On This Day in History – October 21

Major Events

• 1096 – The People’s Crusade ended in defeat for European crusaders.
• 1520 – Ferdinand Magellan discovered the Strait of Magellan.
• 1805 – The Battle of Trafalgar: British Admiral Horatio Nelson defeated Napoleon’s navy.
• 1854 – Florence Nightingale left for the Crimean War with 38 nurses.
• 1879 – Thomas Edison successfully tested a practical electric light bulb.
• 1944 – Aachen became the first German city captured by the Allies in WWII.
• 1966 – A coal waste landslide buried a school in Aberfan, Wales, killing 144.
• 2019 – Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was re-elected.

Famous Birthdays

• Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) – English poet.
• Alfred Nobel (1833–1896) – Swedish chemist, inventor of dynamite.
• Dizzy Gillespie (1917–1993) – American jazz trumpeter.
• Celia Cruz (1925–2003) – Cuban-American singer.
• Carrie Fisher (1956–2016) – American actress and writer.
• Kim Kardashian (born 1980) – American media personality.

Notable Deaths

• Horatio Nelson (1758–1805) – British admiral, killed at the Battle of Trafalgar.
• Jack Kerouac (1922–1969) – American novelist, On the Road.
• François Truffaut (1932–1984) – French filmmaker.

Holidays

• Trafalgar Day (United Kingdom) – Commemorates Nelson’s victory.
• Armed Forces Day (Honduras)

Fun Facts

• Edison tested his light bulb prototype in 1879; it burned for about 13 hours.
• Trafalgar Day honors Britain’s greatest naval victory.
• Alfred Nobel’s invention of dynamite inspired his later Nobel Prizes.