1345 – According to scholars at the University of Paris, the Black Death, from what they call “a triple conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter and Mars in the 40th degree of Aquarius, occurring on the 20th of March 1345″
1602 – United Dutch East Indian Company (VOC) forms
1800 – Alessandro Volta reports his discovery of the electric battery in a letter to Joseph Banks, president of the Royal Society of London
1815 – Napoleon enters Paris after escape from Elba, begins 100-day rule
1900 – US Secretary of State John Hay announces that all nations to whom he sent notes calling for an ‘open door’ policy in China have essentially accepted his stand
1933 – Dachau the first Nazi concentration camp, is completed
1995 Members of the Japanese cult Aum Shinrikyo release sarin gas on three lines of the Tokyo subway, killing 13 people and injuring over 1,000
1995 – Several packages of deadly sarin gas are set off in the Tokyo subway system killing twelve people and injuring over 5,000.
1996 – UK admits humans can catch CJD (Mad Cow Disease)
2000 – Pope John Paul II visits Holy Land – Jordan, Israel, Palestine
2003 – A US-led coalition launches a ground invasion of Iraq after an ultimatum for Saddam Hussein and his sons to leave Iraq expires
2004 – Stephen Harper wins the leadership of the newly created Conservative Party of Canada, becoming the party’s first leader.
2012 – 50 people are killed and 240 injured in a wave of terror attacks across 10 cities in Iraq
2016 – Barack Obama becomes the first US President to visit Cuba since 1928, arriving for a 3 day tour.
2019 – Four men arrested in South Korea for secretly filming 1,600 hotel guests and selling the footage via a website
2019 – A woman who can smell Parkinson’s disease has helped researchers identify molecules on the skin of people with the disease in Manchester, England
2020 – India hangs four men for 2012 gang rape and murder of woman on a bus in New Delhi, country’s first hanging since 2013
2020 – Smoke from Australian bushfires killed more people than the fires – 417 vs 33 according to new study published in “Medical Journal of Australia”
Births & Deaths:
1957 – American filmmaker Spike Lee, who was known for his uncompromising and provocative approach to controversial subject matter, was born.
Film:
1952 – 24th Academy Awards: “An American in Paris”, Humphrey Bogart & Vivian Leigh win
Music: 1969 – John Lennon, a leader of the seminal British rock group the Beatles, married Japanese artist and musician Yoko Ono in Gibraltar.
1991 – Michael Jackson signs $65M 6 album deal with Sony records
Sports:
1973 – Roberto Clemente elected to Hall of Fame, 11 weeks after his death in a plane crash.
