Today in History
Today is Monday, May 6, the 126th day of 2002. There are 239 days left in the year.
In 1932, French president Paul Doumer was assassinated by a Russian emigre in Paris.
In 1935, the Works Progress Administration began operating.
In 1937, the German airship Hindenburg burst into flames on arrival at Lakehurst, New Jersey; 36 people were killed but 62 escaped.
In 1945, at the end of the Second World War, General Johannes Blaskowitz surrendered the German armies in the Netherlands.
In 1954, medical student Roger Bannister broke the four-minute mile during a track meet in Oxford, England, in 3 minutes, 59.4 seconds.
In 1960, Britain’s Princess Margaret married Anthony Armstrong-Jones, a commoner, at Westminster Abbey. (They divorced in 1978.)
In 1968, the worst street fighting in Paris since the city's liberation at the end of World War Two shook the Left Bank as students and police fought for control of the fashionable Boulevard St Germain.
In 1974, West German Chancellor Willy Brandt resigned after an aide was arrested on charges of spying for East Germany.
In 1976, an earthquake struck the town of Udine in northern Italy, killing 973 people and leaving over 100,000 homeless.
In 1981, the United States expelled all Libyan diplomats because of what it called the Libyan government's support for international terrorism.
In 1992, Marlene Dietrich, film's legendary femme fatale, died. The German-born actress shot to fame as the cabaret singer Lola-Lola in “The Blue Angel” and then took Hollywood by storm.
In 1994, the Channel Tunnel opened, linking Britain and France.
In 1996, Guatemala's leftist guerrillas signed an accord with the government of President Alvaro Arzu aimed at ending 35 years of civil war.
In 1998, at least 150 people were killed when torrential rain drove rivers of mud and rocks through towns in southern Italy.
In 2000, James Andanson, French photographer who photographed crowned heads and film stars for decades, was found dead. He was 54.
<$t-5>“The people no longer believe in principles, but will probably periodically believe in saviours.” — Jacob Christoph Burckhardt, Swiss historian (1818-1897).
