1740,	Tadeusz Andrzej Bonawentura Kosciusko, Polish patriot who has Australia’s highest mountain named after him. It took both the Russians and Prussians to defeat and imprison him.
1897,	Dr Ludwig Erhard, German statesman who directed his country’s economic recovery after the Second World War, before succeeding to the Chancellorship of the Federal Republic following Konrad Adenauer.
1902,	Captain Charles Lindberg, US pioneer aviator, the first to fly solo across the Atlantic. He became an international celebrity and was in the news again, first when his baby was kidnapped and murdered, and later when he advised the Nazis on aviation matters prior to the outbreak of the Second World War.
1902,	Charles A. Lindburgh, "Lucky Lindy"
1906,	Dietrich Bonhoeffer, German theologian and anti-Nazi who took part in the failed plot to assassinate Hitler. He was later executed in Flossenberg concentration camp. His Letters and Papers from Prison (1951) was published posthumously.
1921,	Betty Friedan
1947,	Dan Quayle, Mr. Potato Head, (or is that Potatoe?)
1948,	Alice Cooper, singer.

      Events On This Day In History...

1824,	J.W. Goodrich introduces rubber galoshes to the public.
1861,	The Confederate States of America was formed; an alliance of secessionist states which met at Montgomery, Alabama.
1865,	The Hawaiian Board of Education is formed.
1904,	The Russo-Japanese War began over the former’s occupation of Manchuria.
1911,	Rolls-Royce commissioned their famous figurehead ‘The Spirit of Ecstasy’ by Charles Sykes who used as his model Lord Montague’s mistress, Eleanor Thornton. 60 years later to the day, Rolls-Royce was declared bankrupt due to a disastrous contract to supply aero engines to Lockheed. The British government would come to its rescue.
1920,	Two South African aviators took off from Brooklands, Surrey, on the first flight to Cape Town from England. The journey would take Lt Col Pierre van Ryneveld and Flight Lt C J Quinton 28 days.
1927,	Malcolm Campbell reached over 174 mph in Bluebird on the Pendine Sands in Wales to set a new land speed record. A year later in 1928 at Daytona Beach, Florida, he reached 206.35 mph. Four years and one day later, in 1931, he reached a record-breaking 245 mph, again at Daytona Beach.
1928,	In Munich, black US singer Josephine Baker brought protests from the Nazis, but she was only banned from further appearances a year later because of her ‘indecent behaviour’ on stage.
1932,	First Winter Olympics held (At Lake Placid, New York).
1938,	Adolf Hitler assumed command of the German Army. Von Ribbentrop became Foreign Minister.
1948,	Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) gains independence.
1948,	Ceylon became independent. It would later change its name to Sri Lanka.
1962,	The first colour supplement in Britain was published by The Sunday Times.
1968,	The world’s largest hovercraft was launched at Cowes, Isle of Wight.
1976,	The Guatemalan earthquake killed 23,000 people.
1987,	Dennis Connor’s US crew won back the America’s Cup from Australia.

      And Don't Forget...

Independence Day, celebrated in Sri Lanka.