12 History Lessons + 7 Births & 7 Deaths for October 27, 2025
Today’s History:
- 1275 – Amsterdam receives city rights via a toll concession, marking its traditional founding.
- 1682 – William Penn founds Philadelphia.
- 1795 – Pinckney’s Treaty (Treaty of San Lorenzo) is signed by the U.S. and Spain, opening the Mississippi River to American trade and settling borders.
- 1904 – New York City’s first subway line opens (IRT from City Hall to 145th Street).
- 1914 – British battleship HMS Audacious sinks after striking a mine off Ireland.
- 1939 – DuPont publicly unveils nylon stockings, previewing a consumer revolution in synthetics.
- 1941 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivers his Navy Day address amid rising U-boat tensions.
- 1958 – Pakistan’s President Iskander Mirza is deposed in a coup led by Gen. Ayub Khan.
- 1962 – “Black Saturday” of the Cuban Missile Crisis: a U-2 is shot down over Cuba as superpowers edge toward nuclear war.
- 1981 – Soviet submarine U-137 runs aground in Swedish waters (“Whiskey on the Rocks”), causing a diplomatic crisis.
- 1997 – “Mini-Crash”: the Dow plunges 554 points (−7.2%), triggering circuit breakers during the Asian Financial Crisis.
- 2004 – Boston Red Sox sweep the St. Louis Cardinals to win their first World Series since 1918.
- 2005 – Unrest in France begins after the deaths of two teenagers in Clichy-sous-Bois, spreading nationwide in the weeks ahead.
- 2018 – Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue attack kills 11 in the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history.
- 2022 – Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter closes, taking the company private.
Today’s Birthdays:
- 1939 – John Cleese, comedian/actor (Monty Python, “Fawlty Towers”) (86)
- 1950 – Fran Lebowitz, author and cultural commentator (“Metropolitan Life”) (75)
- 1952 – Roberto Benigni, actor/director (“Life Is Beautiful”) (73)
- 1958 – Simon Le Bon, lead singer of Duran Duran (67)
- 1963 – Marla Maples, actress/TV personality (62)
- 1978 – Vanessa-Mae, crossover violinist (47)
- 1997 – Lonzo Ball, NBA guard (28)
Today’s Deaths:
- 0939 – Æthelstan, first king of a unified England (44)
- 1505 – Ivan III “the Great,” Grand Prince of Moscow (65)
- 1605 – Akbar, Mughal emperor (63)
- 1968 – Lise Meitner, physicist who helped elucidate nuclear fission (90)
- 1990 – Xavier Cugat, bandleader and Latin music pioneer (90)
- 2013 – Lou Reed, rock musician (The Velvet Underground) (71)
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