August 17
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
August 17 is the 230th day of the year (231st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 135 days remaining after August 17 until the end of the year.
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[change] Births
- 1473 – Richard, Duke of York, one of the Princes in the Tower (d. 1483?)
- 1601 – Pierre de Fermat, French mathematician (d. 1665)
- 1603 – Lennart Torstensson, Swedish field marshal and military officer (d. 1651)
- 1629 – John III of Poland (d. 1696)
- 1786 – Davy Crockett, American frontiersman, soldier (d. 1836)
- 1786 – Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, mother of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom (d. 1861)
- 1844 – Menelik II, Emperor of Ethiopia (d. 1913)
- 1866 – Julia Marlowe, nee Sarah Frost, Shakespearean actress (d. 1950)
- 1887 – Marcus Garvey, American black leader (d. 1940)
- 1887 – Emperor Karl of Austria (d. 1922)
- 1893 – Mae West, American actress, playwright (d. 1980)
- 1904 – Leopold Nowak, musicologist (d. 1991)
- 1911 – Mikhail Botvinnik, world chess champion (d. 1995)
- 1911 – Martin Sandberger, German military officer (d. 2010)
- 1913 - W. Mark Felt, American agent, 'Deep Throat' in the Watergate scandal (d. 2008)
- 1913 – Rudy York, Major League Baseball All-Star (d. 1970)
- 1914 – Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jr., son of Franklin D. Roosevelt (d. 1988)
- 1920 – Maureen O'Hara, Irish actress
- 1926 – George Melly, British singer (d. 2007)
- 1926 – Jiang Zemin, former President of the People's Republic of China
- 1929 – Francis Gary Powers, U-2 pilot (d. 1977)
- 1930 – Glenn Corbett, actor (d. 1993)
- 1930 – Ted Hughes, English poet (d. 1998)
- 1932 – V. S. Naipaul, writer
- 1933 - Tom Courtney, American athlete
- 1939 – Luther Allison, American blues musician, guitarist (d. 1997)
- 1941 – Lothar Bisky, German politician
- 1941 - Ibrahim Babangida, Nigerian military leader
- 1943 – Robert De Niro, American actor
- 1946 – Patrick Manning, former Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago
- 1951 – Alan Minter, boxer
- 1952 – Nelson Piquet, Brazilian racing driver
- 1952 – Mario Theissen, German Formula 1 team principal
- 1952 – Guillermo Vilas, Argentine tennis player
- 1953 – Herta Mueller, Romanian-German writer, Nobel Prize winner
- 1957 - Robin Cousins, British figure skater
- 1958 – Belinda Carlisle, American singer, guitarist
- 1958 – Kirk Stevens, Canadian snooker player
- 1959 – David Koresh, American cult leader (d. 1993)
- 1960 – Sean Penn, American actor, director
- 1962 - Gilby Clarke, American musician (Guns N'Roses)
- 1964 – Colin James, American blues musician
- 1966 – Rodney Mullen, American skateboarder
- 1968 – Ed McCaffrey, American football player
- 1969 – Donnie Wahlberg, American actor, singer
- 1970 – Jim Courier, former tennis champion
- 1971 – Jorge Posada, American Major League Baseball All-Star
- 1974 – Tomomi Kahala, Japanese singer
- 1977 – William Gallas, French footballer
- 1977 – Thierry Henry, French footballer
- 1977 – Tarja Turunen, Finnish lead singer of Nightwish
- 1980 – Jan Kromkamp, Dutch footballer
- 1980 - Lene Marlin, Norwegian singer
- 1982 – Phil Jagielka, English footballer
- 1990 – Rachel Hurd-Wood, English actress
[change] Deaths
- 1304 - Emperor Go-Fukakusa of Japan (b. 1243)
- 1786 - Frederick II of Prussia (b. 1712)
- 1850 - Jose de San Martin, Argentine revolutionary (b. 1778)
- 1880 – Ole Bull, Norwegian violinist (b. 1810)
- 1896 - Bridget Driscoll, English automobile accident victim (b. 1851)
- 1898 - Carl Zeller, Austrian jurist and composer (b. 1842)
- 1939 - Wojciech Korfanty, Polish journalist and politician (b. 1873)
- 1962 – Peter Fechter, shooting victim at the Berlin Wall (b. 1944)
- 1969 – Otto Stern, German physicist (b. 1888)
- 1969 – Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, German architect (b. 1886)
- 1979 - Vivian Vance, American actress (b. 1909)
- 1983 - Ira Gershwin, American lyricist (b. 1896)
- 1987 – Rudolf Hess, Nazi leader (b. 1894)
- 1988 – Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, President of Pakistan (b. 1924)
- 1988 – Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jr., son of Franklin D. Roosevelt (b. 1914)
- 1990 – Pearl Bailey, American singer and actress (b. 1918)
- 2007 – Eddie Griffin, American basketball player (b. 1982)
- 2010 – Francesco Cossiga, 8th President of Italy (b. 1928)
[change] Events
- 986 - A Byzantine army is destroyed at the pass of Trajan by Bulgarians.
- 1807 - Robert Fulton's North River Steamboat leaves New York City for Albany on the Hudson River.
- 1914 – The first pilots are trained for the Royal Australian Air Force.
- 1945 – Indonesia declares independence from the Netherlands.
- 1960 – Gabon becomes independent from France.
- 1962 – East German border guards kill 18-year-old Peter Fechter.
- 1970 - The Soviet spacecraft Venera 7 is sent to the planet Venus.
- 1977 - Soviet nuclear icebreaker Arktika becomes the first vessel to cross the North Pole overwater.
- 1988 – Pakistani President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq is killed in a plane crash near Bahawalpur, Punjab.
- 1998 – US President Bill Clinton admits to an 'improper physical relationship' with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
- 1999 – A magnitude 7.4 earthquake hits Izmit in Northwestern Turkey, killing more than 17,000 people, and injuring around 44,000.
- 2004 - New state symbols are adopted by Serbia.
- 2005 - The first forced evacuation of settlers as part of the Israeli unilateral disengagement plan begins.
- 2008 - Michael Phelps becomes the first person to win 8 individual gold medals at a single Olympic Games.
