Anniversaries

Births: Claude Adrien Helvetius, philosopher and encyclopaedist, 1715; Charles XIV, King of Sweden, 1763; Ugo (Niccolo) Foscolo, poet, 1778; Gustav Gunz, singer and teacher, 1831; Frederick Corder, conductor and composer, 1852; Edward Sapir, linguist and anthropologist, 1884; Jimmy Van Heusen (Edward Chester Babcock), composer, 1913.

Deaths: Edward Jenner, physician, discoverer of vaccination, 1823; Jean- Louis-Andre-Theodore Gericault, painter, 1824; Gerard de Nerval (Gerard Labrunie), poet and writer, 1855; William Marsden, surgeon and founder of hospitals, 1867; Charles George Gordon, general, killed at Khartoum 1885; Arthur Cayley, mathematician, 1895; Sir James Mackenzie, physician, 1925; Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov, geneticist, 1943; Grace Moore (Mary Willie Grace Moore), singer and actress, killed in KLM air crash, Copenhagen, 1947; Edward G. Robinson (Emmanuel Goldenberg), actor, 1973; Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller, statesman, 1979; William David Ormsby Gore, fifth Lord Harlech, diplomat, 1986; Jose Vicente Ferrer Otero y Cintron, (Jose Ferrer), actor, 1992.

On this day: Sydney, Australia, was founded by Governor Arthur Phillip, 1788; Napoleon Bonaparte became president of the Italian Republic, formerly the Cisalpine republic, 1802; Hong Kong became a British sovereign territory, 1841; the Rugby Union was founded, 1871; Strauss's opera Der Rosenkavalier was first performed, Dresden, 1911; Hindi was made the official language of India, 1965.

Today is Australia Day, Republic Day, India and the Feast Day of St Alberic, St Conan of Man, St Eystein, St Margaret of Hungary, St Paula, St Thordgith or Theorigitha of Barking, St Timothy and St Titus.