On this day in history

March 12

30 births · 16 deaths · 5 events

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Anniversary highlights

Event anniversary

1402

Battle of Badr

1402 years ago

Born this day

1685

George Berkeley

Died aged 67

Photo (modified): John Smibert · Public domain

Oldest record

1402nd

Battle of Badr

event anniversary

Famous births30

1613 · 413 yrs

André Le Nôtre

André Le Nôtre (French pronunciation:; 12 March 1613 – 15 September 1700), originally rendered as André Le Nostre, was a French landscape architect and the principal gardener of King Louis XIV of France.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ArtDied aged 87

View profile Photo (modified): Carlo Maratta · Public domain

1685 · 341 yrs

George Berkeley

George Berkeley ( BARK-lee; 12 March 1685 – 14 January 1753), known as Bishop Berkeley (Bishop of Cloyne of the Anglican Church of Ireland), was an Anglo-Irish philosopher, writer, and clergyman who is regarded as the founder of immaterialism, a philosophical theory he developed which later came to be known as…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ReligionDied aged 67

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

1728 · 298 yrs

Anton Raphael Mengs

Anton Raphael Mengs (12 March 1728 – 29 June 1779) was a Czech-Born German Neoclassical painter of Danish descent.

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ArtDied aged 51

View profile Photo (modified): Anton Raphael Mengs · Public domain

1784 · 242 yrs

William Buckland

William Buckland DD, FRS (12 March 1784 – 14 August 1856) was an English theologian, geologist and palaeontologist. His work in the early 1820s proved that Kirkdale Cave in North Yorkshire had been a prehistoric hyena den, for which he was awarded the Copley Medal.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ReligionDied aged 72

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

1824 · 202 yrs

Gustav Kirchhoff

Gustav Robert Kirchhoff (German:; 12 March 1824 – 17 October 1887) was a German physicist and mathematician who contributed to the fundamental understanding of electrical circuits, spectroscopy, and the emission of black-body radiation by heated objects. He coined the term black body in 1860.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceDied aged 63

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

1863 · 163 yrs

Gabriele D'Annunzio

General Gabriele D'Annunzio, Prince of Montenevoso (12 March 1863 – 1 March 1938), sometimes written d'Annunzio as he used to sign himself, was an Italian poet, playwright, orator, journalist, aristocrat, and Royal Italian Army officer during World War I.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 74

View profile Photo (modified): Agence de presse Meurisse · Public domain

1877 · 149 yrs

Wilhelm Frick

Wilhelm Frick (12 March 1877 – 16 October 1946) was a German politician of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) and convicted war criminal. He served as Minister of the Interior in Adolf Hitler's cabinet from 1933 to 1943 and as the last governor of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsWould be 149

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

1889 · 137 yrs

Vaslav Nijinsky

Vaslav or Vatslav Fomich Nijinsky (12 March 1889/1890 – 8 April 1950) was a Russian ballet dancer and choreographer of Polish ancestry. He is regarded as the greatest male dancer of the early 20th century.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

FashionWould be 137

View profile Photo (modified): unknwown · Public domain

1889 · 137 yrs

Idris I of Libya

Idris (Arabic: إدريس, romanized: Idrīs, Muhammad Idris bin Muhammad al-Mahdi al-Sanusi; 13 March 1890 – 25 May 1983) was King of Libya from 24 December 1951 until his ousting in the 1969 Libyan revolution.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

RoyaltyWould be 137

View profile Photo (modified): Anefo · CC0

1922 · 104 yrs

Jack Kerouac

Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian parentage, Kerouac was raised in a French-speaking home in Lowell, Massachusetts.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 104

View profile Photo (modified): Tom Palumbo from New York, NY, USA · CC BY-SA 2.0

1924 · 102 yrs

Harry Harrison

Harry Max Harrison (born Henry Maxwell Dempsey; March 12, 1925 – August 15, 2012) was an American science fiction author, known mostly for his character The Stainless Steel Rat and for his novel Make Room! Make Room!

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 102

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

1925 · 101 yrs100 Club

Leo Esaki

Leo Esaki (江崎玲於奈, Esaki Reona; born March 12, 1925) is a Japanese physicist who shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physics with Ivar Giaever and Brian Josephson for his work on tunneling in semiconductors, which led to his invention of the tunnel diode that exploits this phenomenon.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceAge 101

View profile Photo (modified): 日本学士院 · CC BY 4.0

Showing 12 of 30

Famous deaths16

1507 · 519 yrs

Cesare Borgia

Cesare Borgia (13 September 1475 – 12 March 1507) was an Italian cardinal deacon and later a condottiero, as well as a member of the Spanish House of Borgia. He was the illegitimate son of Pope Alexander VI and sibling to Lucrezia Borgia.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Notable PeopleDied aged 31

View profile Photo (modified): After Bartolomeo Veneto · Public domain

1648 · 378 yrs

Tirso de Molina

Gabriel Téllez, O. de M. (24 March 1583 – 20 February 1648), also known as Tirso de Molina, was a Spanish Baroque dramatist and poet, as well as a Mercedarian friar, and Catholic priest.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 64

View profile Photo (modified): Fray Antonio Manuel de Hartalejo · Public domain

1898 · 128 yrs

Johann Jakob Balmer

Johann Jakob Balmer (1 May 1825 – 12 March 1898) was a Swiss mathematician best known for his work in physics, the Balmer series of the hydrogen atom.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceDied aged 72

View profile Photo (modified): Johann Jakob Balmer · Public domain

1914 · 112 yrs

George Westinghouse

George Westinghouse Jr. (October 6, 1846 – March 12, 1914) was a prolific American inventor, engineer, and entrepreneurial industrialist based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

TechnologyDied aged 67

View profile Photo (modified): Joseph G. Gessford · Public domain

1916 · 110 yrs

Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

Baroness Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach née Countess Dubsky (Czech: Marie von Ebner-Eschenbachová, German: Marie Freifrau von Ebner-Eschenbach; 13 September 1830 – 12 March 1916) was an Austrian writer and a noblewoman.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 85

View profile Photo (modified): Karl von Blaas · Public domain

1925 · 101 yrs

Sun Yat-sen

Sun Yat-sen (12 November 1866 – 12 March 1925) was a Chinese physician, revolutionary and political philosopher who founded the Republic of China (ROC) and the Kuomintang (KMT). Sun is credited with leading the 1911 Revolution and overthrowing the Qing dynasty.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsDied aged 58

View profile Photo (modified): 上海波尔照相馆 · Public domain

1945 · 81 yrs

Anne Frank

Annelies Marie Frank (12 June 1929 – c. February or March 1945) was a German-born Jewish diarist and Holocaust victim. She gained worldwide notability posthumously for keeping a diary documenting her life in hiding during the German occupation of the Netherlands.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Notable PeopleWould be 97

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

1955 · 71 yrs

Charlie Parker

Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed "Bird" or "Yardbird", was an American jazz saxophonist, bandleader, and composer.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

MusicWould be 106

View profile Photo (modified): William P. Gottlieb · Public domain

1956 · 70 yrs

Bolesław Bierut

Bolesław Bierut (Polish:; 18 April 1892 – 12 March 1956) was a Polish communist activist and politician who was the leader of communist-ruled Poland from 1948 until 1956.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsWould be 134

View profile Photo (modified): Burzyński Roman · Public domain

1957 · 69 yrs

Josephine Hull

Marie Josephine Hull (née Sherwood; January 3, 1877 – March 12, 1957) was an American stage and film actress who also was a director of plays. She had a successful 50-year career on stage while taking some of her better known roles to film.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

FilmWould be 149

View profile Photo (modified): Vandamm Studio · Public domain

1991 · 35 yrs

Ragnar Granit

Ragnar Arthur Granit (30 October 1900 – 12 March 1991) was a Finnish and Swedish neurophysiologist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1967 along with Haldan Keffer Hartline and George Wald "for their discoveries concerning the primary physiological and chemical visual processes in the eye".

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceWould be 125

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

1999 · 27 yrs

Yehudi Menuhin

Yehudi Menuhin, Baron Menuhin (22 April 1916 – 12 March 1999), was an American-born British and Swiss violinist and conductor who spent most of his performing career in Britain. He is widely considered one of the greatest violinists of the 20th century.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

MusicWould be 110

View profile Photo (modified): Film screenshot · Public domain

Showing 12 of 16

Events5

AD 624 · 1402 yrs

Battle of Badr

The Battle of Badr or sometimes called The Raid of Badr (Arabic: غَزْوَةُ بَدْرٍ; Ghazwatu Badr), also referred to as The Day of the Criterion (Arabic: يَوْمُ الْفُرْقَانْ, Arabic pronunciation:; Yawm al-Furqan) in the Qur'an and by Muslims, was fought on 13 March 624 CE (17 Ramadan, 2 AH), near the city of Badr,…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

War

1938 · 88 yrs

Anschluss

The Anschluss (German:, or Anschluß, lit. 'joining' or 'connection'), also known as the Anschluß Österreichs (English: Annexation of Austria), was the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into Nazi Germany on 12 March 1938.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

History

1958 · 68 yrs

Eurovision Song Contest 1958

The Eurovision Song Contest 1958, originally known as the Grand Prix Eurovision de la Chanson Européenne 1958 (English: Grand Prix of the Eurovision Song Contest 1958), was the third edition of the Eurovision Song Contest, held on Wednesday 12 March 1958 at the AVRO Studios in Hilversum, the Netherlands, and presented…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Culture

2013 · 13 yrs

2013 conclave

A conclave was held on 12 and 13 March 2013 to elect a new pope to succeed Benedict XVI, who had resigned on 28 February 2013. Of the 117 eligible cardinal electors, all but two attended.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Politics

2023 · 3 yrs

95th Academy Awards

The 95th Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), took place on March 12, 2023, at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles. During the gala, the AMPAS presented Academy Awards (commonly referred to as Oscars) in 23 categories honoring films released in 2022.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Culture

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