October 15 Dateline

Birthdays

70 B.C.E. -  Virgil or Vergil, ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He wrote three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: the Eclogues (or Bucolics), the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid. A number of minor poems, collected in the Appendix Vergiliana, are sometimes attributed to him. Virgil is traditionally ranked as one of Rome's greatest poets. His Aeneid has been considered the national epic of ancient Rome since the time of its composition. Modeled after Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, the Aeneid follows the Trojan refugee Aeneas as he struggles to fulfill his destiny and reach Italy, where his descendants Romulus and Remus were to found the city of Rome. Virgil's work has had wide and deep influence on Western literature, most notably Dante's Divine Comedy, in which Virgil appears as Dante's guide through Hell and Purgatory. (Virgil's Rome - The Historical Context of the Aeneid. uploaded by Eric Luttrell. Accessed October 15, 2018.)

1775 - Bernhard Henrik Crusell, Swedish-Finnish composer, clarinetist and translator considered as the the most significant and internationally best-known Finnish-born classical composer and indeed, — the outstanding Finnish composer before Sibelius.

1844 - Friedrich (Wilhelm) Nietzsche, German philosopher, cultural critic, composer, poet, philologist, and Latin and Greek scholar. He began his career as a classical philologist before turning to philosophy. His work has exerted an enormous and  profound influence on Western philosophy and modern intellectual history - writings on truth, morality, language, aesthetics, cultural theory, history, nihilism, power, consciousness, and the meaning of existence. (Friedrch Nietzsche's Life and Philosophy. Uploaded by Wes Cecil. Accessed October 15, 2019.)  

1880 - Marie Stopes (Marie Charlotte Carmichael Stopes), British author, palaeobotanist and campaigner for eugenics and women's rights. She made significant contributions to plant palaeontology and coal classification, and was the first female academic on the faculty of the University of Manchester. With her second husband, Humphrey Verdon Roe, Stopes founded the first birth control clinic in Britain. She edited the newsletter Birth Control News, which gave explicit practical advice. Her sex manual Married Love brought the subject of birth control into wide public discourse. 

 
1920 - Mario Gianluigi Puzo, American author, screenwriter, and journalist. He is known for his crime novels about the Italian-American Mafia and Sicilian Mafia, most notably The Godfather (1969), which he later co-adapted into a film trilogy directed by Francis Ford Coppola. He received the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for the first film in 1972 and Part II in 1974. Puzo also wrote the original screenplay for the 1978 Superman film. His final novel, The Family, was released posthumously in 2001.

1924 - Lee Iacocca, (Lido Anthony Iacocca), American automobile executive best known for Ford Mustang and Pinto cars, while at the Ford Motor Company in the 1960s, and for reviving the Chrysler Corporation as its CEO during the 1980s. He was president and CEO of Chrysler until his retirement at the end of 1992. He was one of the few executives to preside over the operations of two of the Big Three automakers. Iacocca authored or co-authored several books, including Iacocca: An Autobiography (with William Novak), and Where Have All the Leaders Gone? Portfolio Magazine named Iacocca the 18th-greatest American CEO of all time. 

1940 - Peter Charles Doherty, AC FRS FMedSci, Australian immunologist, veterinary surgeon and researcher in the field of medicine. He received the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research in 1995, the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly with Rolf M. Zinkernagel in 1996 and was named Australian of the Year in 1997, and named a Companion of the Order of Australia for his work with Zinkernagel. He is also a National Trust Australian Living Treasure. In 2009's Q150 celebrations, Doherty's immune system research was one of the Q150 Icons of Queensland for its role as an iconic "innovation and invention".

2005 - Prince Christian of Denmark, Count of Monpezat (Christian Valdemar Henri John), Danish Royal, the eldest child of Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary. A grandson of Queen Margrethe II, he is second in the line of succession to the Danish throne, after his father.

Leftie:
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More birthdays and historical events, October 15 - On This Day

Historical Events

1815 - Napoleon I of France begins his exile on St. Helena on the Atlantic Ocean.

1878 - The U.S. Edison Electric Company and American Electric and Illumination in Canada begin operation.

1905 - Claude Debussy's La Mer is first performed, in Paris, with Camille Chevillard conducting.

1951 - Sitcom I Love Lucy starring Lucille Ball premieres on the U.S. TV Network CBS.

1969 - National Moratorium peace demonstration across the U.S., protesting against the Vietnam War.

1990 - USSR President Mikhail Gorbachev is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for "his leading role in the peace process."

2001 - The Galileo spacecraft gets within 112 miles or 180 km of Jupiter's moon, Io.





Resources:

 
1. Asiado, Tel. The World's Movers and Shapers. New Hampshire: Ore Mountain Publishing House (2005)

2. Britannica. www.britannica.com
3. Chambers Biographical Dictionary, 19th Ed. London: Chambers Harrap, 2011
4. Dateline. Sydney: Millennium House, (2006)
5. Grun, Bernard. The Timetables of History, New 3rd Revised Ed. Simon & Schuster/Touchstone (1991)
6. Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org



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