This Week In History
Oct 24, 1931
The George Washington Bridge, connecting New York City and New Jersey, opened. The world’s busiest motor vehicle bridge carries over 100m vehicles a year
1931: Chicago gangster Al Capone was sentenced to 11 years in jail and fined US$80,000 for tax evasion 2002: Former tennis champion Boris Becker was given two years’ probation by a Munich court for tax evasion
2011: Millions of Tunisians voted in their first ever free election
2016: Islamic State gunmen stormed a police training camp in the Pakistani city of Quetta, killing at least 61 unarmed cadets
Oct 25, 1881
Pablo Picasso, one of the greatest artists of the 20th century, was born. Famous works include Les Demoiselles d’avignon (1907), and Guernica (1937)
1936: Germany broadcast the first radio request programme
1971: The People’s Republic of China replaced the Republic of China (Taiwan) at the United Nations 1976: Transkei became the first of South Africa’s black homelands to be granted its independence
2020: Formula 1 driver Lewis Hamilton won a world record 92nd career victory, surpassing Michael Schumacher’s tally of 91
Oct 26, 1861
The Pony Express closed. It operated for 19 months and was the most direct means of east to west communication in the US before the advent of the telegraph
1861: The first telephone shown in public was demonstrated in Frankfurt 1956: The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was founded to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy and to inhibit its use for any military purpose 2006: Citizens of Kiribati and Tuvalu were warned they would soon have to relocate because of rising sea levels 2011: Eurozone leaders agreed measures to control the debt crisis
Oct 27, 1986
The “Big Bang” revolutionised the London Stock Exchange with the introduction of computerised dealing and deregulation of many former controls
1901: After robbing a Paris shop, thieves escaped in the first known use of a “getaway car”
1991: Poland held its first free parliamentary elections since WWII 2017: The regional parliament of Catalonia declared unilateral independence from Spain
2019: Abu Bakr al-baghdadi, fugitive leader of Islamic State, killed himself in Syria after being tracked down by US troops
Oct 28, 1971
Britain’s parliament voted to join what was then the European Economic Community. The decision was reversed by the Brexit vote in June 2016
1636: Harvard College, the oldest university in the United States, was founded
1886: The Statue of Liberty was unveiled in New York to mark 100 years of US independence 2006: Scientists announced that the genome of the honeybee Apis mellifera had been fully sequenced 2011: Britain’s royal succession laws were changed to prevent male heirs taking precedence to the throne
Oct 29, 1923
The Republic of Turkey was proclaimed with Mustafa Kemal Ataturk as its first president. His adoption of secularism radically transformed Turkish society 1956: Israeli troops crossed the Egyptian borde r, sweeping into the Sinai Peninsula toward the Suez Canal
1996: Over 8,000 unclaimed works of art stolen from Austrian Jews by the Nazis were auctioned in Vienna 2004: Al Jazeera broadcast a video in which Osama bin Laden admitted responsibility for the 9/11 attacks 2015: China ended its controversial one-child policy after 35 years to offset its ageing workforce
Oct 30, 1996
Wang Dan, one of the student leaders of the 1989 protests in Tiananmen Square, was jailed for 11 years for “conspiring to subvert China’s government”
1911: Pu-yi, five-year-old emperor of China, ended three centuries of Manchu domination with a new constitution
1961 : The USSR tested a 50-megaton hydrogen bomb, the largest explosive device ever detonated
2006: Pakista nk ill ed 80 peopl eina dawn attack on a madrassa suspected of harbouring al-qaeda fighters
2009: Jacques Chirac was ordered to stand tria l on charges of corruption while he was mayor of Paris