20 May History: This Date

<< May 19| HISTORY “4” “2”DAY |May 21 >>
Events, deaths, births, of 20 MAY
[For May 20 Julian go to Gregorian date: 1583~1699: May 30 — 1700s: May 31 — 1800s: Jun 01 — 1900~2099: Jun 02]

ALTERNATE SITES ALL FOR 030520 ANY DAY OF THE YEAR IN HISTORY ART “4” MAY 20

• Columbus dies in poverty... • Martial law in Beijing... • Thermonuclear bomb tested at Bikini... • Hamburger Hill battle ends... • Panzers break through in France... • Homestead Act... • Balzac is born... • Condamnés à mort par la Révolution... • Da Gama reaches India... • French optimism in Vietnam... • Auden becomes US citizen... • Equal rights for homosexuals... • Lindbergh flies off to cross Atlantic... • Parents killed today, school shooting tomorrow... • D'Antona freddato... • John Stuart Mill is born...• Levi Strauss jeans...

On a May 20:

2003 “Happy Sindane”, 18 [photo >], goes to a police station in Bronkhorstspruit, South Africa, and says that, from his Afrikaans-speaking family in Johannesburg, at age 6 he was kidnapped by a maid who gave him to a Ndebele-speaking couple in a rural area, where they made him watch herds and do agricultural work. He his fluent in Ndebele and seems to speak very little Afrikaans.

2002 After two-and-a-half years under UN trusteeship since having its independence vote drowned in blood by Indonesian militias, East Timor becomes an independent country. Xanana Gusmão, a former anti-Indonesia independence leader, becomes President, Mari Alkatiri Prime Minister, José Ramos Horta (1996 Nobel Peace Prize) Foreign Minister.

2001 Local elections in Croatia for officials in 21 county and 422 municipal councils, as well as 123 city halls. 3.9 million Croats are eligible to vote.
2001 Presidential elections in Mongolia. President Natsagiin Bagabandi is reelected. His Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party runs the country almost as a one-party state. It has 72 of parliament's 76 seats, won in elections in 2000. Formerly Communist, it now claims to be for democracy and radical economic reform.

2000 The five nuclear powers on the UN Security Council agree to eventually eliminate their nuclear arsenals, as part of a new disarmament agenda approved by 187 countries.

1996 Supreme Court defends equal rights of homosexuals ^top^
In a historic victory for the "gay" and lesbian civil rights movement, the US Supreme Court voted six to three to strike down an amendment to Colorado’s state constitution that would have prevented any city, town, or county from taking any legislative, executive, or judicial action to protect the rights of homosexuals. In 1992, Colorado’s Amendment Two was passed with a majority of the state’s citizens approving it in a special referendum. Four years later, the Supreme Court agreed to hear Romer v. Evans, a case that allowed the nation’s highest court to scrutinize the constitutionality of the amendment. On 20 May 1996, in a ruling authored by Associate Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, the Supreme Court struck down Amendment Two, arguing that the law inherently violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment by defining a specific group of person and then denying them the possibility of protection across the board. Although the ruling, authored by a Republican appointee, was cautious in its language, it was applauded as a historic civil rights victory that gave activists of the gay and lesbian civil rights movement their first major constitutional precedence for fighting future anti-gay legislation.

1992 “Illegitimacy is something we should talk about in terms of not having it.” says Vice President Dan Quayle (reported in Esquire Aug.92)
1991 Lawmakers in the Soviet Union voted to liberalize foreign travel and emigration.

1989 Martial Law in Beijing ^top^
      China’s Communist government declares martial law over Beijing and calls in troops and tanks to suppress the dissidents protesting for democratic reforms in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.
      On April 15, the death of Hu Yaobang, a former Communist Party head who supported democratic reforms, roused some 100'000 students to gather at Beijing's Tiananmen Square to commemorate Hu and voice their discontent with China's authoritative Communist government.
      On April 22, an official memorial service for Hu Yaobang was held in Tiananmen's Great Hall of the People, and student representatives carried a petition to the steps of the Great Hall, demanding to meet with Premier Li Peng. The Chinese government refused such a meeting, leading to a general boycott of Chinese universities across the country and widespread calls for democratic reforms.
      Ignoring government warnings of violent suppression of any mass demonstration, students from more than forty universities began a march to Tiananmen on April 27. The students were joined by workers, intellectuals, and civil servants, and by mid-May over a million people filled the square, the site of Communist leader's Mao Zedong's proclamation of the People's Republic of China in 1949.
      On May 20, the government formally declares martial law in Beijing, and troops and tanks are called in to disperse the dissidents. However, large numbers of students and citizens blocked the army's advance, and by May 23, government forces had pulled back to the outskirts of Beijing. On June 3, with negotiations to end the protests stalled and calls for democratic reforms escalating, the troops received orders from the Chinese government to reclaim Tiananmen at all cost. By the end of the next day, Chinese troops had forcibly cleared Tiananmen Square and Beijing's streets, killing hundreds of demonstrators and arresting thousands of protestors and other suspected dissidents.
      In the weeks after the government crackdown, an unknown number of dissidents were executed and hard-liners in the government took firm control of the country. The international community was outraged by the incident, and economic sanctions imposed by the United States and other countries sent China's economy into decline. However, by late 1990, international trade had resumed, thanks in part to China's release of several hundred imprisoned dissidents.

1989 Walter McConnel, 57, is oldest to reach 8300 m Mt Everest top.
1985 Dow Jones industrial avg closes above 1300 for first time.
1985 US began broadcasts to Cuba on Radio Marti
1980 In a referendum, 59.5% of Québec voters reject separatism.
1978 US launches Pioneer Venus 1; produces first global radar map of Venus
1972 Republic of Cameroon declared as constitution is ratified.
1970 Some 100'000 demonstrate in New York's Wall Street district in support of US policy in Vietnam and Cambodia.

1969 Bloody battle for Hamburger Hill ends ^top^
      After ten days and ten bloody assaults, Apbia Mountain (Hill 937), known as "Hamburger Hill" by the Americans who fought there, is finally captured by US and South Vietnamese troops.
      Located 1.5 km east of the Laotian border, Hill 937 was to be taken as part of Operation Apache Snow, a mission intended to limit enemy infiltration from Laos that threatened Hue to the northeast and Danang to the southeast. On May 10, following air and artillery strikes, a US-led infantry force launched its first assault on the North Vietnamese stronghold, but suffered a high proportion of casualties and fell back.
      Ten more infantry assaults came over the next ten days, and Hill 937’s North Vietnamese defenders did not give up their fortified position until May 20. Almost one hundred Americans had been killed and more than 400 had been wounded, amounting to a shocking 70-percent casualty rate during the ten-day battle.
      The same day that Hamburger Hill was finally captured, Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts called the operation "senseless and irresponsible" and attacked the military tactics of President Richard Nixon’s administration. His speech before the Senate was seen as part of a growing public outcry over the US military policy in Vietnam.
      In the next week, US military command reversed their stance on the strategic importance of Hamburger Hill, and, on May 28 it was abandoned, just one week after it was taken. North Vietnamese forces eventually returned and re-fortified their original position.
Criticism in the US Senate.
     As part of a growing outcry over US military policy in Vietnam, Edward Kennedy (D-Massachusetts), in a Senate speech, scorns the military tactics of the Nixon administration. He condemned the battle for Ap Bia Mountain, which had become known as "Hamburger Hill," as "senseless and irresponsible." The battle in question had occurred as part of Operation Apache Snow in the A Shau Valley. Starting on May 10, paratroopers from the 101st Airborne had engaged a North Vietnamese regiment on the slopes of Hill 937, known to the Vietnamese as Ap Bia Mountain. Entrenched in prepared fighting positions, the North Vietnamese 29th Regiment repulsed the initial American assault, and beat back another attempt by the 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry on May 14. An intense battle raged for the next 10 days as the mountain came under heavy Allied air strikes, artillery barrages, and 10 infantry assaults. On May 20, Maj. Gen. Melvin Zais, commanding general of the 101st, sent in two additional US airborne battalions and a South Vietnamese battalion as reinforcements. The Communist stronghold was finally captured in the 11th attack when the American and South Vietnamese soldiers fought their way to the summit of the mountain. In the face of the four-battalion attack, the North Vietnamese retreated to sanctuary areas in Laos.
      During the intense fighting, 597 North Vietnamese were reported killed and US casualties were 56 killed and 420 wounded. Due to the bitter fighting and the high loss of life, the battle for Ap Bia Mountain received widespread unfavorable publicity in the United States and was dubbed "Hamburger Hill" in the US media, a name evidently derived from the fact that the battle turned into a "meat grinder." Since the operation was not intended to hold territory but rather to keep the North Vietnamese off balance, the mountain was abandoned soon after the battle and was occupied by the North Vietnamese a month later. Senator Kennedy was not the only American who thought the battle had been futile and ill advised; there was widespread public outrage over what appeared to be a senseless loss of American lives. The situation was exacerbated by pictures published in Life magazine of 241 US soldiers killed during the week of the Hamburger Hill battle. Gen. Creighton Abrams, commander of US Military Assistance Command Vietnam, was ordered by the White House to avoid such battles. Because of Hamburger Hill, and other battles like it, US emphasis was placed on "Vietnamization" (turning the war over to the South Vietnamese forces), rather than direct combat operations.

1961 White mob attacks a busload of "Freedom Riders" in Montgomery, Alabama, prompting the federal government to send in US marshals to restore order.
1956 Atomic fusion (thermonuclear) bomb dropped from plane-Bikini Atoll

1956 US tests thermonuclear bomb over Bikini Atoll ^top^
The United States conducts the first airborne test of an improved atomic fusion bomb, dropping it from a plane over the tiny island of Namu in the Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean. The successful test indicated that hydrogen bombs were viable airborne weapons and that the arms race had taken another giant leap forward. The United States first detonated a hydrogen bomb in 1952 in the Marshall Islands, also in the Pacific. However, that bomb — and the others used in tests that followed — were large and unwieldy affairs that were exploded from the ground. The practical application of dropping the weapon over an enemy had been a mere theoretical possibility until the successful test in May 1956. The hydrogen bomb dropped over Bikini Atoll was carried by a B-52 bomber and released at an altitude of more than 50,000 feet. The device exploded at about 15,000 feet. This bomb was far more powerful than those previously tested and was estimated to be 15 megatons or larger (one megaton is roughly equivalent to 1 million tons of TNT). Observers said that the fireball caused by the explosion measured at least four miles in diameter and was brighter than the light from 500 suns. The successful US test meant that the ante in the nuclear arms race had been dramatically upped. The Soviets had tested their own hydrogen bomb in 1953, shortly after the first US test in 1952. In November 1955, the Soviets had dropped a hydrogen bomb from an airplane in remote Siberia. Though much smaller and far less powerful (estimated at about 1.6 megatons) than the US bomb dropped over Bikini, the Russian success spurred the Americans to rush ahead with the Bikini test. The massive open-air blast in 1956 caused concerns among scientists and environmentalists about the effects of such testing on human and animal life. During the coming years, a growing movement in the United States and elsewhere began to push for a ban on open-air atomic testing. The Limited Test Ban Treaty, signed in 1963 by the United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain, prohibited open-air and underwater nuclear testing.

1953 French see "light at the end of the tunnel" in Vietnam ^top^
Using a phrase that will haunt Americans in later years — "Now we can see [success in Vietnam] clearly, like light at the end of a tunnel" — Gen. Henri Navarre assumes command of French Union Forces in Vietnam. The French had been fighting a bloody war against Communist insurgents in Vietnam since 1946. The insurgents, the Viet Minh, were fighting for independence and the French were trying to reassert their colonial rule in Indochina. Upon assumption of command, Navarre addressed himself to the grave deterioration of the French military position, particularly in the North, by advancing a plan for a build up of French forces preparatory to a massive attack against the Viet Minh. He received more support from US Secretary of State John F. Dulles in Washington than he did from Paris, but his operations during the summer only underscored the inadequacy of French military means and French inability to deal with Viet Minh tactics. Ultimately, the French were decisively defeated by the Viet Minh at Dien Bien Phu in May 1954.
When the US took over the role of stopping Communism in South Vietnam, they ran into the same kind of military problems that had plagued the French. Nevertheless, there was a widespread feeling that the United States would not make the same mistakes that the French had. In late 1967, Gen. William Westmoreland, commander of US Military Assistance Command Vietnam, used similar language to Navarre's when he asserted that the US "had turned the corner in the war." His credibility was seriously damaged on 29 January 1968, when the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese launched a massive attack that became known as the Tet Offensive. Conditioned by Westmoreland's overly optimistic assessments of the war's progress, many Americans were stunned that the Communists could launch such a ferocious attack. In the end, the Communists were defeated on the battlefield, but achieved a great psychological victory that caused many in America to question the wisdom of continuing US involvement in the war.

1946 W.H. Auden becomes a US citizen ^top^
      The English poet was born in 1907 in England, had his first poem published in a collection called Public School Verse when he was 17. He entered Oxford the following year and befriended several men who became important intellectuals, including Cecil Day-Lewis and Christopher Asherwood. His friend Stephen Spender published Auden's first poetry collection in 1928, the year Auden graduated from Oxford.
      Two years later, Auden's second book, Poems, was published. Auden spent a year in Berlin, then worked for five years as a teacher in Scotland and England. He later worked for a government film bureau. In the 1930s, Auden's work was highly political. He embraced leftist causes and went to Spain intending to drive an ambulance during the Spanish Civil War. However, he was so appalled by the sacking of Roman Catholic churches that he returned to England.
      In 1935, he married Thomas Mann's daughter Erika, whom he had never met, to help her escape Nazi Germany. In 1936, he published On This Island. In 1939, Auden moved to the US, and his work became less political as he turned to Christianity. During this time, he wrote such major works as Another Time (1940) and The Double Man (1941). In 1948, Auden won the Pulitzer Prize for his long poem The Age of Anxiety (1947), which explores human isolation and spiritual emptiness in the modern city. In 1956, he accepted a position as professor of poetry at Oxford, back in England. He stayed at Oxford until 1960 and died in Austria in 1973.

1941 Germany invades Crete

A Moncornet et Crépy-sur-Serre, le colonel de Gaulle et la 4ème DC ont arrêté depuis le 17 la progression allemande; mais il ne peuvent plus tenir un jour de plus.
1940 Panzers at Abbeville ^top^
     The German army in northern France reaches the English Channel. In reaching Abbeville, German armored columns, led by General Heinz Guderian (a tank expert), severed all communication between the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in the north and the main French army in the south. He also cut off the Force from its supplies in the west. The Germans now faced the sea, England in sight.
      Winston Churchill was prepared for such a pass, having already made plans for the withdrawal of the BEF (the BEF was a home-based army force that went to northern France at the start of both World Wars in order to support the French armies) and having called on the British Admiralty to prepare "a large number of vessels" to cross over to France if necessary. With German tanks at the Channel, Churchill prepared for a possible invasion of England itself, approving a plan to put into place gun posts and barbed wire roadblocks to protect government offices in Whitehall as well as the prime minister's dwelling, 10 Downing Street.
     The first German panzers of General Guderian reach the Somme estuary at Abbeville. Immediately their armored columns start a sweep north, toward the seaports of Boulogne, Calais, and Dunkirk. Boulogne falls on May 23. Calais holds out for three days, then fall, while the panzers pour north toward Dunkirk.
2. General Lord Gort of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF)
A crucial decision was forced on the commander of the BEF. General Lord Gort was a brave, stubborn, intellectually limited man. His French colleagues described him condescendingly as a "jovial battalion commander"; yet his troops called him "The Tiger" -a tribute to his personal courage. His mind was all too readily bogged down by detail; at an important conference in November 1939, he had astounded his colleagues by choosing as the first subject of a discussion whether a helmet, when not on a soldier's head, should be slung over the left shoulder or the right.
3. Could the BEF make it?
The great question was: Could the BEF make it? At the time of Gort's decision the Germans were much closer to Dunkirk than the BEF were. But what made Gort's decision the right one-though of course he could not know it-was the fact that the Germans chose, unwittingly, to help him by making strategic mistakes.
4. Hitler's mistake
The chief error was made by Hitler himself. Despite the heroic defenses of Boulogne and Calais, Guderian's panzers found themselves almost in sight of Dunkirk by 24 May. They were halted by the Aa Canal, 10 meters wide, 20 km from Dunkirk, the last tank obstacle in Guderian's way. By the morning of the 25 May, pontoon bridges were spanning the canal. A few tanks were across, roaring and throbbing as their crews waited for the rest of the panzer division to form up. But the order to advance was held up-that day and the next-by the intercession of Hitler.
5. "A small price to pay" for Paris
The Fuhrer felt that victory was certain if they took their time to make sure of it-step by step. The tanks that had made this victory possible should not now be expended where they were not needed; they should be husbanded for bigger battles to come. After all, the rest of France remained to be conquered. The goal, in the end, was Paris, not an unimpressive port city like Dunkirk. If gaining that goal meant that some British soldiers would manage to escape across the Channel, it was a small price to pay. And Goring's air force could play an important part in minimizing the number of soldiers who escaped. — // http://motlc.wiesenthal.com/text/x18/xr1847.html
6. Churchill was ready
     Winston Churchill was prepared for the Germans reaching the English Channel. Now General Heinz Guderian and his tanks had severed all communication between the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in the north and the main French army in the south, and also cut off the Force from its supplies in the west. Churchill had already made plans for the withdrawal of the BEF (the BEF was a home-based army force that went to northern France at the start of both World Wars in order to support the French armies) and had called on the British Admiralty to prepare "a large number of vessels" to cross over to France if necessary. Churchill also prepared for a possible invasion of England itself, approving a plan to put into place gun posts and barbed wire roadblocks to protect government offices in Whitehall as well as the prime minister's dwelling, 10 Downing Street.

1939 Regular transatlantic passenger and air mail service begins as a Pan American Airways plane, the Yankee Clipper, took off from Port Washington, N.Y., bound for Marseille France.
1932 Amelia Earhart took off from Newfoundland for Ireland to become the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic.

1927 Spirit of St. Louis departs ^top^
      At 07:52, American aviator Charles Augustus Lindbergh, Jr., 25, takes off from Roosevelt Field on Long Island, New York, on the world’s first solo, nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean.
      Lindbergh, a young airmail pilot, was a dark horse when he entered a competition with a $25'000 payoff to fly nonstop from New York to Paris. He ordered a small monoplane, configured it to his own design, and christened it the Spirit of St. Louis.
      On this rainy morning, he takes off from Roosevelt Field, but his monoplane is so loaded down with fuel that it barely clears the trees at the end of the runway. He flies north and then westward from Newfoundland, Canada. The next afternoon, after flying 5810 km in thirty-three-and-a-half hours, Lindbergh would land at Le Bourget field in Paris, becoming the first pilot to accomplish the nonstop transatlantic crossing. Lindbergh’s achievement made him an international celebrity, and won widespread public acceptance of the airplane and commercial aviation.

1927 Great Britain via treaty grants independence to Saudi Arabia's kingdom
1926 Thomas Edison says Americans prefer silent movies over talkies
1916 Codell, Kansas hit by tornado (also on same date in 1917 and 1918)
1902 US military occupation of Cuba (since 01 Jan 1899) ends
1875 Intl Bureau of Weights and Measures established by treaty
1874 Levi Strauss markets blue jeans with copper rivets, price $13.50 doz

1862 The Homestead Act ^top^
      In an important milestone in the settlement of the American West, President Abraham Lincoln signs into law the Homestead Act, a program designed to grant public land to small farmers at low cost. The act gives 160 acres of land (1/4 of a square mile, or hectares) to any applicant who is a head of a household and twenty-one years or older, provided that the person settles on the land for five years and then pays a small filing fee. If settlers wished to obtain title earlier, they could do so after six months by paying $1.25 an acre.
      The Homestead Act was first proposed in the 1850s, but, concerned free land would lower property values and reduce the cheap labor supply, Northern businessmen opposed the movement. Southern congressmen feared that the settlement of the West by small farmers would the creation of additional free states that would provide an agricultural alternative to the Southern slave system. In 1858, a homestead bill was defeated by only one vote in the Senate and in the next year a bill was passed in both houses but vetoed by President James Buchanan. Passage of the bill was high on President Lincoln’s agenda, and the loss of Southern congressmen in the succession removed most of the bill’s congressional opposition.
      The president signs the Homestead Act into law on May 20, 1862, and, by the end of the Civil War, some 15'000 land claims had been made. Most homesteaders were experienced farmers from the crowded East or Europe, and by 1900, 600'000 claims had been made for some 80 million acres of public land. Although, numerous claims continued to be made into the twentieth century, the mechanization of American agriculture in the 1930s and 1940s led to the replacement of individual homesteads with a smaller number of much larger farms.
      The Union Congress passes the Homestead Act, allowing an adult over the age of 21, male or female, to claim 160 acres of land from the public domain. Eligible persons had to cultivate the land and improve it by building a barn or house, and live on the claim for five years, at which time the land became theirs with a $10 filing fee. The government of the United States had long wrestled with the problem of how to get land into the hands of productive farmers. Throughout the 19th century, politicians had pursued a variety of schemes to raise revenues from land sales, but the results were always mixed. By the 1830s, Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton proposed a program that would allow citizens to claim land from the public domain to develop farmland. By the mid-19th century the issue of land became embroiled in sectional politics. In the 1850s, the fledgling Republican Party endorsed a homestead act as a way to develop an alliance between the Northeast and Midwest. But the South wanted no part of such a scheme. The expansion of slavery had become too important to the South, and they felt expansion to the west was the only way to keep the institution healthy. Filling the West with small individual farmers did not sit well with Southerners. Consequently, it was impossible to agree upon a proposal while the struggle over slavery continued. The Republicans were strong enough by 1859 to push an act through Congress, but Democratic president James Buchanan vetoed the measure. However, the events of the war soon removed all obstacles to the bill. The secession of Southern states opened the way for passage of the Homestead Act of 1862. The Homestead Act was important symbolically if not in practice. By 1890, only about three percent of the lands west of the Mississippi had been given away under the act. This measure was far less effective in making vacant land productive than were liberal mining laws and grants to railroads. Nevertheless, it stands as a shining example of legislation that passed in the North while the South had seceded from the Union.

1861 North Carolina becomes 11th and last state to secede from Union
1861 the capital of the Confederacy is moved from Montgomery, Alabama, to Richmond, Virginia
1861 Kentucky proclaims its neutrality in Civil War
1845 first legislative assembly convenes in Hawaii
1795 (1 prairial an III) MIGELLI Charlotte Françoise Carle, âgée de 21 ans, native de Paris, département de la Seine, y demeurant, marchande fripière, coopère volontairement, sans provocation violente, sans la nécessité actuelle de la défense légitime de soi-même, ou d'autrui, et avec préméditation, à l'homicide du représentant du peuple Ferraud. Ce pourquoi elle sera condamnée à mort le 25 prairial an 4 (13 Jun 1796), par le tribunal criminel du département de la Seine, et en plus pour avoir dans les 1er jours de prairial an 4, participé volontairement sans provocation violente, sans la nécessité actuelle de la défense légitime de soi-même où d'autrui et avec préméditation aux attaques qui ont été faites à dessein de tuer les représentants du peuple Boissy-d'Anglas et Camboulas; elle sera exécutée le 21 fructidor an 4 (07 septembre 1796).
1775 Citizens of Mecklenburg County, NC declare independence from Britain.
1774 Britain gives Québec, Labrador and territory north of the Ohio.
1690 England passes Act of Grace, forgiving followers of James II

1498 Vasco da Gama reaches India ^top^
Portuguese explorer Vasco de Gama becomes the first European to reach India via the Atlantic Ocean or Mediterranean Sea when he arrives at Calicut on the Malabar Coast. Da Gama sailed from Lisbon, Portugal, in July 1497, rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and anchored at Malindi on the east coast of Africa. With the aid of an Indian merchant he met there, he then set off across the Indian Ocean. The Portuguese explorer was not greeted warmly by the Muslim merchants of Calicut, and in 1499 he had to fight his way out of the harbor on his return trip home. In 1502, he led a squadron of ships to Calicut to avenge the massacre of Portuguese explorers there and succeeded in subduing the inhabitants. In 1524, he was sent as viceroy to India, but he fell ill and died in Cochin.

0325 first Christian ecumenical council opens at Nicea, Asia Minor

TO THE TOP

Deaths which occurred on a May 20:

2002 Stephen Jay Gould [1999 photo >], 60, of adenocarcinoma of the lung, evolutionary biologist born on 10 September 1941. One of his controversial theories was that evolution occurs jerkily. Author of such books as Ontogeny and Phylogeny, Ever Since Darwin, The Panda's Thumb, The Mismeasure of Man (on intelligence testing), Bully for Brontosaurus, Dinosaur in a Haystack, Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life, The Structure of Evolutionary Theory (March 2002, 1464 pages).

2002 Jihad Jibril [< photo], 38, lieutenant colonel in the terrorist Syrian-based Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command, and son of its general secretary Ahmed Jibril, who founded it in 1968. Jihad Jibril was driving his Peugeot sedan down a street off the busy Corniche Mazraa in west Beirut when a bomb under his seat detonated at midday. Israel denies involvement.

2001:: 26 of the 32 prisoners in a prison dorm in Iquique, Chile, in fire started by prisoners in mattresses and blankets. Most of the 32 were young, first-time offenders.

1999 Massimo D'Antona, 51 ^top^
     Massimo D'Antona fu freddato da due killer con tre colpi di pistola al torace in Via Salaria a Roma. D'Antona, docente di diritto del lavoro all'Università La Sapienza, era stato sottosegretario ai Trasporti nel Governo Dini e aveva collaborato con il ministro del Lavoro Treu. Bassolino gli aveva affidato l'incarico di coordinare sia la commissione di esperti per la riforma degli ammortizzatori sociali sia il comitato consultivo per la riforma della legislazione del lavoro. L'omicidio D'Antona fu rivendicato dalle Br-Partito Comunista Combattente, con un documento di 28 pagine recapitato al Messaggero e al Corriere della Sera. Nel testo contrassegnato dalla stella a 5 punte, riferimenti alla guerra dei Balcani, accuse all'imperialismo Usa e alla nuova linea dei Ds. D'Antona era indicato come uno dei protagonisti della politica economica del Governo. Tra i libri di testo che Massimo D'Antona aveva fatto adottare ai suoi studenti l'anno della sua uccisione uno era stato scritto nel 1996 da Giugni.
     D'Antona e le riforme del pubblico impiego
      Un riformista impegnato nel sindacato e nel Governo. Una delle menti più acute al servizio prima della Cgil e poi dell'Esecutivo, senza nascondere la sua scelta di campo: prima nel Pci poi nei Ds, ma senza estremismi. La serietà e l'onestà intellettuale di D'Antona erano state riconosciute anche dalle controparti: la Confindustria lo ricordava come “un leale interlocutore”.
      Proprio D'Antona aveva scritto le regole per la privatizzazione del rapporto di lavoro nel pubblico impiego e poi quelle per la rappresentanza sindacale nel lavoro pubblico. E sempre D'Antona aveva la paternità della proposta per la revisione della legge sullo sciopero (la “legge Piazza”) accolta in gran parte del "Patto di Natale" del dicembre 1998. Atti, impegni e scelte che lo avevano trasformato in un bersaglio per gli assassini delle Br che il 20 May 1999 lo freddarono sotto casa. Massimo D'Antona era ordinario di diritto del Lavoro all'Università La Sapienza di Roma e aveva ricoperto l'incarico di sottosegretario ai Trasporti (con delega per la Marina mercantile) nel governo Dini con il ministro Giovanni Caravale. Al momento del suo assassinio D'Antona era uno dei più stretti collaboratori del ministro del Lavoro Antonio Bassolino. Quest'ultimo gli aveva affidato negli ultimi mesi diversi incarichi, come quelli di coordinare sia la commissione di esperti per la riforma degli ammortizzatori sociali che il comitato consultivo per la riforma della legislazione del lavoro.
      D'Antona, 51 anni, di Roma, era uno dei giuristi del lavoro più autorevoli. Autore di numerose pubblicazioni, era soprattutto un esperto di mercato del lavoro e degli aspetti giuridici della contrattazione collettiva e degli scioperi nei servizi pubblici. Aveva alle spalle una brillante carriera che, dall'insegnamento nella Scuola della pubblica amministrazione, lo aveva portato nel '96 a divenire uno dei consulenti dell'allora Presidente del consiglio Dini e poi sottosegretario ai Trasporti nello stesso governo. Il ministro del Lavoro Treu lo aveva poi voluto al dicastero di via Flavia, chiamandolo a coordinare la commissione che lavorò al disegno di legge sulla rappresentatività sindacale.
      Durante il Governo Prodi, D'Antona era stato nominato dirigente generale della Funzione pubblica dall'allora ministro Franco Bassanini ed era poi divenuto consigliere giuridico della Presidenza del consiglio con la responsabilità dell'attuazione delle deleghe legislative in materia di privatizzazione del pubblico impiego.
      Al di fuori della carriera universitaria e degli incarichi governativi, D'Antona — sposato con una figlia — era stato in gioventù simpatizzante del Pci. Nella Cgil D'Antona era approdato intorno alla fine degli anni '80. Faceva parte del nucleo di giuristi della Consulta giuridica, insieme, tra gli altri, a Giorgio Ghezzi e Pier Giovanni Alleva. E a lui venivano affidate le questioni più delicate. Fu anche direttore della Rivista giuridica del lavoro, pubblicazione di area Cgil.
      Il suo impegno politico e sindacale non aveva impedito a D'Antona di affermarsi nel mondo accademico. Aveva cominciato la sua carriera universitaria con un saggio sui licenziamenti. Poi aveva proseguito cimentandosi su tutti gli argomenti del diritto del lavoro e di quello sindacale. Insieme a Franco Carinci ha curato la stesura del manuale sul lavoro nella pubblica amministrazione. D'Antona aveva insegnato a Catania, Napoli e poi a Roma, nella stessa facoltà di Scienze politiche che era stata di Aldo Moro e Vittorio Bachelet. Accanto al lavoro politico D'Antona, che aveva continuato a fare l'avvocato, svolgeva una rilevante attività pubblicistica, scrivendo articoli anche per l'Unità e Il Sole 24 Ore.

1998 — William P. Kinkel, 59, Faith M. Kinkel, 57 ^top^
shot dead by their son, Kipland P. Kinkel, 15, in Springfield, Oregon. He first shoots his father in the back of the head at about 17:00. When his mom comes home at about 18:00, he says: "I love you mom, and shoots her dead.. He writes a note:
"I have just killed my parents! I don't know what is happening. I love my mom and dad so much. I just got two felonies on my record. My parents can't take that! It would destroy them. The embarrassment would be too much for them. They couldn't live with themselves. I'm so sorry. I am a horrible son. I wish I had been aborted. I destroy everything I touch. I can't eat. I can't sleep. I didn't deserve them. They were wonderful people. It's not their fault or the fault of any person, organization, or television show. My head just doesn't work right. God damn these VOICES inside my head. I want to die. I want to be gone. But I have to kill people. I don't know why. I am so sorry! Why did God do this to me. I have never been happy. I wish I was happy. I wish I made my mother proud. I am nothing! I tried so hard to find happiness. But you know me I hate everything. I have no other choice. What have I become? I am so sorry"
The next morning he would go to Thurston High School and shoot 48 shots from a semi-automatic rifle, killing Mikael Nickkolauson, and wounding more than 20 other people, one of which, Ben Walker, 16, died the next day from his injuries.. — MORE

1997 Ezequiel Hernandez, 18, shot in the side, without a warning, by Cpl. Banuelos, 22, of a squad of 4 camouflaged Marines on drug surveillance duty near Mexican border in Redford, Texas, while Ezequiel was herding his goats. Ezequiel had a .22-caliber rifle which he did NOT fire at the Marines. They followed him for 20 minutes before killing him, and then let him bleed to death, calling for medical help only after 22 minutes, and attempting no first-aid. On 14 August 1997, a grand jury would refuse to indict the killer, who claimed he was acting in self-defense.
1975 Barbara Hepworth, British abstract sculptor and draftswoman born on 10 January 1903. — LINKS
1965 Charles Camoin, French Fauvist painter born on 23 September 1879. — MORE ON CAMOIN AT ART “4” MAY — LINKS — Voiliers à Ploumanach — Cargo à Saint-Tropez — Nature Morte aux Tomates — Nature Morte aux Zinias — Portrait — Rue de Montmartre
1943 Henry Seely White, on his 82nd birthday, US research mathematician. He worked on invariant theory, the geometry of curves and surfaces, algebraic curves and twisted curves. Here is a theorem proved by White in 1915:
If seven points on a twisted cubic be joined, two and two, by twenty-one lines, then any seven planes that contain these 21 lines will osculate a second cubic curve.
In 1896 he instigated the Colloquium Lectures of the American Mathematical Society. He was a Colloquium Lecturer himself in 1903 when he lectured on Linear systems of curves on algebraic surfaces. White was president of the American Mathematical Society from 1907 to 1908.
1886 Pierre-Édouard Frère, French painter born on 10 January 1819.
1834 Marie Jean Paul Joseph Roche Yves Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette, born on 06 September 1757. — 1825 portrait by Charles Cromwell Ingham.
1824 Thomas Hickey, Irish portrait painter born in 1741,