On this day in history

November 2

29 births · 7 deaths · 5 events

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Anniversary highlights

Event anniversary

108

Balfour Declaration

108 years ago

Born this day

1795

James K. Polk

Died aged 53

Photo (modified): George Peter Alexander Healy · Public domain

Oldest record

1344th

Umar II

birth anniversary

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Famous births29

AD 681 · 1344 yrs

Umar II

Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz ibn Marwan (c. 680 – February 720), commonly known as Umar II, was the eighth Umayyad caliph, ruling from 717 until his death in 720.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsDied aged 38

View profile Photo (modified): Not credited · CC0

AD 971 · 1054 yrs

Mahmud of Ghazni

Abu al-Qasim Mahmud ibn Sabuktigin (Persian: ابوالقاسم محمود بن سبکتگین, romanized: Abu al-Qāṣim Maḥmūd ibn Sabuktigīn; 2 October 971 – 30 April 1030), commonly known as Mahmud of Ghazni or Mahmud Ghaznavi (محمود غزنوی), was the Sultan of the Ghaznavid Empire, ruling from 998 to 1030.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

RoyaltyDied aged 58

View profile Photo (modified): 11th century artist · Public domain

1431 · 594 yrs

Vlad the Impaler

Vlad III (1428–31 – 1476/77), commonly known as Vlad the Impaler (Romanian: Vlad Țepeș) or Vlad Dracula ( DRAK-yuu-lə, -⁠yə-; Romanian: Vlad Drăculea), was Voivode of Wallachia during three separate reigns (1448, 1456–1462, and 1476). He was born in the House of Drăculești, as the son of Vlad II Dracul.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Notable PeopleDied aged 45

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

1755 · 270 yrs

Marie Antoinette

Marie Antoinette (Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was Queen of France as the wife of Louis XVI from 10 May 1774 until the abolition of the French monarchy in 1792 during the French Revolution.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

RoyaltyDied aged 37

View profile Photo (modified): Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun · Public domain

1795 · 230 yrs

James K. Polk

James Knox Polk (November 2, 1795 – June 15, 1849) was the 11th president of the United States, serving from 1845 to 1849. A protégé of Andrew Jackson and a member of the Democratic Party, he was an advocate of American expansionism and Jacksonian democracy.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsDied aged 53

View profile Photo (modified): George Peter Alexander Healy · Public domain

1808 · 217 yrs

Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly

Jules-Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly (2 November 1808 – 23 April 1889) was a French novelist, poet, short story writer, and literary critic. He specialised in mystery tales that explored hidden motivation and hinted at evil without being explicitly concerned with anything supernatural.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 80

View profile Photo (modified): Émile Lévy · Public domain

1815 · 210 yrs

George Boole

George Boole ( BOOL; 2 November 1815 – 8 December 1864) was an English mathematician and philosopher often credited with revolutionizing logic by transforming it from a philosophical study of language into a mathematical system of algebraic equations using binary values and logical operators.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceDied aged 49

View profile Photo (modified): Samuel Prout Newcombe (c1824-1912) · Public domain

1844 · 181 yrs

Mehmed V

Mehmed V Reşâd (Ottoman Turkish: محمد خامس, romanized: Meḥmed-i ḫâmis; Turkish: V. Mehmed or Mehmed Reşad; 2 November 1844 – 3 July 1918) was the penultimate sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1909 to 1918. Mehmed V reigned as a constitutional monarch.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 73

View profile Photo (modified): P. S. Rogers · Public domain

1847 · 178 yrs

Georges Sorel

Georges Eugène Sorel (French:; 2 November 1847 – 29 August 1922) was a French social thinker, political theorist, historian, and later journalist. He has inspired theories and movements grouped under the name of Sorelianism.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PhilosophyDied aged 74

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

1861 · 164 yrs

Georgy Lvov

Prince Georgy Yevgenyevich Lvov (2 November 1861 – 7/8 March 1925) was a Russian aristocrat, statesman and the first prime minister of the Russian Republic from 15 March to 20 July 1917.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsDied aged 63

View profile Photo (modified): Harris & Ewing · Public domain

1865 · 160 yrs

Warren G. Harding

Warren Gamaliel Harding (November 2, 1865 – August 2, 1923) was the 29th president of the United States, serving from 1921 until his death in 1923. A member of the Republican Party, he was one of the most popular presidents at the time of his death.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsDied aged 57

View profile Photo (modified): Copyright by Moffett, Chicago. J241772 U.S. Copyright Office. · Public domain

1885 · 140 yrs

Harlow Shapley

Harlow Shapley (November 2, 1885 – October 20, 1972) was an American astronomer, who served as head of the Harvard College Observatory from 1921–1952, and political activist during the New Deal and Fair Deal.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceWould be 140

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Showing 12 of 29

Famous deaths7

1887 · 138 yrs

Jenny Lind

Johanna Maria "Jenny" Lind (Madame Goldschmidt) (6 October 1820 – 2 November 1887), was a Swedish opera singer, often called the "Swedish Nightingale".

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

MusicDied aged 67

View profile Photo (modified): John Carl Frederick Polycarpus Von Schneidau ( Daguerreotype in America by Beaumont Newhall. New York: Dover, 1976, p. 5 · Public domain

1950 · 75 yrs

George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950) was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from the 1880s to his death and beyond.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureDied aged 94

View profile Photo (modified): Bain News Service, publisher · Public domain

1963 · 62 yrs

Ngô Đình Diệm

Ngô Đình Diệm ( dyem, YEE-əm or zeem; Vietnamese:; 3 January 1901 – 2 November 1963) was a South Vietnamese politician.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsWould be 129

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

1966 · 59 yrs

Peter Debye

Peter Joseph William Debye ( dib-EYE; born Petrus Josephus Wilhelmus Debije, Dutch:; March 24, 1884 – November 2, 1966) was a Dutch-American physicist and physical chemist, and Nobel laureate in Chemistry.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

ScienceWould be 142

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

1975 · 50 yrs

Pier Paolo Pasolini

Pier Paolo Pasolini (Italian:; 5 March 1922 – 2 November 1975) was an Italian poet, revolutionary, writer, film director, actor and playwright. He is considered one of the defining public intellectuals in 20th-century Italian history, influential both as an artist and a political figure.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

LiteratureWould be 104

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

2004 · 21 yrs

Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan

Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan (Arabic: زايد بن سلطان آل نهيان, romanized: Zāyid bin Sulṭān Āl Nahyān; 6 May 1918 – 2 November 2004) was an Emirati politician, philanthropist, and the founding father of the United Arab Emirates.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

PoliticsWould be 108

View profile Photo (modified): Afrazwarsi derivative work: Sashi Suseshi · CC BY-SA 3.0

2004 · 21 yrs

Theo van Gogh

Theodoor "Theo" van Gogh (Dutch:; 23 July 1957 – 2 November 2004) was a Dutch film director. He directed Submission: Part 1, a short film written by Somali writer and politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali, which criticised the treatment of women in Islam in strong terms.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

FilmWould be 74

View profile Photo (modified): Thomas Kist · GFDL 1.2

Events5

1917 · 108 yrs

Balfour Declaration

The Balfour Declaration (2 November 1917) was a public statement issued by the British Government in 1917 during the First World War announcing its support for the establishment of a "national home for the Jewish people" in Palestine, then an Ottoman region with a small Jewish minority among an overwhelming Arab…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Politics

1938 · 87 yrs

First Vienna Award

The First Vienna Award was a treaty signed on 2 November 1938 pursuant to the Vienna Arbitration, which took place at Vienna's Belvedere Palace. The arbitration and award were direct consequences of the previous month's Munich Agreement, which resulted in the partitioning of Czechoslovakia.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Culture

1990 · 35 yrs

Transnistria War

The Transnistrian War (Romanian: Războiul din Transnistria; Russian: Война в Приднестровье, romanized: Voyna v Pridnestrovye) was an armed conflict that broke out on 2 November 1990 in Dubăsari between pro-separatist (Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic, PMR; Transnistria) forces, including the Transnistrian Republican…

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

War

2004 · 21 yrs

2004 United States presidential election

Presidential elections were held in the United States on November 2, 2004. Incumbent Republican president George W.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Politics

2020 · 5 yrs

2020 Vienna attacks

On 2 November 2020, a series of shootings took place in Vienna, Austria a few hours before the city was scheduled to enter a lockdown as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. A lone gunman started shooting in the busy city centre, killing four civilians and injuring 23 others, seven critically, including a police officer.

Source: Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Tragedy

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