A LOOK BACK AT LIFE ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

— 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 the patron saint of England and Portugal. — 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 1851, the first Canadian postage stamp, the three-penny beaver, was issued. — In 1896, the Vitascope system for projecting movies onto a screen was demonstrated at a music hall in New York City. — In 1915, Lance-Cpl. Fred Fisher of St. Catharines, Ont., won a posthumous Victoria Cross for 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 1954, Hank Aaron of the Milwaukee Braves hit the first of his 755 home runs, in a game against the St. Louis Cardinals. — In 1969, Sirhan Sirhan was sentenced to death in Los Angeles for the assassination the previous June 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 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 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.” New Coke didn't last. — In 1995, American sportscaster Howard Cosell died of cancer at age 75. — In 1998, James Earl Ray, the confessed killer of Martin Luther King Jr., died in a Nashville prison at age 70. Shortly after King’s death, Ray recanted. — In 2003, Ontario Provincial Police laid 12 criminal charges against 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.