38th year - N° 338 Monday, 4 December 2023

BIRTH(+)FACT(᙮)DEATH(-)
38th year - N° 338 Monday, 4 December 2023

4 December / Today's 35 Events:

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(-) 173 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 1850 Physicist and inventor William Sturgeon aka The Electrician known for making the first electromagnets dies of unknown causes at the age of 67 in Prestwich, Lancashire, United Kingdom.

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(+) 160 years ago Friday 4th of December 1863 Victim of Maria Swanenburg aka Goeie Mie Catharina Swanenburg is born in Leiden, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands.

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(+) 158 years ago Monday 4th of December 1865 Nurse Edith Louisa Cavell is born in Swardeston, Norfolk, United Kingdom.

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(-) 152 years ago Monday 4th of December 1871 Pieternella Swanenburg is poisoned with arsenic by serial poisoner Maria Swanenburg aka Goeie Mie in Leiden, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands.

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(+) 148 years ago Saturday 4th of December 1875 Poet and writer Rainer Maria Rilke, originally René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke is born in Praha, Bohemia, Czechoslovakia.

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(-) 142 years ago Sunday 4th of December 1881 Mass murderer Konrad Beck is executed by hanging at the age of 40 in Berlin, Berlin, Germany. Beck killed his wife and five children.

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(+) 131 years ago Sunday 4th of December 1892 Caudillo de España y de la Cruzada Francisco Bahamonde Franco is born in 108 Calle Frutos Saavedra, Ferrol, Galicia, Spain.

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(-) 129 years ago Tuesday 4th of December 1894 Murderer James Canham Read aka The Southend Murderer is executed by hanging at the age of 39 in Chelmsford Prison, Chelmsford, Essex, United Kingdom.

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(+) 113 years ago Sunday 4th of December 1910 Actress Thelma White, originally Thelma Wolpa known from the exploitation film ‘Reefer Madness’ is born in Lincoln, Nebraska, United States.

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(x) 109 years ago Friday 4th of December 1914 45-year-old Serial killer Henri Désiré Landru aka Le Barbe-Bleue de Gambais rents a villa in The Lodge, 47 Rue de Mantes, Vernouillet, Île-de-France, France. Landru killed 39-year-old Jeanne-Marie Cuchet, her 17-year-old son André and two more victims in The Lodge. Their bodies were burned in his furnace.

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(x) 99 years ago Thursday 4th of December 1924 Start of the trial against 45-year-old Serial killer Fritz Friedrich Heinrich Karl Haarmann aka Der Hannover Werwolf in Schwürgericht, Volgersweg 65, Hannover, Niedersachsen, Germany.

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(+) 83 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 1940 Double murderer Gary Mark Gilmore aka The Executioner's Song is born in McCamey, Texas, United States.

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(-) 83 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 1940 Elfriede Franke is attacked and thrown out of a train by serial killer Paul Ogorzow aka Der Schnell-Bahn Mörder in Karlshorst, Berlin, Berlin, Germany.

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(+) 79 years ago Monday 4th of December 1944 Musician Dennis Carl Wilson known from The Beach Boys is born in Inglewood, California, United States.

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(+) 76 years ago Thursday 4th of December 1947 Victim of Norman John Collins aka The Michigan Coed Killer Mary Terese Fleszar is born in Willis, Michigan, United States.

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(x) 70 years ago Friday 4th of December 1953 26-year-old Mass murderer Vincent Ciucci chloroforms his wife Anna and three children, 9-year-old Vincent, 8-year-old Virginia and 4-year-old Angeline, and shoots them in the head in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Ciucci then set the apartment on fire to cover up the murders and planned to run away with his 21-year-old pregnant mistress Carol Amora. Ciucci was arrested three days later.

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(+) 68 years ago Sunday 4th of December 1955 Musician Maurizio Bianchi aka MB is born in Pomponesco, Lombardia, Italy.

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(x) 66 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 1957 90 die in electric and steam train collision in Lewisham by-pass, Lewisham, Greater London, United Kingdom.

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(-) 54 years ago Thursday 4th of December 1969 Black Panther Mark Clark is shot dead in a police raid at the age of 22 in 2337 West Monroe Street, Chicago, Illinois, United States. Clark, sitting in the front room of the apartment with a shotgun in his lap, was on security duty. The first shot hit Clark in the heart. He died instantly and his gun went off as he fell. His gun fired a single round which was later determined to be caused by a reflexive death convulsion after the raiding team shot him; this was the only shot the Panthers fired.

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(-) 54 years ago Thursday 4th of December 1969 Deputy chairman of the Black Panthers Fred Hampton is shot dead in a police raid at the age of 21 in 2337 West Monroe Street, Chicago, Illinois, United States. FBI-informant William O'Neal had slipped the powerful barbiturate sleep agent Secobarbitol into a drink that Hampton consumed during the dinner in order to sedate Hampton so he would not awaken during the subsequent raid. Hampton fell asleep in mid-sentence talking to his mother on the telephone. Hampton was lying on a mattress in the bedroom with his pregnant fiancée who was eight-and-a-half months pregnant with their child. Two officers found him wounded in the shoulder and fellow Black Panther Harold Bell reported that he heard the following exchange: "That's Fred Hampton. Is he dead?... Bring him out. He's barely alive. He'll make it." Two shots were heard, which it was later discovered were fired point blank in Hampton's head. According to Deborah Johnson one officer then said: "He's good and dead now."

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(x) 52 years ago Saturday 4th of December 1971 100 die in Malaysia Airlines Boeing 737-2H6 Flight 653 crash in Tanjung Kupang, Johor, Malaysia. The plane was presumably hijacked by a member of the Japanese Red Army who shot both pilots.

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(x) 52 years ago There Was Smoke on the Water Saturday 4th of December 1971 During a concert by 31-year-old Musician and composer Frank Vincent Zappa known from the Mothers of Invention an unidentified man in the audience sets fire to the concert hall with a flare gun in Casino Barrière de Montreux, Montreux, Vaud, Switzerland. The event is noted in Deep Purple's 'Smoke on the Water'.

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(-) 52 years ago Saturday 4th of December 1971 Member of Zentralrat der Umherschweifenden Haschrebellen and Bewegung 2. Juni Georg von Rauch dies of a shot in the head at the age of 24 in Eisenacher Straße, Schöneberg, Berlin, Berlin, Germany. von Rauch was shot dead by Kriminalhauptmeister Hans-Joachim Schulz after trying to move an observed Ford Transit van. von Rauch had his hands in the air and was unarmed.

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(x) 49 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 1974 69-year-old Writer, philosopher, political activist and critic Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre pays a visit to imprisoned member of the Rote Armee Fraktion Andreas Baader in Justizvollzugsanstalt Stammheim, Asperger Straße 60, Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany.

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(x) 49 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 1974 191 hajj pilgrims die in Martinair McDonnell Douglas DC-8-55F Flight 138 crash in Maskeliya, Madhyama Palata, Sri Lanka.

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(-) 47 years ago Saturday 4th of December 1976 Composer Benjamin Edward Britten dies of congestive heart failure at the age of 63 in Aldeburgh, Suffolk, United Kingdom.

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(x) 42 years ago Friday 4th of December 1981 28-year-old Member of the Rote Armee Fraktion Stefan Werner Wisniewski is sentenced to two life sentences for murder, kidnapping, coercion of a constitutional body, and membership in a terrorist organization in Düsseldorf, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany. Wisniewski commented on the verdict by saying that he did not care. In 1999 Wisniewski was released on parole.

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(x) 38 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 1985 Twentysixth bomb attack by Terrorist organisation Les Cellules Communistes Combattantes aka CCC in Bank of America, Van Eycklei 34, Antwerpen, Antwerpen, Belgium. It was the fourth action in their 'Campagne Pierre Akkerman'.

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(x) 38 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 1985 56-year-old Murderess Gertrude Baniszewski, originally Gertrude Nadine Van Fossan aka Gertrude Wright is released on parole in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. Baniszewski was sentenced to life imprisonment for the sadistic murder of 16-year-old neighbour Sylvia Likens in 1965.

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(-) 37 years ago Thursday 4th of December 1986 Double murderer Michael Wayne Evans is executed by lethal injection at the age of 30 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States.

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(-) 30 years ago Saturday 4th of December 1993 Musician and composer Frank Vincent Zappa known from the Mothers of Invention dies of prostate cancer at the age of 53 in Los Angeles, California, United States.

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(-) 21 years ago Wednesday 4th of December 2002 Double murderer Leonard Uresti Rojas is executed by lethal injection at the age of 52 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States. Rojas' last meal request was for one whole extra crispy fried chicken, salad with Thousand Island dressing, French toast, two diet Cokes, one apple pie, and French fries.

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(-) 20 years ago Thursday 4th of December 2003 Murderer Ivan Ray Murphy is executed by lethal injection at the age of 38 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States.

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19 years ago The Eyes had it Saturday 4th of December 2004 A selection of gifts at AMVK's birthday party in Oudstrijdersstraat 35, Borgerhout, Antwerpen, Antwerpen, Belgium.

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(-) 6 years ago Monday 4th of December 2017 Model and topless showgirl Christine Margaret Keeler known from the Profumo Affair dies of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease at the age of 75 in Princess Royal University Hospital, Locksbottom, London, Greater London, United Kingdom.

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