Malala Yousafzai shot by Taliban gunmen on a Swat bus (2012), and Vajont Dam overtopped by landslide wave in Italy (1963). Born on this day: Giuseppe Verdi, John Lennon and David Cameron. Died: Pius XII, Pieter Zeeman and Oskar Schindler.
32 events, 70 births and 78 deaths on this date.
Gunmen boarded a school bus in Swat and shot the 15-year-old Yousafzai for campaigning for girls' education. She survived, and went on to become the youngest Nobel Peace Prize laureate in 2014.
DFID - UK Department for International Development · CC BY 2.0A huge landslide plunged into the reservoir behind the Vajont Dam in northern Italy, sending a wave over the top of the wall. More than 2,000 people downstream were killed, and the disaster exposed serious failures in how the dam was approved and monitored.
Uganda left British rule and took its place as a self-governing realm within the Commonwealth, with Queen Elizabeth II as its head of state. Milton Obote led the new government as prime minister, though the country's road to stability proved far rougher than its first day suggested.
Power in Panama changed hands by force when a coup named Ricardo Adolfo de la Guardia Arango president. The change came in a country where the United States had built the canal, which tied Panama closely to Washington.
Demonstrators kept gathering in Chicago while the trial of the Chicago Eight, activists charged over the 1968 Democratic convention unrest, went on. The city responded by calling in the National Guard to help keep order.
Facing the German advance, Antwerp's civilian leaders gave up the city rather than defend it, and German troops took control without a fight over the streets. The surrender left the Belgian army to fall back westward and handed the important port to the invaders.
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Verdi became the dominant Italian opera composer of his age, writing Rigoletto, La traviata and Aida. His chorus Va, pensiero from Nabucco became an anthem for the movement to unify Italy.
Disegnatore: A. Cairoli - Incisore: Ernesto Mancastroppa · Public domain
John Lennon was the founder and rhythm guitarist of the Beatles, and half of the most successful songwriting partnership in history with Paul McCartney. After the band split he became a solo artist and a leading voice of the anti-war movement.
Jack Mitchell · CC BY-SA 3.0
David Cameron, born in London in 1966, led the Conservative Party and served as Prime Minister from 2010 to 2016, heading a coalition government. He is best known for steering Britain through austerity after the financial crisis and for holding the 2016 EU referendum.
Lauren Hurley / No 10 Downing Street · OGL 3
Pius XII led the Catholic Church and ruled Vatican City from 1939 until his death. He is remembered for his papacy through the Second World War and the early Cold War, and for a continuing debate over how he responded to the Holocaust.
Michael Pitcairn · Public domain
Dutch physicist who discovered that a magnetic field splits spectral lines, work that won him the 1902 Nobel Prize in Physics. He shared the prize with Hendrik Lorentz, who helped explain the effect.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
Oskar Schindler was a German businessman who employed Jewish workers in his factories in occupied Poland and Bohemia and Moravia, shielding roughly 1,200 people from deportation and murder. His story was later told in the novel Schindler's Ark and the film Schindler's List.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
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