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2005 |
Lebanon's former prime minister, Rafik Hariri, was assassinated. |
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1989 |
Iran's leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, issued a fatwa that called for Muslims to kill the author of The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie as well as all others involved with its publication. The Japanese translator of the book was stabbed to death in 1991 and the Italian and Norwegian publishers of the book were both the victims of assassination attempts. |
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1989 |
The first Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite was launched into orbit. |
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1981 |
A fire at a nightclub in Dublin, Ireland killed 48 people. |
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1980 |
The XIII Winter Olympic Games opened in Lake Placid, New York. |
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1954 |
UEFA (the Union des Associations Europeennes de Football) was founded in Basle, Switzerland. |
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1952 |
The VI Winter Olympic Games opened in Oslo, Norway. |
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1951 |
British footballer, Kevin Keegan, was born in Armthorpe. He is considered as one of the greatest British footballers of all time. |
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1946 |
The Bank of England was nationalized. It had been founded in 1694 by Scottish, William Paterson. |
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1946 |
American actor, Gregory Hines, was born in New York City. He is most remembered for his extraordinary talent in tap dancing. |
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1945 |
The fire bombing of Dresden, during World War II, took place. It was executed by the British Royal Air Force and the United States army air force. The bombing destroyed most of the city and caused the death of a large number of civilians, two facts which led many to label the bombing a war crime. |
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1924 |
The International Business Machines (IBM) company was founded. The company's history actually dates back to 1888 at which time it was known as the Computing Tabulating Recording (CTR) company and was involved in the making of punch card data processing equipment. |
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1913 |
American labour union leader, Jimmy Hoffa, was born in Indiana. He was the president of the 'International Brotherhood of Teamsters' from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s. It is widely believed that he had close ties to the mafia and his disappearance in 1975 has become a story of urban legend in the United States. |
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1912 |
Arizona was admitted to the Union as the 48th US state. |
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1895 |
Oscar Wilde's play, The Importance of Being Earnest, was performed for the first time at the St James's Theatre in London. It was the last play he wrote. |
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1859 |
Oregon was admitted to the Union as the 33rd US state. |
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1779 |
English explorer, James Cook, was killed by the natives of Hawaii. He was one of the great explorers of all time. |
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