Today in history, all week
- The Monkey Bite That Broke an EmpireThe death of King Alexander of Greece from a monkey bite on October 25, 1920
When a twenty-seven-year-old king tried to separate his pet dog from an angry monkey in a palace vineyard, nobody imagined the incident would topple a government.
- The Armchair on Pad Forty-OneThe Nedelin catastrophe at Baikonur Cosmodrome on October 24, 1960
On an autumn evening in nineteen sixty, the Soviet military commander of strategic rocketry dragged a chair to within forty paces of a ticking intercontinental missile.
- A Face Carved from the ForeheadJoseph Carpue's pioneering rhinoplasty on October 23, 1814
In an era before anesthesia, a London surgeon picked up a scalpel to attempt an operation Western medicine had long dismissed as impossible.
- Blind Reckoning in the Western ApproachesThe Scilly Naval Disaster of October 22, 1707
On a pitch black October night in seventeen hundred and seven, Britain's most celebrated admiral steered twenty-one warships straight into jagged granite reefs within…
- It Is Not an AircraftThe disappearance of Frederick Valentich over Bass Strait on October 21, 1978
When a twenty-year-old aviator vanished over the waters of Bass Strait after reporting an uncanny craft above him, the radio transcript sparked global headlines.
- The Untoward Battle of NavarinoThe Battle of Navarino on October 20, 1827
Three allied powers sailed into a Greek bay under strict diplomatic orders to prevent a war without firing a shot.
- Thirty Minutes Over ParisAlberto Santos-Dumont's flight around the Eiffel Tower on October 19, 1901
In October 1901, an eccentric Brazilian heir dared to fly a petrol powered airship through the heart of Paris and around the Eiffel Tower.
From the community
- Seven Laps Around the SpinaChariot racing in ancient Rome
A driver from Roman Iberia won more prize money than perhaps any athlete in history, and a single race could tip an empire into flames.
- Six Weeks in BeijingTiananmen Square protests (1989)
- The Corsican Who Gambled EuropeNapoleon Bonaparte
