Today in History

On this date:

In 34, Jesus Christ was crucified, according to mathematician and physicist Sir Isaac Newton, one of the foremost scientific intellects of all time.

In 303, St. George was beheaded on the orders of the Roman Emperor Diocletian. This martyred soldier is not only the patron saint of England and Portugal, but also of soldiers and the Boy Scouts of America.

In 1348, King Edward III established the Order of the Garter, which is still Britain's highest honour.

In 1564, English dramatist William Shakespeare was born. He died on the same day 52 years later.

In 1616, Spanish novelist Miguel de Cervantes, who wrote ``Don Quixote,'' died in Madrid.

In 1616, English poet and dramatist William Shakespeare, 52, died on what has been traditionally regarded as the anniversary of his birth in 1564.

In 1851, the first Canadian postage stamp, the three-penny beaver, was issued.

In 1879, the city of Guelph, Ont., was incorporated.

In 1896, the Vitascope system for projecting movies onto a screen was demonstrated at a music hall in New York City.

In 1897, Lester Pearson was born in Newtonbrook, Ont. The Nobel Peace Prize winner served as Canada's 14th prime minister from 1963-68. He died on Dec. 27, 1972.

In 1915, Lance-cpl. Fred Fisher of St. Catharines, Ont., won a posthumous Victoria Cross during the Second Battle of Ypres during the First World War. Three other Canadians also won V.C.'S for valour during the battle around the Belgian city.

In 1940, about 200 people died in the Rhythm Night Club fire in Natchez, Miss.

In 1954, Hank Aaron of the Milwaukee Braves hit the first of his 755 home runs, in a game against the St. Louis Cardinals. (Barry Bonds broke Aaron's major league record in August 2007, and finished his career with 762.)

In 1968, the first public hearings of the newly-formed CRTC were held in Ottawa.

In 1969, Sirhan Sirhan was sentenced to death in Los Angeles for the June 1968 assassination of U.S. Senator Robert Kennedy. The sentence was later reduced to life imprisonment when the U.S. Supreme Court temporarily outlawed the death penalty.

In 1969, John Sinclair completed the greatest recorded feat of continuous marathon walking. He walked over 354 kilometres in nearly 48 hours near Simonstown, South Africa.

In 1978, British scientists Bob Edwards and Patrick Steptoe announced they had successfully carried out the first documented ``test tube'' pregnancy. Lesley Brown had become pregnant in November 1977 through in vitro fertilization. The process involves fertilizing an egg outside the mother's body, then implanting the embryo in her womb. Louise Brown was born on July 25, 1978.

In 1981, the House of Commons approved the final form of Canada's proposed constitution.

In 1985, Coca-cola announced it was changing the formula for Coke. The public uproar resulted in two Cokes being sold -- ``new'' Coke and Coca-cola ``Classic.'' The ``new'' Coke didn't last long.

In 1989, the Roman Catholic Church in Newfoundland set up an inquiry into the sexual abuse of children during the 1970s at the Mount Cashel Orphanage.

In 1992, a divorce was granted to Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips. They were married for 18 years before separating in August 1989.

In 1995, American sportscaster Howard Cosell died of cancer at age 75. His flamboyant, caustic style made him the most celebrated, and imitated, sportscaster of his time.

In 2003, Ontario Provincial Police laid a total of 12 criminal charges against two brothers, Stan and Frank Koebel, who ran Walkerton, Ont.'s water system during the deadly E. coli outbreak in May 2000. (In exchange for guilty pleas to charges of common nuisance, more serious charges were dropped. Stan was sentenced to one year in jail, while Frank got a nine-month conditional house arrest.)

In 2003, the Geneva-based World Health Organization issued a travel advisory that named Toronto along with Beijing and China's Shanxi province as places that travellers should avoid in order to minimize the global spread of SARS, the infectious respiratory disease that killed hundreds of people worldwide. The Toronto ban was lifted a week later when a delegation of Canadian health officials presented mounting evidence that indicated the threat of SARS had greatly diminished in Canada.

In 2004, Paul Martin became the first Canadian prime minister to meet with the Dalai Lama, at a reception and interfaith prayer event in Ottawa. The Tibetan exiled political and spiritual leader arrived in Vancouver on April 17 for a 19-day visit.

In 2005, Youtube uploaded its first video, titled ``Me at the Zoo,'' consisting of 18 seconds of co-founder Jawed Karim standing in front of an elephant enclosure at the San Diego Zoo.

In 2007, former Russian president Boris Yeltsin died at age 76. He was Russia's first freely elected president and stood atop a tank to resist an attempted coup by Communist hardliners against former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev in August 1991. He spearheaded the peaceful end of the Soviet state on Dec. 25th of that year.

In 2009, the Supreme Court of Canada rejected a bid by thousands of women to sue Health Canada for negligence after ruptured breast implants leaked silicon into their bodies.

In 2009, the body of Maj. Michelle Mendes, 30, of Wicklow, Ont., was found in her room at Kandahar airfield. Mendes was the 118th Canadian soldier and third female soldier to die as part of Canada's combat mission in Afghanistan since it began in 2002.

In 2012, two workers died and 22 others were injured after a massive explosion rocked the Lakeland Mills sawmill in Prince George, B.C., setting off a massive fire that engulfed the facility.

In 2012, Alberta's Progressive Conservatives under Alison Redford defied the pollsters, winning a 12th consecutive majority. The upstart Wildrose party became the official opposition for the first time.