On this day, 20 May...
526 – An earthquake kills about 250,000 people in what is now Syria and Antiochia.
1498 – Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama discovers the sea route to India when he arrives at Kozhikode (previously known as Calicut).
1609 – Shakespeare's sonnets are first published in London, perhaps illicitly, by the publisher Thomas Thorpe.
1645 – Yangzhou massacre: the 10-day massacre of 800,000 residents of the city of Yangzhou, part of the Transition from Ming to Qing dynasty.
1677 - Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj won the fort of Jingi.
1747 - An experiment to remedy scurvy among sailors was begun by a British ship's surgeon, James Lind, on the HMS Salisbury. He regulated the diets of the sailors and especially included lemons and oranges. Positive results quickly showed that scurvy, and the huge numbers of deaths, could be easily remedied.
1830 - D. Hyde of Reading patented the fountain pen. However, it was 1884 before a truly practical fountain pen was invented by Lewis Waterman. In the first year, 200 Waterman pens were made by hand. Subsequently, Waterman designed machinery to produce them in larger quantities.
1873 - Jacob W Davis, received a U.S. patent on a riveting process for strengthening the pocket openings of canvas pants. He assigned the patent to himself and Levi Strauss, as his business partner. Jacob Davis was in charge of manufacturing when Levi Strauss & Co. opened it's two San Francisco factories. Sometime during 1873, the first riveted clothing was made and sold. (The exact date is unknown; the company's historical records were lost in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire.) For nearly 20 years, Levi Strauss & Co. was the only company making riveted clothing, until the patent expired around 1891. Thereafter, dozens of garment manufacturers began to imitate the original riveted clothing.
1875 - The International Bureau of Weights and Measures was established in Sèvres, France, by the International Metric Convention, (also known as the Treaty of the Meter). Each 20 May is now World Metrology Day.
1892 - George T. Sampson, a black American inventor, patented what was titled a “Clothes-Drier”. In the patent description, he said: “The object of my invention is to suspend clothing in close relation to a stove by means of frames so constructed that they can be readily placed in proper position and put aside when not required for use.”
1901 - Claude Grivolas in Paris patented a projector for three-dimensional (stereoscopic) movies viewed wearing spectacles with one red and one blue lens.
1940 - Inventor Igor Sikorsky demonstrated his helicopter invention to the public.
1974 - A U.S. patent was issued to Gustano A. Pizzo of New York, for his “Anti Hijacking System for Aircraft”. It described an electro-mechanical system immediately aft of the pilots' cabin to trap airplane hijackers. When activated a hijacker is dropped by trap doors through the floor into a net bag in the belly area. The hijacker's weight causes a drawcord to close the bag and also automatically open the airplane's specially-installed bomb bay doors. The encapsulated hijacker is dropped and parachuted to earth, where police, having been alerted by radio, await his arrival.
1976 - Oil production started from Bombay High.
1992 - India launches its 1st satellite independently.
2015 - Archaeologists report on the findings in Kenya of stone tools over a half-million years older than known species of human ancestors, raising questions regarding human evolution and use of tools.
Born
1399 - Saint Kabir.
1750 - Tipu Sultan, the tiger of Mysore. He was the son of Hyder Ali, who named his son after a great Sufi saint namely Tipu Mastan Aulia. Tipu Sultan was a great revolutionary freedom fighter, social reformer, musician, and architect.
1900 – Sumitranandan Pant, poet, and author.
1918 – Company Havildar Major Piru Singh (Shekhawat). As part of 6 RAJ RIF, on 18 July 1948, tasked to capture Pakistani post at Tithwal (J& K), his Company suffered heavy casualties. In time, Singh successfully occupied a Pakistani medium machine-gun post. But, by that time, the entire company lay dead or wounded. Singh was left alone to achieve the objective. He moved out and lobbed grenades at the next enemy post. Before moving to another trench, he received a mortal bullet wound to the head. He was posthumously awarded the Param Vir Chakra.
1964 - P T Usha, famous athlete (sprinter).
RIP
1506 - Christopher Columbus.
1776 - Malharrao Holkar, founder of Indore.
1932 - Bipinchandra Ramchandra Pal, powerful journalist and revolutionary freedom fighter. He was amongst the trio which was known as "Lal - Bal - Pal" during the freedom struggle. He started a newspaper called "Swaraj" for the Indians in England. He also edited several other newspapers like "Tribune", "New India", "Vande Mataram", "Hindu Review".
2015 – Sudha Shivpuri, actor.
Titbits
1899 – The first traffic ticket in the US: New York City taxi driver Jacob German was arrested for speeding while driving 12 miles per hour on Lexington Street.
You may have known...
In ZIP CODE, Zip is for Zonal Improvement Plan.
