October 29 - Under Water

Under Water

This Day In History

539 BC

Cyrus the Great enters the city of Babylon, detains Nabonidus and ends the Babylonian captivity. He gives the Jews permission to return to Yehud province and to rebuild the Temple; but most Jews choose to remain in Babylon.

1618

English adventurer, writer, and courtier Sir Walter Raleigh is beheaded for allegedly conspiring against James I of England.

1675

Leibniz makes the first use of the long s (∫) as a symbol of the integral in calculus.

1787

Mozart's opera Don Giovanni receives its first performance in Prague.

1863

Eighteen countries meet in Geneva and agree to form the International Red Cross.

1886

The first ticker-tape parade takes place in New York City when office workers spontaneously throw ticker tape into the streets as the Statue of Liberty is dedicated.

1921

The Harvard University football team loses to Centre College, ending a 25 game winning streak. This is considered one of the biggest upsets in college football.

1929

The New York Stock Exchange crashes in what will be called the Crash of '29 or "Black Tuesday", ending the Great Bull Market of the 1920s and beginning the Great Depression.

1964

A collection of irreplaceable gems, including the 565 carat (113 g) Star of India, is stolen by a group of thieves (among them Jack "Murph the Surf" Murphy) from the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.

1969

The first-ever computer-to-computer link is established on ARPANET, the precursor to the Internet.

1991

The American Galileo spacecraft makes its closest approach to 951 Gaspra, becoming the first probe to visit an asteroid.

Famous Birthdays

1704
John Byng, British admiral (d. 1757)
1740

James Boswell, Scottish biographer of Samuel Johnson (d. 1795)

1861

Andrei Ryabushkin, Russian painter (d. 1904)

1891

Fanny Brice, American singer (d. 1951)

1906

Fredric Brown, American science fiction and mystery writer (d. 1972)

1921

Bill Mauldin, American cartoonist (d. 2003)

1938

Ralph Bakshi, American cartoonist

1944

Denny Laine, English musician (Moody Blues, Ginger Baker's Air Force, Wings)

1948

Kate Jackson, American actress

1957

Dan Castellaneta, American voice actor

1967

Rufus Sewell, English actor