On this day

1881 - The Savoy Theatre, the first public building to be lit by electricity, opened with a performance of Gilbert and Sullivan's 'Patience'.

1886 - The dinner jacket made its U.S. debut at a ball in Tuxedo Park, New York. It was named tuxedo, after its venue.

1903 - Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst formed the Women's Social and Political Union to fight for women's emancipation in Britain.

1966 - The Beach Boys released the single Good Vibrations.

1996 - A Scottish fisherman found a message in a bottle. It had been thrown in the North Sea in 1914 as part of an experiment to chart currents.

2004 - Actor Christopher Reeve, who became a quadriplegic after a May 1995 horse riding accident, died at age 52.

1899 - The South African Boer War began between the British Empire and Boers of the Transvaal and Orange Free State, settlers from the Netherlands.

1915 - Despite international protests, Edith Cavell, an English nurse in Belgium, was sentenced to death in Brussels by the Germans, for aiding the escape of Allied prisoners.

1919 - The first airline meals were served on a Handley-Page flight from London to Paris. They were pre-packed lunch boxes at 3 shillings each (15p).

1958 - The lunar probe Pioneer 1 was launched, but it failed to go far enough and fell back to Earth, burning up in the atmosphere.

1966 - The Post Office announced that all home and business addresses in Britain were to be allocated postcodes.

1968 - Apollo Seven, the first manned Apollo mission, was launched with astronauts Wally Schirra, Donn Fulton Eisele and R. Walter Cunningham aboard.

1982 - The Mary Rose, which had been the pride of Henry VIII's English fleet until it sank in the Solent in 1545, was raised.

1492 - Christopher Columbus arrived with his expedition in the present day Bahamas, believing he had found Asia.

1810 - The German festival Oktoberfest was first held in Munich to celebrate the wedding of Bavarian Crown Prince Ludwig and Princess Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen.

1823 - Charles Macintosh of Scotland began selling raincoats, now better known as - Macs.

1933 - Alcatraz Island was made a federal maximum security prison.

1948 - The first Morris Minor, designed by Alec Issigonis, was produced at Cowley, Oxfordshire.

1967 - Zoologist Desmond Morris stunned the world with his book The Naked Ape that compared human behaviour with animals.

1986 - Queen Elizabeth II became the first British monarch to visit China.

1999 - The world population reached six billion, according to the United Nations.

1307 – Hundreds of Knights Templar in France are simultaneously arrested by agents of Phillip the Fair, to be later tortured into "admitting" heresy.

1773 – The Whirlpool Galaxy is discovered by Charles Messier.

1884 - Greenwich, London, was chosen as the universal time meridian of longitude from which standard times throughout the world are calculated.

1943 – World War II: The new government of Italy sides with the Allies and declares war on Germany.

1992 - The government announced plans to close one third of Britain's deep coal mines, putting 31,000 miners out of work.

1066 - The Normans under William the Conqueror defeated the English and King Harold II at the Battle of Hastings. Killed in the battle, Harold II was the last Anglo-Saxon king of England.

1322 – Robert the Bruce of Scotland defeats King Edward II of England at Byland, forcing Edward to accept Scotland's independence.

1881 - 189 men died when the Berwickshire fishing fleet was caught in a hurricane. The tragedy, which became known locally as Black Friday, remains Scotland's worst fishing disaster. 129 of the victims came from the village of Eyemouth.

1884 - Photographic film was patented by U.S. entrepreneur and inventor George Eastman.

1968 - First live telecast from a manned U.S. spacecraft was transmitted from Apollo Seven.

1971 - U.S. spacecraft Mariner 9 transmitted the first close-up TV pictures of Mars to Earth.

1783 – The Montgolfier brothers' hot air balloon marks the first human ascent by Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier (tethered balloon).

1815 - Napoleon began his exile on the island of St. Helena, after suffering a final defeat against a force under the Duke of Wellington.

1860 - Eleven year old Grace Bedell of Westfield, N.Y., wrote a letter to presidential candidate Abraham Lincoln, suggesting he could improve his appearance by growing a beard.

1888 – The "From Hell" letter sent by Jack the Ripper is received by the investigators.

1961 - The human rights organization Amnesty International was established in London.

1993 - Nelson Mandela and F.W. de Klerk were named winners of the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts to end apartheid in South Africa.

1997 - British car driver Andy Green, driving the 13.7 m long (45 ft) jet car Thrust SSC, set a new land speed record and broke the sound barrier at Black Rock Desert, Nevada, with a two-way average of 763.035 mph (Mach 1.020).

2001 – NASA's Galileo spacecraft passes within 112 miles of Jupiter's moon Io.

1793 - Marie Antoinette was beheaded during the French Revolution.

1847 - Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte was published under her pseudonym Currer Bell.

1853 - The Ottoman Empire declared war on Russia, starting the Crimean War.

1902 - Britain opened its first 'Borstal' detention centre, at the village of Borstal in Kent. The institution was designed to keep boys, especially first offenders, away from adult criminals in prisons; to teach them a trade and to reward good behaviour.

1958 - Britain's most popular children's television programme 'Blue Peter' was first broadcast on BBC TV. The first presenters were Leila Williams and Christopher Trace.

1962 - The Cuban missile crisis began when President John F. Kennedy was informed that reconnaissance photographs had revealed the presence of missile bases in Cuba.

1964 - China detonated its first atomic bomb, at Lop Nor.

1860 - The world's first professional golf tournament was held, at Prestwick in Scotland.

1931 - Mobster Al Capone was convicted of income tax evasion and sentenced to 11 years in prison.

1956 - Queen Elizabeth II opened Calder Hall in Cumbria - Britain's first large scale atomic energy station.

1973 - Leaders of OPEC decided to suspend oil exports to all nations supporting Israel in the Yom Kippur War. The embargo caused major shortages and gas rationing.

1980 - In Rome, the first ever meeting between a British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II and the Pope, during a State Visit to the Vatican.

1990 - The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) was created.

2003 – The pinnacle is fitted on the roof of Taipei 101, a 101-floor skyscraper in Taipei, allowing it to surpass the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur by 56 metres (184 ft) and become the World's tallest highrise.

2010 – Mary MacKillop becomes Australia's first saint, she was canonised as Saint Mary of the Cross by Pope Benedict

1469 - Ferdinand of Aragon married Isabella of Castile, making Spain a world power. They started the Spanish Inquisition in 1478.

1851 – Herman elton's Moby-Dick is first published as The Whale by Richard Bentley of London.

1910 - The trial of English murderer Dr Crippen began at the Old Bailey Criminal Court in London.

1922 - British Broadcasting Company (later British Broadcasting Corporation) was officially formed.

1967 – The Soviet probe Venera 4 reaches Venus and becomes the first spacecraft to measure the atmosphere of another planet.

1995 - Red Rum, three times winner of the Grand National at Aintree, died at the age of 30 - an exceptional age for a horse.

1216 - King John died during a Civil War which was the result of his refusal to recognize the Magna Carta signed the previous year. He was known as Lackland for losing so much territory to France.

1453 – The French recapture of Bordeaux brings the Hundred Years' War to a close, with the English retaining only Calais on French soil.

1781 - The American War of Independence came to an end when British commander Lord Cornwallis surrendered his 8,000 troops to George Washington at Yorktown, in Virginia, after a three week siege.

1813 - Napoleon was defeated at Leipzig by the Allies at the Battle of the Nations. Around 500,000 troops were involved.

1970 - British Petroleum announced the first major discovery of oil under the British sector of the North Sea.

1977 - The supersonic Concorde jet landed in New York City for the first time.

1987 - Black Monday. Millions of pounds were wiped off the value of shares and other financial markets around the world. Wall Street ended the day down 22%, a greater fall than the Wall Street Crash of 1929.

1989 - After serving 14 years in prison for the IRA Guildford and Woolwich bombings in England, the "Guildford Four" had their convictions quashed.

2003 – Mother Teresa is beatified by Pope John Paul II.

2005 – Saddam Hussein goes on trial in Baghdad for crimes against humanity.