ON THIS DAY

1816 France decrees Bonaparte family excluded from the country forever.

1836 HMS Beagle with Charles Darwin aboard reaches Sydney. 1937 Plough for laying submarine cable patented. 1948 Mahatma Gandhi begins his final fast.

1959 American record company Motown is founded by Berry Gordy Jr as Tamla Records. 1967 Louisville, Kentucky, draft board refuses exemption for boxer Muhammad Ali.

1995 Murder trial against O.J. Simpson, begins in LA.

2008 The first man to climb Mt Everest Sir Edmund Hillary dies, aged 88.

Birthdays: PW Botha, South African president (1916-2006); Tim Horton, Canadian ice hockey player/Hortons founder (19301974); Jo Frazier, American boxer (1944-2011); Kirstie Alley, American actress (1951-); Craig Parry, Australian golfer (1966-).