Today is May 8.
Nazi Germany unconditionally surrendered this day in 1945, and it is celebrated as
VE Day.
Today is also
Ima Get Drunk As Fuck Day, and is celebrated everywhere within a five foot circle of me.
Events
1429 – Joan of Arc lifts the Siege of Orléans, turning the tide of the Hundred Years' War.
1541 – Hernando de Soto reaches the Mississippi River and names it Río de Espíritu Santo.
1794 – Branded a traitor during the Reign of Terror by revolutionists, French chemist Antoine Lavoisier, who was also a tax collector with the Ferme générale, is tried, convicted and guillotined in one day in Paris.
1861 – American Civil War: Richmond, Virginia is named the capital of the Confederate States of America.
1877 – At Gilmore's Gardens in New York City, the first Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show opens.
1886 – Pharmacist John Pemberton (PBUH) first sells a carbonated beverage named "Coca-Cola" as a patent medicine.
1902 – In Martinique, Mount Pelée erupts, destroying the town of Saint-Pierre and killing over 30,000 people. Only a handful of residents survive the blast.
1912 – Paramount Pictures
is founded.
1919 – Edward George Honey proposes the idea of a moment of silence to commemorate the Armistice of 11 November 1918 which ended World War I.
1942 – World War II: The Battle of the Coral Sea comes to an end with Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carrier aircraft attacking and sinking the United States Navy aircraft carrier USS Lexington.
The battle marks the first time in the naval history that two enemy fleets fight without visual contact between warring ships.
1973 – A 71-day standoff between federal authorities and the American Indian Movement members occupying the Pine Ridge Reservation at Wounded Knee, South Dakota ends with the surrender of the militants.
1980 – The World Health Organization confirms the eradication of smallpox.
1984 – The Thames Barrier is officially opened.
1988 – A fire at Illinois Bell's Hinsdale Central Office triggers an extended 1AESS network outage once considered the "worst telecommunications disaster in US telephone industry history".
1847 – Oscar Hammerstein I, 1884 – Harry S. Truman (33rd POTUS), 1895 – Fulton J. Sheen, 1911 – Robert Johnson
1919 – Lex Barker, 1920 – Saul Bass, 1926 – David Attenborough, 1926 – Don Rickles, 1928 – Ted Sorensen, 1940 – Peter Benchley (author
Jaws), 1940 – Ricky Nelson, 1940 – Toni Tennille (Capt. & Tenille), 1941 – James Traficant, 1943 – Danny Whitten (Crazy Horse), 1944 – Gary Glitter (kiddie fiddler), 1944 – Bill Legend (T. Rex), 1950 – Robert Mugge, 1951 – Philip Bailey (Earth, Wind, & Fire), 1951 – Chris Frantz (Talking Heads), 1953 – Billy Burnette (Fleetwood Mac), 1953 – Alex Van Halen, 1954 – David Keith, 1955 – Stephen Furst ('Flounder' in
Animal House), 1956 – Jeff Wincott, 1958 – Lovie Smith, 1959 – Ronnie Lott, 1961 – Bill de Blasio, 1964 – Melissa Gilbert, 1973 – Marcus Brigstocke, 1975 – Enrique Iglesias
1794 – Antoine Lavoisier
, 1819 – Kamehameha I , 1880 – Gustave Flaubert, 1903 – Paul Gauguin
, 1947 – Harry Gordon Selfridge, 1982 – Neil Bogart (founded Casablanca Records, signed Donna Summer, The Village People, T. Rex, Parliament, Harry Chapin, Joan Jett, et al), 1982 – Gilles Villeneuve
, 1985 – Dolph Sweet, 1988 – Robert A. Heinlein, 1994 – George Peppard (
Breakfast At Tiffany's, Banacek, The A-Team), 1999 – Dirk Bogarde, 1999 – Dirk Bogarde, 1999 – Dana Plato (
Diff'rent Strokes), 2008 – Eddy Arnold, 2013 – Jeanne Cooper (played 'Katherine Chancellor' for forty years on
The Young and The Restless), 2016 – William Schallert (that guy who was in that thing)