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- 1252 Pope Innocent IV issues the papal bull ad exstirpanda, which authorizes the torture of heretics in the Medieval Inquisition.
- 1492 Cheese & Bread rebellion: German mercenaries kills 232 Alkmaarse
- 1514 Jodocus Badius Ascensius publishes Christiern Pedersen's Latin version of Saxos Gesta Danorum, the oldest known version of that work.
- 1525 German boer army surrounded/slaughters 5,000; ends Boer war
- 1525 The battle of Frankenhausen ends the Peasants' War.
- 1536 Anna Boleyn & Lord Rochford accused of adultery/incest
- 1567 Mary Queen of Scots weds James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, her third husband.
- 1567 Mary, Queen of Scots marries James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell
- 1572 Louis van Nassau & huguenots occupy Valenciennes
- 1602 Bartholomew Gosnold becomes the first European to see Cape Cod.
- 1602 Cape Cod discovered by English navigator Bartholomew Gosnold
- 1610 Louis XIII appointed King of France
- 1610 Parliament of Paris appoints Louis XIII (8) as French king
- 1618 Johannes Kepler confirms his previously rejected discovery of the third law of planetary motion (he first discovered it on March 8 but soon rejected the idea after some initial calculations were made).
- 1625 16 rebellious farmers hanged in Vöcklamarkt Upper-Austria
- 1648 Treaty of Münster: Spain & Netherlands ratified
- 1665 Pope Alexander VII convicts Jansenisme
- 1672 The first copyright law enacted by Massachusetts
- 1701 The War of the Spanish Succession begins.
- 1702 War of Spanish Succession, first American conflict between England & France
- 1718 James Puckle, a London lawyer, patents the world's first machine gun.
- 1756 The Seven Years' War begins when England declares war on France.
- 1776 American Revolution: Virginia convention instructs its delegates to propose a declaration of independence from Great Britain.
- 1792 War of the First Coalition, France declares war on Kingdom of Sardinia.
- 1793 Diego Marn Aguilera flies a glider for "about 360 meters", at a height of 5-6 meters, during one of the first attempted flights.
- 1796 France & Sardinia sign Peace treaty of Paris
- 1796 French troops occupy Milan
- 1800 King George III survives a 2nd assassination attempt
- 1800 Pope Pius VII calls on French bishops to return to Gospel principles
- 1811 Paraguay declares independence from Spain.
- 1817 Ambonese uprising against Dutch authority, under T Matulesia
- 1817 Opening of the first private mental health hospital in the United States, the Asylum for the Relief of Persons Deprived of the Use of Their Reason (now Friends Hospital) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
- 1836 Francis Baily observes "Baily's Beads" during annular solar eclipse
- 1849 Philadelphia Turngemeinde founded
- 1849 Troops of the Two Sicilies take Palermo and crush the republican government of Sicily.
- 1851 First sorority Alpha Delta Pi founded at Wesleyan College in Macon, Georgia.
- 1851 Rama IV is crowned King of Thailand.
- 1858 Royal Italian Opera opens in Covent Garden London
- 1858 The third Royal Opera House officially opens in London.
- 1862 Battle of Drewry's Bluff (Fort Darling) VA
- 1862 Battle of Princeton WV
- 1862 Confederate cruiser The Alabama runs aground near London
- 1862 Department of Agriculture created
- 1862 General Benjamin F Butler issues "Woman's Order" - women of New Orleans to be treated as whores as a result of their treatment of Union soldiers
- 1862 President Abraham Lincoln signs a bill into law creating the United States Bureau of Agriculture (later renamed USDA).
- 1864 Battle of New Market VA
- 1864 Battle of Resaca GA (3rd day)
- 1864 Skirmish at Marksville (Avoyelles) (Red River Campaign)
- 1868 Dutch Government of Zuylen van Nijevelt falls
- 1869 National Woman Suffrage Association forms
- 1869 Woman's suffrage: In New York, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton form the National Woman Suffrage Association.
- 1882 May Laws-Czar Alexander III bans Jews from living in rural Romania
- 1883 Italy signs military treaty with Austria-Hungary & Germany
- 1885 Canadian Meti insurgent Louis Riel captured, Saskatchewan
- 1891 British Central African Protectorate (now Malawi) is established
- 1891 Operations begin at Philips & Company in Holland
- 1891 Rerum Novarum, the first document of the Catholic Social Teaching tradition is published by Pope Leo XIII.
- 1896 Tornado kills 78 in Texas
- 1897 The Greek army retreats with heavy losses in Greco-Turkish War
- 1902 In a field outside Grass Valley, California, Lyman Gilmore reportedly becomes the first person to fly a powered airplane (a steam-powered glider).
- 1902 Portugal bankrupt by revolt in Angola
- 1905 Las Vegas, Nevada is founded
- 1905 Las Vegas, Nevada, is founded when 110 acres (0.4 km), in what later would become downtown, are auctioned off.
- 1905 Pierre de Brazza reaches Leopoldville
- 1907 Toronto Ontario, plumbers go on four-month strike nobody plug the toilet!!!!!
- 1910 The last time a major earthquake happened on the Elsinore Fault Zone.
- 1911 British house of commons accept Parliament Bill
- 1911 Supreme Court dissolves Standard Oil (Sherman Antitrust Act)
- 1911 The Georgios Averof cruiser is bought by Greece.
- 1912 Ty Cobb rushes a heckler at a New York Highlander game & is suspended
- 1914 Bolivia becomes a signatory to the Buenos Aires copyright treaty.
- 1916 Asiago Italy falls when Austrian troops attack the Italian front
- 1918 Finnish Civil War ends.
- 1918 Greek troops lands at Smyrna
- 1918 Visitor posting - Marjorie E. Hurst was born
- 1918 The US Post Office Department (later renamed the USPS) begins the first regular airmail service in the world (between New York City, Philadelphia and Washington, DC).
- 1918 The first regular airmail service (between New York, Philadelphia & Washington DC) inaugurated
- 1919 Greek invasion of zmir. During the invasion, the Greek army killed or wounded 350 Turks. The responsible were punished by the Greek Commander Aristides Stergiades. Hasan Tahsin fired the first shot of the Turkish War of Independence.
- 1919 The Winnipeg General Strike began. By 11:00, virtually the entire working population of Winnipeg had walked off the job.
- 1920 Council of Lithuania adjourned as newly elected Constituent Assembly of Lithuania met for the first time in Kaunas
- 1923 Cooperation of Dutch Molen forms
- 1928 Mickey Mouse made his first appearance
- 1928 Release of the animated short "Plane Crazy", featuring the first appearances of Mickey and Minnie Mouse.
- 1929 A fire at the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio kills 123.
- 1929 Fire in X-ray film stock kills 125 at Crile Clinic (Cleveland OH)
- 1930 Aboard a Boeing tri-motor, Ellen Church becomes the first airline stewardess, on a flight from Oakland, California to Chicago.
- 1930 Ellen Church becomes the first airline stewardess (United airlines, San Francisco to Cheyenne, WY)
- 1932 The May 15 Incident. In an attempted coup the Prime Minister of Japan Inukai Tsuyoshi is killed.
- 1933 The first voice amplification system to be used in US Senate
- 1934 Department of Justice offers $25,000 reward for Dillinger, dead or alive
- 1934 Karlis Ulmanis names himself fascist dictator of Latvia
- 1934 Krlis Ulmanis establishes an authoritarian government in Latvia.
- 1936 Amy Johnson arrives in Croydon England from South Africa in record 4 days 16 hours
- 1938 Paul-Henri Spak forms red coalition of Belgium
- 1940 German armour division moves into Northern France
- 1940 German troops occupy Amsterdam, General Winkelman surrenders
- 1940 McDonald's is founded.
- 1940 Nazis capture General Dutch Persbureau (ANP)
- 1940 Nylon stockings go on sale for first time (US)
- 1940 World War II: After fierce fighting, the poorly trained and equipped Dutch troops surrender to Nazi Germany, marking the beginning of 5 years of occupation.
- 1941 Baseball player Joe DiMaggio starts his record-breaking 56-game hitting streak.
- 1941 British attack Halfaya-pass & Fort Capuzzo in Egypt & Libya
- 1941 Nazi occupiers in Netherlands forbid Jewish music
- 1941 Rumania passes law condemning Jews to forced labor.
- 1941 The first British turbojet flies
- 1942 Australian troops reinforce Port Moresby
- 1942 Gasoline first rationed in US (17 Eastern States)
- 1942 Movement of POWs ("A Force") to Thailand from Singapore for work on the Burma–Thailand Railway
- 1942 World War II: In the United States, a bill creating the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) is signed into law.
- 1943 Halifax bombers sinks U-463
- 1943 Joseph Stalin dissolves the Comintern (or Third International).
- 1943 Warsaw ghetto uprising ends, in it's destruction
- 1944 14,000 Jews of Munkacs Hungary deported to Auschwitz
- 1944 Deportation of Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz begins.
- 1944 Eisenhower, Montgomery, Churchill & George VI discuss D-Day plan
- 1944 Sergei Aleksi becomes guardian of Patriarch Throne
- 1945 Last skirmish of the Second World War in Europe fought near Prevalje, Slovenia.
- 1948 28 year old British Mandate over Palestine ends
- 1948 Australia scores 721 runs in one day vs Essex, world record
- 1948 Bradman scores 187 Australia vs Essex, 124 minutes, 33 fours 1 five
- 1948 Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq & Saudi-Arabia troops attack Israel
- 1948 Egypt, Transjordan, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Saudi Arabia attack Israel.
- 1951 AT&T is first US company to have one million stockholders
- 1951 The Polish cultural attache in Paris, Czesaw Miosz, asks the French government for political asylum.
- 1951 The cartoon Rabbit Fire is released.
- 1953 Heavyweight Rocky Marciano KOs Joe Walcott in Chicago for heavywgt boxing title
- 1953 Osip Zadkines monument to "The destroyed city" unveiled in Rotterdam
- 1955 Austrian Independence Treaty signed.
- 1955 Building of space travel center at Baikonur Kazachstan begins
- 1955 First ascent of Makalu, the world's fifth highest mountain.
- 1955 Vienna Treaty: Britain, France, US & USSR restores Austria's independence
- 1956 In Orleans Ontario, a Royal Canadian Air Force plane crashes into the Grey Nuns' Home for the Aged in Orleans, killing 15 people, including 11 nuns.
- 1957 18,000 people at Madison Square Garden-Billy Graham launched a crusade
- 1957 Britain tests its first hydrogen bomb in Operation Grapple.
- 1957 The first British H-bomb explosion (over Christmas Island)
- 1958 Sputnik III satelite launched by the U S S R
- 1960 Sputnik 4 launched into Earth orbit; later recovery failed
- 1960 Taxes took 25% of earnings in US
- 1961 36 Unification church couples wed in Korea
- 1962 US marines arrive in Laos
- 1963 Last Project Mercury flight, L Gordon Cooper in Faith 7, launched
- 1963 Peter, Paul & Mary win their first Grammy (If I Had a Hammer)
- 1963 Project Mercury: launch of Mercury-Atlas 9 with astronaut L. Gordon Cooper onboard. He became the first American to spend more than a day in space. Final Mercury mission.
- 1963 Tottenham Hotspur wins 3rd Europe Cup II at Rotterdam
- 1963 Visitor posting - Francis Ravi born. My pet is Cow - India
- 1964 Sporting Portugal wins 4th Europe Cup II at Antwerp
- 1966 South Vietnamese army battle Buddhists, about 80 die
- 1967 Paul McCartney meets his future wife Linda Eastman
- 1968 A tornado strikes Jonesboro AR at 10 PM, killing 36
- 1968 Paul McCartney & John Lennon appear on Johnny Carson Show to promote Apple records, Joe Garagiola is the substitute host
- 1969 Associate Justice Abe Fortas resigns from Supreme Court
- 1970 Beatles' last LP, "Let It Be" is released in US
- 1970 Elizabeth Hoisington & Anna Mae Mays named first female US generals
- 1970 Philip Lafayette Gibbs and James Earl Green killed at Jackson State University by police during student protests.
- 1970 South-Africa excluded from Olympic play
- 1971 Number one hit on UK music charts - Dawn - Knock Three Times
- 1971 Radio Nordsee International's ship bombed
- 1972 Bus plunges into Nile River killing 50 pilgrims (Minia Egypt)
- 1972 George Wallace shot & left paralyzed by Arthur Bremer in Laurel MD
- 1972 In Laurel, Maryland, Arthur Bremer shoots and paralyzes Alabama Governor George Wallace while Wallace is campaigning to be American President.
- 1972 Ryukyu Island & Daito Island returned to Japan after 27 years of US control
- 1972 The island of Okinawa, under U.S. military governance since its conquest in 1945, reverts to Japanese control.
- 1974 Ma'alot, Israel massacre - a total of 31 people, including hostage takers, are killed.
- 1974 Mail truck terrorists take school in Maälot, 30 killed
- 1975 Emmy 2nd Daytime Award & Emmy News & Documentaries Award presentation
- 1976 "Fonz Song" by Heyettes hits #91
- 1976 "Kentucky Moonrunner" by Cledus Maggard hits #85
- 1976 Emmy Creative Arts Award presentation
- 1978 Lagumot Harris, having only been elected President less than a month before, is replaced as the leader of the republic of Nauru. He is succeeded by Hammer DeRoburt.
- 1980 Ottawa agrees to extend natural gas pipeline from Montreal to Quebec City.
- 1980 Shawn Weatherly, Sumter SC, crowned 29th Miss USA/Miss Universe-1980
- 1981 Soyuz 40 carries 2 cosmonauts (1 Rumanian) to Salyut 6
- 1982 Number one hit on UK music charts - Nicole - A Little Peace
- 1983 Madison Hotel (Boston) destroyed by implosion
- 1984 Visitor posting - the most super native american in the world named Stephanopolis was born - USA
- 1986 Visitor posting - May 15, 1986 Tiya Khuranna was born - India
- 1988 Moscow begins withdrawing its 115,000 troops in Afghánistán
- 1989 Maxwell House coffee runs ads during "Roe vs Wade" movie despite threat of boycott by right to lifers
- 1989 Soviet President Gorbachev in Beijing for first Sino-Soviet summit in 30 years
- 1989 The Golden Toad was last seen due to extinction.
- 1990 "Portrait of Doctor Gachet" by Vincent Van Gogh sold for $825 million
- 1990 Mona Grudt, 19, of Norway, crowned 39th Miss Universe
- 1990 Portrait of Doctor Gachet by Vincent van Gogh is sold for a record $82.5 million, the most expensive painting at the time.
- 1991 Angry independent truckers close down 20 km of Highway 401 near Toronto; cause huge traffic jams.
- 1991 Defense releases docs claiming Noriega was "CIA's man in Panama"
- 1991 Edith Cresson becomes France's first female premier
- 1991 Manchester United wins 31th Europe Cup II at Rotterdam
- 1991 Nepal premier Bhattarai resigns
- 1992 Colombo '92 opens in Genoa Italy
- 1992 In Kyrgyzstan a 6.2 quake resulted in three people killed, 5,500 houses completely destroyed and more than 4,000 houses damaged
- 1992 New York department store chain Alexanders announces closing of all 11 stores
- 1992 Visitor posting - Tyler Canterbury born - USA
- 1992 Visitor posting - May 15 1992 Nick Cesare born to Pete & Melody
- 1993 Jane Seymour & James Kesch marry
- 1996 Visitor posting - kevin dickson was born - USA
- 1996 Visitor posting - May 15, 1996 Daniela born to Jorge and Dorelis an aquaintence named Sebastian is also born!
- 2004 The largest known prime number at the time of its discovery, 224036583 1, is found by Josh Findley and the GIMPS collaborative effort.
- 2007 David Bain is released on bail, following a Privy Council ruling that a retrial should be undertaken on the murder of his four family members.
- 2008 Visitor posting - I, Karamba Bayo received my USA social security number
- 2009 Visitor posting - May 15 2009 Alley W's 16th birthday
- 2010 Visitor posting - Dr Jitender Weds Dr Neha - India [email protected]
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