This Week In History
September 13, 1990
A physician investigating the transmission of yellow fever was bitten by a mosquito and died of the disease, thus proving that the mosquito was the carrier
1985: The World Health Organisation announced that AIDS had become a worldwide epidemic 2003: Sweden voted emphatically to reject the euro in a referendum
2006: The solar system’s largest dwarf planet, previously designated 2003 UB313, was officially named Eris and its moon was called Dysnomia
2007: The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was adopted by the United Nations The first Body Worlds exhibition opened in Tokyo, featuring human bodies preserved by plastination, in which fluids are drained and replaced by certain plastics 2010: A bill banning the wearing of the Islamic full face veil in public was approved in France
September 14, 1995
1975: Rembrandt’s painting The Nightwatch was slashed with a knife at Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum
2015: At least five European countries reintroduced border controls as the migrant crisis intensified
2019: Oil prices soared after drone attacks on two major oil facilities in Saudi Arabia
September 15, 1830
British MP William Huskisson became the world’s first railway fatality when he was struck by George Stephenson’s train Rocket on its inaugural run
1821: Independence was proclaimed for Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador
1935: Nazi Germany enacted the Nuremberg Laws, which led to all Jews being deprived of citizenship
1950: The UN landing of 75,000 troops at Incheon led to a decisive victory over North Korea during the Korean War
2017: The Cassini spacecraft plunged into Saturn’s atmosphere at the end of a historic 20-year mission
September 16, 1620
Seeking religious freedom, the
Pilgrim Fathers set sail from Plymouth, England, aboard the Mayflower to establish a colony in North America 1810: Miguel Hidalgo called for the end of Spanish rule in Mexico
1884: U.S. ophthalmologist Carl Koller first used cocaine as a local anaesthetic in eye surgery 2018: Kenya’s Eliud Kipchoge set a new marathon world record in Berlin of 2 hours, 1 minute and 39 seconds, shattering the previous mark by almost 1 minute and 20 seconds
September 17, 1683
Dutch biologist Antonie van Leeuwenhoek described seeing living animalcules (bacteria) when he used a microscope to examine plaque found between his teeth
1900: The Federal Commonwealth of Australia was established, uniting six British colonies
2010: A drill reached 33 Chilean miners trapped underground since August 5
2010: BP pumped cement into its Deepwater Horizon oil well to halt the huge spill into the Gulf of Mexico
2013: The video game Grand Theft Auto V earned more than $800 million on its first day of release
September 18, 1970
Jimi Hendrix, widely regarded as one of the most influential guitarists in the history of rock music, died of a drug overdose in London at the age of 27
1995: Pro-democracy campaigners won a clear victory in Hong Kong’s first fully democratic election 2015: Japan’s parliament approved the use of military forces outside Japan for the first time since WW2
2015: Croatia closed road borders with Serbia after an influx of thousands of migrants
2015: Volkswagen admitted to rigging tests of diesel emissions to make its cars appear less polluting
September 19, 1985
An 8.0-magnitude earthquake struck Mexico City, killing over 10,000 people and injuring 30,000. Much of the city was flattened and 250,000 people were left homeless
1955: Argentine President Juan Peron resigned and fled into exile
1959: Soviet leader Nikita Khruschchev was refused a visit to Disneyland for security reasons
1982: Computer scientist Scott Elliott Fahlman first proposed the use of emoticons :-) and :-( to distinguish jokes from serious posts
1995: A terrorist manifesto by a man identified as the “Unabomber” was published by the Washington Post