On this day: Franklin D Roosevelt elected US president

On this day in 1944 Franklin D Roosevelt was elected United States president for a record fourth time. Picture: Getty

National day of Russia.

1872: The ill-fated 282-ton brigantine Mary Celeste set sail from New York for Genoa – a month later she was found sailing in the Atlantic near the Azores but with no-one on board.

1908: Professor Ernest Rutherford announced that he had discovered the atom.

1916: Jeanette Rankin, from Montana, was elected first woman member of US Congress.

1917: Bolshevik Revolution, led by Lenin, overthrew Kerensky government and began setting up world’s first communist state.

1921: Benito Mussolini declared himself Il Duce, leader of the Italian National Fascist Party.

1944: Franklin D Roosevelt re-elected US President for record fourth time.

1945: Flying over Herne Bay, Kent, a British RAF Gloster Meteor jet reached a record speed of 606mph.

1956: Britain and France declared ceasefire in Egypt, but Britain said it would evacuate troops only on arrival of UN Emergency Force.

1967: Henry Cooper beat Billy Walker and became the only boxer to win three Lonsdale belts outright.

1972: Richard Nixon was elected 37th United States president. He was the only president to resign.

1974: Lord Lucan disappeared the same night his children’s nanny was murdered and his wife seriously assaulted at their home in London.

1975: The Scottish Daily News ceased publication after six months.

1988: Sugar Ray Leonard completed collection of world titles at five different weights by knocking out Canadian Donny Lalonde.

1989: Clapham rail accident report criticised BR for “positively dangerous” working practices.

1989: Paul Boateng became first black MP to be appointed to Opposition front bench.

1990: Mary Robinson, liberal feminist lawyer, was elected as Ireland’s first woman president.

1994: The Irish Republic announced that it would be releasing up to 30 IRA prisoners before Christmas in a “sensitive approach” to the terrorist ceasefire.

1996: A scathing report into remand suicides at woman-only Cornton Vale Prison, Stirling, blamed an increase in drug-abusing women which stretched staff resources.

2006: Three hundred soldiers executed in the First World War for offences including cowardice and desertion were pardoned with the passing of the Armed Forces Act. The campaign had been led by the family of Private Henry Farr, who was shot at dawn.

2008: Labour won the Glenrothes by-election, comfortably holding off a challenge from the SNP. Lindsay Roy was elected the new MP with a majority of 6,737. Gordon Brown, the prime minister, said victory in the Fife seat was a vote of confidence in the government’s handling of the economic crisis.

2009: Britain’s David Haye, 29, became the first Briton to hold a world heavyweight crown since Lennox Lewis retired in 2003 after beating Russian Nikolay Valuev in Nuremberg to claim the WBA heavyweight crown.

2011: Michael Jackson’s personal physician, Dr Conrad Murray, was found guilty of the involuntary manslaughter of the star by a jury in Los Angeles.

BIRTHDAYS

John Barnes MBE, footballer and coach, 52; Lindsay Duncan CBE, Edinburgh-born actress, 65; Rio Ferdinand, footballer, 37; Doctor Billy Graham, American evangelist, 97; Lucinda Green MBE, three-day eventer, 62; Neil Hannon, singer, 45; Dame Gwyneth Jones DBE, soprano, 79; Joni Mitchell (born Roberta Anderson), folk singer, 72; Jonathan Palmer, racing driver, 59; Su Pollard, actress, 66; Jean Shrimpton, odel and actress, 73; Sharleen Spiteri, Scottish singer (Texas), 48; Morgan Spurlock, director and producer, 45.

ANNIVERSARIES

Births: 1867 Marie Curie, scientist; 1879 Leon Trotsky, Russian Revolution leader; 1913 Albert Camus, novelist and playwright; 1917 Helen Suzman, South African politician; 1924 Wolf Mankowitz, author, playwright and scriptwriter; 1926 Dame Joan Sutherland DBE, soprano.

Deaths: 1910 Leo Tolstoy, novelist; 1962 Eleanor Roosevelt, niece of Theodore and wife of Franklin; 1974 Eric Linklater, novelist; 1980 Steve McQueen, actor; 1990 Tom Clancy, folk singer and actor; 1990 Lawrence Durrell, novelist; 2008 Lord Caplan, Senator of the College of Justice in Scotland 1989-2000; 2011 Joe Frazier, boxer.