Anniversaries

Anniversaries

Births: Charles Stewart Parnell, Irish nationalist leader, 1846; Sir John Monash, engineer and general, 1865; Helen Adams Keller, blind, deaf and mute scholar and teacher, 1880. Deaths: James Lewis Macie Smithson, scientist and founder of the Smithsonian Institution, 1829; Joseph Smith, founder of the Mormons (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints), murdered in prison 1844. On this day: the Ladies' Mercury, the first women's magazine, was issued, 1693; Bonnie Prince Charlie, disguised as a maid, escaped to Skye, 1746; the first nuclear power station was opened at Obninsk, near Moscow, 1954. Today is the Feast Day of St Cyril of Alexandria, St George Mtasmindeli, St John of Chinon, St Ladislas, king of Hungary, St Samson of Constantinople, The Martyrs of Arras and St Zoilus of Cordova.