Pierre Curie is born in France (1859), and Bach leads premiere of cantata about the Good Shepherd (1725). Born on this day: Pierre Curie, Mikhail Bulgakov and Madeleine Albright. Died: Emily Dickinson, Kazimir Malevich and Marinus I.
30 events, 71 births and 64 deaths on this date.
The French physicist and chemist later split a 1903 physics prize with his wife Maria, for studies of radioactivity, and the pair were the first spouses to be honoured that way. Their joint honour started a family run of five Nobel laureates.
Dujardin · Public domainBach conducted the premiere of church cantata BWV 85, which portrays Jesus as the caring shepherd. He wrote it as Thomaskantor in Leipzig, a post he had taken up two years earlier.
A Christie's sale in New York brought $82.5 million for the painting, the highest price ever paid for a work of art at that time. The buyer's identity was not publicly known at the time.
Richard and Maurice McDonald's drive-in in California was the seed of what became a global chain. Their fast, streamlined kitchen method, later called the Speedee Service System, shaped how fast food was made.
Arsenal went through the 2003–04 top-flight season without a single defeat, the first English top-division side to do so since Preston North End in 1888–89. Their 'Invincibles' remain the benchmark for consistency in English football.
Robespierre urged the Assembly to bar its own members from sitting in the next legislature. The move was aimed at showing that the revolutionaries were not grabbing power for themselves.
Unidentified painter · CC0
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French physicist and chemist who, with his wife, shared a Nobel Prize for research into radioactivity. He also pioneered work on crystals and magnetism, and the couple's win was the first by a married pair.
Dujardin · Public domain
Russian novelist and playwright and former physician, best known for The Master and Margarita, published only after his death in 1966–67. Banned for much of his career, he had an unlikely admirer in Stalin, who reportedly saw The Days of the Turbins many times.
Moisej Nappelbaum · Public domain
Born in Prague, she fled communist Czechoslovakia as a child and later became the first woman to serve as United States Secretary of State. She held the post from 1997 to 2001 under President Bill Clinton.
United States Department of State · Public domain
Emily Dickinson was an American poet who wrote nearly 1,800 poems, yet only ten appeared in print during her lifetime. Her younger sister found the rest in a desk drawer after her death, and her distinctive short, slanted lines are now widely admired.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
Malevich was the painter who founded Suprematism, the movement built on pure geometric shapes, and whose Black Square broke decisively with representational art. He died in Leningrad in 1935, having spent much of his later life under growing pressure from Soviet authorities.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
Marinus I was elected pope while already a bishop, a move many at the time found controversial. Before taking the papacy he had served as a papal envoy to Constantinople, and he held the office for about two years.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
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