What Happened on October 21

Admiralty Dispatches

1805 — Nelson Falls at Trafalgar as British Fleet Crushes Combined Enemy

Off Cape Trafalgar, the Mediterranean Fleet under Lord Nelson shatters French and Spanish naval power in a decisive afternoon engagement — Admiral Villeneuve's line broken, nineteen prizes taken, though the nation mourns its greatest seaman

OFF CAPE TRAFALGAR, October 21 — Signal flags still flutter from the shattered masts of the Redoutable as dusk settles over a sea littered with the wreckage of empires.

Vice-Admiral Lord Nelson, commanding the Mediterranean Fleet in his flagship Victory, fell in the hour of triumph, struck down by a marksman's ball as British gunners poured devastating fire into the French and Spanish vessels ranged against them. Admiral Pierre-Charles Villeneuve, who had sought battle to oblige his Emperor's command, saw his combined fleet scattered and captured in an engagement that began before noon and ended with the surrender of nineteen sail of the line.

The enemy's losses in ships and men are reported to be grievous. British casualties, though severe, are as yet unnumbered in full. The Victory, though much damaged, remains afloat.

Lord Nelson's death, coming at the moment of his crowning victory, has already moved the nation to profound sorrow. His body is being conveyed to England in the Victory's hold, preserved in spirits of wine.

The battle secures British command of the Channel and the Atlantic approaches. No French fleet can now threaten these islands, nor interrupt the commerce that sustains the war against Bonaparte. The victory is total; the loss incalculable.

• Napoleonic Wars: A British fleet led by Lord Nelson defeats a combined French and Spanish fleet under Admiral Villeneuve in the Battle of Trafalgar.

Source: Wikipedia — Napoleonic Wars

Solar System Desk

2003 — Distant World Eris Photographed, Challenging Planet Roll

Discovery images capture a frozen body larger than Pluto, forcing astronomers to reconsider what counts as a planet

PALOMAR MOUNTAIN, Calif., October 21 — The solar system may have shrunk by one planet today, or grown by one, depending on whom you ask.

Astronomers at the California Institute of Technology have captured images of Eris, a distant body orbiting far beyond Pluto in the scattered disc. The photographs, taken with the Samuel Oschin Telescope, reveal a world larger than the ninth planet and accompanied by its own satellite, Dysnomia.

The discovery team, led by Michael Brown, had initially designated the object 2003 UB313. Its existence confirms suspicions that the outer solar system harbors substantial bodies yet unseen.

The find immediately challenges the International Astronomical Union's definition of planethood. If size determines status, Eris qualifies; if orbital dominance matters, it does not.

• Images of the dwarf planet Eris are taken and subsequently used in documenting its discovery.

Source: Wikipedia — Eris (dwarf planet)

Welsh Valleys

1966 — Aberfan Tip Slide Kills 144, Mostly Children at School

A mountain of colliery waste buried Pantglas Junior School and neighboring houses after heavy rain

ABERFAN, October 21 — In an age when coal powered Britain's prosperity, the industry claimed its most terrible tribute here this morning, as 144 perished beneath a slope that should never have stood above them.

• A colliery spoil tip slips onto houses and a school in the village of Aberfan in Wales, killing 144 people, 116 of whom were schoolchildren.

Source: Wikipedia — Aberfan disaster

Théâtre des Bouffes-Parisiens

1858 — Offenbach's 'Orpheus' Opens at Bouffes-Parisiens, Galop Infernal Delights

Offenbach's bouffonerie opened October 21 at his own Paris theater.

PARIS, October 21 — Jacques Offenbach, whose bouffonerie has kept Paris laughing through hard times, opened his newest operetta tonight at his own Théâtre des Bouffes-Parisiens.

• The opera premiered as a two-act 'opéra bouffon' at the Théâtre des Bouffes-Parisiens, Paris, on 21 October 1858.
• The libretto was written by Hector Crémieux and Ludovic Halévy, with music by Jacques Offenbach.
• The original 1858 production ran for 228 performances, rescuing Offenbach and his Bouffes company from financial difficulty.
• A critic's vehement attack in the Journal des débats provoked huge public interest, turning the piece into a cult success.
• The opera lampoons the ancient legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, portraying Orpheus as a rustic violin teacher glad to be rid of his wife.

Source: Wikipedia — Jacques Offenbach

Suffrage Desk

1945 — 15 Million French Women Cast First Ballots in Historic Legislative Vote

Seventy-six years after the Commune, female suffrage finally arrives — the October 21 polls mark the largest single extension of the franchise in French history.

PARIS, October 21 — Fifteen million women entered polling stations across France today, exercising for the first time the right to vote in a national election.

The 1945 legislative elections, called to choose deputies for a constituent assembly, thus became the first in which Frenchwomen stood alongside men as full citizens. The change follows the liberation of France and the provisional government's decree of April 1944 granting equal suffrage.

Queues formed early at schools and town halls converted for the balloting. Women born before 1928, who came of age under the old dispensation, predominated among the new voters.

The polls are expected to continue through Sunday evening.

• In the 1945 French legislative election French women vote for the first time.

Source: Wikipedia — 1945 French legislative election

Fifth Avenue Beat

1959 — Guggenheim Museum Opens as Wright's Spiral Masterpiece

Wright's helical vision at 1071 Fifth Avenue, begun in 1944, debuts today beneath a central skylight.

NEW YORK, October 21 — The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, opened today at 1071 Fifth Avenue on Manhattan's Upper East Side.

The building, begun in 1944 and completed this year, features a six-story helical ramp beneath a central skylight.

• The museum's building, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, took 15 years to design and build and was completed in 1959.
• The museum is located at 1071 Fifth Avenue between 88th and 89th Streets on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.
• Wright produced more than 700 sketches and six sets of working drawings to create the museum.
• The museum's design was controversial for its unusual shape, featuring a six-story helical ramp under a central skylight.
• Solomon R. Guggenheim established the foundation in 1937, and the museum adopted its current name in 1952.

Source: Wikipedia — Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

Cape Canaveral Bureau

1959 — Eisenhower Shifts Army Space Work to NASA

President approves transfer of Ballistic Missile Agency activities — the military's rocket programs now fall under civilian space authority.

WASHINGTON, October 21 — In the Oval Office today, President Dwight D. Eisenhower approved the transfer of all United States Army space-related activities to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The order includes most of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency, the chief military center for rocket development.

• President Dwight D. Eisenhower approves the transfer of all US Army space-related activities to NASA, including most of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency.

Source: Wikipedia — Dwight D. Eisenhower

Nipponica

1600 — Tokugawa Victory at Sekigahara Ends Century of War

The shogunate restored — Ieyasu's triumph over the western clans brings an epoch of peace to the islands.

SEKIGAHARA, October 21 — A new era of peace and unified rule dawned upon Japan today as Tokugawa Ieyasu, lord of the eastern provinces, received the imperial commission as shōgun following his decisive victory over the league of western daimyō.

• Tokugawa Ieyasu defeats the leaders of rival Japanese clans in the Battle of Sekigahara and becomes shōgun of Japan.

Source: Wikipedia — Tokugawa Ieyasu

War Department

1854 — Miss Nightingale Leads Nursing Mission to Crimea; 38 Nurses, 15 Nuns Depart for Ottoman Hospitals

Authorized by Sidney Herbert — Mission includes head nurse Eliza Roberts and aunt Mai Smith — Catholic nuns mobilized by Henry Edward Manning

LONDON, October 21 — In an age when the care of fighting men had grown desperate and the Crimean War exacted its daily toll in suffering, the British government has at last dispatched trained women to minister where arms and medicine had failed. This morning Miss Florence Nightingale, lately superintendent of the Institute for the Care of Sick Gentlewomen in London, embarked with a party of thirty-eight volunteer nurses and fifteen Catholic nuns bound for the Ottoman Empire.

The mission, authorized by Sidney Herbert of the War Office, carries women of experience and devotion to tend wounded soldiers in the eastern theatre.

• On 21 October 1854, Florence Nightingale and 38 volunteer nurses, including head nurse Eliza Roberts and her aunt Mai Smith, departed for the Ottoman Empire.
• The mission included 15 Catholic nuns mobilized by Henry Edward Manning and was authorized by Sidney Herbert.
• During the journey, Nightingale was assisted in Paris by her friend Mary Clarke.
• Nightingale had left her post as superintendent at the Institute for the Care of Sick Gentlewomen in London to lead the nursing mission.

Source: Wikipedia — Florence Nightingale

Menlo Park Bureau

1879 — Edison Files Patent for Electric Lamp; Seeks Protection for Incandescent Design

Application submitted to U.S. Patent Office — Invention promises to illuminate by heated filament

MENLO PARK, N.J., October 21 — Thomas A. Edison, the electrical inventor whose laboratory here has already produced the carbon telephone transmitter and the phonograph, has this day applied to the United States Patent Office for protection upon his design for an incandescent electric lamp.

The application, filed at Washington, covers Mr. Edison's method of producing illumination by the incandescence of a filament in a vacuum. Workmen at the Menlo Park laboratory have for months pursued experiments with various materials resistant to heat, seeking a thread that will glow without destruction when current passes through it.

• Thomas Edison applies for a patent for his design for an incandescent light bulb.

Source: Wikipedia — Thomas Edison