On this day: Apollo 10 splashed down in the Pacific

On this day in 1969 Apollo 10 splashed down in the Pacific after travelling 600,000 miles. It arrived 25 seconds late. Picture: Getty

1424: Gold and silver mines in Scotland became Crown property.

1521: Martin Luther was banned by Edict of Worms for his religious beliefs.

1733: John Kay, Richard Arkwright’s assistant and a former clockmaker, patented the flying shuttle to operate on Arkwright’s spinning frame.

1805: France’s Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned King of Italy.

1834: Sikhs captured Peshawar from British in India.

1865: Surrender of last Confederate army at Shreveport, Louisiana, ended US Civil War.

1887: British East Africa Company was chartered.

1906: Vauxhall Bridge over the Thames was opened.

1913: Emily Duncan became Britain’s first woman magistrate.

1917: German aircraft killed 76 civilians in bombing raids along the south-east coast of England.

1924: United States president Calvin Coolidge signed bill limiting immigration to the US and excluding Japanese.

1933: Australia claimed one-third of Antarctic continent.

1942: German forces began their drives for Stalingrad and the Caucasus.

1950: Petrol rationing ended in Britain after ten years.

1954: Funeral ship of Pharaoh Cheops was discovered in Egypt.

1966: British Guiana became independent Latin American nation of Guyana.

1969: Apollo 10 splashed down in the Pacific after travelling 600,000 miles.

1973: An Icelandic gunboat shelled and holed a British trawler.

1984: Indian authorities said Hindu-Muslim fighting in Bombay area had been brought under control by troops.

1989: The BBC broadcast the 10,000th episode of the daily radio serial The Archers, with Terry Wogan and Dame Judi Dench as guests.

1991: Lauda Air Boeing 767 disintegrated 31,000ft above Thailand, killing all 223 on board. Company said later that crash was caused by engine mistakenly being put into reverse.

1992: Russia’s Constitutional Court ordered president Mikhail Gorbachev, or a substitute, to represent the Communist Party in a trial on its right to exist.

1994: Former Ministry of Defence official Gordon Foxley was jailed for four years for taking more than £1 m in bribes from overseas armaments firms.

1995: Scotland opened their World Rugby Cup programme with a 89-0 victory over Ivory Coast. Skipper Gavin Hastings scored a world record 44 points.

1998: The Supreme Court of the US ruled that Ellis Island, the historic gateway for millions of immigrants, was mainly in the state of New Jersey, not New York.

2004: The New York Times published an admission of journalistic failings, claiming that its flawed reporting and lack of scepticism towards sources during the build-up to the 2003 war in Iraq helped promote the belief that Iraq possessed large stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.

2009: North Korea tested two short-range missiles, further heightening tensions in the region.

2010: The Alcohol Commission called for a ban on Buckfast tonic wine in a bid to combat Scotland’s booze problem.

2011: Fugitive Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect Ratko Mladic was arrested in Serbia after 16 years on the run.

BIRTHDAYS

Hazel Irvine, Scottish television presenter, 50; Helena Bonham Carter CBE, actress, 49; Zola Pieterse (nee Budd), South African athlete, 49; Roy Dotrice OBE, actor, 92; Howard Goodall CBE, composer, 57; Pam Grier, actress, 66; Alan Hollinghurst, novelist, 61; Lenny Kravitz, musician, 51; Alec McCowen CBE, actor and writer, 90; Stevie Nicks, singer-songwriter, 67; Patsy Palmer, actress, 43; Michael Portillo, MP 1984-1997 and 1999-2005, and broadcaster, 62; Lord Stevens of Ludgate, chairman, United News & Media 1981-99, 79; Philip Michael Thomas, actor, 66; Matt Stone, actor and writer (South Park), 44; Philip Treacy OBE, hat designer, 48.

ANNIVERSARIES

Births: AD 673 The Venerable Bede, English historian and scholar; 1799 Aleksander Pushkin, poet and novelist; 1859 AE Housman, poet; 1867 Princess Mary of Teck, who became Queen Mary, wife of George V; 1886 Al Jolson, entertainer; 1904 George Formby, entertainer; 1907 John Wayne (born Marion Michael Morrison), actor; 1908 Robert Morley, actor and dramatist; 1909 Matt Busby, football manager; 1920 Peggy Lee, actress, singer, composer and author.

Deaths: AD604 St Augustine, first Archbishop of Canterbury; 1703 Samuel Pepys, diarist and civil servant; 1943 Edsel Ford, president of Ford Motor Co; 1951 Lincoln Ellsworth, scientist and explorer of Arctic and Antarctic; 1979 George Brent, actor; 2003 Kathleen Winsor, novelist.