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“I can see lights in the distance trembling in the dark cloak of night
Candles and lanterns are dancing, dancing a waltz on All Souls Night.”
~ Loreena McKennitt
Wikiquote (Loreena McKennitt ~ Halloween - Headless Horseman / All Soul's Night theme)
October 31st, 475
Roman Empire:
475 - Romulus Augustulus is proclaimed Western Roman Emperor.
Wikipedia Image: Relief from a 3rd-century sarcophagus depicting a battle between Romans and Germanic warriors; the central figure is perhaps the emperor Hostilian / Depiction of the Menorah on the Arch of Titus in Rome.
October 31st, 1517
Protestant Reformation: Martin Luther posts his Ninety-Five Theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg.
Wikipedia Painting: Martin Luther by Lucas Cranach, 1532
October 31st, 1556
Halloween (a contraction of its original title "All Hallows' Even" not seen until 1556} All Hallows' Eve: is a yearly holiday observed around the world on October 31.
Wikipedia Images: All Hallows' Eve, is a yearly holiday observed around the world on October 31, the eve before the Western Christian feast of All Hallows. Initially incorporated traditions from pagan harvest festivals and festivals honoring the dead. (Development of artifacts and symbols associated with Halloween formed over time)
October 31st, 1587
Leiden University Library opens its doors after its founding in 1575.
Wikipedia Photo: Leiden University (Dutch: Universiteit Leiden), located in the city of Leiden, is the oldest university in the Netherlands (The university was founded in 1575 by William, Prince of Orange, leader of the Dutch Revolt in the Eighty Years' War).
October 31st, 1861
American Civil War:
1861 - Citing failing health, Union General Winfield Scott resigns as Commander of the United States Army.
Wikipedia Image: ● Lincoln Memorial; an American national monument built to honor the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln - located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. across from the Washington Monument.
● The northern army led by George McClellan and the southern army led by Robert E. Lee met at Antietam Creek, Maryland in September, 1862. It was a bloody battle where 13,000 Confederates and 12,000 Union troops died in just one day. McClellan had hesitated to attack before the battle thus letting the southern troops regroup. Also, he had saved reserves and refused to use them at the end of the battle thinking that Lee was holding reserves for a counterattack, even though those reserves didn't exist. The Union victory stopped Lee's northward advance and was a turning point in the war.
● Battle of Antietam / Stone Bridge at Antietam Battlefield - Sharpsburg, Maryland
● First Battle Between Ironclads: CSS Virginia/Merrimac (left) vs. USS Monitor, in 1862 at the Battle of Hampton Roads.
● Although photography was still in its infancy, war correspondents produced thousands of images, bringing the harsh realities of the frontlines to those on the home front in a new and visceral way. The Atlantic.
October 31st, 1863
Maori Wars: Invasion of the Waikato; British forces in New Zealand led by General Duncan Cameron begin their invasion.
Wikipedia Image: Rewi Manga Maniapoto (died 1894) was a Waikato chief who led Maori forces during the British Invasion of Waikato during the New Zealand Wars; Satellite image of New Zealand, NASA's Visible Earth; Bay of Islands.
October 31st, 1864
Nevada is admitted as the 36th U.S. state.
Wikipedia Photo: Las Vegas Strip in Paradise and Winchester; Valley of Fire State Park; Great Basin National Park; Mount Charleston.
October 31st, 1876
Cyclone:
A monster cyclone ravages India, resulting in over 200,000 deaths.
Wikipedia Image: In meteorology, a cyclone is an area of closed, circular fluid motion rotating in the same direction as the Earth (This is usually characterized by inward spiraling winds that rotate counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere of the Earth) ● Emergency Management, Australian Government. ● Global tropical cyclone tracks. ● Emergency Information, Burdenkin Shire.
October 31st, 1913
Dedication of the Lincoln Highway, the first automobile road across United States.
Wikipedia Image: Map, Lincoln Highway (Lincoln Park in San Francisco, CA - Times Square in New York, NY); © "The Main Street Across America", credit Themidway.org
October 31st, 1917
World War I:
1917 - Battle of Beersheba; "last successful cavalry charge in history".
Wikipedia Photo: Trenches on the Western Front; a British Mark IV Tank crossing a trench; Royal Navy battleship HMS Irresistible sinking after striking a mine at the Battle of the Dardanelles; a Vickers machine gun crew with gas masks, and German Albatros D.III biplanes. National Archives and Records Administration.
October 31st, 1926
On October, 22nd J. Gordon Whitehead sucker punches magician Harry Houdini in the stomach in Montreal - he dies of gangrene and peritonitis that developed after his appendix ruptured.
Wikipedia Photo: Harry Houdini, 1891–1926
October 31st, 1938
Great Depression: In an effort to restore investor confidence, the New York Stock Exchange unveils a fifteen-point program aimed to upgrade protection for the investing public.
Wikipedia Photo: Dorothea Lange's Migrant Mother depicts destitute pea pickers in California, centering on Florence Owens Thompson, age 32, a mother of seven children, in Nipomo, California, March 1936; Bud Fields and his family. Alabama. 1935 or 1936. Photographer: Walker Evans; Unemployed men vying for jobs at the American Legion Employment Bureau in Los Angeles during the Great Depression.
October 31st, 1940
World War II:
1940 - Battle of Britain; ends – the United Kingdom prevents a possible German invasion.
1941 - The destroyer USS Reuben James is torpedoed by a German U-boat near Iceland, killing more than 100 United States Navy sailors. It is the first U.S. Navy vessel sunk by enemy action in WWII.
1943 - A F4U Corsair accomplishes the first successful radar-guided interception.
1944 - Dr. jur. Erich Göstl, a member of the Waffen SS, is awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross, to recognise extreme battlefield bravery, after losing his face and eyes during the Battle of Normandy.
Post World War II:
1954 - Algerian War of Independence; The Algerian National Liberation Frontbegins a revolt against French rule.
Wikipedia Photo: Bombing of Dresden in World War II; August Schreitmüller's sculpture 'Goodness' surveys Dresden after a firestorm started by Allied bombers in 1945.
USS Bunker Hill was hit by kamikazes piloted by Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa and another airman on 11 May 1945. 389 personnel were killed or missing from a crew of 2,600; Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa, who flew his aircraft into the USS Bunker Hill during a Kamikaze mission on 11 May 1945; Kamikaze Missions - Lt Yoshinori Yamaguchi's Yokosuka D4Y3 (Type 33 Suisei) "Judy" in a suicide dive against USS Essex. The dive brakes are extended and the non-self-sealing port wing tank is trailing fuel vapor and/or smoke 25 November 1944.
German V1 flying-bomb and V2 Rockets - Preparations for a Salvo Launch of V-2 Rockets in the Heidelager near Blizna (Poland) (1944), credit German History in Documents and Images GHDI.
Eastern Front (World War II); Germans race towards Stalingrad. August 1942; Soviet children during a German air raid in the first days of the war, June 1941, by RIA Novosti archive; Soviet sniper Roza Shanina in 1944. About 400,000 Soviet women served in front-line duty units Caucasus Mountains, winter 1942/43; Finnish ski patrol: the invisible enemy of the Soviet Army with an unlimited supply of skis; Men of the German Engineers Corps cross a river which is swollen after the first autumn rains, to strengthen bridges linking the German positions on the central front in Russia. by Keystone / Getty Images. October 1942; Russian snipers fighting on the Leningrad front during a blizzard. Photo by Hulton Archive / Getty Images, 1943; German soldiers surrendering to the Russians in Stalingrad, the soldier holding the white flag of surrender is dressed in white so that there could be no doubt of his intentions, a Russian soldier is on the right of the photograph. by Keystone / Getty Images, January 1943.
October 31st, 1941
After 14 years of work, Mount Rushmore is completed.
Wikipedia Photo: Mount Rushmore; Sculptures of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln represent the first 130 years of the history of the United States.
October 31st, 1956
Suez Crisis:
1956 - The United Kingdom and France begin bombing Egypt to force the reopening of the Suez Canal.
Wikipedia Photo: Yom Kippur War: credit Phobos.ramapo.edu.
October 31st, 1961
Because of "violations of Lenin's precepts", it is decreed that Joseph Stalin's body be removed from its place of honour inside Lenin's tomb and buried near the Kremlin wall with a plain granite marker instead.
Wikipedia Photo: Lenin's mausoleum on Red square Collection Lenin's mausoleum on Red square in Moscow.
October 31st, 1968
Vietnam War:
1968 - October surprise: Citing progress with the Paris peace talks, United States President Lyndon B. Johnson announces to the nation that he has ordered a complete cessation of "all air, naval, and artillery bombardment of North Vietnam" effective November 1.
Wikipedia Photo: Vietnam_War; Side view of an HH-53 helicopter of the 40th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron as seen from the gunner's position on an A-1 of the 21st Specialist Operations Squadron. (USAF Photo by Ken Hackman), Boston Globe;
Boeing B-52 Stratofortress, credit Free Republic;
Vietnam War: The Big Picture / Boston Globe.
October 31st, 1984
The Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi is assassinated by two security guards. Sikh riots break out in New Delhi and nearly 10,000 Sikhs are killed.
Wikipedia Photo: Indira Gandhi; Gandhi with Jacqueline Kennedy in New Delhi, 1962; Gandhi meeting Shah of Iran Mohammad-Reza Pahlavi and Shahbanu Farah Pahlavi during the latter's State visit to India in 1970.
October 31st, 1998
Gulf War - Iraq War:
1998 - Iraq disarmament crisis; Iraq announces it would no longer cooperate with United Nations weapons inspectors.
Wikipedia Photo: USAF F-15Es, F-16s, and a USAF F-15 flying over burning Kuwaiti oil wells; Iraqi Army T-72 main battle tanks. The T-72 tank was a common Iraqi battle tank used in the Gulf War; F-15Es parked during Operation Desert Shield; The oil fires caused were a result of the scorched earth policy of Iraqi military forces retreating from Kuwait; Aerial view of destroyed Iraqi T-72 tank, BMP-1 and Type 63 armored personnel carriers and trucks on Highway 8 in March 1991.
October 31st, 1999
Aviation accidents and incidents:
1999- EgyptAir Flight 990; crashes into the Atlantic Ocean killing all 217 people on board..
Wikipedia Photo: ● Pan AM 747 ● U.S. Airways flight 1549 also known as the "Miracle on the Hudson" navigates an exit ramp near Burlington, New Jersey, June 5, 2011 ● Passengers stand on the wings of a U.S. Airways plane as a ferry pulls up to it after it landed in the Hudson River in New York, Reuters ● US Airways plane crashes into New York Hudson River, Photo: AP
October 31st, 2000
Soyuz TM-31: launches, carrying the first resident crew to the International Space Station.
Wikipedia Photo: Baikonur Cosmodrome's "Gagarin's Start" Soyuz launch pad prior to the rollout of Soyuz TMA-13, October 10, 2008.
October 31st, 2017
Modern conflicts in the Middle East, social unrest and terrorist attacks:
2017 - New York City truck attack; Manhattan, City of New York - A truck drives in a crowd of people in Lower Manhattan, killing eight people.
2015 - Metrojet Flight 9268; is bombed over the northern Sinai Peninsula, killing all 224 people on board.
Wikipedia Photo: Middle East satellite image, NASA. ● Camels are seen early morning on a beach in the Marina area of Dubai October 16, 2008. (Steve Crisp, Reuters) ● A portrait of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad burns during clashes between rebels and Syrian troops in Selehattin, near Aleppo, on July 23, 2012. (Bulent Kilic, AFP / GettyImages) ● Egyptians gather in their thousands in Tahrir Square to mark the one year anniversary of the revolution on Jan. 25, 2012 in Cairo Egypt. Tens of thousands have gathered in the square on the first anniversary of the Arab uprising which toppled President Hosni Mubarak. (Jeff J Mitchell, Getty Images) ● Black smoke rises above the Tehran skyline as supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi burn tires and other material in the streets as they fight running battles with police to protest the declared results of the Iranian presidential election in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 13, 2009. (Ben Curtis, AP) ● The Iron Dome defense system fires to interecpt incoming missiles from Gaza in the port town of Ashdod, Thursday, Nov. 15, 2012. (Tsafrir Abayov, AP)