What Happened on October 8th in History
30 historical events on this date
War of the Pacific: The Chilean Navy defeats the Peruvian Navy in the Battle of Angamos.
The War of the Pacific, also known by multiple other names, was a war between Chile and a BolivianâPeruvian alliance from 1879 to 1884. Fought over Chilean claims on coastal Bolivian territory in...
Korean Empress Myeongseong is assassinated by Japanese infiltrators.
Empress Myeongseong, of the Yeoheung Min clan, was the wife of Gojong, the 26th king of Joseon and the first emperor of the Korean Empire. During her lifetime, she was known as Queen Min. Following...
The First Balkan War begins when Montenegro declares war against the Ottoman Empire.
The First Balkan War lasted from October 1912 to May 1913 and involved actions of the Balkan League against the Ottoman Empire. The Balkan states' combined armies overcame the initially numerically...
World War I: Corporal Alvin C. York kills 28 German soldiers and captures 132, for which he was awarded the Medal of Honor.
World War I, or the First World War, also known as the Great War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Central Powers. Major areas of conflict included Europe and the...
KDKA in Pittsburgh's Forbes Field conducts the first live broadcast of a football game.
KDKA is a class A, clear channel, AM radio station, licensed to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Owned and operated by Audacy, Inc. and the market affiliate for ABC News Radio, Its radio studios are...
World War II: Germany annexes western Poland.
World War II, or the Second World War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers. Nearly all of the world's countries participated. Tanks and aircraft played major...
World War II: During the preliminaries of the Battle of Rostov, German forces reach the Sea of Azov with the capture of Mariupol.
The Battle of Rostov (1941) took place on the Eastern Front of World War II around Rostov-on-Don and was fought between Army Group South of Nazi Germany and the Southern Front of the Soviet Union.
World War II: Around 30 civilians are executed by Friedrich Schubert's paramilitary group in Kallikratis, Crete.
The Kallikratis executions refer to the mass execution, by German Army and Greek collaborationist paramilitary forces, of some 30 mostly male civilians of Kallikratis, in southwest Crete, on 8...
World War II: Captain Bobbie Brown earns a Medal of Honor for his actions during the Battle of Crucifix Hill, just outside Aachen.
The Battle of Crucifix Hill was a World War II battle that took place on 8 October 1944, on Crucifix Hill, next to the village of Haaren in Germany and was a part of the U.S. 1st Division's campaign...
The Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash in England kills 112 people.
The Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash was a three-train collision at Harrow and Wealdstone station in Wealdstone, Middlesex during the morning rush hour of 8 October 1952. The crash resulted in 112...
The New York Yankees's Don Larsen pitches the only perfect game in a World Series.
Don James Larsen was an American professional baseball pitcher. During a 15-year Major League Baseball (MLB) career, he pitched from 1953 to 1967 for seven different teams: the St. Louis Browns /...
Der Spiegel publishes an article disclosing the sorry state of the Bundeswehr, leading to accusations of treason.
The Spiegel affair of 1962 was a political scandal in West Germany. It stemmed from the publication of an article in Der Spiegel, West Germany's weekly political magazine, about the nation's defense...
Guerrilla leader Che Guevara and his men are captured in Bolivia. Guevara would be executed the next day.
Ernesto "Che" Guevara de la Serna was an Argentine Marxist revolutionary, author, guerrilla leader, diplomat, politician, and military theorist. A major figure of the Cuban Revolution, his stylized...
The opening rally of the Days of Rage occurs, organized by the Weather Underground in Chicago.
The Days of Rage were a series of riots during three days in October 1969 in Chicago, organized by the emerging Weatherman faction of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS).
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wins the Nobel Prize in literature.
Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn was a Soviet and Russian author and dissident who helped to raise global awareness of political repression in the Soviet Union, especially the Gulag prison system....
Yom Kippur War: Israel loses more than 150 tanks in a failed attack on Egyptian-occupied positions.
The Yom Kippur War, also known as the 1973 ArabâIsraeli War, the fourth ArabâIsraeli War, the October War, or the Ramadan War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab states led by Egypt...
Spyros Markezinis begins his 48-day term as prime minister in an abortive attempt to lead Greece to parliamentary rule.
Spyridon "Spyros" Markezinis was a Greek politician, longtime member of the Hellenic Parliament, and briefly the Prime Minister of Greece during the aborted attempt at metapolitefsi...
Franklin National Bank collapses due to fraud and mismanagement; at the time it is the largest bank failure in the history of the United States.
Franklin National Bank was a bank based in Franklin Square on Long Island, New York. It was once the United States' 20th largest bank. On October 8, 1974, it collapsed in obscure circumstances...
Australia's Ken Warby sets the current world water speed record of 275.97Â knots at Blowering Dam, Australia.
Ken Warby was an Australian motorboat racer, who at his death held the water speed record of 275.97 knots, set on Blowering Dam on 8 October 1978.
Poland bans Solidarity and all other trade unions.
Solidarity, full name Independent Self-Governing Trade Union "Solidarity", is a Polish trade union founded in August 1980 at the Lenin Shipyard in GdaĆsk, Poland. Subsequently, it was the first...
An explosion occurred at the Cipel-Marco fur factory in Kwai Chung, Hong Kong, killing 14 and injuring 10.
On 8 October 1986, an explosion occurred at the Cipel-Marco fur factory located on the third floor of Wing Loi Industrial Building on Wing Lap Street, Kwai Chung, Hong Kong. The explosion was...
First Intifada: Israeli police kill 17 Palestinians and wound over 100 near the Dome of the Rock.
The First Intifada, also known as the First Palestinian Intifada, was a sustained uprising involving violent and non-violent protests, acts of civil disobedience, riots, and terrorist attacks...
Upon the expiration of the Brioni Agreement, Croatia and Slovenia sever all official relations with Yugoslavia.
The Brioni Agreement, also known as the Brioni Declaration is a document signed by representatives of Slovenia, Croatia, and Yugoslavia under the political sponsorship of the European Community (EC)...
A twin engine Cessna and a Scandinavian Airlines System jetliner collide in heavy fog during takeoff from Milan, Italy, killing 118 people.
The Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS), commonly known as Scandinavian Airlines, is the joint flag carrier airline of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. It is part of SAS Group and is headquartered in...
U.S. president George W. Bush announces the establishment of the Office of Homeland Security.
The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, comparable to interior ministries abroad. Its missions involve...
The 7.6 Mw⯠Kashmir earthquake leaves 86,000â87,351 people dead, 69,000â75,266 injured, and 2.8 million homeless.
An earthquake occurred at 08:50:39 Pakistan Standard Time on 8 October 2005 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir, region administered by Pakistan. Its epicenter was 19Â km northeast of the city of Muzaffarabad,...
Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person in the United States to be diagnosed with Ebola, dies.
Thomas Eric Duncan was a Liberian citizen who became the first Ebola patient diagnosed in the United States on September 30, 2014.
In the wake of Hurricane Matthew, the death toll rises to nearly 900.
Hurricane Matthew was a powerful and devastating tropical cyclone which caused catastrophic damage and a humanitarian crisis in Haiti, as well as widespread devastation across Cuba, the Bahamas, and...
About 200 Extinction Rebellion activists block the gates of Leinster House (parliament) in the Republic of Ireland.
Extinction Rebellion is a UK-founded global environmental movement, with the stated aim of using nonviolent civil disobedience to compel government action to avoid tipping points in the climate...
Second Nagorno-Karabakh War: Azerbaijan twice deliberately targeted the Church of the Holy Savior Ghazanchetsots of Shusha.
The Second Nagorno-Karabakh War was an armed conflict in 2020 that took place in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding occupied territories. It was a major escalation of an...