1998 – 20 people die in the Cavalese cable car disaster
The wings of a low-flying U.S. military aircraft cut the aerial tramway's cables, causing the cabin to plunge 80 meters.
1989 – Paraguay's dictator, Alfredo Stroessner, is overthrown
Stroessner had come to power in 1954 with a military coup.
1972 – The deadliest snowstorm in history kills 4000
The Iran Blizzard lasted a week and left whole villages without survivors.
1969 – Yasser Arafat becomes leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)
Even after his death in 2011, Arafat remained a highly controversial figure, many Arabs praising him as a freedom fighter while many Israelis denouncing him as a terrorist.
1966 – Luna 9 touches down on the Moon
The unmanned Soviet spacecraft was the first to achieve a soft landing there.
1935 – Johnny "Guitar" Watson
American singer, guitarist
1927 – Kenneth Anger
American actor, director, author
1874 – Gertrude Stein
American poet, art collector
1830 – Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury
English politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
1809 – Felix Mendelssohn
German pianist, composer, conductor
1985 – Frank Oppenheimer
American physicist
1961 – Anna May Wong
American actress
1924 – Woodrow Wilson
American politician, 28th President of the United States, Nobel Prize laureate
1820 – Gia Long
Vietnamese Emperor
1468 – Johannes Gutenberg
German publisher, invented the Printing press
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