This Week In History
May 13, 1981
Pope John Paul II was shot and wounded as he drove through a crowd of 20,000 in St Peter’s Square in Rome. The gunman, Mehmet Ali Agca, was arrested
1968: North Vietnamese and American negotiators began talks in Paris aimed at ending the Vietnam War 1998: Despite sanctions, India carried out a fifth underground nuclear test in the Rajasthan desert
2003: Over a million people protested in France against proposed reforms to the state pension system 2009: Pixar’s 3D movie Up became the first animated film to open the Cannes Film Festival
May 14, 1948
David Ben-Gurion proclaimed the establishment of the State of Israel, just eight hours before the British mandate in Palestine was due to expire 1968: The Czechoslovak government announced widespread liberalising reforms under leader Alexander Dubcek 1988: Iraqi jets bombed the world’s biggest ship, the Seawise Giant, at an oil terminal in Iran
1993: The creation of a sanctuary for whales in the oceans around Antarctica was officially endorsed 2008: The world’s largest land predator, the polar bear, was listed as a threatened species
May 15, 1928
Australia’s Flying Doctor service was launched in the state of Queensland, and flew over 20,000 miles in 50 flights in the first year alone
1718: London lawyer James Puckle patented the world’s first machine gun 1923: Listerine, named after Joseph Lister, the pioneer of antiseptics, was registered as a trademark
1988: The Soviet Union withdrew the first of its estimated 115,000 forces from Afghanistan after nine years 2016: Max Verstappen, aged 18, won the Spanish Grand Prix, becoming the youngest ever driver and the first Dutchman to win a Formula One race
May 16, 1881
The world’s first electric tram line opened in Lichterfelde near Berlin, Germany, using a trolley pole to feed power from electric wires strung above the tram route
1888: In the U.S., Emile Berliner first demonstrated the recording of sound on a flat disc, as opposed to a drum 1888: Nikola Tesla demonstrated his alternating current induction motor
2008: A report claimed that numbers of birds, animals, marine and freshwater creatures had fallen by more than a quarter since 1970 2013: Apple hit 50 billion downloads on its App Store, just five years after its launch
May 17, 1673
Louis Joliet and Jacques Marquette set out from the Great Lakes to explore the Mississippi River, proving it ran all the way to the Gulf of Mexico
1890: Mascagni’s opera Cavalleria Rusticana was first performed at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome 1990: The World Health Organization eliminated homosexuality from its list of psychiatric diseases
2005: Antonio Villaraigosa was elected mayor of Los Angeles, the city’s first Latino mayor since 1872 2006: Captain Nichola Goddard, 26, Canada’s first female combat arms casualty, was killed in Afghanistan
May 18, 1291
The last Christian stronghold in the Holy Land fell to the Mamluk Sultan of Egypt, al-Ashraf Khalil. The fall of Acre marked the end of the Jerusalem crusades 1974: India successfully detonated its first nuclear bomb 1980: The eruption of Mount St Helens volcano in the U.S. state of Washington killed 57 people 1993: The people of Denmark voted in a referendum to ratify the Maastricht Treaty, after rejecting it in June 1992 2003: The curtain fell for the final time on the Broadway production of Les Miserables after 16 years and 6,680 performan
May 19, 1588
The Spanish Armada, then the largest fleet ever assembled, set sail from Lisbon on an ill-fated attempt to invade England and overthrow Queen Elizabeth I 1958: Harold Pinter’s ground-breaking play The Birthday Party opened in London 1988: Sikh rebels holding out in the Golden Temple in Amritsar, India, surrendered to government forces
2003: Indonesia launched a major offensive in the breakaway province of Aceh after martial law was imposed in the oil- and gas-rich region 2017: Hassan Rouhani was re-elected President of Iran by a huge margin