Today in History, 14/10

Highlights in history on this date:

1066 - Normans under William the Conqueror defeat English at Battle of Hastings.

1586 - Mary, Queen of Scots, goes on trial in England, accused of conspiring against Queen Elizabeth I. (Mary was beheaded the following February.)

1705 - The English navy captures Barcelona in the War of the Spanish Succession.

1806 - Napoleon Bonaparte defeats Prussia at Jena and Saxony at Auerstadt.

1824 - Publication of The Australian, the first privately published paper in the colony until its demise in 1848.

1854 - The world's first recorded baby show is held at Springfield, Ohio, in the US.

1912 - Theodore Roosevelt, campaigning for the US presidency, is shot in the chest in Milwaukee. He is saved by his thick coat and a bundle of paper in his breast pocket and goes ahead with a scheduled speech.

1913 - Britain's worst mining disaster occurs as the result of an explosion at the Universal Colliery in Glamorgan, Wales, killing 439.

1933 - Germany leaves disarmament conference and League of Nations.

1939 - British battleship Royal Oak is sunk in Scapa Flow with loss of 800 lives in World War II.

1944 - German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel commits suicide rather than face execution for allegedly conspiring against Adolf Hitler.

1947 - Air Force test pilot Charles "Chuck" Yeager becomes the first person to break the sound barrier over Edwards Air Force Base in California.

1959 - Tasmanian-born film star Errol Flynn dies suddenly aged 50 in Vancouver, British Columbia.

1964 - US civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr is named winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

1968 - First live telecast from manned US spacecraft is transmitted from Apollo 7.

1973 - Sanya Thammasak, university administrator, is named premier of Thailand after violent clashes between troops and students.

1977 - Popular American singer Bing Crosby collapses and dies after a game of golf near Madrid, aged 73.

1988 - Yugoslav government announces wage increases to offset unpopular austerity program.

1990 -US composer-conductor Leonard Bernstein dies in New York at age 72.

1991 - Burmese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi wins Nobel Peace Prize.

1992 - Russia's worst serial killer, Andrei Chikatilo, is convicted of mutilating and killing 52 women and children.

1994 - Kidnapped Israeli soldier Nachshon Waxman is killed when Israeli commandos raid hideout of Islamic militants in Jerusalem.

1995 - A judge orders Italy's former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi to stand trial on corruption charges.

1996 - US pop singer Madonna gives birth to a daughter, Lourdes Maria Ciccone Leon.

1997 - Novelist Harold Robbins dies in California, aged 81.

2001 - President George W Bush sternly rejects a Taliban offer to discuss handing over Osama bin Laden to a third country.

2004 - Bosnian Serbs acknowledge their forces killed more than 7000 Muslims in Srebrenica in 1995, in what was seen as Europe's worst atrocity since World War II.

2005 - English actor Daniel Craig is named as the new James Bond, ending months of speculation over who would take over from Pierce Brosnan.

2006 - The UN Security Council votes unanimously to impose sanctions on North Korea for its claimed nuclear test, declaring that its action posed "a clear threat to international peace and security".

2008 - The federal government announces a $10.4 billion stimulus spending package to prevent the economy sliding into recession.

2010 - The US endorses fragile Afghan efforts to negotiate peace with the Taliban, backing off its prior stance that talks with the Taliban were premature until the war is all but won.

2012 - Extreme athlete Felix Baumgartner lands gracefully on earth after a 24-mile jump from the stratosphere.

2014 - Darwin is shaken by a magnitude 5.3 earthquake in Indonesia's Banda Sea.

2015 - Pope Francis asks for forgiveness for recent sex scandals that have shocked the Vatican - an apparent reference to two cases of priests and gay sex revealed that month.

2016 - A homeless Australian man is arrested in the grounds of supermodel Miranda Kerr's home in California after he allegedly jumped the fence in Malibu and stabbed a security guard in the eye.

2017 - British police say they have charged Kate Middleton's uncle with assault after a late-night altercation in a London street.

Today's Birthdays:

Eamon de Valera, Irish statesman (1882-1975); Dwight D Eisenhower, US general and 34th president (1890-1969); Lillian Gish, US actress (1896-1993); Sir Roger Moore, English actor (1927-2017); Mobutu Sese Seko, president of Zaire (1930-1997); Farah Pahlavi, former empress of Iran (1938-); Ralph Lauren, US fashion designer (1939-); Sir Cliff Richard, British singer (1940-); Justin Hayward, British singer-musician of The Moody Blues fame (1946-); Beth Daniel, US golfer (1956-); Pete Murray, Australian singer-songwriter (1969-); Floyd Landis, US cyclist (1975-); Usher, US singer (1978-); Mia Wasikowska, Australian actress (1989-).

Thought For Today:

It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness - Leo Tolstoy, Russian author (1828-1910).

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