October 18

320 The Greek philosopher, Pappus of Alexandria, observed an eclipse of the Sun on October 18, 320 AD. In his commentary on the 2nd-century Greek-language mathematical and astronomical treatise the Almagest, he calculates "the place and time of conjunction which gave rise to the eclipse in Tybi in 1068 after Nabonassar". This works out as October 18, 320.

By I, Luc Viatour, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikipedia Commons

1009 The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, a Christian church in Jerusalem, was completely destroyed by the Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah on October 18, 1009. He hacked the church's foundations down to bedrock. The church was located on the site venerated by many Christians as Golgotha, (the Hill of Calvary), where Jesus was crucified. It is believed that Al-Hakim was angered by the scale of the Easter pilgrimage to Jerusalem.

1356 On October 18, 1356, a powerful earthquake hit Central Europe. It destroyed the Swiss city of Basel, and also caused extensive damage in a wide region, impacting areas in what is now Switzerland, France, and Germany. It was the most significant earthquake to have occurred in Central Europe in recorded history.

1565 The first recorded naval battle between Europeans and the Japanese was the Battle of Fukuda Bay, which took place on October 18, 1565. The battle occurred when a fleet of wakō (Japanese pirates) allied with a local daimyo, Matsura Takanobu, attempted to intercept and seize a Portuguese trade carrack returning from Macau, China, to Nagasaki. The Portuguese, led by Captain-major Diogo de Meneses, fought back using their superior ship and firearms. Though the Portuguese were outnumbered, they successfully defended their ship and escaped.

1587 Filipinos became the first Asians to have a documented presence in the Americas when they landed in Morro Bay in what is now California on October 18, 1587. They arrived aboard the Nuestra Señora de Buena Esperanza, which had sailed from Macao, as part of the Manila galleon trade. During about three days of travels ashore around Morro Bay, the crew came in contact with the Chumash people.

1744 Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough, died of old age, aged 84, on October 18, 1744, at Marlborough House. Sarah was a confidante of the future Queen Anne who made John Churchill a duke on her accession to the throne. In later life Marlborough was undermined by political intrigue and he fell heavily from royal favor reputedly because his wife’s constant bad temper became too much for even the devoted Queen Anne. The Duchess of Marlborough left at her death a fortune of £3 million.

1752 Genevan philosopher and writer Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote various arias and songs as well as prose. In 1752, he determined to compose an opera about people with dirty hands-the working class. His opera, Le Devin du village (“The Village Soothsayer”) premiered on October 18, 1752.
It attracted much admiration from King Louis XV and remained popular in Paris until the mid 1800s. Mozart parodied it in his "Bastien and Bastienne."

1799 German-Swiss chemist Christian Friedrich Schönbein was born on October 18, 1799. Schönbein was the first to isolate ozone during experiments on the electrolysis of water at the University of Basel. He named the pungent gas after the Greek for 'to smell' which is 'ozein'.

Schönbein

1851 Herman Melville's novel Moby-Dick was first published as The Whale by Richard Bentley of London in October 18, 1851. Moby-Dick is now considered by some as the greatest contribution of American letters to world literature. However, after a run of successful seafaring tales, this was the first flop for ex-cabin boy Herman Melville. The centennial of Melville's birth in 1919 became the starting point of a revival of his work, as. critics discovered his major novels and stories, including Moby-Dick.

1860 Peking's Summer Palace, Yuanmingyuan, was destroyed by British troops occupying the city on October 18, 1860. The palace was so large – covering more than 3.5 square kilometres (1.35 sq miles) – that it took 4,000 men three days of burning to destroy it. 

1867 The United States formally took possession of Alaska on October 18, 1867 after purchasing it from Russia for $7.2 million, or about 2 cents an acre. Alaska's purchase was accomplished solely through the determined efforts of US Secretary of State William H. Seward. For many years afterward the land was mockingly referred to as "Seward's Folly" or "Seward's Icebox" because of its supposed uselessness.

1878 Theodore Roosevelt met his first wife Alice Hathaway Lee for the first time on October 18, 1878. Alice Hathaway Lee was the daughter of the prominent banker George Cabot Lee and Caroline Haskell Lee. Roosevelt first met her at her next door neighbors, the Saltonstalls, residence. By Thanksgiving Roosevelt made up his mind that he would marry Alice and finally proposed June 1879. Alice waited another six months before accepting the proposal and they married in October 1880.

Alice Hathaway Lee at age 17

1898 In 1898, during the Spanish-American War, Puerto Rico was invaded by U.S. forces. The United States took possession of the island and on October 18, 1898 American troops raised their country's flag over the Caribbean nation. The Spanish–American War ended with the signing of the Treaty of Paris, which was signed on December 10, 1898. Its clauses included Spain ceding Puerto Rico to the United States.

1921 Charles Strite, a master mechanic in a plant in Stillwater, Minnesota, decided to do something about the burnt toast served in the company cafeteria. Using springs and a variable timer, he came up with the automatic pop-up toaster, which ejects the toast after toasting it. He received patent #1,394,450 on October 18, 1921 and the same year formed the Waters Genter Company to manufacture his toaster and market it to restaurants.

1922 The British Broadcasting Corporation is the UK state-owned broadcasting network. It was formed by a consortium of six electrical companies on October 18, 1922 to establish a nationwide network of radio transmitters in order to provide a national broadcasting service. The BBC began broadcasting radio programs the following month.

1925 The War of the Stray Dog was a conflict between Greece and Bulgaria between October 18 and 25, 1925 that killed a total of 171 people. It began when a Greek soldier accidentally crossed the border chasing his runaway dog. There was a short invasion of Bulgaria by Greece near the border town of Petrich, after the shooting of the soldier by Bulgarian troops. The incident ended after a decision of the League of Nations.

1926 Chuck Berry was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on October 18, 1926, the fourth child in a family of six. His father, Henry, was a contractor and deacon of a nearby Baptist church, his mother Martha a certified public school principal. He gave his first public performance in 1941 while still at Sumner High School.

1926 On October 18, 1926, Harry Houdini was talking to a group of students in his dressing room after a lecture in Montreal and he commented on the strength of his stomach muscles and their ability to withstand hard blows. Suddenly, one of the students punched Houdini twice in the stomach.
The magician hadn't had time to prepare, and the blows ruptured his appendix. The burst appendix poisoned his system and he died of peritonitis twelve days later.

1931 American inventor Thomas Edison died in his sleep on October 18, 1931 at his West Orange home at 3.24 am. When Edison lay dying at his home in New Jersey, newspaper reporters were anxiously awaiting a sign from his wife of his death. She signaled her husband's passing by turning a light ON, not off, in his bedroom.

1939 Lee Harvey Oswald was born in New Orleans on October 18, 1939, two months after his father died. An American Marxist and former U.S. Marine Oswald assassinated United States President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. He shot Kennedy from the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository as the President traveled by motorcade through Dealey Plaza in Dallas. Oswald was fatally shot by local nightclub owner Jack Ruby in the basement of Dallas Police Headquarters two days later.

1943 On October 18, 1943, during the Italian Campaign of World War II, air support was requested against the German occupied village of Calvi Vecchia, Italy. The British took the village but were unable to radio the RAF to stop the bombing, so a pigeon named G.I. Joe was sent to stop it. G.I. Joe flew this 20 mile distance in an impressive 20 minutes, just as the planes were preparing to take off for the target. Around a thousand men were saved.

1949 Jet of Iada was a German Shepherd dog, who served with the Civil Defence Services of London and saved over 150 people from blitzed buildings during World War II. He died on October 18, 1949, after which a memorial to him was built near his grave.

1954 The first transistor radio, the Regency TR-1, was announced on October 18, 1954. Two companies working together, Texas Instruments of Dallas, Texas and Industrial Development Engineering Associates (I.D.E.A.) of Indianapolis, Indiana, were behind its unveiling. The Regency TR-1 was put on sale in November 1954, and was the first practical transistor radio made in any significant numbers.

Regency TR-1 transistor radio

1963 The first cat in space was a black and white French moggy called Félicette on October 18, 1963.  It was a non-orbital flight, and lasted fifteen minutes, reaching a height of 97 miles (156 kms). She was fitted with electrodes to monitor her vital signs during the flight and survived the mission,

1966 Canadian-born American businesswoman Elizabeth Arden died at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan on October 18, 1966 aged 87. Her real name was Florence Nightingale Graham. She adopted the personal and business name of ‘Elizabeth Arden’ after opening her first beauty salon on Fifth Avenue in 1910. By 1929 she owned 150 upscale salons across the United States and Europe. She was the sole owner, and at the peak of her career,  Arden was one of the wealthiest women in the world.

1982 The wife of U.S. President Harry S. Truman, Bess Truman, died on October 18, 1982 from congestive heart failure at the age of 97. She was and remains the longest-lived First Lady and Second Lady in United States history. The Trumans had known each other since they were children attending the same school in Independence. 

1984 A Swiss couple Emil and Liliana Schmid have earned their place in the Guinness Book of Records for the longest driven journey in the same car. As of April 4, 2017 they had driven 741,065 km (460,476 miles) and traveled across 186 countries in the same Toyota Land Cruiser in a journey that started on October 18, 1984 and is still ongoing.