Anniversaries

Births: Agostino Agazzari, composer, 1578; Henry Gally Knight, architectural illustrator, 1786; Sir Francis Carruthers Gould, caricaturist and politician, 1844; Georges-Pierre Seurat, painter, 1859; Manuel Ponce, composer, 1882; George Richards Minot, physician, 1885; Sir John (Giovanni Battista) Barbirolli, conductor, 1899; Peter Carl Goldmark, inventor of the long-playing record, 1906; Maria Anna Cecilia Sofia Callas (Kalogeropoulos), operatic soprano, 1923.

Deaths: Hernando Cortes, conqueror of Mexico, 1547; Margaret of Angouleme, Queen of Henry II of Navarre, 1549; Gerardus Mercator (Gerhard Kaufmann), cartographer, 1594; Philip II, Duke of Orleans, Regent of France, 1723; Donatien-Alphonse Francois, Marquis de Sade, writer and philosopher, 1814; Amelia Opie (Alderson), novelist, 1853; John Brown, abolitionist, executed 1859; Edmond-Eugene Alexis Rostand, playwright, 1918; Sir Evelyn Henry Wood, field marshal, 1919; E.M. Delafield (Edmee Elizabeth Monica de la Pasture), novelist, 1943; Philip Arthur Larkin, poet, 1985; Robert Cummings (Charles Clarence Robert Orville Main Cummings), actor, 1990.

On this day: the new St Paul's Cathedral was opened, 1697; Napoleon was crowned Emperor in Paris by Pope Pius VII, 1804; Birkbeck College, London, was founded, 1823; the Gaiety Theatre, Strand, London, closed, 1866; King Camp Gillette patented the first safety razor, 1901; Senator Joseph McCarthy was condemned by the US Senate, 1954; the first London performance of the musical show Hello, Dolly! was presented, 1965; the Persian Gulf sheikhdoms combined to form the United Arab Emirates, 1971; in Bangladesh, a cyclone killed 1,200 people, while 6,000 were missing, 1988.

Today is the Feast Day of St Bibiana or Viviana, St Chromatius of Aquilea, St Nonnus and St Silvanus of Constantinople.