On this day in history

April 13

27 births · 15 deaths · 5 events

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Anniversary highlights

Event anniversary

Lebanese Civil War

51 years ago

Born this day

1906

Samuel Beckett

Would be 120

Photo (modified): Roger Pic · Public domain

Oldest record

507th

Catherine de' Medici

birth anniversary

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Famous births27

1519 · 507 yrs

Catherine de' Medici

Catherine de' Medici (13 April 1519 – 5 January 1589) was Queen of France from 1547 to 1559 by marriage to King Henry II. She was the mother of French kings Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III, and a cousin to Pope Clement VII.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

RoyaltyDied aged 69

View profile Photo (modified): Attributed to Germain Le Mannier · Public domain

1570 · 456 yrs

Guy Fawkes

Guy Fawkes (13 April 1570 – 31 January 1606), also known as Guido Fawkes while fighting for the Spanish, was a member of a group of provincial English Catholics involved in the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

MilitaryDied aged 35

View profile Photo (modified): Crispijn van de Passe the Elder · Public domain

1732 · 294 yrs

Frederick North, 2nd Earl of Guilford

Frederick North, 2nd Earl of Guilford (13 April 1732 – 5 August 1792), styled The Honourable Frederick North before 1752 and Lord North between 1752 and 1790, being best known to history by the latter title, was a British statesman who served as Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1770 to 1782.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsDied aged 60

View profile Photo (modified): Nathaniel Dance-Holland · Public domain

1771 · 255 yrs

Richard Trevithick

Richard Trevithick (13 April 1771 – 22 April 1833) was a British inventor and mining engineer. The son of a mining captain, and born in the mining heartland of Cornwall, Trevithick was immersed in mining and engineering from an early age.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

TechnologyDied aged 62

View profile Photo (modified): John Linnell · Public domain

1808 · 218 yrs

Antonio Meucci

Antonio Santi Giuseppe Meucci ( may-OO-chee, Italian:; 13 April 1808 – 18 October 1889) was an Italian inventor and an associate of Giuseppe Garibaldi, a major political figure in the history of Italy.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

TechnologyDied aged 81

View profile Photo (modified): Unknown author · Public domain

1860 · 166 yrs

James Ensor

James Sidney Edouard, Baron Ensor (13 April 1860 – 19 November 1949) was a Belgian painter and printmaker, an important influence on expressionism and surrealism who lived in Ostend for most of his life.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ArtDied aged 89

View profile Photo (modified): James Ensor · Public domain

1883 · 143 yrs

Semyon Budyonny

Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny (Russian: Семён Миха́йлович Будённый, romanized: Semyon Mikháylovich Budyonnyy, IPA:; 25 April 1883 – 26 October 1973) was a Russian and Soviet cavalryman, military commander during the Russian Civil War, Polish–Soviet War and World War II, and politician, who was a close political ally of…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

MilitaryWould be 143

View profile Photo (modified): не указан · CC BY 4.0

1885 · 141 yrs

Georg Lukács

György Lukács (born Bernát György Löwinger; Hungarian: Lukács György; German: Georg Bernard Lukács; 13 April 1885 – 4 June 1971) was a Hungarian Marxist philosopher, literary historian, literary critic, and aesthetician.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PhilosophyWould be 141

View profile Photo (modified): Horst Sturm · CC BY-SA 3.0 de

1901 · 125 yrs

Jacques Lacan

Jacques Marie Émile Lacan (UK:, US: lə-KAHN; French:; 13 April 1901 – 9 September 1981) was a French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist. Described as "the most controversial psycho-analyst since Freud", Lacan gave annual seminars in Paris from 1952 to 1980 and published papers that were later collected in the book Écrits.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 125

View profile Photo (modified): Foto Moisio · Public domain

1906 · 120 yrs

Samuel Beckett

Samuel Barclay Beckett (13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989) was an Irish playwright, novelist, and poet. Written in both English and French, his literary and theatrical works feature bleak, impersonal, and tragicomic episodes of life, coupled with black comedy and literary nonsense.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 120

View profile Photo (modified): Roger Pic · Public domain

1909 · 117 yrs

Stanisław Ulam

Stanisław Marcin Ulam (Polish:; 13 April 1909 – 13 May 1984) was a Polish-American mathematician who made important contributions in advancing the understanding of nuclear physics and computer science.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceWould be 117

View profile Photo (modified): Los Alamos National Laboratory · Attribution

1922 · 104 yrs

Julius Nyerere

Julius Kambarage Nyerere (Swahili:; 13 April 1922 – 14 October 1999) was a Tanzanian politician, anti-colonial activist, revolutionary and political theorist.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsWould be 104

View profile Photo (modified): Rob Mieremet / Anefo · CC0

Showing 12 of 27

Famous deaths15

1695 · 331 yrs

Jean de La Fontaine

Jean de La Fontaine (UK:, US:; French:; 8 July 1621 – 13 April 1695) was a French fabulist and one of the most widely read French poets of the 17th century.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 73

View profile Photo (modified): Henri Millot · Public domain

1794 · 232 yrs

Nicolas Chamfort

Sébastien-Roch Nicolas, known in his adult life as Nicolas Chamfort and as Sébastien Nicolas de Chamfort (French:; 6 April 1741 – 13 April 1794), was a French writer, best known for his epigrams and aphorisms. He was secretary to Louis XVI's sister Madame Élisabeth, and of the Jacobin club.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 54

View profile Photo (modified): Unknown author · Public domain

1882 · 144 yrs

Bruno Bauer

Bruno Bauer (German:; 6 September 1809 – 13 April 1882) was a German philosopher, theologian, and historian. Initially a student of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, he became a radical rationalist critic of the Bible and Christianity, and a prominent member of the Young Hegelians.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PhilosophyDied aged 72

View profile Photo (modified): unknown, must be dead for more than 70 years · Public domain

1941 · 85 yrs

Annie Jump Cannon

Annie Jump Cannon (December 11, 1863 – April 13, 1941) was an American astronomer whose cataloging work was instrumental in the development of contemporary stellar classification. With Edward C.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceDied aged 77

View profile Photo (modified): New York World-Telegram and the Sun Newspaper · Public domain

1945 · 81 yrs

Ernst Cassirer

Ernst Alfred Cassirer ( kah-SEER-ər, kə-; German:; July 28, 1874 – April 13, 1945) was a German philosopher and historian of philosophy. Trained within the Marburg school of neo-Kantianism, he initially followed his mentor Hermann Cohen in attempting to supply an idealistic philosophy of science.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PhilosophyDied aged 70

View profile Photo (modified): Contemporary photograph · Public domain

1945 · 81 yrs

Josef Čapek

Josef Čapek (Czech pronunciation:; 23 March 1887 – April 1945) was a Czech artist who was best known as a painter, but who was also noted as a writer and poet. He invented the word 'robot', which was introduced into literature by his brother, Karel Čapek.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ArtWould be 139

View profile Photo (modified): Anonymous Unknown author · Public domain

1956 · 70 yrs

Emil Nolde

Emil Nolde (born Hans Emil Hansen; 7 August 1867 – 13 April 1956) was a German painter and printmaker. He was one of the first Expressionists, a member of Die Brücke, and was one of the first oil painting and watercolor painters of the early 20th century to explore color.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ArtDied aged 88

View profile Photo (modified): Minya Diez-Dührkoop (* 21. Juni 1873; † 17. November 1929), deutsche Fotografin · Public domain

1966 · 60 yrs

Georges Duhamel

Georges Duhamel (French:; 30 June 1884 – 13 April 1966) was a French author, born in Paris. Duhamel trained as a doctor, and during World War I was attached to the French Army.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 142

View profile Photo (modified): Anonymous Unknown author · Public domain

1983 · 43 yrs

Mercè Rodoreda

Mercè Rodoreda i Gurguí (Catalan pronunciation:; 10 October 1908 – 13 April 1983) was a Catalan novelist, who wrote in the Catalan language.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 118

View profile Photo (modified): Vilallonga · CC BY-SA 2.5

2006 · 20 yrs

Muriel Spark

Dame Muriel Sarah Spark (née Camberg; 1 February 1918 – 13 April 2006) was a Scottish novelist, short story writer, poet and essayist.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 108

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2008 · 18 yrs

John Archibald Wheeler

John Archibald Wheeler (July 9, 1911 – April 13, 2008) was an American theoretical physicist. He was largely responsible for reviving interest in general relativity in the United States after World War II. Wheeler also worked with Niels Bohr to explain the basic principles of nuclear fission.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceWould be 115

View profile Photo (modified): Emielke · CC BY-SA 3.0

2015 · 11 yrs

Günter Grass

Günter Wilhelm Grass (German:; 16 October 1927 – 13 April 2015) was a German novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Literature. He was born in the Free City of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland).

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 99

View profile Photo (modified): Blaues Sofa from Berlin, Deutschland · CC BY 2.0

Showing 12 of 15

Events5

1919 · 107 yrs

Jallianwala Bagh massacre

The Jallianwala Bagh massacre (IPA:), also known as the Amritsar massacre, took place on 13 April 1919.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

War

1941 · 85 yrs

Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact

The Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact (日ソ中立条約, Nisso Chūritsu Jōyaku), also known as the Japanese–Soviet Non-aggression Pact (日ソ不可侵条約, Nisso Fukashin Jōyaku), was a non-aggression pact between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan signed on April 13, 1941, two years after the conclusion of the Soviet-Japanese Border…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Politics

1975 · 51 yrs

Lebanese Civil War

The Lebanese Civil War (Arabic: الحرب الأهلية اللبنانية, al-ḥarb al-ahliyyah al-libnāniyyah) was a multifaceted armed conflict fought in Lebanon from 1975 to 1990. It resulted in an estimated 120,000 deaths, displaced nearly one million people, and caused widespread destruction across the country.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

War

2018 · 8 yrs

2018 Armenian Revolution

The 2018 Armenian Revolution, most commonly known in Armenia as #MerzhirSerzhin (Armenian: #ՄերժիրՍերժին, lit.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Politics

2024 · 2 yrs

April 2024 Iranian strikes on Israel

On 13 April 2024, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), a branch of the Iranian Armed Forces, in collaboration with the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, and the Ansar Allah (Houthis), launched attacks against Israel and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights with loitering munitions,…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

War

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