
1465 – Isabella del Balzo, Queen Consort of Naples (d. 1533)
1485 – Johannes Bugenhagen, Polish-German priest and reformer (d. 1558)
1485 – Elizabeth of Denmark, Electress of Brandenburg (d. 1555)
1499 – Johannes Brenz, German theologian and the Protestant Reformer (d. 1570)
1519 – Theodore Beza, French theologian and scholar (d. 1605)
1532 – Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, English politician (d. 1588)
1532 – William IV, Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel (d. 1573)
1535 – Joanna of Austria, Princess of Portugal (d. 1573)
1546 – Robert Persons, English Jesuit priest, insurrectionist, and author (d. 1610)
1587 – William Arnold, English-American settler (d. 1675)
1591 – Mustafa I, Ottoman sultan (d. 1639)
1614 – John Belasyse, 1st Baron Belasyse
1616 – Ferdinand Bol, Dutch painter, etcher and draftsman, student of Rembrandt (d. 1680)
1661 – Hachisuka Tsunanori, Japanese daimyō (d. 1730)
1663 – Jean Baptiste Massillon, French bishop (d. 1742)
1687 – Johann Albrecht Bengel, German-Lutheran clergyman and scholar (d. 1757)
1694 – Jean-Jacques Burlamaqui, Swiss author and theorist (d. 1748)
1704 – Jean-Baptiste de Boyer, Marquis d’Argens, French philosopher and author (d. 1771)
1753 – William Hull, American general and politician, 1st Governor of Michigan Territory (d. 1825)
1755 – Anacharsis Cloots, Prussian-French activist (d. 1794)
1767 – Jean-Baptiste Benoît Eyriès, French geographer and author (d. 1846)
1771 – Éleuthère Irénée du Pont, French chemist and businessman, founded DuPont (d. 1834)
1774 – Antonio González de Balcarce, Argentinian commander and politician, 5th Supreme Director of the United Provinces of the Río de la Plata (d. 1819)
1774 – François-Nicolas-Benoît Haxo, French general and engineer (d. 1838)
1777 – John Ross, Scottish commander and explorer (d. 1856)
1782 – Juan Larrea, Argentinian captain and politician (d. 1847)
1783 – Johann Heinrich von Thünen, German economist and geographer (d. 1850)
1784 – Juan Antonio Lavalleja, Uruguayan general and politician, President of Uruguay (d. 1853)
1788 – Thomas Blanchard, American inventor (d. 1864)
1795 – Ernst Heinrich Weber, German physician and psychologist (d. 1878)
1797 – John Hughes, Irish-American archbishop (d. 1864)
1797 – Paweł Edmund Strzelecki, Polish geologist and explorer (d. 1873)
1804 – Stephan Endlicher, Austrian botanist, numismatist, and sinologist (d. 1849)
1804 – Willard Richards, American religious leader (d. 1854)
1811 – John Archibald Campbell, American lawyer and jurist (d. 1889)
1813 – Henry Ward Beecher, American minister and reformer (d. 1887)
1813 – Francis Boott, American composer (d. 1904)
1821 – Guillermo Rawson, Argentinian physician and politician (d. 1890)
1826 – George Goyder, English-Australian surveyor (d. 1898)
1835 – Johannes Wislicenus, German chemist and academic (d. 1902)
1838 – Jan Matejko, Polish painter (d. 1893)
1839 – Gustavus Franklin Swift, American businessman (d. 1903)
1842 – Ambrose Bierce, American short story writer, essayist, and journalist (d. 1914)
1846 – Samuel Johnson, Nigerian priest and historian (d. 1901)
1850 – Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener, Irish field marshal and politician, Governor-General of Sudan (d. 1916)
1852 – Friedrich Loeffler, German bacteriologist and academic (d. 1915)
1854 – Eleanor Norcross, American painter (d. 1923)
1856 – Henry Chapman Mercer, American archaeologist and author (d. 1930)
1858 – Hastings Rashdall, English historian, philosopher, and theologian (d. 1924)
1865 – Robert Henri, American painter and educator (d. 1929)
1867 – Ruth Randall Edström, American educator and activist (d. 1944)
1869 – Prince George of Greece and Denmark (d. 1957)
1872 – Frank Crowninshield, American journalist and art and theatre critic (d. 1947)
1875 – Forrest Reid, Irish novelist, literary critic and translator (d. 1947)
1880 – Oswald Veblen, American mathematician and academic (g. 1960)
1880 – João Cândido Felisberto, Brazilian revolutionary and sailor (d. 1969)
1881 – George Shiels, Irish-Canadian author, poet, and playwright (d. 1949)
1882 – Athanase David, Canadian lawyer and politician (d. 1953)
1882 – Carl Diem, German businessman (d. 1962)
1883 – Victor Francis Hess, Austrian-American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1964)
1883 – Fritz Löhner-Beda, Jewish Austrian librettist, lyricist and writer (d.1942)
1883 – Jean Metzinger, French artist (d. 1956)
1883 – Arthur L. Newton, American runner (d. 1956)
1883 – Frank Verner, American runner (d. 1966)
1884 – Frank Waller, American runner (d. 1941)
1885 – Olaf Holtedahl, Norwegian geologist (d. 1975)
1888 – Gerrit Rietveld, Dutch architect, designed the Rietveld Schröder House (d. 1964)
1893 – Roy O. Disney, American businessman, co-founded The Walt Disney Company (d. 1971)
1895 – Jack Dempsey, American boxer and soldier (d. 1983)
1898 – Armin Öpik, Estonian-Australian paleontologist and geologist (d. 1983)
1898 – Karl Selter, Estonian politician, 14th Minister of Foreign Affairs of Estonia (d. 1958)
1900 – Wilhelm Cauer, German mathematician and engineer (d. 1945)
1901 – Marcel Mule, French saxophonist (d. 2001)
1901 – Harry Partch, American composer and theorist (d. 1974)
1901 – Chuck Taylor, American basketball player and salesman (d. 1969)
1904 – Phil Harris, American singer-songwriter and actor (d. 1995)
1905 – Fred Alderman, American sprinter (d. 1998)
1906 – Pierre Fournier, French cellist and educator (d. 1986)
1906 – Willard Maas, American poet and educator (d. 1971)
1907 – Arseny Tarkovsky, Russian poet and translator (d. 1989)
1908 – Hugo Distler, German organist, composer, and conductor (d. 1942)
1908 – Alfons Rebane, Estonian colonel (d. 1976)
1909 – Jean Deslauriers, Canadian violinist, composer, and conductor (d. 1978)
1909 – William Penney, Baron Penney, English mathematician and physicist (d. 1991)
1909 – Betty Cavanna, American author (d. 2001)
1911 – Juan Manuel Fangio, Argentinian race car driver (d. 1995)
1911 – Ernesto Sabato, Argentinian physicist and academic (d. 2011)
1911 – Portia White, Canadian opera singer (d. 1968)
1912 – Brian Johnston, English sportscaster and author (d. 1994)
1912 – Mary Wesley, English author (d. 2002)
1913 – Gustaaf Deloor, Belgian cyclist and soldier (d. 2002)
1914 – Jan Karski, Polish-American activist and academic (d. 2000)
1914 – Pearl Witherington, French secret agent (d. 2008)
1915 – Fred Hoyle, English astronomer and author (d. 2001)
1916 – William B. Saxbe, American soldier, lawyer, and politician, 70th United States Attorney General (d. 2010)
1916 – Saloua Raouda Choucair, Lebanese painter and sculptor (d. 2017)
1917 – David Easton, Canadian-American political scientist and academic (d. 2014)
1917 – Lucy Jarvis, American television producer (d. 2020)
1917 – Ramblin’ Tommy Scott, American singer and guitarist (d. 2013)
1917 – Joan Clarke, English cryptanalyst and numismatist (d. 1996)
1918 – Mildred Ladner Thompson, American journalist and author (d. 2013)
1918 – Yong Nyuk Lin, Singaporean businessman and politician, Singaporean Minister for Education (d. 2012)
1919 – Al Molinaro, American actor (d. 2015)
1921 – Gerhard Sommer, German soldier
1922 – Jack Carter, American actor and comedian (d. 2015)
1922 – John Postgate, English microbiologist, author, and academic (d. 2014)
1922 – Richard Timberlake, American economist
1923 – Margaret Olley, Australian painter and philanthropist (d. 2011)
1924 – Kurt Furgler, Swiss politician, 70th President of the Swiss Confederation (d. 2008)
1924 – Archie Roy, Scottish astronomer and academic (d. 2012)
1924 – Yoshito Takamine, American politician (d. 2015)
1925 – Ogden Reid, American politician (d. 2019)
1927 – Fernand Dumont, Canadian sociologist, philosopher, and poet (d. 1997)
1927 – James B. Edwards, American dentist, soldier, and politician, 3rd United States Secretary of Energy (d. 2014)
1927 – Martin Lewis Perl, American physicist and engineer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2014)
1929 – Carolyn S. Shoemaker, American astronomer
1930 – Claude Chabrol, French actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 2010)
1930 – Donald Gordon, South African businessman and philanthropist (d. 2019)
1930 – William Bernard Ziff, Jr., American publisher (d. 2006)
1931 – Billy Casper, American golfer and architect (d. 2015)
1932 – David McTaggart, Canadian-Italian environmentalist (d. 2001)
1933 – Sam Jones, American basketball player and coach
1933 – Ngina Kenyatta, 1st First Lady of Kenya
1934 – Ferdinand Biwersi, German footballer and referee (d. 2013)
1934 – Jean-Pierre Ferland, Canadian singer-songwriter
1934 – Gloria Christian, Italian singer
1935 – Terry Riley, American composer and educator
1935 – Jean Milesi, French racing cyclist
1935 – Charlie Dees, American baseball player
1937 – Anita Desai, Indian-American author and academic
1938 – Lawrence Block, American author
1938 – Abulfaz Elchibey, 1st democratically elected Azerbaijani president (d. 2000)
1938 – Ken Gray, New Zealand rugby player (d. 1992)
1939 – Brigitte Fontaine, French singer
1940 – Ian Ross, Australian newsreader (d. 2014)
1940 – Vittorio Storaro, Italian cinematographer
1941 – Erkin Koray, Turkish singer-songwriter and guitarist
1941 – Julia Kristeva, Bulgarian-French psychoanalyst and author
1941 – Graham McKenzie, Australian cricketer
1942 – Arthur Brown, English rock singer-songwriter
1942 – Michele Lee, American actress and singer
1942 – Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle, Chilean engineer and politician, 32nd President of Chile
1942 – Colin Groves, Australian academician and educator
1943 – Birgit Grodal, Danish economist and academic (d. 2004)
1944 – Jeff Beck, English guitarist and songwriter
1944 – Kathryn Lasky, American author
1944 – Chris Wood, English saxophonist (d. 1983)
1945 – Colin Blunstone, English singer-songwriter
1945 – Wayne Cashman, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
1945 – George Pataki, American lawyer and politician, 53rd Governor of New York
1945 – Betty Stöve, Dutch tennis player
1946 – David Collenette, Canadian civil servant and politician, 32nd Canadian Minister of National Defence
1946 – Ellison Onizuka, American colonel, engineer, and astronaut (d. 1986)
1946 – Robert Reich, American economist and politician, 22nd United States Secretary of Labor
1947 – Clarissa Dickson Wright, English chef, author, and television personality (d. 2014)
1947 – Peter Weller, American actor and director
1948 – Patrick Moraz, Swiss keyboard player and songwriter
1949 – John Illsley, English singer-songwriter, bass player, and producer
1949 – Betty Jackson, English fashion designer
1950 – Nancy Allen, American actress
1950 – Bob Carlos Clarke, Irish-born English photographer (d. 2006)
1950 – Jan Kulczyk, Polish businessman (d. 2015)
1950 – Mercedes Lackey, American author
1951 – Raelene Boyle, Australian sprinter
1951 – Charles Sturridge, English director, producer, and screenwriter
1952 – Dianna Melrose, English diplomat, British High Commissioner to Tanzania
1952 – Bob Neill, English lawyer and politician
1953 – William E. Moerner, American chemist and physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1953 – Michael Tuck, Australian footballer and coach
1955 – Chris Higgins, English geneticist and academic
1955 – Edmund Malura, German footballer and manager
1955 – Loren Roberts, American golfer
1956 – Owen Paterson, English politician, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
1957 – Mark Parkinson, American lawyer and politician, 45th Governor of Kansas
1958 – Jean Charest, Canadian lawyer and politician, 5th Deputy Prime Minister of Canada
1958 – Silvio Mondinelli, Italian mountaineer
1958 – John Tortorella, American ice hockey player and coach
1959 – Andy McCluskey, English singer-songwriter, bass player, and producer
1960 – Elish Angiolini, Scottish lawyer, judge, and politician, Solicitor General for Scotland
1960 – Siedah Garrett, American singer-songwriter and pianist
1960 – Karin Pilsäter, Swedish accountant and politician
1960 – Erik Poppe, Norwegian director, cinematographer, and screenwriter
1961 – Dennis Danell, American singer and guitarist (d. 2000)
1961 – Iain Glen, Scottish actor
1961 – Bernie Nicholls, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
1961 – Ralph E. Reed, Jr., American journalist and activist
1961 – Curt Smith, English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
1963 – Yuri Kasparyan, Russian guitarist
1963 – Preki, Serbian-American soccer player and coach
1963 – Mike Wieringo, American author and illustrator (d. 2007)
1964 – Jean-Luc Delarue, French television host and producer (d. 2012)
1964 – Kathryn Parminter, Baroness Parminter, English politician
1964 – Gary Suter, American ice hockey player and scout
1965 – Claude Bourbonnais, Canadian race car driver
1965 – Uwe Krupp, German ice hockey player and coach
1965 – Richard Lumsden, English actor, writer, composer and musician
1966 – Hope Sandoval, American singer-songwriter and musician
1966 – Adrienne Shelly, American actress, director, and screenwriter (d. 2006)
1967 – Janez Lapajne, Slovenian director and producer
1967 – John Limniatis, Greek-Canadian footballer and manager
1968 – Alaa Abdelnaby, Egyptian-American basketball player and sportscaster
1970 – Glenn Medeiros, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1970 – Bernardo Sassetti, Portuguese pianist, composer, and educator (d. 2012)
1972 – Robbie McEwen, Australian cyclist
1972 – Denis Žvegelj, Slovenian rower
1973 – Alexis Gauthier, French chef
1973 – Jere Lehtinen, Finnish ice hockey player
1974 – Dan Byles, English sailor, rower, and politician
1974 – Chris Guccione, American baseball player and umpire
1975 – Marek Malík, Czech ice hockey player
1975 – Federico Pucciariello, Argentinian-Italian rugby player
1976 – Brock Olivo, American football player and coach
1977 – Dimos Dikoudis, Greek basketball player and manager
1977 – Jeff Farmer, Australian footballer
1978 – Luis García, Spanish footballer
1978 – Pantelis Kafes, Greek footballer
1978 – Shunsuke Nakamura, Japanese footballer
1978 – Ariel Pink, American singer-songwriter
1978 – Juan Román Riquelme, Argentinian footballer
1978 – Emppu Vuorinen, Finnish guitarist and songwriter
1979 – Mindy Kaling, American actress and producer
1979 – Petra Němcová, Czech model and philanthropist
1980 – Cicinho, Brazilian footballer
1980 – Nina Dübbers, German tennis player
1980 – Andrew Jones, Australian race car driver
1980 – Minka Kelly, American actress
1982 – Kevin Nolan, English footballer
1982 – Jarret Stoll, Canadian ice hockey player
1983 – Rebecca Cooke, English swimmer
1983 – Gianni Munari, Italian footballer
1983 – Gard Nilssen, Norwegian drummer
1983 – David Shillington, Australian rugby league player
1984 – Andrea Raggi, Italian footballer
1984 – J.J. Redick, American basketball player
1984 – Johanna Welin, Swedish-born German wheelchair basketball player
1985 – Diego Alves Carreira, Brazilian footballer
1985 – Tom Kennedy, English footballer
1985 – Ethan Klein, American YouTuber
1985 – Nate Myles, Australian rugby league player
1985 – Vernon Philander, South African cricketer
1985 – Yukina Shirakawa, Japanese model
1986 – Stuart Broad, English cricketer
1986 – Phil Hughes, American baseball player
1986 – Solange Knowles, American singer-songwriter and actress
1987 – Simona Dobrá, Czech tennis player
1987 – Lionel Messi, Argentinian footballer
1987 – Pierre Vaultier, French snowboarder
1988 – Micah Richards, English footballer
1989 – Teklemariam Medhin, Eritrean runner
1990 – Michael Del Zotto, Canadian ice hockey player
1990 – Richard Sukuta-Pasu, German footballer
1991 – Yasmin Paige, English actress
1991 – Aidan Sezer, Australian rugby league player
1992 – David Alaba, Austrian footballer
1996 – Duki, Argentinian rapper
Deaths on June 24
994 – Abu Isa al-Warraq, Arab scholar (b. 889)
1046 – Jeongjong II, Korean ruler (b. 1018)
1088 – William de Warenne, 1st Earl of Surrey, Norman nobleman
1314 – Gilbert de Clare, 8th Earl of Gloucester, English commander (b. 1291)
1314 – Robert de Clifford, 1st Baron de Clifford, English soldier and politician, Lord Warden of the Marches (b. 1274)
1398 – Hongwu, Chinese emperor (b. 1328)
1439 – Frederick IV, duke of Austria (b. 1382)
1503 – Reginald Bray, English architect and politician, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (b. 1440)
1519 – Lucrezia Borgia, Italian wife of Alfonso I d’Este, Duke of Ferrara (b. 1480)
1520 – Hosokawa Sumimoto, Japanese commander (b. 1489)
1604 – Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, English courtier, Lord Great Chamberlain (b. 1550)
1637 – Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc, French astronomer and historian (b. 1580)
1643 – John Hampden, English politician (b. 1595)
1766 – Adrien Maurice de Noailles, French soldier and politician, French Minister of Foreign Affairs (b. 1678)
1778 – Pieter Burman the Younger, Dutch philologist and academic (b. 1714)
1803 – Matthew Thornton, Irish-American judge and politician (b. 1714)
1817 – Thomas McKean, American lawyer and politician, 2nd Governor of Pennsylvania (b. 1734)
1835 – Andreas Vokos Miaoulis, Greek admiral and politician (b. 1769)
1902 – George Leake, Australian politician, 2nd Premier of Western Australia (b. 1856)
1908 – Grover Cleveland, American lawyer and politician, 22nd and 24th President of the United States (b. 1837)
1909 – Sarah Orne Jewett, American novelist, short story writer, and poet (b. 1849)
1922 – Walther Rathenau, German businessman and politician, 7th German Minister for Foreign Affairs (b. 1867)
1931 – Otto Mears, Russian-American businessman (b. 1840)
1931 – Xiang Zhongfa, Chinese politician, 2nd General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (b. 1880)
1932 – Ernst Põdder, Estonian general (b. 1879)
1943 – Camille Roy, Canadian priest and critic (b. 1870)
1946 – Louise Whitfield Carnegie, American philanthropist (b. 1857)
1947 – Emil Seidel, American politician, Mayor of Milwaukee (b. 1864)
1962 – Volfgangs Dārziņš, Latvian composer, pianist and music critic (b. 1906)
1964 – Stuart Davis, American painter and academic (b. 1892)
1968 – Tony Hancock, English actor, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1924)
1969 – Frank King, American cartoonist (b. 1883)
1969 – Willy Ley, German-American historian and author (b. 1906)
1976 – Minor White, American photographer, critic, and academic (b. 1908)
1978 – Robert Charroux, French author and critic (b. 1909)
1980 – V. V. Giri, Indian lawyer and politician, 4th President of India (b. 1894)
1984 – Clarence Campbell, Canadian businessman (b. 1905)
1987 – Jackie Gleason, American actor, comedian, and producer (b. 1916)
1988 – Csaba Kesjár, Hungarian race car driver (b. 1962)
2015 – Mario Biaggi, American police officer, politician and criminal (b. 1917)
2015 – Marva Collins, American author and educator (b. 1936)
2015 – Susan Ahn Cuddy, American lieutenant (b. 1915)
2019 – Billy Drago, American actor (b. 1945)
Holidays and observances on June 24
Army Day or Battle of Carabobo Day (Venezuela)
Bannockburn Day (Scotland)
Christian feast day:
María Guadalupe García Zavala
Nativity of Saint John the Baptist
June 24 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Day of the Caboclo (Amazonas, Brazil)
Discovery Day, observed on the nearest Monday to June 24 (Newfoundland and Labrador)
Earliest day on which Armed Forces Day can fall, while June 30 is the latest; celebrated on the last Saturday in June. (United Kingdom)
Earliest day on which Inventors’ and Rationalizers’ Day can fall, while June 30 is the latest; celebrated on the last Saturday in June. (Russia)
Earliest day on which Mother’s Day can fall, while June 30 is the latest; celebrated on the last Sunday in June. (Kenya)
Earliest day on which Youth Day can fall, while Jun 30 is the latest; celebrated on the last Sunday in June. (Ukraine, Belarus)
Inti Raymi, a winter solstice festival and a New Year in the Andes of the Southern Hemisphere (Sacsayhuamán)
St John’s Day and the second day of the Midsummer celebrations (although this is not the astronomical summer solstice, see June 20) (Roman Catholic Church, Europe), and its related observances:
Enyovden (Bulgaria)
Jaanipäev (Estonia)
Jāņi (Latvia)
Jónsmessa (Iceland)
Midsummer Day (England)
Saint Jonas’ Festival or Joninės (Lithuania)
Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day (Quebec)
Sânziene (western Carpathian Mountains of Romania)
475 BC – Roman consul Publius Valerius Poplicola celebrates a Roman triumph for his victory over Veii and the Sabines.
305 – Diocletian and Maximian retire from the office of Roman emperor.
524 – King Sigismund of Burgundy is executed at Orléans after an eight-year reign and is succeeded by his brother Godomar.
880 – The Nea Ekklesia is inaugurated in Constantinople, setting the model for all later cross-in-square Orthodox churches.
1169 – Norman mercenaries land at Bannow Bay in Leinster, marking the beginning of the Norman invasion of Ireland.
1328 – Wars of Scottish Independence end: By the Treaty of Edinburgh–Northampton, England recognises Scotland as an independent state.
1455 – Battle of Arkinholm, Royal forces end the Black Douglas hegemony in Scotland.
1576 – Stephen Báthory, the reigning Prince of Transylvania, marries Anna Jagiellon and they become co-rulers of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.
1707 – The Act of Union joining England and Scotland to form the Kingdom of Great Britain takes effect.
1753 – Publication of Species Plantarum by Linnaeus, and the formal start date of plant taxonomy adopted by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature.
1759 – Josiah Wedgwood founds the Wedgwood pottery company in Great Britain
1776 – Establishment of the Illuminati in Ingolstadt, Upper Bavaria, by Jesuit-taught Adam Weishaupt.
1778 – American Revolution: The Battle of Crooked Billet begins in Hatboro, Pennsylvania.
1786 – In Vienna, Austria, Mozart’s opera The Marriage of Figaro is performed for the first time.
1794 – War of the Pyrenees: The Battle of Boulou ends, in which French forces defeat the Spanish and regain nearly all the land they lost to Spain in 1793.
1820 – Execution of the Cato Street Conspirators, who plotted to kill the British Cabinet and Prime Minister Lord Liverpool.
1840 – The Penny Black, the first official adhesive postage stamp, is issued in the United Kingdom.
1844 – Hong Kong Police Force, the world’s second modern police force and Asia’s first, is established.
1846 – The few remaining Mormons left in Nauvoo, Illinois, formally dedicate the Nauvoo Temple.
1851 – Queen Victoria opens The Great Exhibition at The Crystal Palace in London.
1856 – The Province of Isabela was created in the Philippines in honor of Queen Isabela II.
1862 – American Civil War: The Union Army completes its capture of New Orleans.
1863 – American Civil War: The Battle of Chancellorsville begins.
1865 – The Empire of Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay sign the Treaty of the Triple Alliance.
1866 – The Memphis Race Riots begin. In three days time, 46 blacks and two whites were killed. Reports of the atrocities influenced passage of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
1875 – Alexandra Palace reopens after being burned down in a fire in 1873.
1884 – The Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions demands the eight-hour work day in the United States.
1884 – Moses Fleetwood Walker becomes the first black person to play in a professional baseball game in the United States.
1885 – The original Chicago Board of Trade Building opens for business.
1886 – Rallies are held throughout the United States demanding the eight-hour work day, culminating in the Haymarket affair in Chicago, in commemoration of which May 1 is celebrated as International Workers’ Day in many countries.
1893 – The World’s Columbian Exposition opens in Chicago.
1894 – Coxey’s Army, the first significant American protest march, arrives in Washington, D.C.
1898 – Spanish–American War: Battle of Manila Bay: The Asiatic Squadron of the United States Navy destroys the Pacific Squadron of the Spanish Navy after a seven-hour battle. Spain loses all seven of its ships, and 381 Spanish sailors die. There are no American vessel losses or combat deaths.
1900 – The Scofield Mine disaster kills over 200 men in Scofield, Utah in what is to date the fifth-worst mining accident in United States history.
1915 – The RMS Lusitania departs from New York City on her 202nd, and final, crossing of the North Atlantic. Six days later, the ship is torpedoed off the coast of Ireland with the loss of 1,198 lives.
1919 – German troops enter Munich to suppress the Bavarian Soviet Republic.
1925 – The All-China Federation of Trade Unions is officially founded. Today it is the largest trade union in the world, with 134 million members.
1927 – The Union Labor Life Insurance Company is founded by the American Federation of Labor.
1929 – The 7.2 Mw Kopet Dag earthquake shakes the Iran–Turkmenistan border region with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent), killing up to 3,800 and injuring 1,121.
1930 – “Pluto” is officially proposed for the name of the newly-discovered dwarf planet Pluto by Vesto Slipher in the Lowell Observatory Observation Circular. The name quickly catches on.
1931 – The Empire State Building is dedicated in New York City.
1941 – World War II: German forces launch a major attack during the siege of Tobruk.
1944 – World War II: Two hundred Communist prisoners are shot by the Germans at Kaisariani, Athens in reprisal for the killing of General Franz Krech by partisans at Molaoi.
1945 – World War II: A German newsreader officially announces that Adolf Hitler has “fallen at his command post in the Reich Chancellery fighting to the last breath against Bolshevism and for Germany”. The Soviet flag is raised over the Reich Chancellery, by order of Stalin.
1945 – World War II: Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels and his wife Magda commit suicide in the Reich Garden outside the Führerbunker. Their children are also killed by having cyanide pills inserted into their mouths by their mother, Magda.
1945 – World War II: Forces of the Soviet Red Army liberate Allied prisoners of war imprisoned at Stalag Luft I near Barth, Germany.
1945 – World War II: Up to 2,500 people die in a mass suicide in Demmin following the advance of the Red Army.
1945 – World War II: Yugoslav Partisans liberate Trieste.
1946 – Start of three-year Pilbara strike of Indigenous Australians.
1946 – The Paris Peace Conference concludes that the islands of the Dodecanese should be returned to Greece by Italy.
1947 – Portella della Ginestra massacre against May Day celebrations in Sicily by the bandit and separatist leader Salvatore Giuliano where 11 persons are killed and 33 wounded.
1956 – The polio vaccine developed by Jonas Salk is made available to the public.
1956 – A doctor in Japan reports an “epidemic of an unknown disease of the central nervous system”, marking the official discovery of Minamata disease.
1957 – Thirty-four people are killed when a Vickers Viking airliner crashes in Hampshire, England.
1960 – Formation of the western Indian states of Gujarat and Maharashtra; also known as “Maharashtra Day”.
1960 – Cold War: U-2 incident: Francis Gary Powers, in a Lockheed U-2 spyplane, is shot down over the Sverdlovsk Oblast, Soviet Union, sparking a diplomatic crisis.
1961 – The Prime Minister of Cuba, Fidel Castro, proclaims Cuba a socialist nation and abolishes elections.
1965 – Cross-Strait relations: Battle of Dong-Yin, a naval conflict between the Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China, takes place.
1967 – Elvis Presley and Priscilla Beaulieu are married in Las Vegas.
1970 – Vietnam War: Protests erupt following the announcement by Richard Nixon that the U.S. and South Vietnamese forces would attack Vietnamese communists in a Cambodian Campaign.
1971 – Amtrak (the National Railroad Passenger Corporation) takes over operation of U.S. passenger rail service.
1974 – The Argentine terrorist organization Montoneros is expelled from Plaza de Mayo by president Juan Perón.
1977 – Thirty-six people are killed in Taksim Square, Istanbul, during the Labour Day celebrations.
1978 – Japan’s Naomi Uemura, travelling by dog sled, becomes the first person to reach the North Pole alone.
1982 – Operation Black Buck: The Royal Air Force attacks the Argentine Air Force during Falklands War.
1983 – The Sydney Entertainment Centre is opened.
1987 – Pope John Paul II beatifies Edith Stein, a Jewish-born Carmelite nun who was gassed in the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz.
1989 – Disney-MGM Studios opens at Walt Disney World near Orlando, Florida, United States.
1990 – The former Philippine Episcopal Church (supervised by the Episcopal Church of the United States of America) is granted full autonomy and raised to the status of an Autocephalous Anglican Province and renamed the Episcopal Church in the Philippines.
1993 – Dingiri Banda Wijetunga became president of Sri Lanka automatically after killing of R Premadasa in LTTE bomb explosion.
1994 – Three-time Formula One world champion Ayrton Senna is killed in an accident whilst leading the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola.
1995 – Croatian War of Independence: Croatian forces launch Operation Flash.
1999 – The body of British climber George Mallory is found on Mount Everest, 75 years after his disappearance in 1924
1999 – SpongeBob SquarePants premieres on Nickelodeon.
2001 – Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo declares the existence of “a state of rebellion”, hours after thousands of supporters of her arrested predecessor, Joseph Estrada, storm towards the presidential palace at the height of the EDSA III rebellion.
2002 – OpenOffice.org released version 1.0, the first stable version of the software.
2003 – Invasion of Iraq: In what becomes known as the “Mission Accomplished” speech, on board the USS Abraham Lincoln (off the coast of California), U.S. President George W. Bush declares that “major combat operations in Iraq have ended”.
2004 – Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia join the European Union, celebrated at the residence of the Irish President in Dublin.
2009 – Same-sex marriage is legalized in Sweden.
2011 – Pope John Paul II is beatified by his successor, Pope Benedict XVI.
2019 – Naxalite attack in Gadchiroli district of India: Sixteen army soldiers, including a driver, killed in an IED blast. Naxals targeted an anti-Naxal operations team.
Births on May 1
1218 – John I, Count of Hainaut (d. 1257)
1218 – Rudolf I of Germany (d. 1291)
1285 – Edmund FitzAlan, 9th Earl of Arundel, English politician (d. 1326)
1326 – Rinchinbal Khan, Mongolian emperor (d. 1332)
1488 – Sidonie of Bavaria, eldest daughter of Duke Albrecht IV of Bavaria-Munich (d. 1505)
1527 – Johannes Stadius, German astronomer, astrologer, mathematician (d. 1579)
1545 – Franciscus Junius, French theologian (d. 1602)
1579 – Wolphert Gerretse, Dutch-American farmer, co-founded New Netherland (d. 1662)
1582 – Marco da Gagliano, Italian composer (d. 1643)
1585 – Sophia Olelkovich Radziwill, Belarusian saint (d. 1612)
1591 – Johann Adam Schall von Bell, German missionary and astronomer (d. 1666)
1594 – John Haynes, English-American politician, 1st Governor of the Colony of Connecticut (d. 1653)
1602 – William Lilly, English astrologer (d. 1681)
1672 – Joseph Addison, English essayist, poet, playwright, and politician (d. 1719)
1730 – Joshua Rowley, English admiral (d. 1790)
1735 – Jan Hendrik van Kinsbergen, Dutch admiral and philanthropist (d. 1819)
1751 – Judith Sargent Murray, American poet and playwright (d. 1820)
1764 – Benjamin Henry Latrobe, English-American architect, designed the United States Capitol (d. 1820)
1769 – Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, Irish-English field marshal and politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1852)
1783 – Phoebe Hinsdale Brown, American hymnwriter (d. 1861)
1803 – James Clarence Mangan, Irish poet and author (d. 1849)
1821 – Henry Ayers, English-Australian politician, 8th Premier of South Australia (d. 1897)
1824 – Alexander William Williamson, English chemist and academic (d. 1904)
1825 – Johann Jakob Balmer, Swiss mathematician and physicist (d. 1898)
1825 – George Inness, American painter and educator (d. 1894)
1827 – Jules Breton, French painter (d. 1906)
1829 – José de Alencar, Brazilian author and playwright (d. 1877)
1829 – Frederick Sandys, English painter and illustrator (d. 1904)
1830 – Guido Gezelle, Belgian priest and poet (d. 1899)
1831 – Emily Stowe, Canadian physician and activist (d. 1903)
1847 – Henry Demarest Lloyd, American journalist and politician (d. 1903)
1848 – Adelsteen Normann, Norwegian painter (d. 1919)
1850 – Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn (d. 1942)
1851 – Laza Lazarević, Serbian psychiatrist and neurologist (d. 1891)
1852 – Calamity Jane, American frontierswoman and professional scout (d. 1903)
1852 – Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Spanish neuroscientist and pathologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1934)
1853 – Jacob Mikhailovich Gordin, Jewish Ukrainian-American journalist, actor, and playwright (d. 1909)
1855 – Cecilia Beaux, American painter and academic (d. 1942)
1857 – Theo van Gogh, Dutch art dealer (d. 1891)
1859 – Jacqueline Comerre-Paton, French painter and sculptor (d. 1955)
1862 – Marcel Prévost, French novelist and playwright (d. 1941)
1864 – Anna Jarvis, American founder of Mother’s Day (d. 1948)
1871 – Seakle Greijdanus, Dutch theologian and scholar (d. 1948)
1871 – Emiliano Chamorro Vargas, President of Nicaragua (d. 1966)
1872 – Hugo Alfvén, Swedish composer, conductor, violinist, and painter (d. 1960)
1872 – Sidónio Pais, Portuguese soldier and politician, 4th President of Portugal (d. 1918)
1874 – Romaine Brooks, American-French painter and illustrator (d. 1970)
1874 – Paul Van Asbroeck, Belgian target shooter (d. 1959)
1875 – Dave Hall, American runner (d. 1972)
1881 – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, French priest, palaeontologist, and philosopher (d. 1955)
1884 – Francis Curzon, 5th Earl Howe, English race car driver and politician (d. 1964)
1885 – Clément Pansaers, Belgian poet (d. 1922)
1885 – Ralph Stackpole, American sculptor and painter (d. 1973)
1887 – Alan Cunningham, Anglo-Irish general and diplomat, High Commissioners for Palestine and Transjordan (d. 1983)
1890 – Clelia Lollini, Italian physician (d. 1963 or 1964)
1891 – Lillian Estelle Fisher, American historian of Spanish America (d. 1988)
1895 – Nikolai Yezhov, Soviet secret police official, head of the NKVD (d. 1940)
1895 – May Hollinworth, Australian theatre producer and director (d. 1968)
1896 – Herbert Backe, German agronomist and politician (d. 1947)
1896 – Mark W. Clark, American general (d. 1984)
1896 – J. Lawton Collins, American general (d. 1987)
1898 – Alfred Schmidt, Estonian weightlifter (d. 1972)
1900 – Ignazio Silone, Italian journalist and politician (d. 1978)
1900 – Aleksander Wat, Polish poet and writer (d. 1967)
1901 – Sterling Allen Brown, American poet, academic, and critic (d. 1989)
1901 – Heinz Eric Roemheld, American pianist, composer, and conductor (d. 1985)
1901 – Antal Szerb, Hungarian scholar and author (d. 1945)
1905 – Henry Koster, German-American director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 1988)
1906 – Horst Schumann, German SS officer and physician (d. 1983)
1907 – Hayes Alvis, American bassist (d. 1972)
1907 – Kate Smith, American singer and actress (d. 1986)
1908 – Giovannino Guareschi, Italian journalist and author (d. 1968)
1908 – Morris Kline, American mathematician and academic (d. 1992)
1909 – Endel Puusepp, Estonian-Soviet military pilot and politician (d. 1996)
1909 – Yiannis Ritsos, Greek poet and playwright (d. 1990)
1910 – Behice Boran, Turkish sociologist and politician (d. 1987)
1910 – Raya Dunayevskaya, Ukrainian-American philosopher and activist (d. 1987)
1910 – Dirk Andries Flentrop, Dutch organ builder (d. 2003)
1910 – J. Allen Hynek, American astronomer and ufologist (d. 1986)
1910 – Nejdet Sançar, Turkish literature teacher (d. 1975)
1911 – Wilfred Watson, English-Canadian poet, playwright and educator (d. 1998)
1912 – Otto Kretschmer, German admiral (d. 1998)
1913 – Louis Nye, American actor (d. 2005)
1913 – Walter Susskind, Czech-English pianist, conductor, and educator (d. 1980)
1914 – Jaap van der Poll, Dutch javelin thrower (d. 2010)
1915 – Hanns Martin Schleyer, German businessman (d. 1977)
1916 – Antoni Bazaniak, Polish sprint canoeist (d. 1979)
1916 – Glenn Ford, Canadian-American actor and producer (d. 2006)
1917 – John Beradino, American baseball player and actor (d. 1996)
1917 – Ulric Cross, Trinidadian navigator, judge, and diplomat (d. 2013)
1917 – Danielle Darrieux, French actress and singer (d. 2017)
1917 – Ahron Soloveichik, Russian rabbi and scholar (d. 2001)
1918 – Gersh Budker, Ukrainian-Russian physicist and academic (d. 1977)
1918 – Jack Paar, American comedian, author and talk show host (d. 2004)
1919 – Manna Dey, Indian singer and composer (d. 2013)
1919 – Mohammed Karim Lamrani, Moroccan businessman and politician, 7th Prime Minister of Morocco (d. 2018)
1919 – Dan O’Herlihy, Irish-American actor (d. 2005)
1921 – Vladimir Colin, Romanian journalist and author (d. 1991)
1922 – Alastair Gillespie, Canadian scholar and politician (d. 2018)
1923 – Joseph Heller, American novelist, short story writer, and playwright (d. 1999)
1923 – Antônio Maria Mucciolo, Italian-Brazilian archbishop (d. 2012)
1923 – Marcel Rayman, Polish soldier (d. 1944)
1924 – Evelyn Boyd Granville, American mathematician, computer scientist, and academic
1924 – Karel Kachyňa, Czech director and screenwriter (d. 2004)
1924 – Terry Southern, American novelist, essayist, and screenwriter (d. 1995)
1925 – Chuck Bednarik, American lieutenant and football player (d. 2015)
1925 – Scott Carpenter, American commander, pilot, and astronaut (d. 2013)
1925 – Sardar Fazlul Karim, Bangladeshi philosopher, scholar, and academic (d. 2014)
1926 – Peter Lax, Hungarian-American mathematician and academic
1927 – Gary Bertini, Israeli conductor and composer (d. 2005)
1927 – Laura Betti, Italian actress (d. 2004)
1927 – Albert Zafy, Malagasy politician, 3rd President of Madagascar (d. 2017)
1927 – Bernard Vukas, Yugoslav-Croatian footballer (d. 1983)
1928 – Sonny James, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2016)
1928 – Delfim Netto, Brazilian economist
1929 – Ralf Dahrendorf, German-English sociologist and politician (d. 2009)
1929 – Sonny Ramadhin, Trinidadian cricketer
1930 – Ollie Matson, American sprinter and football player (d. 2011)
1930 – Richard Riordan, American lieutenant and politician, 39th Mayor of Los Angeles and publisher
1930 – Little Walter Jacobs, American blues harp player and singer (d. 1968)
1931 – Naim Attallah, Palestinian author
1932 – Sandy Woodward, English admiral (d. 2013)
1932 – Tabibar Rahman Sarder, Bangladeshi politician. (d. 2010)
1934 – Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, Mexican politician
1934 – Tang Chang, Thai artist (d. 1990)
1934 – Shirley Horn, American singer and pianist (d. 2005)
1934 – Phillip King, Tunisian-English sculptor
1934 – John Meillon, Australian actor (d. 1989)
1936 – Danièle Huillet, French filmmaker (d. 2006)
1936 – Hans E. Wallman, Swedish director, producer, and composer (d. 2014)
1937 – Una Stubbs, English actress and dancer
1939 – Judy Collins, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1939 – Wilhelmina Cooper, Dutch model (d. 1980)
1939 – Victor Davies, Canadian pianist, composer, and conductor
1943 – Vassal Gadoengin, Nauruan politician (d. 2004)
1943 – Joe Walsh, Irish politician, Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine (d. 2014)
1945 – Rita Coolidge, American singer-songwriter
1945 – Carson Whitsett, American keyboard player, songwriter, and producer (d. 2007)
1946 – Joanna Lumley, English actress, voice-over artist, author, and activist
1946 – John Woo, Hong Kong director, producer, and screenwriter
1947 – Jacob Bekenstein, Mexican-born Israeli-American theoretical physicist (d. 2015)
1947 – Sergio Infante, Chilean-Swedish poet and author
1948 – Györgyi Balogh, Hungarian sprinter
1948 – Patricia Hill Collins, American sociologist and scholar
1949 – Jim Clench, Canadian bass player (d. 2010)
1949 – Tim Hodgkinson, English saxophonist, clarinet player, and composer
1949 – Paul Teutul, Sr., American motorcycle designer, co-founded Orange County Choppers
1950 – Dann Florek, American actor and director
1950 – Danny McGrain, Scottish footballer and coach
1951 – Gordon Greenidge, Barbadian cricketer and coach
1951 – Geoff Lees, English race car driver
1951 – Sally Mann, American photographer
1952 – Richard Blundell, English economist and academic
1952 – Kim Lewison, English lawyer and judge
1952 – Peter Smith, Malaysian-born English academic and judge
1953 – Glen Ballard, American songwriter and producer
1954 – Ray Parker, Jr., American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
1954 – Joel Rosenberg, Canadian-American author and activist (d. 2011)
1955 – Alex Cunningham, Scottish politician
1955 – Martin O’Donnell, American composer
1955 – Ray Searage, American baseball player and coach
1956 – Catherine Frot, French actress
1956 – Phil Foglio, American illustrator
1957 – Rick Darling, Australian cricketer
1957 – Uberto Pasolini, Italian banker, director, and producer
1959 – Yasmina Reza, French actress and playwright
1959 – Lawrence Seeff, South African cricketer and basket weaver
1960 – Steve Cauthen, American jockey and sportscaster
1961 – Sultan Günal-Gezer, Dutch politician
1961 – Clint Malarchuk, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
1961 – Marilyn Milian, American judge
1961 – Vasiliy Sidorenko, Russian hammer thrower
1962 – Maia Morgenstern, Romanian actress
1962 – Ted Sundquist, American football player, coach, and manager
1964 – Yvonne van Gennip, Dutch speed skater
1966 – Olaf Thon, German footballer and manager
1967 – Tim McGraw, American singer-songwriter and actor
1968 – Oliver Bierhoff, German footballer and manager
1968 – D’arcy Wretzky, American bass player and singer
1969 – Wes Anderson, American director, producer, and screenwriter
1969 – Mary Lou McDonald, Irish politician
1969 – Billy Owens, American basketball player
1970 – Bernard Butler, English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
1971 – Ethan Albright, American football player
1971 – Stuart Appleby, Australian golfer
1971 – Kim Grant, South African tennis player
1971 – Artur Kohutek, Polish hurdler and soldier
1971 – Ajith Kumar, Indian film actor in Tamil cinema and race car driver
1972 – Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Yemeni terrorist
1972 – Julie Benz, American actress
1972 – Yoon Hae-young, South Korean actress
1973 – Peter Baah, English footballer and manager
1973 – Mike Jesse, German footballer
1973 – Curtis Martin, American football player
1973 – Oliver Neuville, German footballer
1975 – Austin Croshere, American basketball player and sportscaster
1975 – Marc-Vivien Foé, Cameroonian footballer (d. 2003)
1975 – Nina Hossain, English journalist
1975 – Alexey Smertin, Russian international footballer
1976 – Patricia Stokkers, Dutch swimmer
1977 – Vera Lischka, Austrian swimmer and politician
1978 – James Badge Dale, American actor
1979 – Mauro Bergamasco, Italian rugby player
1979 – Roman Lyashenko, Russian ice hockey player (d. 2003)
1980 – Marvin Cabrera, Mexican footballer
1980 – Rob Davison, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
1980 – Inês Henriques, Portuguese race walker
1980 – Jan Heylen, Belgian race car driver
1980 – Jay Reatard, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2010)
1980 – Yuliya Tabakova, Russian athlete
1981 – Manny Acosta, Panamanian baseball player
1981 – Derek Asamoah, Ghanaian footballer
1981 – Alexander Hleb, Belarusian footballer
1981 – Wes Welker, American football player
1982 – Beto, Portuguese footballer
1982 – Jamie Dornan, Northern Irish model and actor
1982 – Mark Farren, Irish footballer (d. 2016)
1982 – Katya Zamolodchikova, American drag queen
1982 – Tommy Robredo, Spanish tennis player
1982 – Darijo Srna, Croatian footballer
1983 – Alain Bernard, French swimmer
1983 – Human Tornado, American wrestler
1983 – Park Hae-jin, South Korean actor
1984 – David Backes, American ice hockey player
1984 – Mišo Brečko, Slovenian footballer
1984 – Patrick Eaves, American ice hockey player
1984 – Alexander Farnerud, Swedish footballer
1984 – Farah Fath, American actress
1984 – Keiichiro Koyama, Japanese singer and actor
1984 – Víctor Montaño, Colombian footballer
1984 – Mark Seaby, Australian footballer
1985 – Shahriar Nafees, Bangladeshi cricketer
1986 – Christian Benítez, Ecuadorian footballer (d. 2013)
1986 – Adam Casey, Australian footballer
1986 – Cassie Jaye, American actress and film director
1986 – Jesse Klaver, Dutch politician
1986 – Lee Chang-min, South Korean singer
1986 – Brent Stanton, Australian footballer
1987 – Leonardo Bonucci, Italian footballer
1987 – Glen Coffee, American football player
1987 – Iván DeJesús Jr., Puerto Rican baseball player
1987 – Marcus Drum, Australian footballer
1987 – Amir Johnson, American basketball player
1987 – Ryan Mathews, American football player
1987 – Saidi Ntibazonkiza, Burundian footballer
1987 – Shahar Pe’er, Israeli tennis player
1988 – Maria Balaba, Latvian figure skater
1988 – Maxim Gustik, Belarusian freestyle skier
1988 – Teodor Peterson, Swedish cross-country skier
1989 – Alejandro Arribas, Spanish footballer
1989 – Poļina Jeļizarova, Latvian runner
1990 – Uriel Álvarez, Mexican footballer
1990 – Caitlin Stasey, Australian actress
1990 – Diego Contento, German footballer
1990 – Scooter Gennett, American baseball player
1991 – Marcus Stroman, American baseball player
1991 – Daniel Talbot, British sprinter
1992 – Trevor Philp, Canadian alpine skier
1992 – Bradley Roby, American football player
1993 – Jean-Christophe Bahebeck, French footballer
1993 – Ifeoma Nwoye, Nigerian wrestler
1994 – Wallace Oliveira, Brazilian footballer
1995 – Collin Seedorf, Dutch footballer
1996 – Christopher J. Alexis Jr., Grenadian road cyclist
1996 – Daniel Saifiti, Australian-Fijian rugby league player
1996 – Jacob Saifiti, Australian-Fijian rugby league player
1996 – Michael Seaton, Jamaican footballer
2004 – Charli D’Amelio, American social media influencer and dancer
Deaths on May 1
408 – Arcadius, Byzantine emperor (b. 377)
558 – Marcouf, missionary and saint
908 – Wang Zongji, Chinese prince and pretender
1118 – Matilda of Scotland (b. 1080)
1171 – Diarmait Mac Murchada, King of Leinster (b. 1110)
1187 – Roger de Moulins, Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller
1255 – Walter de Gray, English prelate and statesman
1277 – Stefan Uroš I of Serbia (b. 1223)
1278 – William II of Villehardouin
1308 – Albert I of Germany (b. 1255)
1312 – Paul I Šubić of Bribir
1539 – Isabella of Portugal (b. 1503)
1555 – Pope Marcellus II (b. 1501)
1572 – Pope Pius V (b. 1504)
1668 – Frans Luycx, Flemish painter (b. 1604)
1730 – François de Troy, French painter and engraver (b. 1645)
1731 – Johann Ludwig Bach, German violinist and composer (b. 1677)
1738 – Charles Howard, 3rd Earl of Carlisle, English politician, First Lord of the Treasury (b. 1669)
1772 – Gottfried Achenwall, Polish-German historian, economist, and jurist (b. 1719)
1813 – Jean-Baptiste Bessières, French general (b. 1768)
1838 – Antoine Louis Dugès, French obstetrician and naturalist (b. 1797)
1856 – John Wilbur, American minister and theologian (b. 1774)
1873 – David Livingstone, Scottish-English missionary and explorer (b. 1813)
1899 – Ludwig Büchner, German physiologist and physician (b. 1824)
1904 – Antonín Dvořák, Czech composer and academic (b. 1841)
1913 – John Barclay Armstrong, American lieutenant (b. 1850)
1920 – Princess Margaret of Connaught (b. 1882)
1935 – Henri Pélissier, French cyclist (b. 1889)
1943 – Johan Oscar Smith, Norwegian religious leader, founded the Brunstad Christian Church (b. 1871)
1945 – Joseph Goebbels, German lawyer and politician, Chancellor of Germany (b. 1897)
1945 – Magda Goebbels, German wife of Joseph Goebbels (b. 1901)
1953 – Everett Shinn, American painter and illustrator (b. 1876)
1956 – LeRoy Samse, American pole vaulter (b. 1883)
1960 – Charles Holden, English architect, designed the Bristol Central Library (b. 1875)
1963 – Lope K. Santos, Filipino lawyer and politician (b. 1879)
1965 – Spike Jones, American singer and bandleader (b. 1911)
1968 – Jack Adams, Canadian-American ice hockey player, coach, and manager (b. 1895)
1968 – Harold Nicolson, English author and politician (b. 1886)
1970 – Yi Un, Korean prince (b. 1897)
1973 – Asger Jorn, Danish painter and sculptor (b. 1914)
1976 – T. R. M. Howard, American surgeon and activist (b. 1908)
1976 – Alexandros Panagoulis, Greek poet and politician (b. 1939)
1978 – Aram Khachaturian, Armenian composer and conductor (b. 1903)
1982 – William Primrose, Scottish viola player and educator (b. 1903)
1984 – Jüri Lossmann, Estonian-Swedish runner (b. 1891)
1985 – Denise Robins, English journalist and author (b. 1897)
1986 – Hylda Baker, English comedian, actress and music hall performer (b. 1905)
1986 – Hugo Peretti, American songwriter and producer (b. 1916)
1988 – Ben Lexcen, Australian sailor and architect (b. 1936)
1989 – Sally Kirkland, American journalist (b. 1912)
1989 – V. M. Panchalingam, Sri Lankan civil servant (b. 1930)
1989 – Patrice Tardif, Canadian farmer and politician (b. 1904)
1990 – Sergio Franchi, Italian-American tenor and actor (b. 1926)
1991 – Richard Thorpe, American director and screenwriter (b. 1896)
1993 – Pierre Bérégovoy, French metallurgist and politician, Prime Minister of France (b. 1925)
1993 – Ranasinghe Premadasa, Sri Lankan politician, 3rd President of Sri Lanka (b. 1924)
1994 – Ayrton Senna, Brazilian race car driver (b. 1960)
1995 – Antonio Salemme, Italian-American painter (b. 1892)
1997 – Fernand Dumont, Canadian sociologist, philosopher, and poet (b. 1927)
1998 – Eldridge Cleaver, American author and activist (b. 1935)
2000 – Steve Reeves, American bodybuilder and actor (b. 1926)
2002 – Ebrahim Al-Arrayedh, Indian poet and author (b. 1908)
2003 – Miss Elizabeth, American wrestler and manager (b. 1960)
2003 – Wim van Est, Dutch cyclist (b. 1923)
2005 – Kenneth Clark, American psychologist and academic (b. 1914)
2008 – Anthony Mamo, Maltese judge and politician, 1st President of Malta (b. 1909)
2008 – Philipp von Boeselager, German soldier and economist (b. 1917)
2010 – Helen Wagner, American actress (b. 1918)
2011 – Henry Cooper, English boxer (b. 1934)
2011 – Ted Lowe, English sportscaster (b. 1920)
2012 – James Kinley, Canadian engineer and politician, 29th Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia (b. 1925)
2012 – Mordechai Virshubski, German-Israeli lawyer and politician (b. 1930)
2013 – Chris Kelly, American rapper (b. 1978)
2013 – Pierre Pleimelding, French footballer and manager (b. 1952)
2014 – Adamu Atta, Nigerian lawyer and politician, 5th Governor of Kwara State (b. 1927)
2015 – Vafa Guluzade, Azerbaijani political scientist, academic, and diplomat (b. 1940)
2015 – María Elena Velasco, Mexican actress, singer, director, and screenwriter (b. 1940)
2015 – Grace Lee Whitney, American actress (b. 1930)
Holidays and observances on May 1
Christian feast day:
Andeolus
Augustin Schoeffler, Jean-Louis Bonnard (part of Vietnamese Martyrs)
Benedict of Szkalka
Brioc
James the Less (Anglican Communion)
Joseph the Worker (Roman Catholic)
Blessed Klymentiy Sheptytsky (Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church
Marcouf
Philip the Apostle (Anglican Communion, Lutheran Church)
Richard Pampuri
Sigismund of Burgundy
Ultan
May 1 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Earliest day on which Mother’s Day can fall, while May 7 is the latest; celebrated on the first Monday in May. (Samoa)
Earliest day on which Mother’s Day can fall, while May 7 is the latest; celebrated on the first Sunday in May. (Hong Kong, Hungary, Lithuania, Mozambique, Portugal, Spain, Romania)
Earliest day on which National Day of Prayer can fall, while May 7 is the latest; celebrated on the first Thursday in May. (United States)
Earliest day on which World Asthma Day can fall, while May 7 is the latest; celebrated on the first Tuesday in May. (International)
Armed Forces Day (Mauritania)
Constitution Day (Argentina, Latvia, Marshall Islands)
Commemoration of the states of Maharashtra and Gujarat following the foundation of Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti (India):
Maharashtra Day
International Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day
Lei Day (Hawaii)
International Workers’ Day or Labour Day (International), and its related observances:
Earliest day on which Labour Day can fall, while May 7 is the latest; celebrated on the first Monday of May. (Barbados, Dominica)
Law Day (United States), formerly intended to counterbalance the celebration of Labour Day. (United States)
Loyalty Day, formerly intended to counterbalance the celebration of Labour Day. (United States)
May Day (beginning of Summer) observances in the Northern hemisphere (see April 30):
Beltane (Ireland, Scotland, Isle of Man, Celtic neopagans and Wiccans in the Northern hemisphere)
Earliest day on which Beltane can fall, while May 7 is the latest; celebrated on the first Monday in May. (Ireland, Scotland)
Calan Mai (Wales)
Samhain (Celtic neopagans and Wiccans in the Southern Hemisphere)
451 – Attila the Hun sacks the town of Metz and attacks other cities in Gaul.
529 – First draft of the Corpus Juris Civilis (a fundamental work in jurisprudence) is issued by Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian I.
611 – Maya king Uneh Chan of Calakmul sacks rival city-state Palenque in southern Mexico.
1141 – Empress Matilda became the first female ruler of England, adopting the title ‘Lady of the English’.
1348 – Charles University is founded in Prague.
1521 – Ferdinand Magellan arrives at Cebu.
1541 – Francis Xavier leaves Lisbon on a mission to the Portuguese East Indies.
1724 – Premiere performance of Johann Sebastian Bach’s St John Passion, BWV 245, at St. Nicholas Church, Leipzig.
1767 – End of Burmese–Siamese War (1765–67).
1776 – Captain John Barry and the USS Lexington captures the Edward.
1788 – American pioneers to the Northwest Territory establish Marietta, Ohio as the first permanent American settlement in the Northwest Territory.
1789 – Selim III became Sultan of the Ottoman Empire and Caliph of Islam.
1798 – The Mississippi Territory is organized from disputed territory claimed by both the United States and Spain. It is expanded in 1804 and again in 1812.
1805 – Lewis and Clark Expedition: The Corps of Discovery breaks camp among the Mandan tribe and resumes its journey West along the Missouri River.
1805 – German composer Ludwig van Beethoven premiered his Third Symphony, at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna.
1827 – John Walker, an English chemist, sells the first friction match that he had invented the previous year.
1829 – Joseph Smith, founder of the Latter Day Saint movement, commences translation of the Book of Mormon, with Oliver Cowdery as his scribe.
1831 – Emperor Pedro I of Brazil resigns. He goes to his native Portugal to become King Pedro IV.
1862 – American Civil War: The Union’s Army of the Tennessee and the Army of the Ohio defeat the Confederate Army of Mississippi near Shiloh, Tennessee.
1868 – Thomas D’Arcy McGee, one of the Canadian Fathers of Confederation, is assassinated by a Fenian activist.
1890 – Completion of the first Lake Biwa Canal.
1906 – Mount Vesuvius erupts and devastates Naples.
1906 – The Algeciras Conference gives France and Spain control over Morocco.
1922 – The United States Secretary of the Interior leases federal petroleum reserves to private oil companies on excessively generous terms.
1927 – The first long-distance public television broadcast (from Washington, D.C., to New York City, displaying the image of Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover).
1933 – Prohibition in the United States is repealed for beer of no more than 3.2% alcohol by weight, eight months before the ratification of the XXI amendment. (Now celebrated as National Beer Day in the United States.)
1940 – Booker T. Washington becomes the first African American to be depicted on a United States postage stamp.
1943 – The Holocaust in Ukraine: In Terebovlia, Germans order 1,100 Jews to undress and march through the city to the nearby village of Plebanivka, where they are shot and buried in ditches.
1943 – Ioannis Rallis becomes collaborationist Prime Minister of Greece during the Axis Occupation.
1945 – World War II: The battleship Yamato, one of the two largest ever constructed, is sunk by American aircraft during Operation Ten-Go.
1945 – World War II: Visoko is liberated by the 7th, 9th, and 17th Krajina brigades from the Tenth division of Yugoslav Partisan forces.
1948 – The World Health Organization is established by the United Nations.
1949 – The Rodgers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific opened on Broadway; it would run for 1,925 performances and win ten Tony Awards.
1954 – United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower gives his “domino theory” speech during a news conference.
1955 – Winston Churchill resigns as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom amid indications of failing health.
1964 – IBM announces the System/360.
1964 – A bulldozer kills Rev. Bruce W. Klunder, a civil rights activist, during a school segregation protest in Cleveland, Ohio, sparking a riot.
1965 – Representatives of the National Congress of American Indians testify before members of the US Senate against the termination of the Colville tribe in Washington DC.
1968 – Motor racing world champion Jim Clark is killed in an accident during a Formula Two race at Hockenheim.
1969 – The Internet’s symbolic birth date: Publication of RFC 1.
1971 – President Richard Nixon announces his decision to quicken the pace of Vietnamization.
1976 – Member of Parliament and suspected spy John Stonehouse resigns from the Labour Party (UK) after being arrested for faking his own death.
1977 – German Federal prosecutor Siegfried Buback and his driver are shot by two Red Army Faction members while waiting at a red light.
1978 – Development of the neutron bomb is canceled by President Jimmy Carter.
1980 – During the Iran hostage crisis, the United States severs relations with Iran.
1983 – During STS-6, astronauts Story Musgrave and Don Peterson perform the first Space Shuttle spacewalk.
1989 – Soviet submarine Komsomolets sinks in the Barents Sea off the coast of Norway killing 42 sailors.
1990 – Iran–Contra affair: John Poindexter is found guilty of five charges for his part in the scandal (the conviction is later reversed on appeal).
1990 – A fire breaks out on the passenger ferry Scandinavian Star, killing 159 people.
1994 – Rwandan genocide: Massacres of Tutsis begin in Kigali, Rwanda.
1994 – Auburn Calloway attempts to destroy Federal Express Flight 705 in order to allow his family to benefit from his life insurance policy.
1995 – First Chechen War: Russian paramilitary troops begin a massacre of civilians in Samashki, Chechnya.
1999 – The World Trade Organization rules in favor of the United States in its long-running trade dispute with the European Union over bananas.
2001 – Mars Odyssey is launched.
2003 – U.S. troops capture Baghdad; Saddam Hussein’s regime falls two days later.
2009 – Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori is sentenced to 25 years in prison for ordering killings and kidnappings by security forces.
2009 – Mass protests begin across Moldova under the belief that results from the parliamentary election are fraudulent.
2017 – A man deliberately drives a hijacked truck into a crowd of people, killing five people and injuring fifteen others.
Births on April 7
1206 – Otto II Wittelsbach, Duke of Bavaria (d. 1253)
1330 – John, 3rd Earl of Kent, English nobleman (d. 1352)
1470 – Edward Stafford, 2nd Earl of Wiltshire (d. 1498)
1506 – Francis Xavier, Spanish missionary and saint, co-founded the Society of Jesus (d. 1552)
1539 – Tobias Stimmer, Swiss painter and illustrator (d. 1584)
1613 – Gerrit Dou, Dutch painter (d. 1675)
1644 – François de Neufville, duc de Villeroy, French general (d. 1730)
1648 – John Sheffield, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby, English poet and politician, Lord President of the Council (d. 1721)
1652 – Pope Clement XII (d. 1740)
1713 – Nicola Sala, Italian composer and theorist (d. 1801)
1718 – Hugh Blair, Scottish minister and author (d. 1800)
1727 – Michel Adanson, French botanist, entomologist, and mycologist (d. 1806)
1763 – Domenico Dragonetti, Italian bassist and composer (d. 1846)
1770 – William Wordsworth, English poet (d. 1850)
1772 – Charles Fourier, French philosopher and author (d. 1837)
1780 – William Ellery Channing, American preacher and theologian (d. 1842)
1803 – James Curtiss, American journalist and politician, 11th Mayor of Chicago (d. 1859)
1803 – Flora Tristan, French author and activist (d. 1844)
1811 – Hasan Tahsini, Albanian astronomer, mathematician, and philosopher (d. 1881)
1817 – Francesco Selmi, Italian chemist and patriot (d. 1881)
1848 – Randall Davidson, Scottish archbishop (d. 1930)
1859 – Walter Camp, American football player and coach (d. 1925)
1860 – Will Keith Kellogg, American businessman, founded the Kellogg Company (d. 1951)
1867 – Holger Pedersen, Danish linguist and academic (d. 1953)
1870 – Gustav Landauer, Jewish-German theorist and activist (d. 1919)
1871 – Epifanio de los Santos, Filipino jurist, historian, and scholar (d. 1927)
1873 – John McGraw, American baseball player and manager (d. 1934)
1874 – Frederick Carl Frieseke, German-American painter (d. 1939)
1876 – Fay Moulton, American sprinter, football player, coach, and lawyer (d. 1945)
1882 – Bert Ironmonger, Australian cricketer (d. 1971)
1882 – Kurt von Schleicher, German general and politician, 23rd Chancellor of Germany (d. 1934)
1883 – Gino Severini, Italian-French painter and author (d. 1966)
1884 – Clement Smoot, American golfer (d. 1963)
1886 – Ed Lafitte, American baseball player and soldier (d. 1971)
1889 – Gabriela Mistral, Chilean poet and educator, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1957)
1890 – Paul Berth, Danish footballer (d. 1969)
1890 – Marjory Stoneman Douglas, American journalist and activist (d. 1998)
1891 – Ole Kirk Christiansen, Danish businessman, founded the Lego Group (d. 1958)
1893 – Allen Dulles, American lawyer and diplomat, 5th Director of Central Intelligence (d. 1969)
1895 – John Flannagan, American soldier and sculptor (d. 1942)
1895 – Margarete Schön, German actress (d. 1985)
1896 – Frits Peutz, Dutch architect, designed the Glaspaleis (d. 1974)
1897 – Erich Löwenhardt, Polish-German lieutenant and pilot (d. 1918)
1897 – Walter Winchell, American journalist and radio host (d. 1972)
1899 – Robert Casadesus, French pianist and composer (d. 1972)
1900 – Adolf Dymsza, Polish actor (d. 1975)
1900 – Tebbs Lloyd Johnson, English race walker (d. 1984)
1902 – Eduard Eelma, Estonian footballer (d. 1941)
1903 – M. Balasundaram, Sri Lankan lawyer and politician (d. 1965)
1903 – Edwin T. Layton, American admiral (d. 1984)
1904 – Roland Wilson, Australian economist and statistician (d. 1996)
1908 – Percy Faith, Canadian composer, conductor, and bandleader (d. 1976)
1908 – Pete Zaremba, American hammer thrower (d. 1994)
1909 – Robert Charroux, French author and critic (d. 1978)
1913 – Louise Currie, American actress (d. 2013)
1913 – Charles Vanik, American soldier, judge, and politician (d. 2007)
1914 – Ralph Flanagan, American pianist, composer, and conductor (d. 1995)
1915 – Stanley Adams, American actor and screenwriter (d. 1977)
1915 – Billie Holiday, American singer-songwriter and actress (d. 1959)
1915 – Henry Kuttner, American author (d. 1958)
1916 – Anthony Caruso, American actor (d. 2003)
1917 – R. G. Armstrong, American actor and playwright (d. 2012)
1918 – Bobby Doerr, American baseball player and coach (d. 2017)
1919 – Roger Lemelin, Canadian author and screenwriter (d. 1992)
1919 – Edoardo Mangiarotti, Italian fencer (d. 2012)
1920 – Ravi Shankar, Indian-American sitar player and composer (d. 2012)
1921 – Feza Gürsey, Turkish mathematician and physicist (d. 1992)
1922 – Mongo Santamaría, Cuban-American drummer (d. 2003)
1924 – Johannes Mario Simmel, Austrian-English author and screenwriter (d. 2009)
1925 – Chaturanan Mishra, Indian trade union leader and politician (d. 2011)
1925 – Jan van Roessel, Dutch footballer (d. 2011)
1927 – Babatunde Olatunji, Nigerian-American drummer, educator, and activist (d. 2003)
1927 – Leonid Shcherbakov, Russian triple jumper
1928 – James Garner, American actor, singer, and producer (d. 2014)
1928 – Alan J. Pakula, American director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 1998)
1928 – James White, Northern Irish author and educator (d. 1999)
1929 – Bob Denard, French soldier (d. 2007)
1929 – Joe Gallo, American gangster (d. 1972)
1930 – Jane Priestman, English interior designer
1930 – Yves Rocher, French businessman, founded the Yves Rocher Company (d. 2009)
1930 – Andrew Sachs, German-English actor and screenwriter (d. 2016)
1930 – Roger Vergé, French chef and restaurateur (d. 2015)
1931 – Donald Barthelme, American short story writer and novelist (d. 1989)
1931 – Daniel Ellsberg, American activist and author
1932 – Cal Smith, American singer and guitarist (d. 2013)
1933 – Wayne Rogers, American actor, investor, and producer (d. 2015)
1933 – Sakıp Sabancı, Turkish businessman and philanthropist (d. 2004)
1934 – Ian Richardson, Scottish-English actor (d. 2007)
1935 – Bobby Bare, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1935 – Hodding Carter III, American journalist and politician, Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs
1937 – Charlie Thomas, American singer
1938 – Jerry Brown, American lawyer and politician, 34th and 39th Governor of California
1938 – Spencer Dryden, American drummer (d. 2005)
1938 – Freddie Hubbard, American trumpet player and composer (d. 2008)
1938 – Iris Johansen, American author
1939 – Francis Ford Coppola, American director, producer, and screenwriter
1939 – David Frost, English journalist and game show host (d. 2013)
1939 – Gary Kellgren, American record producer, co-founded Record Plant (d. 1977)
1939 – Brett Whiteley, Australian painter (d. 1992)
1940 – Marju Lauristin, Estonian academic and politician, 1st Estonian Minister of Social Affairs
1941 – James Di Pasquale, American composer
1941 – Peter Fluck, English puppet maker and illustrator
1941 – Cornelia Frances, English-Australian actress (d. 2018)
1941 – Gorden Kaye, English actor (d. 2017)
1942 – Jeetendra, Indian actor, TV and film producer
1943 – Mick Abrahams, English singer-songwriter and guitarist
1943 – Dennis Amiss, English cricketer and manager
1944 – Shel Bachrach, American insurance broker, investor, businessman and philanthropist
1944 – Warner Fusselle, American sportscaster (d. 2012)
1944 – Oshik Levi, Israeli singer and actor
1944 – Julia Phillips, American film producer and author (d. 2002)
1944 – Gerhard Schröder, German lawyer and politician, 7th Chancellor of Germany
1944 – Bill Stoneman, American baseball player and manager
1945 – Megas, Icelandic singer-songwriter
1945 – Gerry Cottle, English businessman
1945 – Marilyn Friedman, American philosopher and academic
1945 – Martyn Lewis, Welsh journalist and author
1945 – Joël Robuchon, French chef and author (d. 2018)
1945 – Werner Schroeter, German director and screenwriter (d. 2010)
1945 – Hans van Hemert, Dutch songwriter and producer
1946 – Zaid Abdul-Aziz, American basketball player
1946 – Colette Besson, French runner and educator (d. 2005)
1946 – Herménégilde Chiasson, Canadian poet, playwright, and politician, 29th Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick
1946 – Dimitrij Rupel, Slovenian politician and diplomate
1946 – Stan Winston, American special effects designer and makeup artist (d. 2008)
1947 – Patricia Bennett, American singer
1947 – Florian Schneider, German singer and drummer (d. 2020)
1947 – Michèle Torr, French singer and author
1948 – John Oates, American singer-songwriter guitarist, and producer
1949 – Mitch Daniels, American academic and politician, 49th Governor of Indiana
1950 – Brian J. Doyle, American press secretary
1951 – Bruce Gary, American drummer (d. 2006)
1951 – Janis Ian, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1952 – David Baulcombe, English geneticist and academic
1952 – Jane Frederick, American hurdler and heptathlete
1952 – Gilles Valiquette, Canadian actor, singer, and producer
1952 – Dennis Hayden, American actor
1953 – Santa Barraza, American mixed media artist
1953 – Douglas Kell, English biochemist and academic
1954 – Jackie Chan, Hong Kong martial artist, actor, stuntman, director, producer, and screenwriter
1954 – Tony Dorsett, American football player
1955 – Tim Cochran, American mathematician and academic (d. 2014)
1955 – Gregg Jarrett, American lawyer and journalist
1956 – Annika Billström, Swedish businesswoman and politician, 16th Mayor of Stockholm
1956 – Christopher Darden, American lawyer and author
1956 – Georg Werthner, Austrian decathlete
1957 – Kim Kap-soo, South Korean actor
1957 – Thelma Walker, British politician
1958 – Brian Haner, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1958 – Hindrek Kesler, Estonian architect
1960 – Buster Douglas, American boxer and actor
1960 – Sandy Powell, English costume designer
1961 – Thurl Bailey, American basketball player and actor
1961 – Pascal Olmeta, French footballer
1961 – Brigitte van der Burg, Tanzanian-Dutch geographer and politician
1962 – Jon Cruddas, English lawyer and politician
1962 – Andrew Hampsten, American cyclist
1963 – Jaime de Marichalar, Spanish businessman
1963 – Nick Herbert, English businessman and politician, Minister for Policing
1963 – Dave Johnson, American decathlete and educator
1964 – Jace Alexander, American actor and director
1964 – Russell Crowe, New Zealand-Australian actor
1964 – Steve Graves, Canadian ice hockey player
1965 – Bill Bellamy, American comedian, actor, and producer
1965 – Rozalie Hirs, Dutch composer and poet
1965 – Alison Lapper, English painter and photographer
1965 – Nenad Vučinić, Serbian-New Zealand basketball player and coach
1966 – Richard Gomez, Filipino actor and politician
823 – Lothair I is crowned King of Italy by Pope Paschal I.
919 – The second Fatimid invasion of Egypt begins, when the Fatimid heir-apparent, al-Qa’im bi-Amr Allah, sets out from Raqqada at the head of his army.
1081 – Alexios I Komnenos is crowned Byzantine emperor at Constantinople, bringing the Komnenian dynasty to full power.
1242 – During the Battle on the Ice of Lake Peipus, Russian forces, led by Alexander Nevsky, rebuff an invasion attempt by the Teutonic Knights.
1536 – Royal Entry of Charles V into Rome: The last Roman triumph.
1566 – Two hundred Dutch noblemen, led by Hendrick van Brederode, force themselves into the presence of Margaret of Parma and present the Petition of Compromise, denouncing the Spanish Inquisition in the Seventeen Provinces.
1609 – Daimyō (Lord) Shimazu Tadatsune of the Satsuma Domain in southern Kyūshū, Japan, completes his successful invasion of the Ryūkyū Kingdom in Okinawa.
1614 – In Virginia, Native American Pocahontas marries English colonist John Rolfe.
1621 – The Mayflower sets sail from Plymouth, Massachusetts on a return trip to England.
1710 – The Statute of Anne receives the royal assent establishing the Copyright law of the United Kingdom.
1722 – The Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen discovers Easter Island.
1792 – United States President George Washington exercises his authority to veto a bill, the first time this power is used in the United States.
1795 – Peace of Basel between France and Prussia is made.
1818 – In the Battle of Maipú, Chile’s independence movement, led by Bernardo O’Higgins and José de San Martín, win a decisive victory over Spain, leaving 2,000 Spaniards and 1,000 Chilean patriots dead.
1862 – American Civil War: The Battle of Yorktown begins.
1879 – Chile declares war on Bolivia and Peru, starting the War of the Pacific.
1900 – Archaeologists in Knossos, Crete, discover a large cache of clay tablets with hieroglyphic writing in a script they call Linear B.
1904 – The first international rugby league match is played between England and an Other Nationalities team (Welsh and Scottish players) in Central Park, Wigan, England.
1915 – Boxing challenger Jess Willard knocks out Jack Johnson in Havana, Cuba to become the Heavyweight Champion of the World.
1922 – The American Birth Control League, forerunner of Planned Parenthood, is incorporated.
1932 – Dominion of Newfoundland: Ten thousand rioters seize the Colonial Building leading to the end of self-government.
1933 – U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs two executive orders: 6101 to establish the Civilian Conservation Corps, and 6102 “forbidding the Hoarding of Gold Coin, Gold Bullion, and Gold Certificates” by U.S. citizens.
1936 – Tupelo–Gainesville tornado outbreak: An F5 tornado kills 233 in Tupelo, Mississippi.
1942 – World War II: The Imperial Japanese Navy launches a carrier-based air attack on Colombo, Ceylon during the Indian Ocean raid. Port and civilian facilities are damaged and the Royal Navy cruisers HMS Cornwall and HMS Dorsetshire are sunk southwest of the island.
1943 – World War II: American bomber aircraft accidentally cause more than 900 civilian deaths, including 209 children, and 1,300 wounded among the civilian population of the Belgian town of Mortsel. Their target was the Erla factory one kilometer from the residential area hit.
1944 – World War II: Two hundred seventy inhabitants of the Greek town of Kleisoura are executed by the Germans.
1945 – Cold War: Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito signs an agreement with the Soviet Union to allow “temporary entry of Soviet troops into Yugoslav territory”.
1946 – Soviet troops end their year-long occupation of the Danish island of Bornholm.
1946 – A Fleet Air Arm Vickers Wellington crashes into a residential area in Rabat, Malta during a training exercise, killing all 4 crew members and 16 civilians on the ground.
1949 – A fire in a hospital in Effingham, Illinois, kills 77 people and leads to nationwide fire code improvements in the United States.
1951 – Cold War: Ethel and Julius Rosenberg are sentenced to death for spying for the Soviet Union.
1956 – Cuban Revolution: Fidel Castro declares himself at war with Cuban President Fulgencio Batista.
1956 – In Sri Lanka, the Mahajana Eksath Peramuna win the general elections in a landslide and S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike is sworn in as the Prime Minister of Ceylon.
1957 – In India, Communists win the first elections in united Kerala and E. M. S. Namboodiripad is sworn in as the first Chief Minister.
1958 – Ripple Rock, an underwater threat to navigation in the Seymour Narrows in Canada is destroyed in one of the largest non-nuclear controlled explosions of the time.
1969 – Vietnam War: Massive antiwar demonstrations occur in many U.S. cities.
1971 – In Sri Lanka, Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna launches a revolt against the United Front government of Sirimavo Bandaranaike.
1976 – In China, the April Fifth Movement leads to the Tiananmen Incident.
1977 – The US Supreme Court rules that congressional legislation that diminished the size of the Sioux people’s reservation thereby destroyed the tribe’s jurisdictional authority over the area in Rosebud Sioux Tribe v. Kneip.
1986 – Three people are killed in the bombing of the La Belle discotheque in West Berlin, Germany.
1991 – An ASA EMB 120 crashes in Brunswick, Georgia, killing all 23 aboard including Sen. John Tower and astronaut Sonny Carter.
1992 – Alberto Fujimori, president of Peru, dissolves the Peruvian congress by military force.
1992 – Peace protesters Suada Dilberovic and Olga Sučić are killed on the Vrbanja Bridge in Sarajevo, becoming the first casualties of the Bosnian War.
1998 – In Japan, the Akashi Kaikyō Bridge opens to traffic, becoming the longest bridge span in the world.
1999 – Two Libyans suspected of bringing down Pan Am Flight 103 in 1988 are handed over for eventual trial in the Netherlands.
2000 – UEFA Cup semi-final violence: Four Galatasaray fans are arrested for the stabbings to death of two Leeds United fans.
2009 – North Korea launches its controversial Kwangmyŏngsŏng-2 rocket. The satellite passed over mainland Japan, which prompted an immediate reaction from the United Nations Security Council, as well as participating states of Six-party talks.
2010 – Twenty-nine coal miners are killed in an explosion at the Upper Big Branch Mine in West Virginia.
Births on April 5
1170 – Isabella of Hainault (d. 1190)
1219 – Wonjong of Goryeo, 24th ruler of Goryeo (d. 1274)
1279 – Al-Nuwayri, Egyptian Muslim historian (d. 1333)
1288 – Emperor Go-Fushimi of Japan (d. 1336)
1315 – James III of Majorca (d. 1349)
1365 – William II, Duke of Bavaria (d. 1417)
1472 – Bianca Maria Sforza, Italian wife of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1510)
1521 – Francesco Laparelli, Italian architect (d. 1570)
1523 – Blaise de Vigenère, French cryptographer and diplomat (d. 1596)
1533 – Giulio della Rovere, Italian Catholic Cardinal (d. 1578)
1539 – George Frederick, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach (d. 1603)
1549 – Princess Elizabeth of Sweden, (d. 1597)
1568 – Pope Urban VIII (d. 1644)
1588 – Thomas Hobbes, English philosopher (d. 1679)
1591 – Frederick Ulrich, Duke of Brunswick-Luneburg (d. 1634)
1595 – John Wilson, English composer and educator (d. 1674)
1604 – Charles IV (d. 1675)
1616 – Frederick, Count Palatine of Zweibrücken (d. 1661)
1622 – Vincenzo Viviani, Italian mathematician, astronomer, and physicist (d. 1703)
1649 – Elihu Yale, American-English merchant and philanthropist (d. 1721)
1656 – Nikita Demidov, Russian industrialist (d. 1725)
1664 – Élisabeth Thérèse de Lorraine, French noblewoman and Princess of Epinoy (d. 1748)
1674 – Margravine Elisabeth Sophie of Brandenburg, (d. 1748)
1691 – Louis VIII, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt (d. 1768)
1692 – Adrienne Lecouvreur, French actress (d. 1730)
1719 – Axel von Fersen the Elder, Swedish field marshal and politician, Lord Marshal of Sweden (d. 1794)
1726 – Benjamin Harrison V, American politician, planter and merchant (d. 1791)
1727 – Pasquale Anfossi, Italian violinist and composer (d. 1797)
1729 – Frederick Charles Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg (d. 1809)
1730 – Jean Baptiste Seroux d’Agincourt, French archaeologist and historian (d. 1814)
1732 – Jean-Honoré Fragonard, French painter and etcher (d. 1806)
1735 – Franziskus Herzan von Harras, Czech Roman Catholic cardinal (d. 1804)
1739 – Philemon Dickinson, American lawyer and politician (d. 1809)
1752 – Sébastien Érard, French instrument maker (d. 1831)
1761 – Sybil Ludington, American heroine of the American Revolutionary War (d. 1839)
1769 – Sir Thomas Hardy, 1st Baronet, English admiral (d. 1839)
1773 – José María Coppinger, governor of Spanish East Florida (d. 1844)
1773 – Duchess Therese of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, (d. 1839)
1777 – Marie Jules César Savigny, French zoologist (d. 1851)
1782 – Wincenty Krasiński, Polish nobleman (d. 1858)
1784 – Louis Spohr, German violinist, composer, and conductor (d. 1859)
1788 – Franz Pforr, German painter (d. 1812)
1793 – Casimir Delavigne, French poet and dramatist (d. 1843)
1793 – Felix de Muelenaere, Belgian politician (d. 1862)
1795 – Henry Havelock, British general (d. 1857)
1799 – Jacques Denys Choisy, Swiss clergyman and botanist (d. 1859)
1801 – Félix Dujardin, French biologist (d. 1860)
1801 – Vincenzo Gioberti, Italian philosopher, publicist and politician (d. 1852)
1804 – Matthias Jakob Schleiden, German botanist (d. 1881)
1809 – Karl Felix Halm, German scholar and critic (d. 1882)
1810 – Sir Henry Rawlinson, British East India Company army officer and politician (d. 1895)
1811 – Jules Dupré, French painter (d. 1889)
1814 – Felix Lichnowsky, Czech soldier and politician (d. 1848)
1822 – Émile Louis Victor de Laveleye, Belgian economist (d. 1892)
1827 – Joseph Lister, English surgeon and academic (d. 1912)
1832 – Jules Ferry, French lawyer and politician, 44th Prime Minister of France (d. 1893)
1834 – Prentice Mulford, American humorist and author (d. 1891)
1834 – Wilhelm Olbers Focke, German medical doctor and botanist (d. 1922)
1834 – Frank R. Stockton, American writer and humorist (d. 1902)
1835 – Vítězslav Hálek, Czech poet, writer, journalist, dramatist and theatre critic. (d. 1874)
1837 – Algernon Charles Swinburne, English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic (d. 1909)
1839 – Robert Smalls, African-American ship’s pilot, sea captain, and politician (d. 1915)
1840 – Ghazaros Aghayan, Armenian historian and linguist (d. 1911)
1842 – Hans Hildebrand, Swedish archaeologist (d. 1913)
1845 – Friedrich Sigmund Merkel, German anatomist and histopathologist (d. 1919)
1845 – Jules Cambon, French diplomat (d. 1935)
1846 – Sigmund Exner, Austrian physiologist (d. 1926)
1846 – Henry Wellesley, British peer and politician (d. 1900)
1848 – Thure de Thulstrup, American illustrator (d. 1930)
1848 – Ulrich Wille, Swiss army general (d. 1925)
1850 – Enrico Mazzanti, Italian engineer and cartoonist (d. 1910)
1852 – Émile Billard, French sailor (d. 1930)
1852 – Walter W. Winans, American marksman and sculptor (d. 1920)
1852 – Franz Eckert, German composer and musician (d. 1916)
1856 – Booker T. Washington, African-American educator, essayist and historian (d. 1915)
1857 – Alexander of Battenberg (d. 1893)
1858 – Washington Atlee Burpee, Canadian businessman, founded Burpee Seeds (d. 1915)
1859 – Reinhold Seeberg, German theologian (d. 1935)
1860 – Harry S. Barlow, British tennis player (d. 1917)
1862 – Louis Ganne, French conductor (d. 1923)
1862 – Leo Stern, English cellist (d. 1904)
1863 – Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine (d. 1950)
1867 – Ernest Lewis, British tennis player (d. 1930)
1869 – Sergey Chaplygin, Russian physicist, mathematician, and engineer (d. 1942)
1869 – Albert Roussel, French composer (d. 1937)
1870 – Motobu Chōki, Japanese karateka (d. 1944)
1871 – Stanisław Grabski, Polish economist and politician (d. 1949)
1872 – Samuel Cate Prescott, American microbiologist and chemist (d. 1962)
1873 – Joseph Rheden, Austrian astronomer (d. 1946)
1874 – Emmanuel Célestin Suhard, French Cardinal of the Catholic Church (d. 1949)
1874 – Manuel María Ponce Brousset, President of Peru (d. 1966)
1878 – Albert Champion, French cyclist (d. 1927)
1878 – Georg Misch, German philosopher (d. 1965)
1878 – Paul Weinstein, German high jumper (d. 1964)
1879 – Arthur Berriedale Keith, Scottish lawyer (d. 1944)
1879 – Nikolaus zu Dohna-Schlodien, German naval officer and author (d. 1956)
1880 – Eric Carlberg, Swedish Army officer, diplomat, shooter, fencer and modern pentathlete (d. 1963)
1880 – Vilhelm Carlberg, Swedish Army officer and shooter (d. 1970)
1882 – Song Jiaoren, Chinese revolutionary (d. 1913)
1882 – Natalia Sedova, 2nd wife of Leon Trotsky (d. 1962)
1883 – Walter Huston, Canadian-American actor and singer (d. 1950)
1884 – Ion Inculeț, Bessarabian academic and politician, President of Moldova (d. 1940)
1885 – Dimitrie Cuclin, Romanian composer (d. 1978)
1886 – Gotthelf Bergsträsser, German linguist (d. 1933)
1886 – Frederick Lindemann, British physicist (d. 1957)
1886 – Gustavo Jiménez, Peruvian colonel and politician, 73rd President of Peru (d. 1933)
1887 – William Cowhig, British gymnast (d. 1964)
1889 – Vicente Ferreira Pastinha, Brazilian martial artist (d. 1981)
1890 – Karl Kirk, Danish gymnast (d. 1955)
1890 – William Moore, British track and field athlete (d. 1956)
1891 – Arnold Jackson, English runner, soldier, and lawyer (d. 1972)
1891 – Laura Vicuña, Chilean nun (d. 1904)
1892 – Raymond Bonney, American ice hockey player (d. 1964)
1893 – Frithjof Andersen, Norwegian wrestler (d. 1975)
1893 – Clas Thunberg, Finnish speed skater (d. 1973)
1894 – Lawrence Dale Bell, American industrialist and founder of Bell Aircraft Corporation (d. 1956)
1894 – Hans Hüttig, German SS officer (d. 1980)
1894 – Carl Rudolf Florin, Swedish botanist (d. 1965)
1895 – Mike O’Dowd, American boxer (d. 1957)
1896 – Einar Lundborg, Swedish aviator (d. 1931)
1897 – Hans Schuberth, German politician (d. 1976)
1899 – Alfred Blalock, American surgeon and academic (d. 1964)
1900 – Herbert Bayer, Austrian-American graphic designer, painter, and photographer (d. 1985)
1900 – Roman Steinberg, Estonian wrestler (d. 1928)
1900 – Spencer Tracy, American actor (d. 1967)
1901 – Curt Bois, German actor (d. 1991)
1901 – Chester Bowles, American diplomat and ambassador (d. 1986)
1901 – Melvyn Douglas, American actor (d. 1981)
1901 – Doggie Julian, American football, basketball, and baseball player and coach (d. 1967)
1902 – Menachem Mendel Schneerson, Russian-American rabbi (d. 1994)
1903 – Marion Aye, American actress (d. 1951)
1904 – Richard Eberhart, American poet and academic (d. 2005)
1906 – Albert Charles Smith, American botanist (d. 1999)
1906 – Fernando Germani, Italian organist (d. 1998)
1906 – Ted Morgan, New Zealand boxer (d. 1952)
1907 – Sanya Dharmasakti, Thai jurist (d. 2002)
1908 – Bette Davis, American actress (d. 1989)
1908 – Kurt Neumann, German director (d. 1958)
1908 – Jagjivan Ram, Indian politician, 4th Deputy Prime Minister of India (d. 1986)
1908 – Herbert von Karajan, Austrian conductor and manager (d. 1989)
1909 – Albert R. Broccoli, American film producer, co-founded Eon Productions (d. 1996)
1909 – Giacomo Gentilomo, Italian film director and painter (d. 2001)
1909 – Károly Sós, Hungarian footballer and manager (d. 1991)
1909 – Erwin Wegner, German hurdler (d. 1945)
1910 – Sven Andersson, Swedish politician (d. 1987)
1910 – Oronzo Pugliese, Italian football manager (d. 1990)
1911 – Hedi Amara Nouira, Tunisian politician (d. 1993)
1911 – Johnny Revolta, American golfer (d. 1991)
1912 – Jehan Buhan, French fencer (d. 1999)
1912 – Habib Elghanian, Iranian businessman (d. 1979)
1912 – Antonio Ferri, Italian scientist (d. 1975)
1912 – Carlos Guastavino, Argentine composer (d. 2000)
1912 – Makar Honcharenko, Ukrainian footballer and manager (d. 1997)
1912 – John Le Mesurier, English actor (d. 1983)
1912 – István Örkény, Hungarian author and playwright (d. 1979)
1912 – Bill Roberts, English sprinter and soldier (d. 2001)
1913 – Antoni Clavé, Catalan artist (d. 2005)
1913 – Nicolas Grunitzky, 2nd President of Togo (d. 1969)
1913 – Ruth Smith, Faroese artist (d. 1958)
1914 – Felice Borel, Italian footballer (d. 1993)
1916 – Gregory Peck, American actor, political activist, and producer (d. 2003)
1917 – Robert Bloch, American author (d. 1994)
1917 – Frans Gommers, Belgian footballer (d. 1996)
1919 – Lester James Peries, Sri Lankan director, screenwriter, and producer (d. 2018)
1920 – Barend Biesheuvel, Dutch politician, Prime Minister of the Netherlands (d. 2001)
1920 – Arthur Hailey, English-Canadian soldier and author (d. 2004)
1920 – Alfonso Thiele, Turkish-Italian race car driver (d. 1986)
1920 – John Willem Gran, Swedish bishop (d. 2008)
1921 – Christopher Hewett, English actor and theatre director (d. 2001)
1922 – Tom Finney, English footballer (d. 2014)
1922 – Harry Freedman, Polish-Canadian horn player, composer, and educator (d. 2005)
1922 – Andy Linden, American race car driver (d. 1987)
1922 – Gale Storm, American actress and singer (d. 2009)
1923 – Ernest Mandel, German-born Belgian Marxist economist, Trotskyist activist and theorist (d. 1995)
1923 – Michael V. Gazzo, American actor (d. 1995)
1923 – Nguyễn Văn Thiệu, Vietnamese general and politician, 5th President of South Vietnam (d. 2001)
1924 – Igor Borisov, Soviet rower (d. before 2005)
1925 – Janet Rowley, American human geneticist (d. 2013)
1925 – Pierre Nihant, Belgian cyclist (d. 1993)
1926 – Roger Corman, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter
1926 – Liang Yusheng, Chinese writer (d. 2009)
1927 – Thanin Kraivichien, Thai lawyer and politician
1927 – Arne Hoel, Norwegian ski jumper (d. 2006)
1928 – Enzo Cannavale, Italian actor (d. 2011)
1928 – Tony Williams, American singer (d. 1992)
1929 – Hugo Claus, Belgian author, poet, and painter (d. 2008)
1929 – Ivar Giaever, Norwegian-American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
1929 – Nigel Hawthorne, English actor and producer (d. 2001)
1929 – Joe Meek, English songwriter and producer (d. 1967)
1929 – Mahmoud Mollaghasemi, Iranian wrestler
1930 – Mary Costa, American singer and actress
1930 – Pierre Lhomme, French director of photography (d. 2019)
1931 – Jack Clement, American singer-songwriter and producer (d. 2013)
1931 – Héctor Olivera, Argentine director, producer and screenwriter
1933 – Feridun Buğeker, Turkish footballer (d. 2014)
1933 – Frank Gorshin, American actor (d. 2005)
1933 – Barbara Holland, American author (d. 2010)
1933 – K. Kailasapathy, Sri Lankan journalist and academic (d. 1982)
1934 – John Carey, English author and critic
1934 – Roman Herzog, German lawyer and politician, 7th President of Germany (d. 2017)
1934 – Moise Safra, Brazilian businessman and philanthropist, co-founded Banco Safra (d. 2014)
1934 – Stanley Turrentine, American saxophonist and composer (d. 2000)
1935 – Giovanni Cianfriglia, Italian actor
1935 – Peter Grant, English talent manager (d. 1995)
1935 – Donald Lynden-Bell, English astrophysicist and astronomer (d. 2018)
1935 – Frank Schepke, German rower (d. 2017)
1936 – Ronnie Bucknum, American race car driver (d. 1992)
1936 – Glenn Jordan, American director and producer
1936 – Dragoljub Minić, Yugoslavian chess Grandmaster (d. 2005)
1937 – Joseph Lelyveld, American journalist and author
1937 – Jean-Pierre Petit, French scientist
1937 – Colin Powell, American general and politician, 65th United States Secretary of State
1937 – Andrzej Schinzel, Polish mathematician
1937 – Arie Selinger, Israeli volleyball player and manager
1937 – Juan Vicente Lezcano, Paraguayan footballer (d. 2012)
1938 – Colin Bland, Zimbabwean-South African cricketer (d. 2018)
1938 – Mal Colston, Australian educator and politician (d. 2003)
1938 – Nancy Holt, American sculptor and painter (d. 2014)
1938 – Natalya Kustinskaya, Soviet actress (d. 2012)
1939 – Leka I, Crown Prince of Albania (d. 2011)
1939 – Crispian St. Peters, English singer-songwriter (d. 2010)
1939 – Haidar Abu Bakr al-Attas, Prime Minister of Yemen
1939 – Ronald White, American singer-songwriter (d. 1995)
1939 – David Winters, English-American actor, choreographer and producer (d. 2019)
1940 – Tommy Cash, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1940 – Gilles Proulx, Canadian journalist, historian, and radio host
1941 – Michael Moriarty, American-Canadian actor
1941 – Dave Swarbrick, English singer-songwriter and fiddler (d. 2016)
1942 – Allan Clarke, English singer-songwriter
1942 – Pascal Couchepin, Swiss politician
1942 – Juan Gisbert Sr., Spanish tennis player
1942 – Peter Greenaway, Welsh director and screenwriter
1943 – Dean Brown, Australian politician, 41st Premier of South Australia
1943 – Max Gail, American actor and director
1943 – Fighting Harada, Japanese boxer
1943 – Miet Smet, Belgian politician
1943 – Jean-Louis Tauran, French cardinal (d. 2018)
1944 – Willeke van Ammelrooy, Dutch actress and director
1944 – János Martonyi, Hungarian politician
1944 – Evan Parker, British musician
1944 – Douangchay Phichit, Laotian politician (d. 2014)
1944 – Willy Planckaert, Belgian cyclist
1944 – Pedro Rosselló, Puerto Rican physician and politician, 7th Governor of Puerto Rico
1944 – Peter T. King, American soldier, lawyer, and politician
1945 – Ove Bengtson, Swedish tennis player
1945 – Steve Carver, American director and producer
1945 – Cem Karaca, Turkish musician (d. 2004)
1945 – Tommy Smith, English footballer (d. 2019)
1946 – Jane Asher, English actress
1946 – Julio Ángel Fernández, Uruguayan astronomer
1946 – Björn Granath, Swedish actor (d. 2017)
1946 – Georgi Markov, Bulgarian Greco-Roman wrestler
1947 – Đurđica Bjedov, Yugoslav swimmer
1947 – Willy Chirino, Cuban-American musician
1947 – Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Filipino academic and politician, 14th President of the Philippines
1947 – Ramón Mifflin, Peruvian footballer
1947 – Virendra Sharma, Indian-English lawyer and politician
1948 – Pierre-Albert Chapuisat, Swiss footballer
1948 – Dave Holland, English drummer (d. 2018)
1948 – Roy McFarland, English footballer and manager
1949 – Stanley Dziedzic, American wrestler
1949 – Larry Franco, American film producer
1949 – Judith Resnik, Ukrainian-American engineer and astronaut (d. 1986)
1950 – Ann C. Crispin, American writer (d. 2013)
1950 – Franklin Chang Díaz, Costa Rican-Chinese American astronaut and physicist
1950 – Agnetha Fältskog, Swedish singer-songwriter and producer
1950 – Toshiko Fujita, Japanese actress, singer and narrator (d. 2018)
1950 – Miki Manojlović, Serbian actor
1951 – Les Binks, Irish drummer and songwriter
1951 – Yevgeniy Gavrilenko, Belarusian hurdler
1951 – Nedim Gürsel, Turkish writer
1951 – Dean Kamen, American inventor and businessman, founded Segway Inc.
1951 – Dave McArtney, New Zealand singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2013)
1951 – Ubol Ratana, Thai Princess
1952 – Alfie Conn, Scottish international footballer, midfielder
1952 – John C. Dvorak, American author and editor
1952 – Sandy Mayer, American tennis player
1952 – Dennis Mortimer, English footballer
1952 – Mitch Pileggi, American actor
1953 – Frank Gaffney, American journalist and radio host
1953 – Keiko Han, Japanese actress
1953 – Tae Jin-ah, South Korean singer
1953 – Raleb Majadele, Israeli politician
1953 – Ian Swales, English accountant and politician
1954 – Guy Bertrand, Canadian linguist and radio host
1954 – Peter Case, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1954 – Mohamed Ben Mouza, Tunisian footballer
1954 – Stan Ridgway, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1954 – Yoshiichi Watanabe, Japanese footballer
1955 – Charlotte de Turckheim, French actress, producer, and screenwriter
1955 – Ricardo Ferrero, Argentine footballer (d. 2015)
1955 – Christian Gourcuff, French footballer and manager
1955 – Anthony Horowitz, English author and screenwriter
1955 – Bernard Longley, English prelate
1955 – Akira Toriyama, Japanese illustrator
1955 – Takayoshi Yamano, Japanese footballer
1956 – Diamond Dallas Page, American wrestler and actor
1956 – Leonid Fedun, Russian businessman
1956 – Reid Ribble, American politician
1957 – Sebastian Adayanthrath, Indian bishop
1957 – Karin Roßley, German hurdler
1958 – Henrik Dettmann, Finnish basketball coach
1958 – Ryoichi Kawakatsu, Japanese footballer
1958 – Johan Kriek, South African-American tennis player
1958 – Daniel Schneidermann, French journalist
1958 – Lasantha Wickrematunge, Sri Lankan lawyer and journalist (d. 2009)
1959 – Paul Chung, Hong Kong actor and host (d. 1989)
1960 – Asteris Koutoulas, Romanian-German record producer, manager, and author
1960 – Larry McCray, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1960 – Ian Redford, Scottish footballer and manager (d. 2014)
1960 – Hiromi Taniguchi, Japanese long-distance runner
1960 – Adnan Terzić, Bosnian politician
1961 – Andrea Arnold, English filmmaker and actress
1961 – Anna Caterina Antonacci, Italian soprano
1961 – Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, Bahraini-Danish human rights activist
1961 – Lisa Zane, American actress and singer
1962 – Lana Clarkson, American actress and model (d. 2003)
1962 – Sara Danius, Swedish scholar of literature and aesthetics
1962 – Richard Gough, Swedish born Scottish international footballer
1068 – An earthquake in the Levant and the Arabian Peninsula, leaves up to 20,000 dead.
1229 – Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, declares himself King of Jerusalem in the Sixth Crusade.
1241 – First Mongol invasion of Poland: Mongols overwhelm Polish armies in Kraków in the Battle of Chmielnik and plunder the city.
1314 – Jacques de Molay, the 23rd and final Grand Master of the Knights Templar, is burned at the stake.
1438 – Albert II of Habsburg becomes Holy Roman Emperor.
1608 – Susenyos is formally crowned Emperor of Ethiopia.
1644 – The Third Anglo-Powhatan War begins in the Colony of Virginia.
1741 – New York governor George Clarke’s complex at Fort George is burned in an arson attack, starting the New York Conspiracy of 1741.
1766 – American Revolution: The British Parliament repeals the Stamp Act.
1793 – The first modern republic in Germany, the Republic of Mainz, is declared by Andreas Joseph Hofmann.
1793 – Flanders Campaign of the French Revolution, Battle of Neerwinden.
1834 – Six farm labourers from Tolpuddle, Dorset, England are sentenced to be transported to Australia for forming a trade union.
1848 – March Revolution: In Berlin there is a struggle between citizens and military, costing about 300 lives.
1850 – American Express is founded by Henry Wells and William Fargo.
1865 – American Civil War: The Congress of the Confederate States adjourns for the last time.
1871 – Declaration of the Paris Commune; President of the French Republic, Adolphe Thiers, orders the evacuation of Paris.
1874 – Hawaii signs a treaty with the United States granting exclusive trade rights.
1892 – Former Governor General Lord Stanley pledges to donate a silver challenge cup as an award for the best hockey team in Canada; it was later named after him as the Stanley Cup.
1900 – AFC Ajax Amsterdam, The Netherlands’s biggest and most successful football club, was founded.
1902 – Macario Sakay issues Presidential Order No. 1 of his Tagalog Republic.
1913 – King George I of Greece is assassinated in the recently liberated city of Thessaloniki.
1915 – World War I: During the Battle of Gallipoli, three battleships are sunk during a failed British and French naval attack on the Dardanelles.
1921 – The second Peace of Riga is signed between Poland and the Soviet Union.
1921 – The Kronstadt rebellion is suppressed by the Red Army.
1922 – In India, Mohandas Gandhi is sentenced to six years in prison for civil disobedience, of which he serves only two.
1925 – The Tri-State Tornado hits the Midwestern states of Missouri, Illinois, and Indiana, killing 695 people.
1937 – The New London School explosion in New London, Texas, kills 300 people, mostly children.
1937 – Spanish Civil War: Spanish Republican forces defeat the Italians at the Battle of Guadalajara.
1938 – Mexico creates Pemex by expropriating all foreign-owned oil reserves and facilities.
1940 – World War II: Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini meet at the Brenner Pass in the Alps and agree to form an alliance against France and the United Kingdom.
1942 – The War Relocation Authority is established in the United States to take Japanese Americans into custody.
1944 – Mount Vesuvius in Italy erupts, killing 26 people, causing thousands to flee their homes, and destroying dozens of Allied bombers.
1948 – Soviet consultants leave Yugoslavia in the first sign of the Tito–Stalin Split.
1953 – An earthquake hits western Turkey, killing 265 people.
1959 – The Hawaii Admission Act is signed into law.
1962 – The Évian Accords end the Algerian War of Independence, which had begun in 1954.
1965 – Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov, leaving his spacecraft Voskhod 2 for 12 minutes, becomes the first person to walk in space.
1967 – The supertanker Torrey Canyon runs aground off the Cornish coast.
1968 – Gold standard: The U.S. Congress repeals the requirement for a gold reserve to back US currency.
1969 – The United States begins secretly bombing the Sihanouk Trail in Cambodia, used by communist forces to infiltrate South Vietnam.
1970 – Lon Nol ousts Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia.
1971 – Peru: a landslide crashes into Yanawayin Lake, killing 200 people at the mining camp of Chungar.
1980 – A Vostok-2M rocket at Plesetsk Cosmodrome Site 43 explodes during a fueling operation, killing 48 people.
1990 – Germans in the German Democratic Republic vote in the first democratic elections in the former communist dictatorship.
1990 – In the largest art theft in US history, 12 paintings, collectively worth around $500 million, are stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston.
1994 – Bosnia’s Bosniaks and Croats sign the Washington Agreement, ending war between the Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia and the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and establishing the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
1996 – A nightclub fire in Quezon City, Philippines kills 162 people.
1997 – The tail of a Russian Antonov An-24 charter plane breaks off while en route to Turkey causing the plane to crash and killing all 50 people on board.
2014 – The parliaments of Russia and Crimea sign an accession treaty.
2015 – The Bardo National Museum in Tunisia is attacked by gunmen. 23 people, almost all tourists, are killed, and at least 50 other people are wounded.
Births on March 18
1075 – Al-Zamakhshari, Persian scholar and theologian (d. 1144)
1395 – John Holland, 2nd Duke of Exeter, English military commander (d. 1447)
1495 – Mary Tudor, Queen of France (d. 1533)
1548 – Cornelis Ketel, Dutch painter (d. 1616)
1552 – Polykarp Leyser the Elder, German theologian (d. 1610)
1555 – Francis, Duke of Anjou (d. 1584)
1578 – Adam Elsheimer, German painter (d. 1610)
1590 – Manuel de Faria e Sousa, Portuguese historian and poet (d. 1649)
1597 – Jérôme le Royer de la Dauversière, French religious leader, founded the Société Notre-Dame de Montréal (d. 1659)
1603 – Simon Bradstreet, English colonial magistrate (d. 1697)
1609 – Frederick III of Denmark (d. 1670)
1634 – Madame de La Fayette, French author (d. 1693)
1640 – Philippe de La Hire, French mathematician and astronomer (d. 1719)
1657 – Giuseppe Ottavio Pitoni, Italian organist and composer (d. 1743)
1690 – Christian Goldbach, Prussian-German mathematician and academic (d. 1764)
1701 – Niclas Sahlgren, Swedish businessman and philanthropist, co-founded the Swedish East India Company (d. 1776)
1733 – Christoph Friedrich Nicolai, German author and bookseller (d. 1811)
1780 – Miloš Obrenović, Serbian prince (d. 1860)
1782 – John C. Calhoun, American lawyer and politician, 7th Vice President of the United States (d. 1850)
1789 – Charlotte Elliott, English poet, hymn writer, editor (d. 1871)
1798 – Francis Lieber, German-American jurist and philosopher (d. 1872)
1800 – Harriet Smithson, Irish actress, the first wife and muse of Hector Berlioz (d. 1854)
1813 – Christian Friedrich Hebbel, German poet and playwright (d. 1864)
1814 – Jacob Bunn, American businessman (d. 1897)
1819 – James McCulloch, Scottish-Australian politician, 5th Premier of Victoria (d. 1893)
1820 – John Plankinton, American businessman and industrialist, also noted for philanthropy (d. 1891)
1823 – Antoine Chanzy, French general (d. 1883)
1828 – Randal Cremer, English activist and politician, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1908)
1837 – Grover Cleveland, American lawyer and politician, 22nd and 24th President of the United States (d. 1908)
1840 – William Cosmo Monkhouse, English poet and critic (d. 1901)
1842 – Stéphane Mallarmé, French poet and critic (d. 1898)
1844 – Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Russian composer and academic (d. 1908)
1846 – Kicking Bear, Native American tribal leader (d. 1904)
1848 – Nathanael Greene Herreshoff, American architect and engineer (d. 1938)
1858 – Rudolf Diesel, German engineer, invented the Diesel engine (d. 1913)
1862 – Eugène Jansson, Swedish painter (d. 1915)
1863 – William Sulzer, American lawyer and politician, 39th Governor of New York (d. 1941)
1869 – Neville Chamberlain, English businessman and politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1940)
1870 – Agnes Sime Baxter, Canadian mathematician (d. 1917)
1874 – Nikolai Berdyaev, Russian-French philosopher and theologian (d. 1948)
1877 – Edgar Cayce, American mystic and psychic (d. 1945)
1877 – Clem Hill, Australian cricketer and engineer (d. 1945)
1878 – Percival Perry, 1st Baron Perry, English businessman (d. 1956)
1882 – Gian Francesco Malipiero, Italian composer and educator (d. 1973)
1884 – Bernard Cronin, English-Australian journalist and author (d. 1968)
1886 – Edward Everett Horton, American actor, singer, and dancer (d. 1970)
1890 – Henri Decoin, French director and screenwriter (d. 1969)
1893 – Costante Girardengo, Italian cyclist (d. 1978)
1893 – Wilfred Owen, English soldier and poet (d. 1918)
1901 – Manly Palmer Hall, Canadian mystic, author and philosopher (d. 1990)
1901 – William Johnson, American painter (d. 1970)
1903 – Galeazzo Ciano, Italian journalist and politician, Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs (d. 1944)
1903 – E. O. Plauen, German cartoonist (d. 1944)
1904 – Srečko Kosovel, Slovenian poet and author (d. 1926)
1904 – Margaret Tucker, Australian author and activist (d. 1996)
1905 – Thomas Townsend Brown, American physicist and engineer (d. 1985)
1905 – Robert Donat, English actor (d. 1958)
1907 – John Zachary Young, English zoologist and neurophysiologist (d. 1997)
1908 – Loulou Gasté, French composer (d. 1995)
1909 – Ernest Gallo, American businessman, co-founded the E & J Gallo Winery (d. 2007)
1909 – C. Walter Hodges, English author and illustrator (d. 2004)
1911 – Smiley Burnette, American singer-songwriter and actor (d. 1967)
1912 – Art Gilmore, American voice actor and announcer (d. 2010)
1913 – René Clément, French director and screenwriter (d. 1996)
1913 – Werner Mölders, German colonel and pilot (d. 1941)
1915 – Richard Condon, American author and screenwriter (d. 1996)
1922 – Egon Bahr, German journalist and politician, Federal Minister for Special Affairs of Germany (d. 2015)
1922 – Seymour Martin Lipset, American sociologist and academic (d. 2006)
1922 – Fred Shuttlesworth, American activist, co-founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (d. 2011)
1923 – Andy Granatelli, American race car driver and businessman (d. 2013)
1925 – Alessandro Alessandroni, Italian musician (d. 2017)
1925 – James Pickles, English journalist, lawyer, and judge (d. 2010)
1926 – Peter Graves, American actor and director (d. 2010)
1927 – John Kander, American pianist and composer
1927 – George Plimpton, American journalist and actor (d. 2003)
1927 – Lillian Vernon, German-American businesswoman and philanthropist, founded the Lillian Vernon Company (d. 2015)
1928 – Miguel Poblet, Spanish cyclist (d. 2013)
1928 – Fidel V. Ramos, Filipino general and politician, 12th President of the Philippines
1929 – Samuel Pisar, Polish-American lawyer and author (d. 2015)
1930 – James J. Andrews, American mathematician and academic (d. 1998)
1931 – John Fraser, Scottish actor
1932 – John Updike, American novelist, short story writer, and critic (d. 2009)
1933 – Unita Blackwell, American civil rights activist and politician (d. 2019)
1934 – Roy Chapman, English footballer and manager (d. 1983)
1934 – Charley Pride, American country music singer and musician
1935 – Ole Barndorff-Nielsen, Danish mathematician and statistician
1935 – Frances Cress Welsing, American psychiatrist and author (d. 2016)
1936 – F. W. de Klerk, South African lawyer and politician, 2nd State President of South Africa, Nobel Prize laureate
1937 – Rudi Altig, German cyclist and sportscaster (d. 2016)
1937 – Mark Donohue, American race car driver (d. 1975)
1938 – Carl Gottlieb, American actor and screenwriter
1938 – Shashi Kapoor, Indian actor and producer (d. 2017)
1938 – Kenny Lynch, English singer-songwriter and actor (d. 2019)
1938 – Timo Mäkinen, Finnish race car driver (d. 2017)
1938 – Machiko Soga, Japanese actress (d. 2006)
1939 – Ron Atkinson, English footballer and manager
1939 – Jean-Pierre Wallez, French violinist and conductor
1941 – Wilson Pickett, American singer-songwriter (d. 2006)
1942 – Kathleen Collins, African-American filmmaker and playwright (d. 1988)
1943 – Dennis Linde, American singer-songwriter (d. 2006)
1944 – Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, Israeli general and politician, 22nd Transportation Minister of Israel (d. 2012)
1944 – Frank McRae, American football player and actor
1944 – Dick Smith, Australian publisher and businessman, founded Dick Smith Electronics and Australian Geographic
1945 – Hiroh Kikai, Japanese photographer
1945 – Michael Reagan, American journalist and radio host
1945 – Susan Tyrrell, American actress (d. 2012)
1945 – Eric Woolfson, Scottish singer-songwriter, pianist, and producer (d. 2009)
1946 – Michel Leclère, French race car driver
1947 – Patrick Barlow, English actor and playwright
1947 – Patrick Chesnais, French actor, director, and screenwriter
1947 – David Lloyd, English cricketer, journalist, and sportscaster
1947 – B. J. Wilson, English rock drummer (d. 1990)
1948 – Guy Lapointe, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
1948 – Brian Lloyd, Welsh footballer
1948 – Eknath Solkar, Indian cricketer (d. 2005)
1949 – Åse Kleveland, Norwegian singer and politician, Norwegian Minister of Culture
1950 – James Conlon, American conductor and educator
1950 – Brad Dourif, American actor
1950 – Linda Partridge, English geneticist and academic
1950 – Larry Perkins, Australian race car driver
1951 – Paul Barber, English actor
1951 – Ben Cohen, American businessman and philanthropist, co-founded Ben and Jerry’s
1951 – Bill Frisell, American guitarist and composer
1951 – Timothy N. Philpot, American lawyer, author, and judge
1952 – Will Durst, American journalist and actor
1952 – Pat Eddery, Irish jockey and trainer (d. 2015)
1952 – Bernie Tormé, Irish singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2019)
1952 – Mike Webster, American football player (d. 2002)
1953 – Franz Wright, Austrian-American poet and translator (d. 2015)
1953 – Takashi Yoshimatsu, Japanese composer
1955 – Francis G. Slay, American lawyer and politician, 45th Mayor of St. Louis
1955 – Jeff Stelling, English journalist and game show host
1956 – Rick Martel, Canadian wrestler
1956 – Deborah Jeane Palfrey, American madam (d. 2008)
1956 – Ingemar Stenmark, Swedish skier
1957 – Christer Fuglesang, Swedish physicist and astronaut
1958 – Richard de Zoysa, Sri Lankan journalist and author (d. 1990)
1959 – Luc Besson, French director, producer, and screenwriter, founded EuropaCorp
1960 – Richard Biggs, American actor (d. 2004)
1960 – Guy Carbonneau, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
1960 – James Plaskett, Cypriot-English chess player
1961 – Grant Hart, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2017)
1962 – Michael Andrews, Australian rugby league player
1962 – Irene Cara, American singer-songwriter, actress, and producer
1962 – Brian Fisher, American baseball player
1962 – Thomas Ian Griffith, American actor and martial artist
1962 – James McMurtry, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and actor
1962 – Etsushi Toyokawa, Japanese actor and director
1962 – Volker Weidler, German race car driver and engineer
1963 – Jeff LaBar, American guitarist
1963 – Vanessa L. Williams, American model, actress, and singer
1964 – Bonnie Blair, American speed skater
1964 – Alex Caffi, Italian race car driver
1964 – Jo Churchill, British politician
1964 – Courtney Pine, English saxophonist and clarinet player
1964 – Isabel Noronha, Mozambican film director
1966 – Jerry Cantrell, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1966 – Peter Jones, English businessman
1966 – Brian Watts, Canadian golfer
1967 – Miki Berenyi, English singer-songwriter and guitarist
1968 – Prince Eudes, Duke of Angoulême
1968 – Miguel Herrera, Mexican footballer and manager
1968 – Temur Ketsbaia, Georgian footballer and manager
1968 – Paul Marsden, English businessman and politician
1969 – Andy Cutting, English accordion player and composer
1969 – Vassily Ivanchuk, Ukrainian chess player
1969 – Shaun Udal, English cricketer
1970 – Queen Latifah, American rapper, producer, and actress
1971 – Wayne Arthurs, Australian tennis player
1971 – Mike Bell, American wrestler (d. 2008)
1971 – Mariaan de Swardt, South African-American tennis player, coach, and sportscaster
1971 – Kitty Ussher, English economist and politician
1972 – Dane Cook, American comedian, actor, director, and producer
1972 – Reince Priebus, American lawyer and politician
1973 – Luci Christian, American voice actress and screenwriter
1974 – Laure Savasta, French basketball player, coach, and sportscaster
1974 – Stuart Zender, English bass player, songwriter, and producer
1975 – Sutton Foster, American actress, singer, and dancer
1975 – Brian Griese, American football player and sportscaster
1975 – Kimmo Timonen, Finnish ice hockey player
1975 – Tomas Žvirgždauskas, Lithuanian footballer
1976 – Giovanna Antonelli, Brazilian actress and producer
1976 – Tomo Ohka, Japanese baseball player
1976 – Scott Podsednik, American baseball player
1976 – Mike Quackenbush, American wrestler, trainer, and author, founded Chikara wrestling promotion
1977 – Zdeno Chára, Slovak ice hockey player
1977 – Danny Murphy, English international footballer, midfielder and sportscaster
1977 – Fernando Rodney, Dominican-American baseball player
1977 – Willy Sagnol, French footballer and manager
1977 – Terrmel Sledge, American baseball player and coach
1978 – Fernandão, Brazilian footballer and manager (d. 2014)
1978 – Brooke Hanson, Australian swimmer
1978 – Brian Scalabrine, American basketball player, coach, and sportscaster
1978 – Jonas Wallerstedt, Swedish footballer, coach, and manager
1979 – Adam Levine, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and television personality
1980 – Sébastien Frey, French footballer
1980 – Sophia Myles, English actress
1980 – Alexei Yagudin, Russian figure skater
1981 – Tora Berger, Norwegian biathlete
1981 – Fabian Cancellara, Swiss cyclist
1981 – Leslie Djhone, French sprinter
1981 – Jang Na-ra, South Korean singer and actress
1981 – Kasib Powell, American basketball player
1981 – Tom Starke, German footballer
1981 – Doug Warren, American soccer player
1981 – Lovro Zovko, Croatian tennis player
1982 – Mantorras, Angolan footballer
1982 – Chad Cordero, American baseball player
1982 – Timo Glock, German race car driver
1982 – Adam Pally, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter
1983 – Ethan Carter III, American wrestler
1983 – Stéphanie Cohen-Aloro, French tennis player
1983 – Andy Sonnanstine, American baseball player
1983 – Tomasz Stolpa, Polish footballer
1984 – Simone Padoin, Italian footballer
1984 – Rajeev Ram, American tennis player
1984 – Vonzell Solomon, American singer and actress
1985 – Ana Beatriz, Brazilian race car driver
1985 – Marvin Humes, English singer
1985 – Vince Lia, Australian footballer
1986 – Lykke Li, Swedish singer-songwriter
1986 – Abdennour Chérif El-Ouazzani, Algerian footballer
1987 – Rebecca Soni, American swimmer
1989 – Francesco Checcucci, Italian footballer
1989 – Lily Collins, English-American actress
1989 – Shreevats Goswami, Indian cricketer
1989 – Kana Nishino, Japanese singer-songwriter
1989 – Paul Marc Rousseau, Canadian guitarist and producer
1989 – Ming Xi, Chinese model
1991 – Dylan Mattingly, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1991 – Sam Williams, Australian rugby league player
1992 – Ryan Truex, American race car driver
1992 – Takuya Terada, Japanese singer, actor, and model
1997 – Ciara Bravo, American actress
1997 – Rieko Ioane, New Zealand rugby union player
Deaths on March 18
978 – Edward the Martyr, English king (b. 962)
1076 – Ermengarde of Anjou, Duchess of Burgundy (b. 1018)
1086 – Anselm of Lucca, Italian bishop (b. 1036)
1227 – Pope Honorius III (b. 1148)
1272 – John FitzAlan, 7th Earl of Arundel (b. 1246)
1308 – Yuri I of Galicia
1314 – Jacques de Molay, Frankish knight (b. 1244)
1314 – Geoffroy de Charney, Preceptor of Normandy for the Knights Templar
1321 – Matthew III Csák, Hungarian oligarch (b. c.1260/5)
1582 – Juan Jauregui, attempted assassin of William I of Orange (b. 1562)
1675 – Arthur Chichester, 1st Earl of Donegall, Irish soldier (b. 1606)
1689 – John Dixwell, English soldier and politician (b. 1607)
1745 – Robert Walpole, English scholar and politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1676)
1768 – Laurence Sterne, Irish novelist and clergyman (b. 1713)
1781 – Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, French economist and politician, Controller-General of Finances (b. 1727)
1823 – Jean-Baptiste Bréval, French cellist and composer (b. 1753)
1835 – Christian Günther von Bernstorff, Danish-Prussian politician and diplomat (b. 1769)
1845 – Johnny Appleseed, American gardener and missionary (b. 1774)
1871 – Augustus De Morgan, Indian-English mathematician and academic (b. 1806)
1898 – Matilda Joslyn Gage, American author and activist (b. 1826)
1900 – Hjalmar Kiærskou, Danish botanist (b. 1835)
1907 – Marcellin Berthelot, French chemist and politician, French Minister of Foreign Affairs (b. 1827)
1913 – George I of Greece (b. 1845)
1918 – Henry Janeway Hardenbergh, American architect, designed the Plaza Hotel (b. 1847)
1930 – Jean Leon Gerome Ferris, American painter (b. 1863)
1936 – Eleftherios Venizelos, Greek journalist, lawyer, and politician, 93rd Prime Minister of Greece (b. 1864)
1939 – Henry Simpson Lunn, English businessman, founded Lunn Poly (b. 1859)
1941 – Henri Cornet, French cyclist (b. 1884)
1947 – William C. Durant, American businessman, co-founded General Motors and Chevrolet (b. 1861)
1954 – Walter Mead, English cricketer (b. 1868)
1956 – Louis Bromfield, American environmentalist and author (b. 1896)
1962 – Walter W. Bacon, American accountant and politician, 60th Governor of Delaware (b. 1880)
1964 – Sigfrid Edström, Swedish businessman, 4th President of the International Olympic Committee (b. 1870)
1965 – Farouk of Egypt (b. 1920)
1973 – Johannes Aavik, Estonian philologist and poet (b. 1880)
1977 – Marien Ngouabi, Congolese politician, President of the Republic of the Congo (b. 1938)
1977 – Carlos Pace, Brazilian race car driver (b. 1944)
1978 – Leigh Brackett, American author and screenwriter (b. 1915)
1978 – Peggy Wood, American actress (b. 1892)
1980 – Erich Fromm, German psychologist and philosopher (b. 1900)
1982 – Patrick Smith, Irish farmer and politician, Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine (b. 1901)
1983 – Umberto II of Italy (b. 1904)
1984 – Charley Lau, American baseball player and coach (b. 1933)
1986 – Bernard Malamud, American novelist and short story writer (b. 1914)
1988 – Billy Butterfield, American trumpet player and cornet player (b. 1917)
1990 – Robin Harris, American comedian (b. 1953)
1993 – Kenneth E. Boulding, English-American economist and activist (b. 1910)
1996 – Odysseas Elytis, Greek poet and critic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1911)
2000 – Eberhard Bethge, German theologian and academic (b. 1909)
2001 – John Phillips, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (The Mamas & the Papas) (b. 1935)
2002 – R. A. Lafferty, American soldier and author (b. 1914)
2003 – Karl Kling, German race car driver (b. 1910)
2003 – Adam Osborne, Thai-English engineer and businessman, founded the Osborne Computer Corporation (b. 1939)
2004 – Harrison McCain, Canadian businessman, co-founded McCain Foods (b. 1927)
2006 – Dan Gibson, Canadian photographer and cinematographer (b. 1922)
2007 – Bob Woolmer, Indian-English cricketer, coach, and sportscaster (b. 1948)
2008 – Anthony Minghella, English director and screenwriter (b. 1954)
2009 – Omid Reza Mir Sayafi, Iranian journalist and blogger (b. 1980)
