October 15: What Happened on This Day in History (High_school Level)?

(Page last edited 10/12/2017)

1. 1783 - The Montgolfier brothers' hot air balloon marks the first human ascent, by Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, (tethered balloon).
2. 1793 - Queen Marie-Antoinette of France is tried and convicted in a swift, pre-determined trial in the Palais de Justice, Paris, and condemned to death the following day.
3. 1888 - The "From Hell" letter sent by Jack the Ripper is received by investigators.
4. 1910 - Airship America launched from New Jersey in the first attempt to cross the Atlantic by a powered aircraft.
5. 1951 - The first episode of I Love Lucy, an American television sitcom starring Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance, and William Frawley, airs on the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS).
6. 1956 - Fortran, the first modern computer language, is shared with the coding community for the first time.
7. 1989 - Wayne Gretzky becomes the all-time leading points scorer in the NHL.
8. 1997 - The first supersonic land speed record is set by Andy Green in ThrustSSC (United Kingdom), exactly 50 years and 1 day after Chuck Yeager first broke the sound barrier in the Earth's atmosphere.
9. 1997 - The Cassini probe launches from Cape Canaveral on its way to Saturn.
10. 2001 - NASA's Galileo spacecraft passes within 112 miles of Jupiter's moon Io.
11. Famous Birthdays: Arch Hoxsey (pioneer aviator), Emeril Lagasse (American chef), Jesse Leonard Greenstein (American astronomer), Peter Doherty (Australian immunologist, Nobel laureate), Roberto Vittori (Italian astronaut)

For famous birthdays and other daily events in history, visit our Daily Dose Activities.

Click Here for Yesterday in History: October 14

Click Here for Tomorrow in History: October 16

For more history resources on Internet 4 Classrooms, visit our Social Studies and History index. For Pre K-8th Grade Level History and Social Studies Resources, visit our Grade Level Index.