May 3

From Encyclopedia Jr, free information reference for Kids

May 3 is the 123rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (124th in leap years). There are 242 days remaining.

[edit] Events

• 1494 - Christopher Columbus first sights land that will be called Jamaica.
• 1791 - The May Constitution of Poland (first modern constitution in Europe) is proclaimed by the Polish Diet.
• 1808 - Finnish War: Sweden loses the fortress of Sveaborg to Russia.
• 1808 - Peninsular War: The Madrid rebels who rose up on May 2 are fired upon near Príncipe Pío hill.
• 1810 - Lord Byron swims the Hellespont.
• 1849 - The May Uprising in Dresden begins - the last of the German revolutions of 1848.
• 1860 - Charles XV of Sweden-Norway is crowned king of Sweden.
• 1867 - The Hudson's Bay Company gives up all claims to Vancouver Island.
• 1901 - Great Fire of 1901 begins in Jacksonville, FL.
• 1916 - Easter Rising leaders are executed in Dublin.
• 1923 - Lieutenants John Macready & Oakley Kelly land their Fokker T-2 aircraft in San Diego, California. This is the first non-stop transcontinental flight. It took nearly 27 hrs.
• 1928 - Japanese atrocities in Jinan, China.
• 1933 - Nellie Tayloe Ross becomes the first woman to head the United States Mint.
• 1937 - Gone with the Wind, a novel by Margaret Mitchell, wins the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
• 1939 - The All India Forward Bloc is formed by Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose.
• 1945 - World War II: Sinking of the floating-jails Cap Arcona, Thielbek and Deutschland by the RAF in Lübeck Bay.
• 1946 - World War II: The International Military Tribunal for the Far East begins in Tokyo against 28 Japanese military and government officials accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
• 1947 - New post-war Japanese constitution goes into effect.
• 1951 - London's Royal Festival Hall opens.
• 1951 - The United States Senate Armed Services and Foreign Relations Committees begin their closed door hearings into the dismissal of General Douglas MacArthur by U.S. President Harry S. Truman.
• 1952 - U.S. Lieutenant Colonels Joseph O. Fletcher and William P. Benedict land a plane at the North Pole.
• 1956 - The judo World Championships are first held.
• 1957 - Walter O'Malley, the owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers, agrees to move the team from Brooklyn, New York, to Los Angeles, California.
• 1959 - The first Grammy Awards are announced.
• 1960 - The Off-Broadway musical comedy, The Fantasticks, opens in New York City's Greenwich Village, eventually becoming the longest-running musical of all time.
• 1960 - The Anne Frank House opened in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
• 1973 - The Sears Tower in Chicago is topped out as the world's tallest building.
• 1991 - The Declaration of Windhoek is signed.
• 1997 - In Dublin, Ireland, Katrina and the Waves win the forty-second Eurovision Song Contest for the United Kingdom singing "Love Shine A Light".
• 1999 - Oklahoma City is slammed by an F5 tornado killing 42 people, injuring 665, and causing $1 billion in damage. The tornado was one of 66 from the Oklahoma Tornado Outbreak.
• 1999 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above 11,000 for the first time in its history at 11,014.70.
• 2000 - The sport of Geocaching begins, with the first cache placed and the coordinates from a GPS posted on Usenet.
• 2003 - New Hampshire's famous Old Man of the Mountain collapses.
• 2006 - Armavia Flight 967 crashes into the Black Sea, killing 113 people on board, with no survivors.
• 2006 - Zacarias Moussaoui is sentenced to life in prison in Alexandria, Virginia.

[edit] Births

• 612 - Constantine III, Byzantine Emperor (d. 641)
• 1415 - Cecily Neville, mother of Edward IV of England and Richard III of England (d. 1495)
• 1428 - Pedro González de Mendoza, Spanish cardinal and statesman (d. 1495)
• 1446 - Margaret of York, wife of Charles I, Duke of Burgundy (d. 1503)
• 1469 - Niccolò Machiavelli, Italian historian and political author (d. 1527)
• 1662 - Matthäus Daniel Pöppelmann, German architect (d. 1736)
• 1695 - Henri Pitot, Italian-born French engineer (d. 1771)
• 1713 - Alexis Clairault, French mathematician (d. 1765)
• 1761 - August von Kotzebue, German dramatist (d. 1819)
• 1826 - Charles, Crown Prince of Sweden-Norway (d. 1872)
• 1835 - Alfred Austin, English poet (d. 1913)
• 1844 - Richard D'Oyly Carte, English theatrical impresario (d. 1901)
• 1849 - Bernhard von Bülow, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1929)
• 1857 - George Gore, baseball player (d. 1933)
• 1859 - Andy Adams, American author (d. 1935)
• 1860 - John Scott Haldane, Scottish physiologist (d. 1936)
• 1860 - Vito Volterra, Italian mathematician (d. 1940)
• 1861 - Emmett Dalton, American outlaw (d. 1937)
• 1867 - J.T. Hearne, English cricketer (d. 1944)
• 1873 - Pavlo Skoropadsky, Ukrainian general (d. 1945)
• 1874 - François Coty, French perfume manufacturer (d. 1934)
• 1874 - V. Walfrid Ekman, Swedish oceanographer (d. 1954)
• 1877 - Karl Abraham, German psychoanalyst (d. 1925)
• 1886 - Marcel Dupré, French composer (d. 1971)
• 1888 - Beulah Bondi, American actress (d. 1981)
• 1891 - Tadeusz Peiper, Polish poet (d. 1969)
• 1892 - George Paget Thomson, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1975)
• 1893 - Konstantine Gamsakhurdia, Georgian writer and public benefactor (d. 1975)
• 1895 - Cornelius Van Til, philosopher and Christian apologist (d. 1987)
• 1898 - Golda Meir, Prime Minister of Israel (d. 1978)
• 1902 - Alfred Kastler, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1984)
• 1903 - Bing Crosby, American singer (d. 1977)
• 1905 - Sebastian Shaw, English actor (d. 1994)
• 1906 - Anna E. Roosevelt, American radio personality (d. 1975)
• 1906 - Mary Astor, American actress (d. 1987)
• 1910 - Norman Corwin, American radio pioneer
• 1912 - Virgil Fox, American organist (d. 1980)
• 1913 - William Inge, American playwright (d. 1973)
• 1915 - Stu Hart, Canadian professional wrestler and trainer (d. 2003)
• 1916 - Léopold Simoneau, French Canadian tenor (d. 2006)
• 1919 - Betty Comden, American lyricist, usually teamed with Adolph Green
• 1919 - John Cullen Murphy, American comic strip artist (d. 2004)
• 1919 - Pete Seeger, American folk singer
• 1921 - Joe Ames, American singer
• 1921 - Sugar Ray Robinson, American boxer (d. 1989)
• 1923 - Ralph Hall, American politician
• 1928 - Dave Dudley, American singer (d. 2003)
• 1932 - Robert Osborne, American film historian
• 1933 - James Brown, American singer
• 1933 - Steven Weinberg, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• 1935 - Ron Popeil, American inventor
• 1937 - Frankie Valli, American singer (The Four Seasons)
• 1938 - Chris Cannizzaro, Baseball player
• 1940 - Clemens Westerhof, Dutch football manager
• 1941 - Edward "Monk" Malloy, Former University of Notre Dame President
• 1942 - Věra Čáslavská, Czech gymnast
• 1945 - Davey Lopes, baseball player and coach
• 1946 - Silvino Francisco, South African snooker player
• 1947 - Doug Henning, Canadian magician (d. 2000)
• 1950 - Howard Ashman, American lyricist (d. 1991)
• 1950 - Mary Hopkin, Welsh singer
• 1951 - Christopher Cross, American musician
• 1951 - Tatyana Tolstaya, Russian writer
• 1952 - Allan Wells, British athlete
• 1955 - David Hookes, Australian cricketer (d. 2004)
• 1959 - David Ball, British musician (Soft Cell)
• 1959 - Uma Bharati, Indian politician
• 1959 - Ben Elton, British comedian and author
• 1960 - Amy Steel, American actress
• 1961 - Joe Murray, Cartoonist
• 1962 - Anders Graneheim, Swedish bodybuilder
• 1963 - Jeff Hornacek, Basketball player
• 1965 - Rob Brydon, Welsh comedian
• 1966 - Darren Morgan, Welsh snooker player
• 1971 - Josey Scott, lead singer of Saliva
• 1972 - Celeste, American adult actress
• 1974 - Dulé Hill, American actor
• 1975 - Maksim Mrvica, Croatian pianist
• 1978 - Paul Banks, American vocalist (Interpol)
• 1981 - Farrah Franklin, American singer (formerly of Destiny's Child)
• 1983 - Romeo Castelen, Dutch footballer
• 1984 - Nam Sang-mi, South Korean actress and model

[edit] Deaths

• 1152 - Matilda of Boulogne, Queen of England (b. 1105)
• 1160 - Peter Lombard, Italian scholar and bishop (b. c.1100)
• 1270 - King Béla IV of Hungary (b. 1206)
• 1294 - John I, Duke of Brabant (b. 1252/1253)
• 1481 - Mehmed II, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1432)
• 1598 - Anna Guarini, Italian singer (b. 1563)
• 1606 - Henry Garnet, English Jesuit (executed) (b. 1555)
• 1622 - Pedro Páez, Spanish Jesuit missionary (b. 1564)
• 1679 - James Sharp, English archbishop (assassinated) (b. 1613)
• 1693 - Claude de Rouvroy, duc de Saint-Simon, French courtier (b. 1607)
• 1704 - Heinrich Ignaz Biber, Bohemian composer (b. 1644)
• 1724 - John Leverett the Younger, American President of Harvard (b. 1662)
• 1750 - John Willison, Scottish minister and writer (b. 1680)
• 1752 - Samuel Ogle, British provincial Governor of Maryland (b. c.1692)
• 1758 - Pope Benedict XIV (b. 1675)
• 1763 - George Psalmanazar, British imposter (b. 1679)
• 1764 - Francesco Algarotti, Italian philosopher (b. 1712)
• 1779 - John Winthrop, American astronomer (b. 1714)
• 1793 - Martin Gerbert, German theologian and historian (b. 1720)
• 1839 - Ferdinando Paer, Italian composer (b. 1771)
• 1856 - Adolphe Charles Adam, French composer (b. 1803)
• 1942 - Thorvald Stauning, Prime Minister of Denmark (b. 1873)
• 1958 - Frank Foster, English cricketer (b. 1889)
• 1987 - Dalida, French singer (b. 1933)
• 1988 - Lev Semenovich Pontryagin, Russian mathematician (b. 1908)
• 1988 - Milton Caniff, American cartoonist (Terry and the Pirates, Steve Canyon) (b. 1907)
• 1989 - Christine Jorgenson, American transexual (b. 1926)
• 1989 - Edward Ochab, Polish Communist politician (b. 1906)
• 1988- Chris Johnson, Jew that moved to America
• 1991 - Jerzy Kosiński, Polish-born writer (b. 1933)
• 1994 - Ezra Taft Benson, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (b. 1899)
• 1996 - Jack Weston, American movie and television actor (b.1924)
• 1996 - Alex Kellner, baseball player (b. 1924)
• 2002 - Barbara Castle, Baroness Castle of Blackburn, British politician (b. 1910)
• 2003 - Suzy Parker, American actress (b. 1932)
• 2004 - Anthony Ainley, British actor (b. 1932)
• 2004 - Darrell Johnson, baseball player (b. 1928)
• 2006 - Karel Appel, Dutch painter (b. 1921)
• 2006 - Pramod Mahajan, Indian politician (b. 1949)
• 2006 - Earl Woods, father of golfer Tiger Woods (b. 1932)

[edit] Holidays and observances

• World Press Freedom Day.
• Constitution Day in Poland and Japan.
• Discoflux (Discordianism).

[edit] Liturgical Feast days

Roman Catholicism

• Feast of the Finding of the Holy Cross, aka the Invention of the True Cross.
• Saint Apostle Philip
• Saint Apostle James the Lesser
• Saint Alexander I
• Saint Juvenal of Narni (d. 369)
• Saint Ansfrid (c. 1008)
• Saints Eventius and Alexander, Saint Theodulus (martyrs of 119)
• Saint Emily Bicchiere (1238 - 1314
• Antonia and Alexander (martyrs of 313)
• Black Madonna of Częstochowa Queen and Protector of Poland (since April 1, 1656)

[edit] External links

• BBC: On This Day
• The New York Times: On This Day
• On This Day in Canada

May 2 - May 4 - April 3 - June 3 – listing of all days