17 March
Notable Births
Brandon Aiyuk
b. 1998
American football player (born 1998)
Katie Ledecky
b. 1997
American swimmer (born 1997)
Daniel Sprong
b. 1997
Dutch ice hockey player (born 1997)
Claressa Shields
b. 1995
American boxer (born 1995)
DeForest Buckner
b. 1994
American football player (born 1994)
Terry Rozier
b. 1994
American basketball player (born 1994)
Marcel Sabitzer
b. 1994
Austrian footballer (born 1994)
Rhys Hoskins
b. 1993
American baseball player (born 1993)
Death of Yao Yuanjun
b. 1993
John Boyega
b. 1992
English actor (born 1992)
Patrick Cantlay
b. 1992
American professional golfer (born 1992)
Yeltsin Tejeda
b. 1992
Costa Rican footballer (born 1992)
Sergey Kalinin (ice hockey)
b. 1991
Russian ice hockey player (born 1991)
Cordarrelle Patterson
b. 1991
American football player (born 1991)
Thomas Robinson (basketball)
b. 1991
American-Lebanese basketball player
Hozier
b. 1990
Irish musician (born 1990)
Saina Nehwal
b. 1990
Indian badminton player (born 1990)
Jean Segura
b. 1990
Dominican baseball player (born 1990)
Mikael Backlund
b. 1989
Swedish ice hockey player (born 1989)
Thomas Boston
b. 1676
Scottish Presbyterian church leader and theologian
Notable Deaths
John Hemingway (RAF officer)
d. 2025
Irish RAF fighter pilot (1919–2025)
Lee Shau-kee
d. 2025
Hong Kong real estate billionaire (1928–2025)
Lance Reddick
d. 2023
American actor (1962–2023)
John Magufuli
d. 2021
President of Tanzania from 2015 to 2021
Phan Văn Khải
d. 2018
Vietnamese politician (1933–2018)
Meir Dagan
d. 2016
Israeli general and Mossad director (1945–2016)
Marek Galiński (cyclist)
d. 2014
Polish cyclist (1974–2014)
William B. Caldwell III
d. 2013
United States Army general
A.B.C. Whipple
d. 2013
American Journalist, Editor, Historian
Pope Shenouda III of Alexandria
d. 2012
Head of the Coptic Church from 1971 to 2012
Margaret Whitlam
d. 2012
Australian social campaigner and athlete
Michael Gough
d. 2011
British character actor (1916–2011)
Ferlin Husky
d. 2011
American country music singer (1925–2011)
Alex Chilton
d. 2010
American musician (1950–2010)
Sid Fleischman
d. 2010
American writer (1920–2010)
Clodovil Hernandes
d. 2009
Brazilian politician
Roland E. Arnall
d. 2008
American businessman and diplomat (1939–2008)
John Backus
d. 2007
American computer scientist
Oleg Cassini
d. 2006
Russian-American fashion designer (1913–2006)
Ray Meyer
d. 2006
American basketball player and coach, college athletics administrator
On This Day in History
All 38 ›
2016
Rojava conflict: At a conference in Rmelan, the Movement for a Democratic Society declares the establishment of the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria.
Rojava Revolution
2004
Unrest in Kosovo: More than 22 are killed and 200 wounded. Thirty-five Serbian Orthodox shrines in Kosovo and two mosques in Serbia are destroyed.
2004 unrest in Kosovo
2003
Leader of the House of Commons and Lord President of the Council, Robin Cook, resigns from the British Cabinet in disagreement with government plans for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Leader of the House of Commons
2000
Five hundred and thirty members of the Ugandan cult Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God die in a fire, considered to be a mass murder or suicide orchestrated by leaders of the cult. Elsewhere another 248 members are later found dead.
Uganda
1992
Israeli Embassy attack in Buenos Aires: Car bomb attack kills 29 and injures 242.
1992 Buenos Aires Israeli embassy bombing
1992
A referendum to end apartheid in South Africa is passed 68.7% to 31.2%.
1992 South African apartheid referendum
1988
A Colombian Boeing 727 jetliner, Avianca Flight 410, crashes into a mountainside near the Venezuelan border killing 143.
Colombia
1988
Eritrean War of Independence: The Nadew Command, an Ethiopian army corps in Eritrea, is attacked on three sides by military units of the Eritrean People's Liberation Front in the opening action of the Battle of Afabet.
Eritrean War of Independence
1985
Serial killer Richard Ramirez, aka the "Night Stalker", commits the first two murders in his Los Angeles murder spree.
Richard Ramirez
1979
The Penmanshiel Tunnel collapses during engineering works, killing two workers.
Penmanshiel Tunnel
1979
Aeroflot Flight 1691 crashes on approach to Vnukovo International Airport, killing 58.
Aeroflot Flight 1691
1973
The Pulitzer Prize–winning photograph Burst of Joy is taken, depicting a former prisoner of war being reunited with his family, which came to symbolize the end of United States involvement in the Vietnam War.
Pulitzer Prize
1969
Golda Meir becomes the first female Prime Minister of Israel.
Golda Meir
1968
As a result of nerve gas testing by the U.S. Army Chemical Corps in Skull Valley, Utah, over 6,000 sheep are found dead.
Nerve agent
1966
Off the coast of Spain in the Mediterranean, the DSV Alvin submarine finds a missing American hydrogen bomb.
DSV Alvin
1963
Mount Agung erupts on Bali killing more than 1,100 people.
Mount Agung
1960
U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the National Security Council directive on the anti-Cuban covert action program that will ultimately lead to the Bay of Pigs Invasion.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
1960
Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 710 crashes in Tobin Township, Perry County, Indiana, killing 63.
Northwest Airlines Flight 710
1958
The United States launches the first solar-powered satellite, which is also the first satellite to achieve a long-term orbit.
Vanguard 1
1957
A plane crash in Cebu, Philippines kills Philippine President Ramon Magsaysay and 24 others.
1957 Cebu Douglas C-47 crash