[The tragedy of Van Gogh's life is nothing compared to the circumstances surrounding some of his works... While the private purchase and subsequent removal of this painting from its rightful place (namely, on public view) was bad enough, having changed hands at least twice since 1990 - it's thought to have been bought and sold by Austrian businessman Wolfgang Flöttl - its whereabouts are currently unknown.]
1252 - Pope
Innocent IV issued a papal bull entitled
Ad exstirpanda, authorizing the torture of
heretics during the
Medieval Inquisition - which is what Jesus would have done, I'm sure.
1514 -
Jodocus Badius Ascensius published
Christiern Pedersen's Latin version of
Saxo Grammaticus'
Gesta Danorum, making it the oldest known version of the work which chronicles Denmark's past from prehistory to the 12th Century.
1525 - The
Battle of Frankenhausen ended the
Peasants' War, when the mercenary troops of the Landgrave
Philipp I of Hesse and
George, Duke of Saxony were defeated by a rag tag group commanded by
Anabaptist leader
Thomas Müntzer.
1567 -
Mary Queen of Scots married her third and worst husband
James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, in the Great Hall at the
Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.
1602 -
Bartholomew Gosnold became the first European to see
Cape Cod; not only did he name it, he also named
Martha's Vineyard after his daughter. Gosnold's voyage was written about by one of the adventurers who sailed onboard the barque
Concord with him,
John Brereton.
1776 - In an event considered to have prompted the
American Revolution the
Virginia Convention instructed its delegation to the
Continental Congress - which was led by
Richard Henry Lee - to propose a
resolution of independence from Great Britain, paving the way for the
Declaration of Independence.
1869 -
Susan B. Anthony and
Elizabeth Cady Stanton formed the
National Woman Suffrage Association in New York City.
1905 -
Las Vegas was founded when 44.5 hectares (110 acres) of what later would become downtown - owned by the
San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad - were auctioned off.
1918 - The
Finnish Civil War - between the
Social Democrats led by the
People's Deputation of Finland (supported by
Bolshevist Russia and known as the 'Reds') and the conservative forces of the
Senate, (supported by the
German Empire and commonly called the 'Whites') - ended; in the end, victory went to the Whites, but it was to be short-lived. Following the collapse of the German Empire in November 1918 the country became a sovereign republic.
1919 - The
Winnipeg General Strike began; by 11AM virtually the entire working population of the city - as many as 35,000 -
had walked off the job.
1932 - During the
May 15 Incident - an attempted coup by radical, ultranationalist elements within the Japanese military - Prime Minister
Inukai Tsuyoshi was assassinated; some historians view this event as part of the larger
League of Blood Incident, in which Finance Minister
Inoue Junnosuke and businessman
Takuma Dan were killed ten weeks earlier.
1935 - The
Moscow Metro was opened to public.
1941 -
New York Yankees center fielder
Joe DiMaggio began a record-breaking 56-game hitting streak, earning him the sobriquet 'the Yankee Clipper'.
1954 -
The Queen and
Prince Philip returned to the United Kingdom after a six-month tour of the
Commonwealth, making her the first British monarch to circumnavigate the globe. Having covered
43,618 miles by land, sea, and air the royal yacht
HMY Britannia sailed triumphantly up the Thames, under
Tower Bridge, and into the
Pool of London; on board with the royal couple were their two children -
Prince Charles and
Princess Anne - as well as Prime Minister
Winston Churchill, who'd come aboard the previous night. Docking at the
Tower of London, they were joined by the
Queen Mother and
Princess Margaret for the short jaunt to Westminster where, following a carriage ride to
Buckingham Palace, they then made four appearances on the balcony to rapturous applause, the last at 11 PM.
1955 - The first successful ascent of
Makalu - the world's fifth highest mountain, located near
Mount Everest on the border between Nepal and Tibet - was made by French mountaineers by
Lionel Terray and
Jean Couzy.
1957 - Britain
tested its first H-bomb high above
Christmas Island, in the South Pacific.
1972 -
Arthur Bremer shot Alabama Governor
George Wallace four times at a campaign stop in Maryland during Wallace's bid for the Presidency, permanently paralyzing him from the waist down. Bremer eventually served 35 years of a 63 year sentence - a sentence which was reduced to 53 years on appeal; he was released from prison in November 2007, whereas Wallace was only released from his own prison when he died in September 1998.
1990 - Vincent van Gogh's Portrait of Doctor Gachet was sold to Japanese businessman Ryoei Saito for a record $82.5 million, making it the world's most expensive painting at the time.
1991 -
Edith Cresson became France's first female
prime minister.
*
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