Today in History, 5/23

1430: Joan of Arc is captured by the Burgundians while leading an army to relieve Compiegne.
1533: The marriage of King Henry VIII to Catherine of Aragorn is declared null and void.
1701: After being convicted of piracy and the murder of William Moore, Captain William Kidd is hanged in London.
1788: South Carolina ratifies the US Constitution.
1805: Napoleon Bonaparte is crowned king of Italy.
1824: Ambrose Burnside, Union Civil War general is born.1863: The Seventh Day Adventist Church is organized in Battle Creek, MI.
1883: Douglas Fairbanks is born.1900: Sergeant William Harvey Carney becomes the first African American wo be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his heroism during the Civil War.1910: Margaret Wise Brown is born. She is the author of Goodnight Moon.1911: The New York Public Library is dedicated.1921: James Blish is born. He wrote the novelizations of the original Star Trek TV show that are what made me a Trekkie nerd in the first place. I read those and the novelizations of the Star Trek cartoon by Allen Dean Foster one summer on the way out to Michigan. 1928: Rosemary Clooney is born. I love the guys in the straw boaters back there. How do I get that job?

1928: Nigel Davenport is born. He was in the classic "hyper intelligent ants take over the world" movie Phase IV. I watched that one night when I was a kid (probably because I couldn't find any Emmanuel movies on) and it freaked me right out.

1929: The first Mickey Mouse talkie, The Karnival Kid, debuts.

1933: Seabiscuit, the legendary racehorse, is born.1933: Joan Collins is born.1934: Robert Moog, pioneer of electronic music and inventor of the Moog synthesizer, is born. Here he is on The Screen Savers explaining the history of the synthesizer. (Geez, I miss The Screen Savers)

1934: Bonnie and Clyde are ambushed by police and killed in Black Lake, LA.1945: Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS, commits suicide while in Allied custody.
1951: Tibetans are forced to sign the Seventeen Point Agreement for the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet with the People's Republic of China.
1958: Drew Carey is born.

1974: Jewel is born.


Today in History elements mostly cribbed from The History Channel, Wikipedia, The New York Times, The Jewish World Review, The Writer's Almanac and anything else I can dig up.