On This Day in History for October 6

Events 1 - 100 of 134

• 105 BC Battle of Arausio: The Cimbri inflict the heaviest defeat on the Roman army of Gnaeus Mallius Maximus.
• 68 BC Battle of Artaxata: Lucullus averts the bad omen of this day by defeating Tigranes the Great of Armenia.
• 891 Formosus begins his reign as Catholic Pope
• 1111 Boudouin VII becomes earl of Flanders
• 1499 French King Louis XII occupies Milan
• 1567 Duke of Alva becomes land guardian of Netherlands
• 1683 13 Mennonite families from Germany found Germantown, Philadelphia
• 1689 Pietro Ottoboni replaces Pope Innocent XI as Alexander VIII
• 1762 British troops occupy Manila, Philippines
• 1783 Benjamin Hanks patents self-winding clock

• 1799 Battle of Castricum: Franco-Dutch army beats British-Russian army

• 1849 The execution of the 13 Martyrs of Arad after the Hungarian war of independence.
• 1853 4th National Women's Rights Convention opens in Cleveland Ohio
• 1854 The Great Fire of Newcastle and Gateshead started shortly after midnight, leading to 53 deaths and hundreds injured.


• 1861 Naval Engagement at Charleston, South Carolina, USS Flag vs BR Alert
• 1861 Revolt of Russian student shuts down university of Petersburg
• 1863 Battle at Baxter Springs, Kansas
• 1863 Dr Charles H Sheppard opens 1st public bath, in Brooklyn
• 1866 1st train robbery in US (Reno Brothers take $13,000)
• 1869 Johannes Brahms' "Liebeslieder Walzer" premieres
• 1876 American Library Association organized in Philadelphia
• 1884 Naval War College forms in Newport, Rhode Island
• 1889 Moulin Rogue opens in Paris

• 1890 General Conference of the Mormon Church outlaws polygamy
• 1893 Nabisco Foods invents Cream of Wheat

• 1898 Gustav Mahler conducts 1st Wiener Philharmonic
• 1900 Britain annexes Orange Free State (as Orange River Colony)
• 1903 The High Court of Australia sits for the first time.
• 1906 The Majlis of Iran convened for the first time.
• 1908 Austria annexes Bosnia & Herzegovina
• 1908 Yanks lose 100th game of year go 51-103 for season
• 1911 Beatrix van Rijk becomes 1st licensed Dutch woman pilot
• 1912 Pirates Owen "Chief" Wilson hits record 36th triple of season
• 1914 The Russians fall back along the Eastern Front in Poland and Galicia
• 1917 Battle of Passchendaele: Canadian troops capture the village of Passchendaele in the Third Battle of Ypres, after 250,000 casualties on both sides
• 1918 US ship Otranto sinks between Scotland & Ireland, 425 die
• 1919 Stambuliski becomes premier of Bulgaria


• 1921 Century Theater opens at 7th Ave & 59th St NYC (demolished 1962)
• 1921 International PEN is founded in London.
• 1922 The great powers of the first world war withdraw from Istanbul
• 1923 2nd government of Stresemann in Germany forms
• 1923 US Lt Al Williams fly 392.2 KPH (record)
• 1923 USSR adopts experimental calendar
• 1925 Greek premier Papanastasiou orders gen Pangulos arrested

• 1931 Js Van Severen forms Verdinaso (Union of Flemish National Solidarists)
• 1935 Italian army occupies Adua Abyssinia
• 1935 Market Street Railway, San Francisco, starts using trackless trolley coaches

• 1939 Adolf Hitler announces plans to regulate Jewish problem
• 1939 Last Polish army is defeated in World War II.
• 1940 Zoological Gardens opens on Sloat & Skyline in San Francisco
• 1941 German army occupies Briansk, USSR
• 1942 Allied assault on oil installations of Bula Ceram
• 1943 Battle at Vella Lavella, Solomon Island

• 1944 Allied aircraft accidentally bomb Fishing, Overijssel
• 1944 Canadians free Austria
• 1944 Royal Dutch Navy submarine Zwaardvis (Swordfish) sinks German submarine U168 in the Java Sea
• 1944 Soviets march into Hungary & Czechoslovakia

• 1945 Memorial for executed unveiled in Terbregge
• 1946 90°F highest temperature ever recorded in Cleveland in Oct
• 1946 US President Harry Truman questions Great Britain Jews about Palestine
• 1948 The 1948 Ashgabat earthquake kills 100,000 in the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic

• 1949 Iva Toguri D'Aquino (Tokyo Rose) sentenced to 10 years & $10,000 fine

• 1956 Dr Albert Sabin discovers oral polio vaccine
• 1957 USSR performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya USSR
• 1958 US nuclear sub USS Seawolf remains a record 60 days under the north pole
• 1959 Soviet Luna 3, 1st successful photographic spacecraft, impacts Moon

• 1961 USSR performs nuclear tests at Kapustin Yar & Novaya Zemlya USSR
• 1962 US performs atmospheric nuclear test at Johnston Island
• 1965 William Goodhart's "Generation" premieres in NYC
• 1966 Partial meltdown at Detroits's Fermi 1 nuclear reactor
• 1966 LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide) is first declared illegal in state of California, other states follow.
• 1967 Haight-Ashbury (San Francisco) hippies throw a funeral for "Hippie" to mark end of "the summer of love".
• 1967 USSR performs nuclear test
• 1972 22-car train carrying 2,000 pilgrims derails, kills 208 in Mexico
• 1972 Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) Jack Lynch closes the Sinn Féin office in Dublin
• 1973 Yom Kippur War begins as Syria & Egypt attack Israel
• 1976 "Gang of Four" arrested in Beijing

• 1976 Cubana Flight 455 crashes into the Atlantic Ocean after two bombs, placed by terrorists with connections to the CIA, explode onboard shortly after taking off from Bridgetown, Barbados, killing all 73 people on board
• 1977 DL Coburns "Gin Game" premieres in NYC
• 1977 In Alicante, Spain, fascists attack a group of MCPV militants and sympathizers, and one MCPV sympathizer is killed.
• 1978 Hannah H Gray inaugurated as 1st female head of a US university (Chicago)

• 1979 Harry Drake set long distance footbow shot record of 2,006 yds 1'9"

• 1980 Guyana adopts constitution

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• 1289 Wenceslaus III of Bohemia, King of Hungary (1301-05) and King of Bohemia and Poland (1305-06), born in Prague, Czech Republic (d. 1306)
• 1459 Martin Behaim, German navigator and geographer, born in Nuremberg, Germany (d. 1507)
• 1510 Rowland Taylor, English clergyman, born in Northumberland, England (d. 1555)
• 1510 John Caius, English physician, born in Norwich, England (d. 1573)
• 1552 Matteo Ricci, Italian Jesuit missionary (China), born in Macerata, Italy (d. 1610)
• 1573 Henry Wriothesley, 3rd Earl of Southampton, English patron of the theater, born in Cowdray House, Sussex, England (d. 1624)
• 1610 Charles de Sainte-Maure, duc de Montausier, French soldier (d. 1690)
• 1706 Pieter Steyn, Dutch grand pensionary (1749-72), born in Haarlem, Netherlands (d. 1772)
• 1716 George Montague-Dunk, 2nd Earl of Halifax, English statesman, born in Dover, England (d. 1771)
• 1738 Archduchess Maria Anna of Austria, second child of Francis I Holy Roman Emperor, born in Vienna, Austria (d. 1789)
• 1744 James McGill, Scottish-Canadian businessman and philanthropist, born in Glasgow, Scotland (d. 1813)
• 1767 Henri Christophe, President of Haiti (1807-11) and King of Haiti (1811-20), born in Grenada (d. 1820)

• 1773 Louis-Philippe, King of France (1830-48), born in Palais Royal, Paris (d. 1850)
• 1801 Hippolyte Carnot, French statesman, born in Saint-Omer, France (d. 1888)
• 1803 Heinrich Wilhelm Dove, Prussian physicist and meteorologist, born in Legnica, Poland (d. 1879)
• 1808 Frederik VII, 1st constitutional king of Denmark (1848-63), born in Copenhagen, Denmark (d. 1863)
• 1819 Willem A Scholten, Dutch potato-flour manufacturer (d. 1892)
• 1831 Richard Dedekind, German mathematician (Nature & Meaning of Numbers), born in Braunschweig, Germany (d. 1916)
• 1838 Giuseppe Cesare Abba, Italian patriot and writer, born in Cairo Montenotte, Italy (d. 1910)

• 1847 Adolf von Hildebrand, German sculptor, born in Marburg, Germany (d. 1921)
• 1849 Basil Zaharoff, Greek arms dealer (merchant of death), born in Muğla, Turkey (d. 1936)
• 1860 Oscar L Helfrich, Dutch governor (Curacao)
• 1860 Reneke de Marees van Swinderen, Dutch foreign minister (1908-13)
• 1862 Albert Jeremiah Beveridge, American politician/author (Progressive)
• 1872 Mikhail Kuzmin, Russian writer (d. 1936)
• 1874 Frank G. Allen, 51st Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1950)
• 1876 Ernest Lapointe, French-Canadian politician (d. 1941)

• 1887 MartinLuis Guzman, Mexican novelist (Eagle & the Serpent)
• 1888 Li Ta-chao, co-founder with Mao Zedong (Chinese Communist Party)
• 1888 Roland Garros, French pilot (d. 1918)
• 1889 Maria Dabrowska, Polish writer (Noce I Dnie)
• 1895 Caroline Gordon, Kentucky, writer (Green Centuries)
• 1903 Ernest Walton, Irish physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1995)
• 1904 Horst Lange, German writer (The Long Lament), born in Liegnitz, Silesia (d. 1971)
• 1908 Sergei Lvovich Sobolev, Russian mathematician (d. 1989)
• 1910 Barbara Castle, British politician (d. 2002)
• 1912 Anthony Cuthbert Baines, English music scholar (d. 1997)
• 1912 Joop Zwart, Dutch political activist and resistance fighter, born in Amsterdam, Netherlands (d. 1991)
• 1913 Meret Oppenheim, writer

• 1915 Harry van Doorn [Henri W], CRM minister/Dutch politician (KVP/PPR)
• 1915 Alice Timander, Swedish dentist (d. 2007)

• 1920 Pietro Consagra, Italian sculptor (d. 2005)
• 1920 Lord Donaldson of Lymington, British judge (d. 2005)
• 1921 Yevgeniy Landis, Russian mathematician (d. 1997)
• 1923 Yaşar Kemal, Turkish writer (Memed, My Hawk), born in Hemite, Osmaniye, Ottoman Empire (d. 2015)

• 1931 Riccardo Giacconi, Italian American astrophysicist, Nobel Prize for Physics 2002 for X-ray astronomy, born in Genoa, Italy (d. 2018)
• 1932 Gloria Lane, educator/author/founder (Women's International Center)
• 1936 Rob Touber, [Robert J Noordervliet], cabaret director (Capers)
• 1938 Serge Nubret, French bodybuilder
• 1939 Douglas K Bereuter, (Rep-R-Nebraska, 1979- )
• 1939 John J LaFalce, (Rep-D-NY, 1975- )
• 1940 Boris Dmitriyevich Andreyev, Russian cosmonaut
• 1940 Wyche Fowler Jr, (Rep-D-GA, 1977-87)
• 1943 Alexander Maxovich Shilov, Russian painter
• 1944 Merzak Allouache, director (Salut Cousin, Amour a Paris)
• 1945 Domonic Barber, American celebrity attorney (Howard Stern, Jessica Hahn, Joe Buttafucco)
• 1946 Eddie Villanueva, JIL Spiritual Director, Owner of ZOE Broadcasting Network
• 1946 Lloyd Doggett, American attorney and politician (US Representative, Democrat, Texas), born in Austin, Texas
• 1947 Aleksandr Stepanovich Andryushkov, Russian colonel/cosmonaut
• 1948 Dan Hamburg, (Rep-D-California)
• 1948 Gerry Adams, Northern Irish politician
• 1952 Ayten Mutlu, Turkish poet and writer
• 1953 Klaas Bruinsma, Dutch drug lord (d. 1991)
• 1956 Kathleen Webb, American comic book writer and artist
• 1958 Joseph Finder, American novelist
• 1959 Walter Ray Williams Jr, bowler (twice Player of the Year)
• 1959 Brian Higgins, American politician, Member of US House of Representatives
• 1965 Jim "Razor" Sharp, American rodeo rider (Las Vegas 1988), Kermit, Texas
• 1967 Svend Karlsen, Norwegian strongman
• 1982 MC Lars, American hip-hop artist
• 1995 Jessica Lunsford, American kidnapping victim (d. 2005)
• 2000 Jazz Jennings, American transgender activist, born in South Florida (probable date)

• 1936 Diana Mitford marries Oswald Mosley in the house of Joseph Goebbels with Adolf Hitler as a guest
• 1956 South African politician "Kobie" Coetsee marries Helena E Malan
• 2007 "The Montel Williams Show" talk show host Montel Williams (51) weds American Airlines flight attendant Tara Fowler on a beach in Bermuda
• 2008 Steven Curtis Chapman's oldest daughter Emily Chapman (45) weds longtime boyfriend Tanner Richards

• 404 Eudoxia Aelia, empress of Austria, dies
• 877 Charles II the Bald, King of France (843-77) and Holy Roman emperor (875-77), dies at 54
• 1014 Samuel (Samuil), ruler of Bulgaria, dies (b. 958)
• 1072 Sancho II, king of Castile (1065-72), murdered
• 1101 Bruno of Cologne, German founder of the Carthusian order
• 1214 Alfonso VIII de Edele, king of Castile, dies
• 1413 Dawit I, Emperor of Ethiopia (b. 1382)
• 1536 William Tyndale, English Protestant bible translator and scholar, is strangled and burned at the stake at 41 or 42 (born c. 1494)
• 1542 Thomas Wyatt, English poet (b. 1503)
• 1585 Luca Cambiaso, Italian painter/sculptor, dies
• 1641 Matthijs H Quast, fleet guardian (Gold Islands), dies in battle
• 1644 Elisabeth (In Spanish Isabel) of Bourbon, wife of Philip IV of Spain (b. 1602)
• 1661 Guru Har Rai, seventh Sikh Guru
• 1688 Christopher Monck, 2nd Duke of Albemarle, English statesman (b. 1652)
• 1819 Charles Emanuel II, King of Sardinia (1796-1802)/Jesuit, dies
• 1829 Pierre Derbigny, Governor of Louisiana (b. 1769)
• 1840 François Budan de Boislaurent, French mathematician, dies at 80

• 1849 Lajos, Count Batthyany, 1st Prime Minister of Hungary, executed by firing squad at 42
• 1855 August Leopold Crelle, German inventor and mathematician (1st Prussian Railway), dies at 75
• 1861 Elias Canneman, liberal minister of Finance (1813-14), dies at 84
• 1873 Paweł Edmund Strzelecki, Polish explorer and geologist, dies at 76
• 1880 Benjamin Pierce, American mathematician and astronomer (Peirce's criterion for outliers), dies at 71
• 1885 Thomas Talbot, 31st Governor of Massachusetts, dies at 67
• 1891 Charles Stewart Parnell, English-Irish Home Rule Party leader, dies at 45

• 1893 Ford Madox Brown, British painter, dies at 72
• 1905 Ferdinand von Richthofen, German geographer and explorer, dies at 72
• 1912 Auguste Beernaert, 14th Prime Minister of Belgium (1884-94) and Nobel Peace Prize laureare 1909, dies at 83
• 1924 Jacques Oppenheim, lawyer, dies at 75
• 1926 Charles Van de Banks, Flemish writer/poet (Red Horse), dies
• 1942 Erich Kuttner, German journalist and historian (Vorwarts), dies at 55
• 1943 Robert Cooper, father of Card pitcher Mort & catcher Walker, dies
• 1945 Leonardo Conti, Nazi physician, dies by hanging himself while awaiting trial for war crimes at Nuremberg at 45
• 1949 Robert Lynd, Irish writer and critic (News Chronicle), dies at 70
• 1951 Henry Gurney, British high commissioner to Malaya, assassinated
• 1951 Otto Fritz Meyerhof, German-born physician and biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1884)
• 1951 Will Keith Kellogg, American cereal manufacturer (Kellogg's cereal brand), dies at 91
• 1951 Otto Meyerhof, German psychologist and biochemist (Nobel 1922), dies at 67
• 1956 Charles E. Merrill, American investment banker (Merrill Lynch), dies at 70
• 1959 Bernard Berenson, American art critic (Italian Painters of the Renaissance), dies at 94
• 1964 Richard Scheibe, German sculptor (Adler mit Hakenkreuz), dies at 85
• 1965 Georges Vandertongerloo, Flemish sculptor/painter, dies at 78
• 1968 Phyllis Nicolson, British mathematician (Crank-Nicolson method), dies at 51
• 1974 V. K. Krishna Menon, Indian nationalist, Minister of Defense (1957-62), dies at 78
• 1976 Gilbert Ryle, British philosopher (b. 1900)
• 1979 Elizabeth Bishop, poetess (North & South, Pulitzer 1956), dies at 68

• 1983 Terence Cooke, cardinal/archbishop of NY, dies at 62
• 1984 George Gaylord Simpson, American paleontologist, dies at 82
• 1986 Alexander Kronrod, Russian mathematician (b. 1921)
• 1991 Lincoln Demyan, dies at 66
• 1991 Wendell Phillips, dies at 83 [or 10/13]
• 1993 Larry Walters, American "lawn chair" pilot, committed suicide at 44
• 1995 Oswald Moxley Gibbs, Grenadian diplomat (High Commissioners to the United Kingdom 1974-78), dies at 67
• 1996 Martyn Taylor, teacher/campaigner, dies at 57
• 1999 Francis Turner, American civil engineer (oversaw the Interstate Highway System), dies at 90
• 2000 William Putnam Bundy, American attorney and intelligence expert (9th Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs), dies at 83
• 2002 Claus von Amsberg, husband of Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands (b. 1926)
• 2003 Timothy Treadwell, American environmentalist (Grizzly Man), dies mauled and eaten by bears in Katmai National Park, Alaska at 46
• 2006 Wilson Tucker, American writer (b. 1914)
• 2006 Alex L. Shigo, American Biologist and Plant Pathologist, dies at 76
• 2007 Bud Ekins, American stuntman (b. 1930)
• 2010 David Rowbotham, Australian poet and journalist, dies at 86
• 2012 Chadli Bendjedid, Algerian president, dies from cancer at 83
• 2012 Raoul de Keyser, Flemish painter, dies at 82
• 2014 Marian Seldes, American actress (A Delicate Balance, Father's Day), dies at 86
• 2015 Árpád Göncz, Hungarian politician, 1st post-communist President (1990-2000), dies at 93

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