On this day: Dutch protests for US missile arrival

Dutch youths demonstrate against arrival of US Pershing cruise missiles in Netherlands. Picture: AFP

29 October

National Day of Turkey.

1787: Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni was first performed, in Prague.

1859: Spain declared war on Morocco.

1863: Swiss philanthropist Henri Dunant founded the International Red Cross.

1929: “Black Tuesday” - named when Wall Street crashed, leading to the Great Depression.

1956: Israel invaded the Sinai Peninsula and troops pushed on towards the Suez Canal, just 20 miles away.

1964: A collection of gems, including the 565 carat (113g) Star of India, were stolen by thieves from the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.

1967: London criminal Jack McVitie was murdered by the Kray twins, leading to their eventual imprisonment.

1969: The first-ever computer-to-computer link made on ARPANET, the precursor to the internet.

1983: More than half-a-million people demonstrated against cruise missiles in The Hague, Netherlands.

1985: Lester Piggott rode Full Choke at Nottingham to record his 4,349th winner. This was thought to be the end of his British career – he retired in 1995.

1986: The final section of the M25 motorway around London was opened by prime minister Margaret Thatcher.

1987: Thomas “Hit Man” Hearns won the world middleweight title, making him the first boxer to win a world title at four weights.

1991: The American Galileo spacecraft made its closest approach to 951 Gaspra. It was the first probe to visit an asteroid.

1994: A man was arrested outside the White House in Washington after spraying the building with gunfire while president Bill Clinton, watched television inside.

1995: Orkney police started an investigation after 25 grey seal pups were found shot near Burwick on South Ronaldsay.

1998: A fire at The Gothenburg nightclub in Sweden claimed 63 lives and injured 200.

2004: In Rome, European heads of state signed the Treaty and Final Act to establish the first European Constitution.

2005: More than 60 people die in a series of bombings in Delhi.

2008: Delta Air Lines merged with Northwest Airlines to create the world’s largest airline.

BIRTHDAYS

Yasmin Le Bon, model, 50; Angela Douglas, actress, 74; Richard Dreyfuss, actor, 67; Ian Durrant, Scottish football coach and former player, 48; Robert Hardy CBE, actor and writer, 89; Kate Jackson, actress, 66; Michael Jayston, actor, 79; Denny Laine, musician (Moody Blues & Wings), 70; Winona Ryder, actress, 43; Rufus Sewell, actor, 47; Michael Vaughan OBE, former England cricket captain, 40; Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, president of Liberia and first female premier of an African country, 76; Lee Child, thriller writer, 60; Amanda Beard, Olympic champion swimmer, 33; Randy Jackson, singer and musician, 53; Peter Green, musician, founder of Fleetwood Mac, 68.

ANNIVERSARIES

Births: 1650 David Calderwood, Scottish historian; 1656 Edmund Halley, astronomer; 1740 James Boswell, Edinburgh-born diarist and biographer of Samuel Johnson; 1897 Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s propaganda minister.

Deaths: 1618 Sir Walter Raleigh, seafarer; 1911 Joseph Pulitzer, American newspaper publisher; 1957 Louis B Mayer, film producer; 1971 Duane Allman, musician, co-founder and leader of the Allman Brothers;.