On October 14th...

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1066 William the Conqueror won the Battle of Hastings.

1322 Robert the Bruce of Scotland defeated King Edward II of England at Byland, forcing Edward to accept Scotland's independence.

1586 Mary Queen of Scots went on trial for conspiracy against Elizabeth.

1633 King James II of England was born.

1644 William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania, was born.

1774 The First Continental Congress passed a Declaration of Colonial Rights.

1784 King Ferdinand VII of Spain was born.

1806 Napoleon Bonaparte defeated the Prussians at Jena and Austerstädt.

1834 Henry Blair became the second black to be awarded a patent in the United States, for a corn planter.
1834 Whigs and Democrats battled for control of a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, election, resulting in one death, several injuries, and property destruction.

1867 The 15th, and last, Tokugawa Shogun resigned in Japan.

1881 Bob Ferguson won the British Golf Open.

1882 The University of the Punjab was founded in present-day Pakistan.
1882 Eamon de Valera, President of the Irish Republic, was born.

1884 George Eastman patented paper-strip photographic film.

1890 Dwight David Eisenhower, 34th President of the United States, was born.

1893 Actress Lillian Gish was born.

1894 Poet E. E. Cummings was born.

1908 The Baseball Writers Association of America was founded.

1911 U. S. Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan died.

1912 Former President Theodore Roosevelt barely escaped an assassination attempt.

1913 An explosion at the Senghenydd Colliery killed 439 persons.

1916 C. Everett Koop, Surgeon General of the United States, was born.

1926 A. A. Milne's book Winnie the Pooh was published.

1927 Actor Roger Moore was born.

1929 The Philadelphia A's defeated the Chicago Cubs to win the World Series.

1930 Joseph-Désiré Mobutu, President of Zaire (as Mobutu Sese Seko), was born.

1931 The Spanish Cortes agreed to separation of church and state.

1938 John Dean, White House counsel under Richard Nixon, was born.

1939 A German U-boat sank the British battleship HMS Royal Oak, killing 833 persons.
1939 BMI (Broadcast Music Incorporated) was formed.
1939 Fashion designer Ralph Lauren was born.

1940 Singer Cliff Richard was born.

1943 600 Jews escaped during an uprising at a concentration camp in Sobibor, Poland.

1944 German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel committed suicide.
1944 British troops marched into Athens, Greece.

1947 Chuck Yeager became the first human to break the sound barrier.

1949 Ezzard Charles TKO'd Pat Valentino in the 8th round to win the heavyweight boxing title.

1951 The Organization of Central American States was formed.

1952 Actor Harry Anderson was born.

1953 A Belgian Convair crashed at Frankfurt, Germany, killing 44 persons.

1956 Playwright Owen Davis died.

1957 Queen Elizabeth II became the first reigning British monarch to open the Canadian Parliament.

1958 A bomb explosion damaged a Reform Jewish temple in Peoria, Illinois.
1958 A Venezuelan Airlines Super Constellation hit a mountain peak in bad weather, killing all 24 persons aboard.
1958 The Provincial Assemblies of Madagascar voted to proclaim an autonomous republic within the French Overseas Community.
1958 Potter Stewart was sworn in as Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
1958 Musician Thomas Dolby was born.

1959 Actor Errol Flynn died.

1962 Flemish- and French-speaking Belgians clashed in Brussels.

1968 The first live telecast from a manned U.S. spacecraft was transmitted from Apollo 7 back to earth.

1969 The first Soviet international satellite, Intercosmos 1, was laiunched.

1977 Singer Bing Crosby died.

1979 Over 100,000 people staged the first ever Gay and Lesbian Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C.
1979 The television adaptation of "The Miracle Worker" premiered on NBC.

1984 The Detroit Tigers defeated the San Diego Padres to win the World Series.

1986 Actor Keenan Wynn died.

1990 Conductor Leonard Bernstein died.

1997 Author Harold Robbins died.

1998 Musician Frankie Yankovic died.

1999 Julius Nyerere, the first President of Tanzania, died

2001 Michael Schumacher won the Formula One Drivers' Championship.

2006 Singer Freddy Fender died.

2007 "Keeping Up with the Kardashians" premiered on the E! network.

2012 Twenty persons were gunned down in a mosque in Dogo Dawa, Nigeria.
2012 Former U. S. Senator Arlen Specter died.

2017 A truck bomb killed more than 300 people in Mogadishu, Somalia.

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This page was last updated on October 14, 2018.