On this day: Martin Luther King‘s ‘I have a dream’ speech

On this day in 1963 civil rights leader Dr Martin Luther King jnr made his I have a dream speech to a rally in Washington. Picture: Getty

1413: Bull of Pope Benedict XIII (of Avignon) ratifying the founding of St Andrews University.

1574: Treaty of Bristol settles commercial disputes between English and Spanish merchants.

1833: Parliament banned slavery throughout British Empire.

1841: Sir Robert Peel succeeded Lord Melbourne as prime minister for his second term.

1848: Boers defeated at Boomplatz by British forces and retired across Vaal River, thus ensuring Orange River sovereignty.

1850: Wagner’s opera Lohengrin was first performed and the conductor was the composer, Franz Liszt. It contains the Bridal Chorus, better known as Here Comes The Bride.

1879: British troops captured Cetywayo in Zulu War.

1895: RL Thomas, secretary and treasurer of Kinestoscope Co of New Jersey, became the first film actor, playing the part of the Queen in The Execution of Mary Queen of Scots. A dummy was also used for the first time – for the beheading.

1910: Montenegro was proclaimed an independent kingdom under Nicholas I.

1917: The Order of the British Empire (OBE) and the Companion of Honour (CH) were awarded for the first time.

1931: Ramsay MacDonald was ousted as Labour leader after joining national government. He was succeeded by Arthur Henderson.

1963: Black civil rights leader Dr Martin Luther King jnr made his famous “I have a dream…” speech to a rally of 200,000 people in Washington.

1967: Britain’s hippie movement held its great Festival of the Flower Children at Woburn Abbey, Buckinghamshire.

1975: France flew troops and police to its Mediterranean island of Corsica to quell demonstrations for autonomy.

1978: The deputy keeper of the Tate Gallery and an art historian announced that they would publish a paper demonstrating that a number of oil paintings, sketches and water colours attributed to John Constable were the work of members of his family.

1986: Bolivian government imposed nationwide state of siege in response to march to La Paz by about 7,000 miners opposed to closing of mines.

1988: Thirty-three died when three Italian air force jets collided during an aerobatics display at Ramstein in Western Germany. About 500 people were injured.

1989: Police said masked Sikh gunmen raided a passenger train in India’s Punjab State and massacred at least 22 Hindu passengers.

1990: Kuwait declared 19th province of Iraq.

1995: More than 30 people were killed when Bosnian Serbs shelled the centre of Sarajevo, hitting market shoppers.

1996: The 15-year marriage of the Prince and Princess of Wales was formally ended when they were granted a decree absolute in London.

2005: Hurricane Katrina began to make landfall in Louisiana and Mississippi in the afternoon.

2007: Two companies who owned the Stockline plastics factory in Maryhill, Glasgow, in which nine people died in an explosion in 2004, were fined £400,000. Relatives of the dead and 33 injured said the fine was an “insult”.

BIRTHDAYS

Billy Boyd, Scottish actor, 46; Kim Appleby, singer, 53; Jack Black, actor, 45; Imogen Cooper CBE, concert pianist, 65; Hugh Cornwell, rock singer (The Stranglers), 65; Windsor Davies, actor, 84; David Fincher, film director, 52; Luis Guzmán, actor, 58; Bob Langley, author and broadcaster, 75; Jamie Osborne, jockey, 47; Jason Priestley, actor and director, 45; LeAnn Rimes, singer, 32; Emma Samms, actress, 54; David Soul, singer and actor, 71; Shania Twain, country music singer, 49.

ANNIVERSARIES

Births: 1749 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, poet, novelist and scientist; 1828 Count Leo Tolstoy, novelist and philosopher; 1833 Sir Edward Burne-Jones, Pre-Raphaelite painter; 1840 Ira Sankey, hymn writer; 1894 Karl Böhm, conductor; 1896 Liam O’Flaherty, novelist; 1899 Charles Boyer, actor; 1906 Sir John Betjeman, Poet Laureate 1972-84; 1913 Lord Cudlipp, journalist; 1915 Max Robertson, radio sports commentator; 1916 Mel Ferrer, film actor; 1930 Ben Gazzara, American actor; 1931 John Shirley-Quirk CBE, British bass-baritone; 1937 12th Duke of Argyll.

Deaths: 1805 Alexander Carlyle, Scottish church leader; 1811 John Leyden, physician and poet; 1859 Leigh Hunt, essayist and poet; 1958 Ernest Lawrence, physicist; 1967 Charles Darrow, inventor of Monopoly; 1972 Prince William of Gloucester (air race crash); 1987 John Huston, film director; 1990 Patience Strong, writer; 2001 Sir Reo Stakis, hotelier; 2006 Ed Benedict, animator (notably Yogi Bear and The Flintstones).