Anniversaries

Anniversaries

Births: Denis Papin, physicist and inventor, 1647; Jean-Francois de Galaup de la Perouse, sailor and explorer, 1741; Pope Leo XII, 1760; Thomas Tredgold, engineer and carpenter, 1788; Francois Forster, engraver, 1790; Dr John Hill Burton, historian and jurist, 1809; William Hayman Cummings, oratorio tenor, 1831; Sir Alexander Campbell Mackenzie, composer, 1847; Gustaf Froding, poet, 1860; Claude-Achille Debussy, composer, 1862; Jacques Lipchitz, painter and sculptor, 1891; Dorothy Parker (Rothschild), humorist and writer, 1893; Leni (Helene Bertha Amalie) Riefenstahl, actress, film producer and photographer, 1902. Deaths: Pope Gregory IX, 1241; King Richard III, killed at Bosworth Field 1485; Jean- Honore Fragonard, painter, 1806; Warren Hastings, first governor-general of India, 1818; Franz Joseph Gall, neurophysiologist and founder of phrenology, 1828; Alexandre-Gabriel Decamps, painter, 1860; George Shillibeer, pioneer of London's first bus service, 1866; Sydney Thompson Dobell, poet, 1874; Henry George Bohn, bookseller and publisher, 1884; "Lord" John Sanger, circus entrepreneur, 1889; Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne Cecil, third Marquess of Salisbury, statesman, 1903; Michael Collins, Irish nationalist leader, killed in an ambush 1922; Sir Oliver Joseph Lodge, physicist, 1940; Michael (Mikhail Mikhail- ovich) Fokine, dancer and choreographer, 1942; Roger Martin du Gard, novelist and playwright, 1958; William Richard Morris, first Viscount Nuffield, motor manufacturer, 1963; Jomo Kenyatta (Kamau), Kenyan leader, 1978; James Thomas Farrell, novelist, 1979. On this day: the Scots were defeated by the English at the Battle of the Standard (Northallerton), 1138; Richard III was defeated by Henry VII's men at the Battle of Bosworth Field, 1485; the Civil War began in England, 1642; Sierra Leone was first settled by the British as a haven for former slaves, 1788; New Mexico was annexed by the US, 1846; the Geneva Conference adopted the ideas put forward by Jean-Henri Dunant, and the International Red Cross organisation was founded, 1864; the first British aircraft shot down during war crashed near Mons, killing its two-man crew, 1914; the first regular BBC television service began, 1932; Pope Paul VI made the first papal visit to South America when he arrived in Colombia, 1968; an engine on a British Airtours Boeing 737 aircraft exploded and burst into flames on take-off, and 55 passengers were killed, 1985; following a change in the licensing laws, public houses in England and Wales were allowed to stay open all day, 1988. Today is the Feast Day of St Andrew of Fiesole, St John Kemble, St Sigfrid of Wearmouth, St Symphorian and St Timothy.