October 21Birthdays & History

On this day: October 21 in history

Oldest first. Tap a year to see it on the World Chronicle timeline.

1. 310Sixty-five days after being exiled by the Emperor Maxentius to Sicily, Pope Eusebius dies.Europe
2. 685Election of Pope Conon following the death of Pope John V.Europe
3. 1094El Cid and his forces defeat a larger army of the Almoravids in the battle of Cuarte.Europe
4. 1096A Seljuk Turkish army successfully ambushes the People's Crusade at the Battle of Civetot.Middle East
5. 1097First Crusade: Crusaders led by Godfrey of Bouillon, Bohemund of Taranto, and Raymond IV, Count of Toulouse, begin the Siege of Antioch.Middle EastEurope
6. 1139Zengi, atabeg of Aleppo, takes Baalbek from the Burid dynasty.Middle East
7. 1187Election of Gregory VIII following the death of Pope Urban III.Europe
8. 1392Japanese Emperor Go-Kameyama abdicates in favor of rival claimant Go-Komatsu.Asia
9. 1512Martin Luther joins the theological faculty of the University of Wittenberg.Europe
10. 1520João Álvares Fagundes discovers the islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon, bestowing them their original name of "Islands of the 11,000 Virgins".North America
11. 1600Tokugawa Ieyasu defeats the leaders of rival Japanese clans in the Battle of Sekigahara and becomes shōgun of Japan.Asia
12. 1774The flag of Taunton, Massachusetts is the first to include the word "Liberty".North America
13. 1797In Boston Harbor, the 44-gun United States Navy frigate USS Constitution is launched.North America
14. 1805Napoleonic Wars: A British fleet led by Lord Nelson defeats a combined French and Spanish fleet under Admiral Villeneuve in the Battle of Trafalgar.Europe
15. 1824Portland cement is patented.Europe
16. 1854Florence Nightingale and a staff of 38 nurses are sent to the Crimean War.Europe
17. 1861American Civil War: Union forces under Colonel Edward Baker are defeated by Confederate troops in the second major battle of the war.North America
18. 1867The Medicine Lodge Treaty is signed by southern Great Plains Indian leaders. The treaty requires Native American Plains tribes to relocate to a reservation in the western Indian Territory.AsiaNorth America
19. 1879Thomas Edison applies for a patent for his design for an incandescent light bulb.North America
20. 1888The Swiss Social Democratic Party is founded.Europe
21. 1892Opening ceremonies for the World's Columbian Exposition are held in Chicago, though because construction was behind schedule, the exposition did not open until May 1, 1893.North America
22. 1895The capitulation of Tainan completes the Japanese conquest of Taiwan.AsiaAsia
23. 1907The 1907 Qaratog earthquake hits the borders of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, killing between 12,000 and 15,000 people.Asia
24. 1910HMS Niobe arrives in Halifax Harbour to become the first ship of the Royal Canadian Navy.North America
25. 1912First Balkan War: The Greek navy completes the capture of the island of Lemnos for use as a forward base against the Dardanelles.Europe
26. 1921President Warren G. Harding delivers the first speech by a sitting U.S. president against lynching in the Deep South.North America
27. 1931A secret society in the Imperial Japanese Army launches an abortive coup d'état attempt.Asia
28. 1940The first edition of the Ernest Hemingway novel For Whom the Bell Tolls is published.North America
29. 1941World War II: The Kragujevac massacre against Serbian men and boys takes place.Europe
30. 1943World War II: The Provisional Government of Free India is formally established in Japanese-occupied Singapore.AsiaAsia
31. 1944World War II: The Nemmersdorf massacre against German civilians takes place.Europe
32. 1944World War II: The first kamikaze attack damages HMAS Australia as the Battle of Leyte Gulf begins.Oceania
33. 1944World War II: The city of Aachen falls to American forces after three weeks of fighting, the first German city to fall to the Allies.North AmericaEurope
34. 1945In the 1945 French legislative election French women vote for the first time.Europe
35. 1950Korean War: Heavy fighting begins between British and Australian forces and North Koreans during the Battle of Yongju.AsiaEuropeOceania
36. 1956The Mau Mau Uprising in Kenya is defeated.Africa
37. 1959President Dwight D. Eisenhower approves the transfer of all US Army space-related activities to NASA, including most of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency.North America
38. 1959In New York City, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum opens to the public.North America
39. 1965Comet Ikeya–Seki approaches perihelion, passing 450,000 kilometers (279,617 miles) from the sun.Asia
40. 1966A colliery spoil tip slips onto houses and a school in the village of Aberfan in Wales, killing 144 people, 116 of whom were schoolchildren.Europe
41. 1967The National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam organizes a march of fifty thousand people from the Lincoln Memorial to the Pentagon.Asia
42. 1969The 1969 Somali coup d'état establishes a Marxist–Leninist administration.Africa
43. 1971A gas explosion kills 22 people at a shopping centre near Glasgow, Scotland.Europe
44. 1973Fred Dryer of the Los Angeles Rams becomes the first player in NFL history to score two safeties in the same game.North America
45. 1978Australian civilian pilot Frederick Valentich vanishes over the Bass Strait south of Melbourne, after reporting contact with an unidentified aircraft.Oceania
46. 1979Moshe Dayan resigns from the Israeli government because of strong disagreements with Prime Minister Menachem Begin over policy towards the Arabs.Middle East
47. 1981Andreas Papandreou becomes Prime Minister of Greece, ending an almost 50-year-long system of power dominated by conservative forces.Europe
48. 1983The metre is defined as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second.World
49. 1984Niki Lauda claims his third and final Formula One Drivers' Championship Title by half a point ahead of McLaren team-mate Alain Prost at the Portuguese Grand Prix.Europe
50. 1986In Lebanon, pro-Iran kidnappers claim to have abducted American writer Edward Tracy (he is released in August 1991).Middle EastNorth America
51. 1987The Jaffna hospital massacre is carried out by Indian peacekeeping forces in Sri Lanka, killing 70 Tamil patients, doctors and nurses.Asia
52. 1989In Honduras, 131 people are killed when a Boeing 727 crashes on approach to Toncontín International Airport near the nation's capital Tegucigalpa.Latin America
53. 1994In Seoul, South Korea, 32 people are killed when a span of the Seongsu Bridge collapses.Asia
54. 1994North Korea and the United States sign an Agreed Framework that requires North Korea to stop its nuclear weapons program and agree to inspections.AsiaNorth America
55. 2003Images of the dwarf planet Eris are taken and subsequently used in documenting its discovery.North America
56. 2007Finnish race drivers Kimi Räikkönen of Scuderia Ferrari won the Brazilian Grand Prix in Formula One. With this result, Räikkönen became world champion, surpassing McLaren drivers Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso by one point in the drivers' standings.EuropeLatin America
57. 2011Iraq War: President Barack Obama announces that the withdrawal of United States troops from Iraq will be complete by the end of the year.Middle EastNorth America
58. 2018A passenger train derails in Yilan County, Taiwan, killing 18 people and injuring 187.Asia
59. 2019In Canada, the 2019 Canadian federal election ends, resulting in incumbent Prime Minister Justin Trudeau remaining in office, albeit with the Liberal Party in a minority government.North America
60. 2019Thirty people are killed in a fiery bus crash in western Democratic Republic of the Congo.Africa
61. 2021A shooting occurs on the set of the film Rust, in which actor Alec Baldwin discharged a prop weapon which had been loaded, killing the director of photography, Halyna Hutchins, and injuring director Joel Souza.North America

Source: Wikipedia "October 21" / CC BY-SA 4.0