Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/October
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| An archive of historical anniversaries that appeared on the Main Page 2008 day arrangement |
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October 1: National Day in the People's Republic of China (1949); Independence Day in Cyprus and Nigeria (both 1960), Tuvalu (1978) and Palau (1994)
- 331 BC – Alexander the Great of Macedon defeated Darius III of Persia at the Battle of Gaugamela, and was subsequently crowned "King of Asia" in a ceremony in Arbela.
- 1890 – At the urging of preservationist John Muir, the United States Congress established Yosemite National Park in California.
- 1949 – Chinese Civil War: Chinese Communist Party leader Mao Zedong proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic of China.
- 1958 – NASA began operations, replacing the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA).
- 1964 – Tōkaidō Shinkansen, the first Shinkansen line of high-speed railways in Japan, opened. (0 Series Shinkansen train pictured)
More events: September 30 – October 1 – October 2
October 2: Eid ul-Fitr begins at sunset (Islam, 2008); Independence Day in Guinea; Gandhi Jayanti in India; International Day of Non-Violence
- 1535 – French explorer Jacques Cartier sailed along the St. Lawrence River and reached an Iroquois fort on the island now known as Montreal.
- 1835 – Mexican dragoons dispatched to disarm settlers at Gonzales, Texas encountered stiff resistance from a Texian militia in the Battle of Gonzales, the first armed engagement of the Texas Revolution.
- 1928 – Saint Josemaría Escrivá (pictured) founded Opus Dei, a worldwide organization of lay members of the Roman Catholic Church.
- 1941 – World War II: Nazi German forces began Operation Typhoon, an all-out offensive against Moscow, starting the three-month long Battle of Moscow.
- 1992 – In response to a prison riot, military police stormed the Carandiru Penitentiary in São Paulo, Brazil, killing at least 100 prisoners.
More events: October 1 – October 2 – October 3
October 3: National Foundation Day in South Korea; German Unity Day
- 1283 – Dafydd ap Gruffydd the Prince of Wales, the last native ruler of Wales to resist English domination, was executed by drawing and quartering.
- 1918 – World War I: Following his armed forces' defeat to the Allied Powers, Tsar Ferdinand I of Bulgaria abdicated in favor of his son Boris III.
- 1929 – King Alexander I renamed the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes as the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, and changed its subdivisions from the 33 oblasts to nine new banovinas.
- 1990 – German reunification (reunited country flag pictured): The five re-established German states (Bundesländer) of East Germany formally joined West Germany.
- 1993 – Soldiers from Malaysian, Pakistani and U.S. armed forces attempted to capture Somalian warlord Mohamed Farrah Aidid in the Battle of Mogadishu.
More events: October 2 – October 3 – October 4
October 4: Independence Day in Lesotho (1966); Feast Day of St. Francis of Assisi (Catholicism); World Animal Day
- 1830 – Belgian Revolution: A provisional government in Brussels declared the creation of the independent and neutral state of Belgium, in revolt against the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.
- 1910 – Manuel II, the last King of Portugal, fled to Gibraltar when a revolution erupted in Lisbon and his palace was shelled. The Portuguese First Republic was proclaimed the next day.
- 1957 – Soviet spacecraft Sputnik 1 (pictured), the first artificial satellite to orbit the Earth, was launched by an R-7 rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome near Tyuratam, Kazakh SSR.
- 1985 – Software developer Richard Stallman founded the Free Software Foundation to support the free software movement.
- 1993 – Russian Constitutional Crisis: Tanks bombarded the White House in Moscow while demonstrators against President Boris Yeltsin rallied outside.
More events: October 3 – October 4 – October 5
October 5: Republic Day in Portugal (1910)
- 1877 – After battling the U.S. Army for more than three months, retreating over 1,000 miles across Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana, and enduring a five-day siege, Chief Joseph (pictured) and his Nez Perce band finally surrendered.
- 1908 – Prince Ferdinand became the first Tsar of Bulgaria since the Ottoman invasion in the 14th century.
- 1930 – The British airship R101 crashed in France in route to India on its maiden voyage, killing 48 passengers and crew.
- 1970 – Members of the Front de Libération du Québec kidnapped British diplomat James Cross, sparking the October Crisis in Montreal, Canada.
- 1986 – British newspaper The Sunday Times published former nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu's story revealing details of Israel's nuclear capability.
More events: October 4 – October 5 – October 6
October 6: Labour Day in New South Wales, Australian Capital Territory and South Australia (2008); German-American Day in the United States
- 105 BC – The Cimbri and the Teutons inflicted a major defeat on the Roman Republic in the Battle of Arausio.
- 1927 – The first successful feature sound film The Jazz Singer, starring Al Jolson, was released.
- 1973 – Egyptian troops under President Anwar Sadat (pictured) crossed the Suez Canal and destroyed the fortified Israeli Bar Lev Line, starting the Yom Kippur War.
- 1976 – Premier Hua Guofeng ordered the arrest of the Gang of Four and their associates, putting an end to the Cultural Revolution in China.
- 1995 – In an article published by the scientific journal Nature, astronomers Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz reported the discovery of a planet orbiting 51 Pegasi as the first known extrasolar planet around a main-sequence star.
More events: October 5 – October 6 – October 7
October 7: Double Ninth Festival in the Chinese calendar (2008); Feast Day of St. Osyth
- 1571 – The Ottoman Empire was decisively defeated by the Christian West for the first time, as a multinational fleet led by Don John of Austria crushed the Turkish navy near the Gulf of Corinth in the Battle of Lepanto (painting by Paolo Veronese pictured).
- 1763 – Following Great Britain's acquisition of New France after the end of the Seven Years' War, King George III issued a Royal Proclamation closing most of this land to the colonists of the Thirteen Colonies.
- 1959 – Soviet spacecraft Luna 3 captured the first photographs of the far side of the Moon.
- 1985 – The Mediterranean ocean liner Achille Lauro was hijacked by Palestine Liberation Front terrorists while sailing from Alexandria to Port Said within Egypt.
- 2003 – California recall: Californians voted to recall Governor Gray Davis from office and elected Arnold Schwarzenegger from a list of 135 candidates.
More events: October 6 – October 7 – October 8
October 8: Yom Kippur begins at sunset (Judaism, 2008); Independence Day in Croatia
- 451 – The Council of Chalcedon, the fourth ecumenical council in Christianity, opened. It repudiated the Eutychian doctrine of monophysitism, and set forth the Chalcedonian Creed.
- 1600 – San Marino, the world's oldest constitutional republic, adopted its written constitution.
- 1871 – Two historic fires, the Great Chicago Fire (artist's rendering pictured) and Wisconsin's Peshtigo Fire, broke out in the U.S. Midwest.
- 1879 – The Chilean Navy defeated the Peruvian Navy in the Battle of Angamos, a decisive encounter during the War of the Pacific.
- 2005 – A major earthquake centred in Kashmir killed over 74,500 people and injured at least 106,000 others in Pakistan, India, and Afghanistan.
More events: October 7 – October 8 – October 9
October 9: Independence Day in Uganda (1962); Hangul Day in South Korea; Leif Erikson Day in the United States
- 1514 – Mary Tudor (pictured), sister of Henry VIII of England, became queen consort of France.
- 1831 – John Capodistria, the Greek head of state, was assassinated in Nafplion.
- 1919 – The Black Sox Scandal: The Cincinnati Reds won the World Series Major League Baseball championship, 5 games to 3, over "Shoeless Joe" Jackson and the Chicago White Sox, many of whom were later found to have lost intentionally.
- 1942 – World War II: American forces defeated the Japanese at the Third Battle of the Matanikau in Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, avenging the Japanese victory at the Second Battle of the Matanikau a couple of weeks earlier.
- 1962 – Uganda became independent from the United Kingdom, with Milton Obote as the first prime minister.
More events: October 8 – October 9 – October 10
October 10: National Day in Fiji (1970); Double Ten Day in the Republic of China
- 732 – Battle of Tours (pictured): Charles Martel and the Franks defeated a large Andalusian Muslim army led by Abd er Rahman near Tours and Poitiers, stopping the northward advance of Islam from the Iberian Peninsula.
- 1780 – The Great Hurricane of 1780: One of the deadliest Atlantic hurricanes on record struck the Caribbean, killing at least 22,000 people over the next several days.
- 1911 – The Xinhai Revolution began with the Wuchang Uprising, marking the beginning of the collapse of the Qing Dynasty in China.
- 1982 – St. Maximilian Kolbe, who had volunteered to die in place of a stranger in the Nazi concentration camp of Auschwitz in Poland, was canonized by the Roman Catholic Church.
- 1987 – After two military coups in Fiji led by Sitiveni Rabuka, the military government revoked the constitution and declared the country a republic.
More events: October 9 – October 10 – October 11
October 11: National Coming Out Day and General Pulaski Memorial Day in the United States
- 1852 – The University of Sydney, Australia's oldest university, was inaugurated in Sydney two years after the New South Wales Legislative Council established it with the passage of the University of Sydney Act.
- 1865 – The Morant Bay rebellion, led by Paul Bogle and George William Gordon, began in Jamaica, but it eventually was brutally suppressed by Governor Edward John Eyre.
- 1942 – World War II: At the Battle of Cape Esperance on the northwest coast of Guadalcanal, American ships intercepted and defeated a Japanese fleet on their way to reinforce troops on the island.
- 1954 – Ho Chi Minh (pictured) and the Viet Minh took control of North Vietnam under the terms of the Geneva Accords which saw the end of the First Indochina War and French colonisation.
- 1962 – Pope John XXIII convened the Second Vatican Council, the first Roman Catholic ecumenical council in 92 years.
More events: October 10 – October 11 – October 12
October 12: Hispanic Day in Spain; Day of Indigenous Resistance in Venezuela; Our Lady Aparecida's Day and Children's Day in Brazil
- 1492 – Christopher Columbus made landfall in the Caribbean, believing he had reached East Asia.
- 1915 – A German firing squad executed British nurse Edith Cavell (pictured) for helping Allied soldiers to escape occupied Belgium.
- 1928 – An iron lung medical ventilator, designed by Philip Drinker and colleagues at Children's Hospital, Boston, was used for the first time in the treatment of polio victims.
- 1984 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army failed in its attempt to assassinate British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and most of her cabinet in the Brighton hotel bombing.
- 2002 – A series of bombs planted by Islamist militant group Jemaah Islamiyah exploded in Bali, Indonesia, killing 202 people and injuring a further 209.
More events: October 11 – October 12 – October 13
October 13: Sukkot begins at sunset (Judaism, 2008); Columbus Day in the United States (2008); Health and Sports Day in Japan (2008); Thanksgiving in Canada (2008)
- 54 – Claudius was fatally poisoned by his wife Agrippina the Younger, making her 16-year-old son Nero the next Roman Emperor.
- 1773 – French astronomer Charles Messier discovered the Whirlpool Galaxy (pictured), an interacting, grand-design spiral galaxy located at a distance of approximately 23 million light-years in the constellation Canes Venatici.
- 1843 – The Independent Order of B'nai B'rith, the oldest continually-operating Jewish service organization in the world, was founded in New York City.
- 1917 – An estimated 100,000 people in the Cova da Iria fields near Fátima, Portugal witnessed "The Miracle of the Sun".
- 1943 – World War II: With a new government led by General Pietro Badoglio, parts of Italy switched sides to the Allies and declared war on the Axis Powers.
More events: October 12 – October 13 – October 14
October 14: Teachers' Day in Poland
- 1773 – The first recorded ministry of education, the Commission of National Education, was formed in Poland.
- 1806 – Battle of Jena-Auerstedt: French forces under Napoleon secure a decisive victory over the Prussians, effectively eliminating Prussia from the War of the Fourth Coalition after only nineteen days of fighting.
- 1926 – The first book featuring English author A. A. Milne's fictional bear Winnie-the-Pooh was first published.
- 1947 - Flying at an altitude of 45,000 ft (13.7 km) in an experimental Bell X-1 rocket-powered aircraft, American test pilot Chuck Yeager (pictured) became the first person to break the sound barrier.
- 1981 – Hosni Mubarak was elected President of Egypt, one week after Anwar Sadat was assassinated.
More events: October 13 – October 14 – October 15
October 15: White Cane Safety Day in the United States
- 1582 – Spain, Portugal, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, and Italy became the first countries to replace the Julian calendar with the Gregorian calendar.
- 1917 – Dutch exotic dancer Mata Hari (pictured) was executed by a firing squad for spying for Germany.
- 1987 – The Great Storm of 1987 hit France and England, killing at least 23 people.
- 1989 – Playing for the Los Angeles Kings against his old team, the Edmonton Oilers, Canadian professional ice hockey player Wayne Gretzky broke Gordie Howe's National Hockey League record of 1,850 career points.
- 2003 – Chinese space program: Shenzhou 5, China's first manned space mission was launched, carrying astronaut Yang Liwei.
More events: October 14 – October 15 – October 16
- 456 – Magister militum Ricimer defeated Emperor Avitus at Piacenza and became master of the Western Roman Empire.
- 1813 – The Sixth Coalition attacked Napoleon and the First French Empire in the Battle of Leipzig, the largest conflict in the Napoleonic Wars with over 500,000 troops involved.
- 1843 – William Rowan Hamilton first wrote down the fundamental formula for quaternions, carving the equation into the side of Broom Bridge (pictured) in Cabra, Dublin, Ireland.
- 1940 – World War II: Nazi Governor-General Hans Frank established the Warsaw Ghetto, the largest Jewish ghetto in occupied Poland.
- 1978 – Karol Józef Wojtyła, a cardinal from Kraków, Poland, became Pope John Paul II, the first non-Italian pope since the 16th century and the first ever from a Slavic country.
More events: October 15 – October 16 – October 17
October 17: International Day for the Eradication of Poverty
- 1346 – King David II of Scotland led an invasion of England during the Hundred Years' War, but was captured in the Battle of Neville's Cross.
- 1604 – Kepler's Star: German astronomer Johannes Kepler (pictured) observed an exceptionally bright star which had suddenly appeared in the constellation Ophiuchus.
- 1860 – The Open Championship, the oldest of the four major championships in men's golf, was first played at Prestwick Golf Club in Prestwick, South Ayrshire, Scotland.
- 1977 – German Autumn: Four days after it was hijacked, Lufthansa Flight 181 landed in Mogadishu, Somalia, where a team of German GSG 9 commandos rescued all remaining hostages on board.
More events: October 16 – October 17 – October 18
October 18: Alaska Day; Feast day of Saint Luke
- 1009 – The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, a Christian church now within the walled Old City of Jerusalem, was destroyed by Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah.
- 1016 – Danish forces led by Canute the Great decisively defeated Edmund Ironside in the Battle of Ashingdon, gaining control over most of the Kingdom of England.
- 1851 – Moby-Dick, a novel by Herman Melville (pictured), was first published as The Whale.
- 1922 – The British Broadcasting Company was founded by a consortium to establish a network of radio transmitters to provide a national broadcasting service in the United Kingdom.
- 1954 – The first commercial transistor radio, the Regency TR-1 by Texas Instruments, was introduced in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA.
More events: October 17 – October 18 – October 19
October 19: Constitution Day in Niue (1974); Mother Teresa Day in Albania
- 202 BC – Proconsul Scipio Africanus of the Roman Republic defeated Hannibal and the Carthaginians in the Battle of Zama, concluding the Second Punic War.
- 1469 – Ferdinand II of Aragon wedded Isabella of Castile (pictured), a marriage that paved the way to the unification of Aragon and Castile into a single country, Spain.
- 1781 – American Revolutionary War: British forces led by Lord Cornwallis officially surrendered to Franco-American forces under George Washington, ending the Siege of Yorktown.
- 1943 – Streptomycin, the first antibiotic remedy for tuberculosis, was first isolated by researchers at Rutgers University.
- 1987 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell by 22.6% on Black Monday, the largest one-day percentage decline in stock market history.
More events: October 18 – October 19 – October 20
October 20: Shemini Atzeret begins at sunset (Judaism, 2008); Birth of the Báb, a holy day in the Bahá'í Faith
- 1740 – Maria Theresa (pictured) assumed the throne of the Habsburg Monarchy in Austria, following the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713.
- 1818 – The United Kingdom and the United States signed the Treaty of 1818, which settled the Canada – United States border on the 49th parallel for most of its length.
- 1827 – An allied British, French, and Russian naval force destroyed a combined Turkish and Egyptian fleet at the Battle of Navarino, a decisive moment in the Greek War of Independence.
- 1941 – World War II: German soldiers began a massacre of thousands of civilians in Kragujevac in Nazi-occupied Serbia.
- 1973 – Queen Elizabeth II, in her capacity as Queen of Australia, formally opened the Sydney Opera House on Bennelong Point in Sydney Harbour.
More events: October 19 – October 20 – October 21
October 21: Simchat Torah begins at sunset (Judaism, 2008); Overseas Chinese Day in Taiwan
- 1600 – Tokugawa Ieyasu defeated the leaders of rival Japanese clans at the Battle of Sekigahara in what is now Sekigahara, Gifu, clearing the path for him to form the Tokugawa shogunate.
- 1805 – Napoleonic Wars: The British Royal Navy led by Lord Nelson defeated Pierre-Charles Villeneuve and his combined French and Spanish navy at the Battle of Trafalgar off the coast of Spain's Cape Trafalgar.
- 1854 – Florence Nightingale (pictured) and a staff of 38 nurses were sent to the Crimean War.
- 1858 – French composer Jacques Offenbach's operetta Orpheus in the Underworld, featuring the can-can, was first performed at the Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens in Paris.
- 1969 – Siad Barre became President after a military coup in Somalia.
More events: October 20 – October 21 – October 22
October 22: International Stuttering Awareness Day
- 1383 – King Ferdinand I of Portugal died without a male heir to the Portuguese throne, resulting in a period of civil war and anarchy.
- 1844 – Millerites, including future members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, were greatly disappointed that Jesus did not return as predicted by American preacher William Miller (pictured).
- 1924 – The educational non-profit organization Toastmasters International was founded at a YMCA in Santa Ana, California.
- 1934 – Pretty Boy Floyd, an American bank robber and alleged killer who was later romanticized by the media, was gunned down by Federal Bureau of Investigation agents near East Liverpool, Ohio.
- 1962 – Cuban Missile Crisis: U.S. President John F. Kennedy announced on television that Soviet nuclear weapons had been discovered in Cuba and that he had ordered a naval "quarantine" of the island nation.
More events: October 21 – October 22 – October 23
October 23: National Day in Hungary (1956); Chulalongkorn Memorial Day in Thailand
- 1642 – The Battle of Edgehill, the first pitched battle of the First English Civil War between the Royalists and the Parliamentarians, was fought to an inconclusive result near Edge Hill and Kineton in southern Warwickshire.
- 1906 – Early flight: Alberto Santos-Dumont (pictured) flew the 14-bis aircraft for 60 metres (200 ft) at a height of two to three metres (10 ft).
- 1955 – Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem defeated Emperor Bao Dai in a fraudulent referendum supervised by his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu on the future of the monarchy in South Vietnam.
- 1956 – The Hungarian Revolution began as a peaceful student demonstration which attracted thousands as it marched through central Budapest to the Parliament building.
- 1983 – Lebanese Civil War: Suicide bombers destroyed two barracks in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 241 U.S. Marines and 58 French paratroopers of the international peacekeeping force.
More events: October 22 – October 23 – October 24
October 24: United Nations Day; Independence Day in Zambia (1964)
- 1260 – The Cathedral of Chartres in Chartres, France (pictured) was dedicated in the presence of King Louis IX.
- 1648 – The second treaty of the Peace of Westphalia, the Treaty of Münster, was signed, ending both the Thirty Years' War and the Dutch Revolt, and officially recognizing the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands and Swiss Confederation as independent states.
- 1929 – The Great Depression: The New York Stock Exchange crashed on "Black Thursday", setting off a chain of bankruptcies and triggering a worldwide economic depression.
- 1945 – The UN Charter, the constitution of the United Nations, entered into force after being ratified by the Republic of China, France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, the United States, and a majority of the other signatories.
- 1960 – A prototype of the Soviet R-16 intercontinental ballistic missile exploded on the launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome near Tyuratam, Kazakh SSR, killing at least 90 people.
More events: October 23 – October 24 – October 25
October 25: Republic Day in Kazakhstan (1990); Retrocession Day in Taiwan; Armed Forces Day in Romania
- 1147 – Reconquista: Forces under King Afonso I of Portugal captured Lisbon from the Moors after a four-month siege in what would be their only success during the Second Crusade.
- 1616 – The Dutch sailing ship Eendracht reached Shark Bay on the western coastline of Australia, as documented on the Hartog Plate etched by explorer Dirk Hartog.
- 1875 – The first performance of the Piano Concerto No. 1 by Tchaikovsky (pictured) is given in Boston, Massachusetts with Hans von Bülow as soloist.
- 1922 – The Third Dáil adopted the Constitution of the Irish Free State, based on the requirements of the Anglo-Irish Treaty establishing the first independent Irish state to be recognised by the British.
- 1971 – The UN General Assembly adopted Resolution 2758, replacing the Republic of China with the People's Republic of China as China's representative at the United Nations.
More events: October 24 – October 25 – October 26
October 26: National Day in Austria (1955); Angam Day in Nauru
- 1597 – Imjin War: About twelve Korean ships commanded by Admiral Yi Sun-sin defeated a large Japanese invasion fleet of at least 300 at the Battle of Myeongnyang in the Myeongnyang Strait.
- 1881 – The Gunfight at the O.K. Corral took place in Tombstone, Arizona, USA between the Wyatt Earp faction and Ike Clanton's gang.
- 1937 – Second Sino-Japanese War: Xie Jinyuan and his 'Lone Battalion' of Chinese soldiers began the Defense of Sihang Warehouse (pictured) against waves of Japanese attackers during the Battle of Shanghai.
- 1944 – World War II: In one of the largest naval battles in modern history, Allied forces defeated the Imperial Japanese Navy at the Battle of Leyte Gulf in the seas surrounding the Philippine island of Leyte.
- 2001 – U.S. President George W. Bush signed the USA PATRIOT Act into law, significantly expanding the authority of U.S. law enforcement agencies in fighting terrorism in the United States and abroad.
More events: October 25 – October 26 – October 27
October 27: Labour Day in New Zealand (2008); Independence Day in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Turkmenistan
- 1553 – Condemned as a heretic for preaching nontrinitarianism and anti-infant baptism, Michael Servetus (pictured) was burned at the stake outside Geneva.
- 1904 – The New York City Subway, one of the most extensive public transportation systems in the world, opened its first underground segment, connecting New York City Hall with Harlem.
- 1958 – General Ayub Khan deposed Iskander Mirza in a bloodless coup d'état to become the second President of Pakistan, less than three weeks after Mirza had appointed him the enforcer of martial law.
- 1961 – NASA launched the first Saturn I rocket, the United States' first dedicated spacecraft designed specifically to launch loads into Earth orbit.
- 1971 – The Democratic Republic of the Congo was renamed Zaire after a Portuguese mispronunciation of the Kikongo word nzere or nzadi, which translates to "the river that swallows all rivers."
More events: October 26 – October 27 – October 28
October 28: Okhi Day in Greece
- 312 – Constantine the Great defeated Maxentius at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge in Rome, leading him to end the Tetrarchy and become the only ruler of the Roman Empire.
- 1886 – In New York Harbor, U.S. President Grover Cleveland dedicated the Statue of Liberty (pictured), a gift from France, to commemorate the centennial of the United States Declaration of Independence.
- 1940 – The Balkans Campaign in World War II: Italy invaded Greece after Greek prime minister Ioannis Metaxas rejected Italian dictator Benito Mussolini's ultimatum demanding the occupation of Greek territory.
- 1954 – The Kingdom of the Netherlands was re-founded as a federacy with the proclamation of the Charter for the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
- 1965 – Nostra Aetate, the "Declaration on the Relation of the Church with Non-Christian Religions" of the Second Vatican Council, was promulgated by Pope Paul VI, absolving the Jews of the killing of Jesus, and calling for increased relations with all non-Christian religions.
More events: October 27 – October 28 – October 29
October 29: Republic Day in Turkey
- 1268 – Conradin, the last Duke of Swabia, was beheaded in Naples after failing to reclaim Sicily for the House of Hohenstaufen from Charles of Anjou.
- 1787 – The opera Don Giovanni, based on the legendary fictional libertine Don Juan and composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (pictured), premiered in the Estates Theatre in Prague.
- 1923 – Mustafa Kemal Atatürk became the first President of the Republic of Turkey, a new nation founded from remnants of the Ottoman Empire.
- 1956 – The Suez Crisis began with Israel invading the Sinai Peninsula and pushing Egyptian forces back toward the Suez Canal.
- 1998 – After more than three decades, 77-year old John Glenn returned to space aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery on STS-95, to study the effects of space flight on the elderly.
More events: October 28 – October 29 – October 30
October 30: Diwali in Hinduism, Sikhism and Jainism (2008)
- 1470 – Richard Neville, the Earl of Warwick, restored Henry VI (pictured) as the King of England during the Wars of the Roses.
- 1938 – The radio drama The War of the Worlds, based on the science fiction novella by English writer H. G. Wells, frightened many listeners in the United States into believing that an actual Martian invasion was in progress.
- 1960 – Surgeon and scientist Michael Woodruff performed the first successful kidney transplant in the United Kingdom at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary.
- 1961 – The Soviet hydrogen bomb Tsar Bomba was detonated over Novaya Zemlya Island in the Arctic Sea as a test. With a yield of around 50 megatons, it was the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated to date.
- 1975 – Prince Juan Carlos became Spain's acting head of state, taking over for the country's ailing dictator General Francisco Franco.
More events: October 29 – October 30 – October 31
October 31: Halloween; Samhain; Reformation Day in Protestantism
- 1517 – According to traditional accounts, Martin Luther (pictured) nailed his 95 Theses onto the door of a church in Wittenberg, Germany, marking the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.
- 1863 – The New Zealand land wars resumed as British forces in New Zealand led by General Duncan Cameron began their Invasion of Waikato along the Waikato River.
- 1922 – Benito Mussolini became Prime Minister of Italy at the age of 39, establishing a coalition government composed of fascists, nationalists, and liberals during his first years in office.
- 1941 – Gutzon Borglum and 400 workers completed the colossal busts of U.S. Presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln at Mount Rushmore.
- 1984 – Indira Gandhi, India's first and to date only female prime minister, was assassinated by two of her own bodyguards after Operation Blue Star on the holy Sikh temple in Amritsar. Riots soon broke out in New Delhi and several other cities throughout the country.
More events: October 30 – October 31 – November 1
Selected anniversaries/On this day archive
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