680 – Al-Hussein (Al-Ḥusayn ibn) and his followers killed at Karbala by army of Yazid, the Umayyad caliph, on the way to Kufa
1780 – Great Hurricane of 1780 kills 20,000 to 30,000 in the Caribbean, hitting Barbados first. Atlantic’s deadliest recorded hurricane.
1845 – To improve the then-unsatisfactory methods of instructing midshipmen, George Bancroft—historian, educator, and secretary of the navy—founded the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, on this day in 1845.
1954 – Ho Chi Minh enters Hanoi after withdrawal of French troops
1957 – A fire at the Windscale nuclear plant in Cumbria, England becomes the world’s first major nuclear accident
1970 – Fiji gained independence from Great Britain.
1978 – British pop music magazine “Smash Hits” first published
1982 – Pope John Paul II canonizes Rev Maximilian Kolbe, who volunteered to die in place of another inmate at Auschwitz concentration camp, a saint
2005 – Negotiations between the CDU/CSU and SPD in Germany conclude with the two parties agreeing to form a grand coalition with Angela Merkel as chancellor after both parties lost seats in the 2005 German federal election
2010 – The Netherlands Antilles—formerly an autonomous part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands consisting of a group of five islands in the Caribbean Sea—was officially dissolved.
2014 – Malala Yousafzai & Kailash Satyarthi win the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize
2015 – Bombing at a peace rally in Ankara, Turkey kills at least 95, injures 200
2018 – Hurricane Michael makes landfall near Mexico Beach, Florida, as a category 4 hurricane with winds of 155 mph (250 km/h), going on to kill 27, having killed 15 in Central America
2019 – 3,500 women are the first to be allowed to attend a football match in Iran for a World Cup qualifier in Tehran, since the Islamic revolution
Births & Deaths: 1985 – American filmmaker Orson Welles—who notably wrote, directed, produced, and acted in Citizen Kane (1941), one of the most influential films of all time—died at age 70.
Film & TV:
1954 – 1st National Film Awards (India): “Shyamchi Aai” wins the Golden Lotus
1956 – The American classic Giant had its world premiere; the saga was especially notable for being the last movie of James Dean, who died in a car accident shortly after filming was completed.
1963 – The British spy film From Russia with Love premiered in London; the second film in the James Bond franchise, it is considered one of the best in the series.
2017 – “Thor: Ragnarok” directed by Taika Waititi, starring Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston and Cate Blanchett premieres in Los Angeles, California
Music:
1969 – “Jesus Christ Superstar” soundtrack album by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice is recorded
Sport:
1899 – African-American inventor Issac R. Johnson patents the bicycle frame
