May 14
From Wikipedia, a free encyclopedia written in simple English for easy reading.
[edit] Births
- 1265 - Dante Alighieri, Italian poet (d. 1321)
- 1316 - Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1378)
- 1553 - Margaret of Valois, queen of Henry IV of France (d. 1615)
- 1710 - King Adolf Frederick of Sweden (d. 1771)
- 1727 - Thomas Gainsborough, English artist (d. 1788)
- 1771 - Robert Owen, social reformer (d. 1858)
- 1832 - Rudolf Lipschitz, mathematician (d. 1903)
- 1867 - Kurt Eisner, politician and publicist (d. 1919)
- 1869 - Friedrich Karl Kleine, physician (d. 1951)
- 1884 - Claude Dornier, aircraft designer (d. 1969)
- 1885 - Otto Klemperer, conductor (d. 1973)
- 1897 - Sidney Bechet, jazz musician (d. 1959)
- 1904 - Hans Albert Einstein, American professor
- 1907 - Ayub Khan, President of Pakistan (d. 1974)
- 1917 - Lou Harrison, composer (d. 2003)
- 1921 - Richard Deacon, actor (d. 1984)
- 1922 - Franjo Tuđman, President of Croatia (d. 1999)
- 1929 - Gump Worsley, hockey player
- 1931 - Alvin Lucier, composer
- 1934 - Siân Phillips, actress
- 1936 - Bobby Darin, American singer (d. 1973)
- 1942 - Byron Dorgan, politician
- 1943 - Jack Bruce, Bass player for Cream
- 1943 - Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson, President of Iceland
- 1944 - George Lucas, American film director and producer
- 1946 - Eric Peterson, Canadian actor
- 1948 - Bob Woolmer, cricket coach
- 1952 - David Byrne, singer, songwriter, and guitarist
- 1952 - Robert Zemeckis, director
- 1953 - Norodom Sihamoni, King of Cambodia
- 1960 - Steve Williams, professional wrestler
- 1961 - Tim Roth, actor
- 1965 - Eoin Colfer, writer
- 1966 - Raphael Saadiq, American music artist
- 1967 - Tony Siragusa, American football player
- 1969 - Cate Blanchett, Australian actress
- 1971 - Sofia Coppola, American film director, producer, writer and actress
- 1977 - Ada Nicodemou, Australian actress
- 1977 - Roy Halladay, baseball player
- 1981 - Sarbel, Greek- Arab singer
- 1983 - Amber Tamblyn, actress
[edit] Deaths
[edit] Events
- 1264 - Battle of Lewes: Henry III of England is captured in France making Simon de Montfort the de facto ruler of England.
- 1483 - Coronation of Charles VIII of France ("Charles l'Affable").
- 1509 - Battle of Agnadello: In northern Italy, French forces defeat the Venetians.
- 1643 - Four year-old Louix XIV becomes King of France upon the death of his father, Louis XIII.
- 1747 - A British fleet under Admiral George Anson defeats the French at first battle of Cape Finisterre.
- 1787 - In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, delegates begin to meet to write a new Constitution for the United States.
- 1796 - Edward Jenner administers the first smallpox vaccination.
- 1804 - The Lewis and Clark Expedition departs from Camp Dubois and begin their historic journey by traveling up the Missouri River.
- 1811 - Paraguay gains independence from Spain.
- 1861 - The Canellas meteorite, an 859-gram chondrite-type meteorite strikes the earth near Barcelona, Spain.
- 1870 - The first game of rugby in New Zealand is played in Nelson between Nelson College and the Nelson Rugby Football Club.
- 1889 - The children's charity the NSPCC is launched in London.
- 1900 - The 1900 Summer Olympics open in Paris.
- 1913 - New York Governor William Sulzer approves the charter for the Rockefeller Foundation, which begins operations with a $100 million donation from John D. Rockefeller.
- 1914 - The Hellenic Holocaust starts, according to an official document from Talaat Bey (Minister of the Interior) to the prefect of Smyrna.
- 1927 - Cap Arcona is launched at the Blohm + Voss shipyard in Hamburg.
- 1929 - Wilfred Rhodes takes his 4000th first-class wicket during a performance of 9 for 39 at Leyton.
- 1935 - The Filipinos ratify an independence agreement.
- 1939 - Lina Medina, becomes the world's youngest confirmed mother in medical history at the age of five.
- 1940 - World War II: Rotterdam is bombed by the German Luftwaffe.
- 1940 - World War II: The Netherlands surrender to Germany.
- 1948 - Israel declares itself to be an independent state and a provisional government is established.
- 1948 - The murder of a three-year-old girl in Blackburn, northern England, leads to the fingerprinting of more than 40,000 men in the city in an attempt to find the murderer.
- 1955 - Cold War: Eight communist bloc countries including the Soviet Union sign a mutual defence treaty called the Warsaw Pact.
- 1961 - American civil rights movement: Freedom Riders bus is fire-bombed near Anniston, Alabama, and the civil rights protestors are beaten by an angry mob.
- 1970 - The Red Army Faction is established in Germany.
- 1973 - Skylab, the United States' first space station, is launched. It is the last launch of the Saturn V rocket.
- 1995 - Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama proclaims six-year-old Gedhun Choekyi Nyima as the eleventh reincarnation of the Panchen Lama.
- 1998 - After nine years on the air, the series finale of the television sitcom Seinfeld is aired on NBC.
- 2004 - The marriage of Frederik, Crown Prince of Denmark and Mary Donaldson takes place in Copenhagen.
- 2004 - Piers Morgan is fired as editor of the Daily Mirror, when photographs that had been published in the newspaper of alleged abuse of Iraqi prisoners by British soldiers were proved to be fake.
- 2004 - Insurgents or terrorists in Iraq detonate a 155 mm shell containing several liters of binary precursors for sarin. The shell was designed to mix the chemicals as it spun during flight and the explosion failed to mix them properly. Although it only resulted in a small release of sarin, two U.S. soldiers are treated for exposure after displaying the early symptoms.
- 2005 - Pope Benedict XVI observes his first beatification, elevating Blessed Marianne of Molokai on the road to canonization into sainthood; Nintendo opens up its first retail store, Nintendo World, in Rockefeller Center in New York City. They celebrated the grand opening with a block party in Rockefeller Plaza.
