October 13

54 The Roman emperor Claudius died in the early hours of October 13, 54 after being poisoned by his wife Agrippina. Agrippina was determined to secure the Emperorship for her son. Nero, despite Claudius' plans to name Nero's step brother Britannicus as his successor. She fed her husband amanita mushrooms then his physician, Xenophon, shoved a feather down his throat to induce vomiting. Claudius died in agony choking to death without making his wishes known.

Marie-Lan Nguyen (2011) Wikipedia Commons

64 One of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus Christ, Saint Peter is traditionally counted as the first bishop of Rome‍—‌or pope. Church Tradition says that Peter probably died by crucifixion (with arms outstretched) in the year 64. Some classical scholars believe that Peter died on October 13, 64 during the festivities on the occasion of the "dies imperii" of Emperor Nero. This took place three months after the disastrous fire that destroyed Rome for which Nero wished to blame the Christians.

1247 On October 13, 1247, Henry III of England gave notice to his assembled nobles at Westminster Abbey that he had "most agreeable news of a holy benefit recently conferred upon the English." The king then prepared to receive a relic of the Holy Blood of Jesus sent from Jerusalem, keeping vigil the night before its reception in London, fasting on bread and wine with many candles and solemn prayers. On the day itself Henry personally carried the relic the two miles to the abbey. Once he arrived there, he carried the blood in procession around the abbey and the neighboring royal properties before consigning it to the care of the monks.

1269  Saint Edward the Confessor died in 1066 within ten days of the consecrating of Westminster Abbey and the Benedictine monks buried him within its walls. His shrine in Westminster Abbey remains where it was after the final translation of his body to a chapel east of the sanctuary on October 13, 1269 by King Henry III of England.

1762 Marie-Antoinette met the young Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart on October 13, 1762 in Vienna, when she was seven, (he was two months her junior). Mozart performed a short musical concert for the Imperial Family. When the Empress asked him what he would like as a reward, the young child genius is said to have responded by saying he would like the hand of the Empress's youngest daughter - Marie-Antoinette - in marriage (much to the Empress's amusement.)

1775 The Continental Congress established the Continental Navy (predecessor of the United States Navy) on October 13, 1775. With only two ships and a crew of eighty men, the main goal of the Continental Navy was to intercept shipments of British material and generally disrupt British maritime commercial operations during the Revolutionary War. 

1836 For several centuries in Europe, nursing was regarded as a menial occupation fit only for the lower-classes, because of the unpleasant and disgusting aspects of the work. On October 13, 1836 Theodor Fliedner, the Lutheran pastor of Kaiserswerth near Düsseldorf, established the Deaconess Institute. The scheme led respectable ladies into nursing and produced the world's first trained nurses.

1843 12 German Jewish immigrants led by Henry Jones founded B'nai B'rith, the oldest Jewish service organization in the world, on October 13, 1843. in Aaron Sinsheimer's café in New York City's Lower East Side. B'nai B'rith states that it is committed to the security and continuity of the Jewish people and the State of Israel and combating antisemitism and bigotry.

1892 American astronomer Edward Emerson Barnard discovered D/1892 T1, the first comet found by photographic means, on the night of October 13, 1892. The comet was then lost for over a century before being rediscovered on October 7, 2008 by Andrea Boattini and identified as Comet Barnard 3. Now called 206P/Barnard–Boattini, it has made 20 revolutions since 1892 and passed within 0.3–0.4 AU of Jupiter in 1922, 1934 and 2005.

1906 Aloha Wanderwell, the first woman to drive around the world, was born on October 13, 1906. Travelling in a Ford Model T as driver, translator and film maker for the Wanderwell Expeditions, she started and ended in Nice, France, between December 1922 and January 1927,.

1914 In Major League Baseball's World Series, the Boston Braves defeated the Philadelphia Athletics, 4 games to 0, at Fenway Park on October 13, 1914. In doing so the team completed the first World Series sweep in history.

1917 Six months after an apparition of a lady dressed in white appeared to three shepherd children, the "Miracle of the Sun" was witnessed by a large crowd at Fátima, Portugal on October 13, 1917. 70,000 people had gather during a cloud-burst in response to the children's claim that a miracle would occur on October 13, 1917. The incessant rain ceased, the black clouds parted and the Sun broke through in a dull grey disc shape that could be looked at directly. As the Sun started whirling wildly then plunging dramatically towards Earth, there were various changes of color on the surroundings. Such was the heat emitted that in a space of ten minutes the people’s wet clothing was completely dried.

1923 Constantinople served as the capital of four empires: the Roman Empire (330–395), the Byzantine Empire (395–1204 and 1261–1453), the Latin Empire (1204–1261), and the Ottoman Empire (1453–1922). On October 13, 1923 Angora replaced Constantinople as Turkey's capital. The name of Constantinople was changed to Istanbul six and a half years later. The city of Angora was changed to Ankara on the same day.

1924 Ramsay MacDonald took office as Britain's first Labour Party Prime Minister in January 1924. The right-wing press professed disbelief that a group of socialist ‘wild men’ could take charge of Britain and her Empire. Ramsay MacDonald made the first ever election broadcast on the BBC on October 13, 1924. The minority Labour government was dependent upon the Liberal Party to maintain it in power and lasted only until November 1924.

Ramsay MacDonald

1925 The UK's first female Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, was born on Friday, October 13, 1925 in Grantham, Lincolnshire, to Alfred Roberts, who was a grocer, Methodist lay preacher and local mayor and Beatrice Ethel (née Stephenson). She developed an early interest in politics and, when studying chemistry at University of Oxford's Somerville College, Thatcher became president of the Oxford Conservative Association.

1949 In mid-1949, George Orwell started courting the tough, outspoken and beautiful Sonia Brownell. They married on October 13, 1949 only three months before his death from tuberculosis. Orwell's Julia character in his Nineteen Eighty-Four novel was based on Sonia.

1963 The term 'Beatlemania' was used by the Daily Mirror in the aftermath of a successful appearance by The Beatles on Sunday Night At The London Palladium on October 13, 1963, which was seen by an estimated 15 million television viewers in the UK.

1967 The first game in the history of the American Basketball Association (ABA) was played on October 13, 1967. The Anaheim Amigos lost to the Oakland Oaks 134-129 in Oakland, California. The AMA professional basketball league in the United States existed from 1967 to 1976. It was known for its distinctive style of play, including the introduction of the three-point line, and it ultimately contributed to the growth and evolution of professional basketball in the United States.

2016 Bhumibol Adulyadej died at the age of 88 on October 13, 2016. He had ascended to the throne of Thailand in 1946 and served for 70 years, 126 days. At the time of his death, he was the world's longest-serving head of state.

2016 On October 13, 2016, Bob Dylan was announced as the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature. Dylan was the first American to win the Nobel Prize for Literature since Toni Morrison in 1993. The choice of Bob Dylan was unconventional because it was the first time a musician and song-writer won the Nobel for Literature. The committee noted he was honored "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition."