Jamaican Earthquake And Other Historical Events That Happened Today

“A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots.” – Marcus Garvey

Here are the special events that took place on this day in history:

1502

Pope Gregory XIII, the creator of the Gregorian calendar, was born. The calendar was introduced to enable the Church to celebrate Easter. As a result, the dates between the 4th and the 15th of October were removed and the leap year was introduced.

1692

At 11:43 AM, an earthquake occurred in Jamaica. The earthquake split the rocks, converted mountains to lakes and killed two-thirds (over five thousand people) of the unofficial capital of Jamaica, Port Royal. Port Royal was the wealthiest and busiest area at that time.

1775

The Congress of the United Colonies of North America changed their colonies name to the United States of America. It was made up of Delaware, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Maryland, Georgia, New Jersey, North Carolina, Massachusetts Bay, Virginia, Rhode Island, New York, New Hampshire, Providence Plantations and South Carolina.

1778

George Bryan “Beau” Brummell, the man who introduced trousers, was born. Before the introduction, people wore breeches.

1954

Alan Mathison Turing, the father of computer science and an English mathematician, committed suicide. He is best known as the wartime coding hero who hacked German Enigma code during the World War II. 65 years after his death, researchers decoded the electronic song he made.

1967

On the third day of the six-day war with Jordan, Israel recaptured the Wailing Wall in Old Jerusalem. With tears in the eyes of soldiers, a prayer service was held for people who had been killed. Gen. Moshe Dayan, the defence minister, told the press, “We have returned to Jerusalem never to part from her again.”

2006

Nigerian militants kidnap five South Koreans in their latest raid on a Shell-operated natural gas facility. The raid resulted in the deaths of 10 soldiers.