539 BC – The army of Cyrus the Great of Persia takes Babylon
1279 – Nichiren, a Japanese Buddhist monk, founder of Nichiren Buddhism, inscribes the Dai-Gohonzon
1492 – Christopher Columbus’s expedition makes landfall on a Caribbean island he names San Salvador (likely Watling Island, Bahamas). The explorer believes he has reached East Asia (OS 21 Oct)
1915 – Ford Motor Company under Henry Ford manufactures its 1 millionth automobile at the River Rouge plant in Detroit
1968 – Equatorial Guinea gained its independence from Spain.
1999 The Day of Six Billion: the proclaimed 6 billionth living human in the world is born
2000 – While preparing to refuel in the Yemeni port of Aden, the USS Cole, a U.S. naval destroyer, was attacked by suicide bombers associated with al-Qaeda; 17 sailors were killed and 39 wounded.
2001 – The centennial Nobel Prize for Peace was awarded to the United Nations and the organization’s secretary-general, Kofi Annan.
2002 – Terrorists explode two bombs in Bali’s nightclub district killing 202 and injuring 209 mostly foreign tourists
2008 – Anna Kournikova and Andy Roddick defeat Martina Navratilova and Jesse Levine in a match for charity, raising over $400,000 for the Elton John AIDS Foundation and Atlanta AIDS Partnership Fund
2017 – Plague outbreak in Madagascar kills 57, with 684 cases so far reported by WHO
Births & Deaths:
1866 – Ramsay MacDonald, the first Labour Party prime minister of the United Kingdom—in the Labour governments of 1924 and 1929–31 and in the national coalition government of 1931–35—was born.
1915 – During World War I, English nurse Edith Cavell was executed for assisting Allied soldiers in escaping from German-occupied Belgium.
1998 – American college student Matthew Shepard died in Fort Collins, Colorado, several days after being beaten by two men and left in the cold in Laramie, Wyoming; Shepard’s homosexuality was believed to have motivated the attack, and his death contributed to the expansion of federal hate-crime legislation.
1999 – American basketball player Wilt Chamberlain, who was considered one of the greatest offensive players in the history of the game, died at age 63.
Film & TV:
1960 – Japanese politician Inejiro Asanuma is assassinated with a sword during a televised debate live on TV by 17-year old nationalist Otoya Yamaguchi
Music:
1966 – Jimi Hendrix Experience forms with Jimi Hendrix, Noel Redding & Mitch Mitchell
Sport:
1968 – IXX Summer Olympic Games open at Mexico City, Mexico; first Olympics in Latin America
