Sleeping with the enemy; 40 years in jail for mother who killed her kids; Elvis and Hound Dog scandalise public

On This Day In History

1873 The name of the diamond diggings, De Beer’s New Rush is changed to Kimberley.

1873 Sultan Barghash bin Said of Zanzibar closes the island’s great slave market.

1883 The first regularly scheduled run of the fabled Orient Express train leaves Paris.

1916 Britain’s Anglo-Boer War hero, Lord Kitchener drowns when the SS Hampshire sinks after hitting a German mine near the Orkney Islands.

1918 The Broederbond is founded in Jozi to advance the cultural traditions of Afrikaans.

1937 Henry Ford orders a 32-hour work week.

1941 World War II: At least 4 000 people who are hiding in a tunnel die after a Japanese air attack on the Chinese city of Chongqing.

1947 US Secretary of State George Marshall calls for economic aid to war-torn Europe. It becomes known as the Marshall Plan.

1956 Elvis Presley introduces his new single, Hound Dog, on TV, scandalising the audience with his suggestive hip movements.

1963 British Secretary of State for War, John Profumo resigns amid a scandal because of his relationship with a prostitute, who is also sleeping with a member of the Russian embassy.1967 Israel launches the Six-Day War.

1975 The Suez Canal opens for the first time since the Six-Day War, 8 years before.

1981 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports the first cases of Aids.

1998 Thulane ‘Sugarboy’ Malinga wins the WBF super-middleweight boxing title for SA.

2006 Islamic militants seize Somalia’s capital, unifying the city for the first time in 16 years.

2019 The average person ingests 50 000 pieces of microplastic a year and inhales a similar amount, according to a study – the first of its kind – published in the journal, Environmental Science and Technology.

2023 Australian Kathleen Folbigg is pardoned after 20 years in prison for the murder of her four children, after new genetic research found evidence of gene disorders in the children.

2024 The world’s only surviving wild horse, the Przewalski’s Horse, is returned to the Golden Steppe of Kazakhstan for the first time in over 200 years.

DAILY NEWS