Historical Events
- 1787 First Fleet headed by Arthur Phillip sets sails with 11 ships of convicts for Botany Bay, Australia [1]
- 1830 Republic of Ecuador is founded, with Juan Jose Flores as president
- 1940 Winston Churchill says "I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat" in his first speech as Prime Minister to British House of Commons
- 1981 Pope John Paul II is shot and critically wounded by Turkish gunman Mehmet Ali Ağca in St Peter's Square, Vatican City
- 1989 Approximately 2,000 students begin a hunger strike in Tiananmen Square, China to force a dialogue with the government ahead of a visit by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev
- Historical Events Today Events in 2024
Today in Film & TV
- 2004 The final episode of "Frasier" on NBC is watched by 33 million people
Today in Music
- 1767 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's first opera "Apollo et Hyacinthus", written when he was 11 years old, premieres in Salzburg
Today in Sport
- 1950 First ever race of the Formula 1 World Drivers Championship is run at Silverstone, England and won by Giuseppe Farina of italy in an Alfa Romeo
Famous Birthdays
- Charles Watson-Wentworth
1730 - 1782 - Arthur Sullivan
1842 - 1900 - Witold Pilecki
1901 - 1948 - Joe Louis
1914 - 1981 - Jim Jones
1931 - 1978 - Scott Morrison
56th Birthday
Celebrity Birthdays
- Stevie Wonder
74th Birthday - Dennis Rodman
63rd Birthday - Stephen Colbert
60th Birthday - Lena Dunham
38th Birthday - Robert Pattinson
38th Birthday - Morgan Wallen
31st Birthday
Fun Fact About Today
22-year-old UK blogger halts spread of global ransomware cyber-attack by accidentally identifying "kill switch"
Famous Weddings
- 1917 American missionary and writer Pearl Sydenstricker (24) weds fellow American missionary and economist John Lossing Buck (26), becoming Pearl S. Buck; divorce in 1935
- 1922 "Latin Lover" silent actor Rudolph Valentino (27) weds film costume and set designer Natacha Rambova (25) in Mexicali, Mexico; divorce in 1925
- 1932 Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich (25) weds Russian physicist Nina Varsar (23), mostly until her death in 1954