March 1

589 Saint David was a Welsh bishop of Menevia during the 6th century. He was born near the present city of St Davids around 520 AD. He founded a Celtic monastic community on the western headland of Pembrokeshire and died on March 1, 589. His last words to the community of monks were: "Be steadfast brothers be ye constant. The yoke which with single mind ye have taken, bear ye to the end; and whatsoever ye have seen with me and heard, keep and fulfill."

589 Saint David's Day is the feast day of Saint David, the Patron Saint of Wales, and falls on March 1st each year. The day has been a national festival in Wales since the 18th century, and it is marked by various celebrations and traditions, which celebrate Welsh identity, culture, and heritage. It provides an opportunity for people in Wales and those of Welsh descent around the world to come together and honor their patron saint.

1562 An attempt on March 1, 1562 by Francis, Duke of Guise, to disperse a church service by Huguenots in Wassy, France, turned into a massacre. It resulted in 50 dead, and started the French Wars of Religion, a prolonged period of war and popular unrest between Catholics and Huguenots between 1562 and 1598. It is estimated that three million people perished in this period from disease, famine or violence. 

1810 Frédéric Chopin was born on March 1, 1810 as Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin in a manor house in a village Zelazowa Wola, 36 miles from Warsaw, Poland. He was born to Mikołaj (Nicolas) Chopin, a Polonized French teacher and Tekla Justyna Krzyżanowska. A precocious child, Chopin began piano lessons at the age of six. At the age of 7, he was already the author of two polonaises (in G minor and B-flat major), the first being published in the engraving workshop of Father Cybulski.

1813 When John Payne of the Royal Society was sacked for fighting, the scientist Humphry Davy recommended a young man named Michael Faraday for the job of Chemical Assistant at the Royal Institution. He was accepted and Faraday started on March 1, 1813. Faraday went on to become  one of Britain's leading scientists, a pioneer of electromagnetism and electrochemistry,

Michael Faraday by Thomas Phillips oil on canvas, 1841-1842 

1867 The Kansas–Nebraska Act became law in 1854 establishing the U.S. territories of Nebraska and Kansas, and allowing settlers in those territories to determine if they would permit slavery within their boundaries. In the 1860s, many people moved to Nebraska to take free land from the government. Nebraska became the 37th U.S. state on March 1, 1867;  the city of Lancaster was renamed Lincoln and became the state capital the same day.

1872 Yellowstone National Park was signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant on March 1, 1872.  It spans an area of 3,468.4 square miles (8,983 km2), comprising lakes, canyons, rivers, and mountain ranges. Although Yellowstone was not officially termed a "national park" in its establishing law, it was always termed such in practice and is widely held to be the first and oldest national park in the world.

1873 Four and a half years after journalist Christopher Latham Sholes received a patent for an invention he called the "Type-Writer," he sold his patent rights for $12,000 to E. Remington and Sons of New York state. An arms manufacturer seeking to diversify, they were a firm well equipped with the machinery and skill to carry out the development work. On March 1, 1873 E. Remington and Sons began the manufacturing of the first practical typewriter in Ilion, New York.

Sholes typewriter, 1873. Buffalo History Museum.

1896 On March 1, 1896 French physicist Henri Becquerel discovered the principle of radioactive decay when he exposed photographic plates to uranium. Becquerel was trying to study the way that uranium atoms absorbed and emitted energy when he made his discovery. 

1910 On March 1, 1910, the deadliest avalanche disaster in United States history occurred in the town of Wellington, Washington. It was caused by a severe snowstorm that had been raging in the area for several days. On the morning of March 1, a massive avalanche swept down the mountainside and struck the town. At the time, Wellington was a stop on the Great Northern Railway and it destroyed two trains killing 96 people. 

Train wreckage caused by the avalanche

1912 A 2012 article in Air and Space Magazine made a claim that U.S. Army Captain Albert Berry of the Jefferson Barracks in St. Louis was the first person to jump from a powered airplane on March 1, 1912. Captain Albert Berry jumped from an altitude of 1,500 feet at a speed of 50 mph. They said that Grant Morton, who is believed to have made the first parachute jump from an airplane in 1911 actually did soon April 28, 1912 which would certainly give credit to Berry.

1921 The Australian international cricket team captained by Warwick Armstrong became on March 1, 1921 the first team to complete a whitewash of The Ashes, something that would not be repeated for 86 years.

1932 20-month-old Charles Augustus Lindbergh, Jr. , the son of Charles Lindbergh, was abducted from his home on the evening of March 1, 1932, in what the press of the time came to sensationally refer to as "The Crime of the Century." Such was the public outcry even Al Capone offered a $10,000 reward for the return of baby Lindy.

1936 Five weeks after becoming king of the United Kingdom, Edward VIII broadcast his first message to the British Empire on March 1, 1936. His next message, nine months later, was to announce he was abdicating so he could marry Wallis Simpson.

1938 Technical gadget giant Samsung was started on March 1, 1938 by Lee Byung-chul as a small trading company. Byung-chul was the son of a wealthy landowning family (a branch of the Gyeongju Lee clan. “Samsung” is comprised of a combination of meanings: Sam (three) and Sung (stars). The stars are references to three celestial Chinese Gods who represent glory, luck and longevity.

1938 The comic-strip character Superman was co-created by Canadian artist Joseph Shuster and Cleveland, Ohio writer Jerry Siegel.  Superman's origin was inspired by the biblical story of Moses, whose parents abandoned him as a baby to save his life. Shuster and  Siegel sold all rights to Superman to their publishers National Allied Publications for $130 on March 1, 1938. Superman, made his debut a month later in Action Comics #1, the first true superhero comic book.

Action Comics #1 (June 1938), the debut of Superman.

1941 The phrase 'Back to the drawing board,' meaning to start again on a new plan after the failure of an earlier one, originated as the caption to a cartoon produced by Peter Arno for the New Yorker magazine on March 1, 1941. It showed various military men and ground crew racing towards a crashed plane, and a designer, with a roll of plans under his arm, walking away saying: "Well, back to the old drawing board."

1950 On Wednesday, March 1, 1950, West Side Baptist Church in Beatrice, Nebraska exploded during what was meant to be choir practice. However, no one in the 15-person choir was hurt or killed, because they were all running late for different reasons. No one was in the building when it went up in flames.

1953 American lawyer and politician Luther Johnson Strange III was born March 1, 1953. He served as a United States Senator from Alabama from 2017 to 2018. At 6 feet 9 inches (2.06 m) tall, Luther Strange was the tallest United States senator in American history.

1953 On March 1, 1953, after an all-night dinner with interior minister Lavrenty Beria and future premiers Georgi Malenkov, Nikolai Bulganin and Nikita Khrushchev at his Volynskoe dacha, Joseph Stalin collapsed, having probably suffered a stroke that paralyzed the right side of his body. Stalin's staff found him semi-conscious on the bedroom floor. They were so afraid of him that no one called a doctor until hours after later and Stalin died four days later.

1954 The largest nuclear bomb ever tested by the United States, Castle Bravo, was detonated on March 1, 1954 at Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands. It was the first in a series of high-yield thermonuclear weapon design tests conducted by the Americans. However, due to a miscalculation, the bomb was three times stronger than expected. This resulted in most of the test equipment being destroyed or vaporized rendering the experiment a failure.

1962 The originator of the Mayday procedure word Frederick Stanley Mockford died on March 1, 1962. In 1923, Mockford was a senior radio officer at Croydon Airport in London. When asked to think of a word that could be used internationally to indicate distress and be easily understood by in an emergency, Mockford proposed "Mayday" an alliteration of the French "m’aider" in versez m’aider ("come and help me").

1962 Former newspaper reporter turned Kresge store manager Harry Cunningham opened the first ground-up full-size Kmart store in a suburb of Detroit on March 1, 1962, just four months before the first Walmart. Like Walmart, it was a discount department store, which offered a wide range of products including clothing, home goods, and electronics. 

1967 The flag of Saint Lucia consists of a cerulean blue field charged with a yellow triangle in front of a white-edged black isosceles triangle. It was adopted on March 1, 1967 after the country became an Associated State of the United Kingdom that year.

Flag of St Lucia

1968 Johnny Cash first met his second wife wife June Carter Cash backstage at the Grand Ole Opry in 1956 while she was singing backup for Elvis Presley. They were married while they were performing together in London, Ontario on March 1, 1968, just one week after Cash proposed. Merle Kilgore, who co-wrote Cash’s "Ring of Fire," served as the best man for the nuptials.

1973 America, Why I Love Her, A LP of poetry read by John Wayne reached #66 on the US albums chart. Released on March 1, 1973, the record consists of patriotic poems written by actor John Mitchum, the brother of Robert Mitchum.

1973 Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon was released on March 1, 1973; the album is often considered the best concept album and the height of experimental rock. Dark Side Of The Moon was in the U.S. Billboard chart for 736 consecutive weeks — more than 14 years.

1978 On March 1, 1978, the late Charlie Chaplin's body was stolen by by two unemployed immigrants. The body was held for ransom in an attempt to extort money from Chaplin’s family. The perpetrators were caught, and Chaplin’s body was found 11 weeks later near Lake Geneva. He was buried under concrete to prevent further incidents.

1983 The first Compact Disc player available for sale, the Sony CDP-101, became available worldwide on March 1, 1983. The first discs could play 74 minutes, on the insistence of Sony chief Akio Morita, who stipulated one disc could carry Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. The first CDs--nearly 5 inches (13 centimeters) in diameter--stored the same amount of sound on one side as a 12-inch (30.5-centimeter) LP reproduced on two sides.

1984 Child movie star Jackie Coogan died on March 1, 1984, aged 69. Jackie Coogan became one of the first globally recognized child stars, after playing Charlie Chaplin’s irascible companion in The Kid at the age of five. In 1938, he sued his mother and stepfather for squandering his $4 million fortune. It led to the Coogan Law, which put all child earnings into court-administered trust funds.

1985 Prince Charles became the first member of the Royal Family to become a blood donor on March 1, 1985. Nurses confirmed his blood was red, not blue.

1992 On March 1, 1992, Bosnia and Herzegovina declared its independence from Yugoslavia, following a referendum in which the majority of Bosnian citizens voted in favor of independence. The declaration of independence was not recognized by the government of Yugoslavia, which led to a military conflict between the Yugoslav People's Army and the newly formed Bosnian government. This conflict eventually escalated into the Bosnian War, which lasted from 1992 to 1995 and resulted in the deaths of an estimated 100,000 people.

1993 American serial killer Joseph Christopher died in prison from a rare form of male breast at the age of 37 on March 1, 1993. Christopher gained infamy for a series of murders in the early 1980s. He is believed to have killed at least twelve individuals and wounded numerous others. Christopher had tried to check himself into a psychiatric center just weeks before he began his murders.

1994 Justin Bieber was born on March 1, 1994, in London, Ontario, at St Joseph's Hospital.  Justin is the son of Jeremy Jack Bieber and Patricia "Pattie" Mallette. They never got married and Pattie raised her son with the help of her mother Diane, and stepfather, Bruce. Justin paid tribute to his mom with his song "Turn to You (Mother's Day Dedication," which he explained is about, "the struggles she went through and how brave she was and I think the world needs to know that."