ON THIS DAY
■ 1783: The last public hanging in England took place at Tyburn (now Marble Arch in London) - forger John Austin was the last to die there.
■ 1867: Scientific genius Marie Curie was born in Warsaw. She and her husband Pierre shared the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903 and she was awarded a second Prize in 1911 for her discovery of radium.
■ 1872: The Marie Celeste, the ill-fated brigantine, sailed from New York - and was found mysteriously abandoned near the Azores some time later.
■ 1885: A golden spike was driven into the track at Craigellachie in British Columbia to complete the Canadian Pacific Railway after fourand-a-half years’ work.
■ 1917: The Bolshevik Revolution, led by Lenin, overthrew prime minister Alexander Kerensky’s government.
■ 1935: Australian pilot Sir Charles Kingsford-Smith flew over Calcutta on a flight from England - and was never seen again.
■ 1967: Henry Cooper beat Billy Walker and became the first and only boxer to win three Lonsdale Belts outright.
■ 1974: Lord Lucan disappeared, following the murder of his children’s nanny and serious assault of his wife. He has never been seen since.
■ 1980: Actor Steve McQueen died.
■ 1990: Mary Robinson was elected as the first woman president of the Irish Republic.
■ ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: A cargo of sex toys worth £1 million was stolen from a lorry parked overnight in a lay-by.
■BIRTHDAYS: Dame Gwyneth Jones, soprano, 84; Jean Shrimpton, former model, 78; Joni Mitchell, singer, 77; Su Pollard, actress and comedienne, 71; Lindsay Duncan, actress, 70; John Barnes, former footballer and manager, 57; Sharleen Spiteri, singer, 53; Rio Ferdinand, former footballer, 42.