On this day in history

May 4

26 births · 10 deaths · 5 events

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Anniversary highlights

Event anniversary

102

1924 Summer Olympics

102 years ago

Born this day

1929

Audrey Hepburn

Would be 97

Photo (modified): Anefo · CC BY-SA 3.0 nl

Oldest record

1018th

Henry I of France

birth anniversary

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Famous births26

1008 · 1018 yrs

Henry I of France

Henry I (4 May 1008 – 4 August 1060) was King of the Franks from 1031 to 1060. The royal demesne of France reached its smallest size during his reign, and for this reason he is often seen as emblematic of the weakness of the early Capetians.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

RoyaltyDied aged 52

View profile Photo (modified): Merry-Joseph Blondel · Public domain

1654 · 372 yrs

Kangxi Emperor

The Kangxi Emperor (4 May 1654 – 20 December 1722), also known by his temple name Emperor Shengzu of Qing, personal name Xuanye, was the third emperor of the Qing dynasty, and the second Qing emperor to rule over China proper.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

RoyaltyDied aged 68

View profile Photo (modified): Anonymous Unknown author Qing Dynasty Court Painter · Public domain

1655 · 371 yrs

Bartolomeo Cristofori

Bartolomeo Cristofori di Francesco (Italian pronunciation:; May 4, 1655 – January 27, 1731) was an Italian maker of musical instruments famous for inventing the piano.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

TechnologyDied aged 75

View profile Photo (modified): Unidentified painter · Public domain

1821 · 205 yrs

Pafnuty Chebyshev

Pafnuty Lvovich Chebyshev (Russian: Пафну́тий Льво́вич Чебышёв, IPA:) (16 May 1821 – 8 December 1894) was a Russian mathematician and considered to be the founding father of Russian mathematics. Chebyshev is known for his fundamental contributions to the fields of probability, statistics, mechanics, and number theory.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceDied aged 73

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1825 · 201 yrs

Thomas Henry Huxley

Thomas Henry Huxley (4 May 1825 – 29 June 1895) was an English biologist and anthropologist who specialised in comparative anatomy. He has become known as "Darwin's Bulldog" for his advocacy of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceDied aged 70

View profile Photo (modified): Lock & Whitfield · Public domain

1845 · 181 yrs

William Kingdon Clifford

William Kingdon Clifford (4 May 1845 – 3 March 1879) was a British mathematician and philosopher. Building on the work of Hermann Grassmann, he introduced what is now termed geometric algebra.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceDied aged 33

View profile Photo (modified): not stated · Public domain

1883 · 143 yrs

Wang Jingwei

Wang Zhaoming (Chinese: 汪兆銘; Wade–Giles: Wang Chao-ming; Japanese: Ō Chōmei; 4 May 1883 – 10 November 1944), widely known by his pen name Wang Jingwei (Chinese: 汪精衞; Wade–Giles: Wang Ching-wei; Japanese: Ō Seiei), was a Chinese politician and poet who became leader of the Reorganized National Government of the…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsWould be 143

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1918 · 108 yrs

Kakuei Tanaka

Kakuei Tanaka (田中角栄, Tanaka Kakuei; IPA:; 4 May 1918 – 16 December 1993) was a Japanese politician who served as prime minister of Japan from 1972 to 1974.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsWould be 108

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1928 · 98 yrs

Hosni Mubarak

Muhammad Hosni El Sayed Mubarak (Arabic: محمد حسني السيد مبارك‎; 4 May 1928 – 25 February 2020) was an Egyptian politician and military officer who served as the fourth president of Egypt from 1981 until his resignation in 2011, following the Egyptian revolution.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsWould be 98

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1929 · 97 yrs

Ronald Golias

Ronald Golias (4 May 1929 – 27 September 2005) was a Brazilian comedian and actor.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

FilmWould be 97

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

1929 · 97 yrs

Audrey Hepburn

Audrey Kathleen Hepburn-Ruston (née Ruston; 4 May 1929 – 20 January 1993) was a British actress and humanitarian. Recognised as a film and fashion icon, she was ranked by the American Film Institute as the third-greatest female screen legend from the Classical Hollywood cinema.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

FilmWould be 97

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

1939 · 87 yrs

Amos Oz

Amos Oz (Hebrew: עמוס עוז; born Amos Klausner (עמוס קלוזנר); 4 May 1939 – 28 December 2018) was an Israeli writer, novelist, journalist, and intellectual. He was also a professor of Hebrew literature at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 87

View profile Photo (modified): Michiel Hendryckx · CC BY 3.0

Showing 12 of 26

Famous deaths10

1799 · 227 yrs

Tipu Sultan

Tipu Sultan (Urdu:, Kannada:, Sultan Fateh Ali Sahab Tipu; 1 December 1751 – 4 May 1799), commonly referred to as Sher-e-Mysore (Tiger of Mysore), was the Sultan of Mysore from 1782 until his death in 1799. He was a pioneer of rocket artillery.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

RoyaltyDied aged 47

View profile Photo (modified): Anonymous artist from Mysore, India. · Public domain

1824 · 202 yrs

Joseph Joubert

Joseph Joubert (French:; 6 May 1754 in Montignac, Périgord – 4 May 1824 in Paris) was a French moralist and essayist, remembered today largely for his Pensées (Thoughts), which were published posthumously.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 69

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1938 · 88 yrs

Carl von Ossietzky

Carl von Ossietzky (German:; 3 October 1889 – 4 May 1938) was a German journalist and pacifist. He was the recipient of the 1935 Nobel Peace Prize for his work in exposing the clandestine German rearmament.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

MediaWould be 137

View profile Photo (modified): Sohst, Walter / Kurzbein, Heiner · CC BY-SA 3.0 de

1938 · 88 yrs

Kanō Jigorō

Kanō Jigorō (嘉納治五郎; 10 December 1860 – 4 May 1938) was a Japanese judoka, educator, politician, and the founder of judo.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsDied aged 77

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1945 · 81 yrs

Fedor von Bock

Moritz Albrecht Franz Friedrich Fedor von Bock (3 December 1880 – 4 May 1945) was a German Generalfeldmarschall (Field Marshal) who served in the German Army during the Second World War.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

MilitaryWould be 145

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1955 · 71 yrs

Georges Enescou

George Enescu (Romanian:; 19 August 1881 – 4 May 1955), known in France as Georges Enesco, was a Romanian composer, violinist, pianist, conductor, teacher and statesman. He is regarded as one of the greatest musicians in Romanian history.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

MusicWould be 145

View profile Photo (modified): Unknown · Public domain

1972 · 54 yrs

Edward Calvin Kendall

Edward Calvin Kendall (March 8, 1886 – May 4, 1972) was an American biochemist. In 1950, Kendall was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine along with Swiss chemist Tadeusz Reichstein and Mayo Clinic physician Philip S. Hench, for their work with the hormones of the adrenal glands.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceWould be 140

View profile Photo (modified): Unknown (Mondadori Publishers) · Public domain

1980 · 46 yrs

Josip Broz Tito

Josip Broz (7 May 1892 – 4 May 1980), commonly known as Tito, was a Yugoslav communist revolutionary and statesman who led Yugoslavia as prime minister from 1943 to 1963 and as president from 1953 until his death in 1980.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ActivismWould be 134

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2004 · 22 yrs

David Reimer

David Reimer (born Bruce Peter Reimer; 22 August 1965 – 4 May 2004) was a Canadian man raised as a girl following medical advice and intervention after his penis was severely injured during a botched circumcision in infancy.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Notable PeopleWould be 61

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2013 · 13 yrs

Christian de Duve

Christian René Marie Joseph, Viscount de Duve (2 October 1917 – 4 May 2013) was a Nobel Prize-winning Belgian cytologist and biochemist.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceWould be 109

View profile Photo (modified): Julien Doornaert · CC BY 2.5

Events5

1886 · 140 yrs

Haymarket affair

The Haymarket affair was a bombing that took place at a labor demonstration on May 4, 1886, at Haymarket Square in Chicago.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

War

1919 · 107 yrs

May Fourth Movement

The May Fourth Movement was a Chinese cultural and anti-imperialist political movement which grew out of student protests in Beijing on May 4, 1919.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Politics

1924 · 102 yrs

1924 Summer Olympics

The 1924 Summer Olympics (French: Jeux olympiques d'été de 1924), officially the Games of the VIII Olympiad (French: Jeux de la VIIIe olympiade) and officially branded as Paris 1924, were an international multi-sport event held in Paris, France.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Sports

1942 · 84 yrs

Battle of the Coral Sea

The Battle of the Coral Sea, from 4 to 8 May 1942, was a major naval battle between the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) and naval and air forces of the United States and Australia.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

War

2022 · 4 yrs

2022–2023 mpox outbreak

In May 2022, the World Health Organization (WHO) made an emergency announcement of the existence of a multi-country outbreak of mpox, a viral disease then commonly known as "monkeypox".

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Disaster

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