Today In History. What Happened This Day In History
A Timeline Of Events That Occurred On This Day In History
A chronological timetable of historical events that occurred on this day in history. Historical facts of the day in the areas of military, politics, science, music, sports, arts, entertainment and more. Discover what happened today in history.
Today in History
May 21
| 996 | Sixteen year old Otto III is crowned the Roman Emperor. | |
| 1471 | King Henry VI is killed in the Tower of London. Edward IV takes the throne. | |
| 1506 | Christopher Columbus dies. | |
| 1536 | The Reformation is officially adopted in Geneva, Switzerland. | |
| 1620 | Present-day Martha's Vineyard is first sighted by Captain Bartholomew Gosnold. | |
| 1790 | Paris is divided into 48 zones. | |
| 1832 | The Democratic party holds its first national convention. | |
| 1856 | Lawrence, Kansas is captured and sacked by pro-slavery forces. | |
| 1863 | The siege of the Confederate Port Hudson, Louisiana, begins. | |
| 1881 | The American Red Cross is founded by Clara Barton. | |
| 1927 | Charles Lindbergh lands in Paris completing the first solo air crossing of the Atlantic. | |
| 1940 | British forces attack German General Rommel's 7th Panzer Division at Arras, slowing his blitzkrieg of France. | |
| 1941 | The first U.S. ship, the S.S. Robin Moor, is sunk by a U-boat. | |
| 1951 | The U.S. Eighth Army counterattacks to drive the Communist Chinese and North Koreans out of South Korea. | |
| 1961 | Governor Patterson declares martial law in Montgomery, Alabama. | |
| 1970 | The U.S. National Guard mobilizes to quell disturbances at Ohio State University. | |
| 1991 | In Madras, India, a suicide bomber kills the former Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi. | |
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Born on May 21 |
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| 427 BC | Plato, Greek philosopher. | |
| 1527 | Philip II, king of Spain and Portugal. | |
| 1844 | Henri Rousseau, French painter. | |
| 1856 | Grace Hoadley Dodge, philanthropist, helped organize the YWCA. | |
| 1860 | Willem Einthoven, physiologist, inventor of the electrocardiogram. | |
| 1867 | Frances Densmore, ethnomusicologist. | |
| 1878 | Glenn Hammond Curtiss, aviation pioneer. | |
| 1898 | Armand Hammer, American entrepeneur and industrialist. | |
| 1902 | Marcel Breuer, Hungarian-born architect. | |
| 1909 | Sister Maria Innocentia Hummel, artist. | |
| 1917 | Raymond Burr, actor (Perry Mason). | |
| 1921 | Andrei Sakharov, Russian physicist. | |
| 1926 | Robert Creeley, poet. | |
| 1944 | Mary Bourke Robinson, first woman president of Ireland (1990-1997). | |
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