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On this day
What happened on October 21?
October 21 is day 294 of the year, day 295 in leap years. On October 21, 1969, Willy Brandt was elected Federal Chancellor of West Germany. In 1997, a new Mercedes-Benz A-Class overturned during the “Elk Test,” prompting Daimler-Benz to fit ESP as standard. In addition, the musician Manfred Mann was born in 1940.
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Events on October 21
- 1520 During his circumnavigation of the globe, Ferdinand Magellan sights a cape which he names Cabo Virgenes after the day it was discovered. The Virgin Cape lies in the present-day Region of Magallanes and Chilean Antarctica at the entrance to the Magellan Strait, which was later named after him.
- 1805 With the victory over Napoleon Bonaparte's fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar during the Third War of the Coalition, Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson, who is killed in the battle, secures British naval supremacy.
- 1879 Thomas Alva Edison's first commercially viable light bulb passes an endurance test of over 40 hours in the Menlo Park laboratory in New Jersey.
- 1907 Day laborer Daniel Hartmann finds the Mauer lower jaw near Heidelberg, the type specimen of Homo heidelbergensis. It is the oldest fossil of the genus Homo recovered in Germany to date.
- 1944 After a three-week battle, the Allies capture Aachen, the first major German city, during World War II.
- 1964 My Fair Lady starring Audrey Hepburn opens in German cinemas.
- 1969 Willy Brandt is elected Federal Chancellor of West Germany. The first social-liberal federal government takes office.
- 1984 At the Portuguese Grand Prix, Niki Lauda finishes second behind Alain Prost and thus wins the Formula 1 World Championship for the third time in his career by a half-point margin.
- 1992 Madonna's published photo book SEX provokes the intended scandal, driving sales. One of the most successful coffee table books is born.
- 1997 A new Mercedes-Benz A-Class model overturns during the “Elk Test” in Sweden. As a consequence, Daimler-Benz fitted the Electronic Stability Program (ESP) as standard – at the time, a novelty outside the luxury class.
- 2011 Opening of the new runway 07L/25R at Frankfurt Airport
- 2012 During a solemn ceremony in St. Peter's Square in Rome, Pope Benedict XVI. canonizes, among others, the German Anna Schäffer, the German-born nun Marianne Cope, and the North American Kateri Tekakwitha.
Born on October 21
- 1884 Claire Waldoff, German chanson singer and cabaret artist
- 1892 Otto Nerz, German football player and coach, first national team coach of the DFB
- 1901 Margarete Buber-Neumann, German Gulag and concentration camp prisoner, publicist and writer
- 1912 Georg Solti, British-Hungarian conductor
- 1940 Manfred Mann, South African musician and songwriter
- 1951 Sigmund Gottlieb, German journalist and editor-in-chief of Bavarian Television
- 1961 Marina Krogull, German actress and voice actress
- 1980 Kim Kardashian, American model
- 1990 Ricky Rubio, Spanish basketball player
- 2001 Georg Steinhauser, German racing cyclist
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Source of events and birthdays: German Wikipedia article „21. Oktober“, licence CC BY-SA 4.0, selected, shortened and translated by Birthday Paper.
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