On This Day In ...

• Oct 18 1902: After the blizzard lets up, Skelton climbs down to the sea-ice and finds the Emperor penguin breeding colony of about 400 birds.
• Oct 18 1903: At lunchtime, inspection of the sledges shows that the runners on three of the four were wrecked. Scott is forced to turn back and return to the ship for repairs. They cache the undamaged sledge and most of the supplies and head back to the ship at a cracking pace. They camp that night at the Knob Head Moraine.
• Oct 18 1915: Endurance, still trapped in the pack-ice, is raised up onto a pressure ridge as the ice shifts.

• Oct 18 1851: Publication of Moby-Dick, a novel by Herman Melville, in London, England. This edition was published under the title The Whale.
• Oct 18 1971: Publication of Bonecrack, the 10th mystery novel by Dick Francis.
• Oct 18 2011: Man Booker Prize awarded to The Sense of an Ending, a novel by Julian Barnes.

• Oct 18 1887: World première public performance of Johannes Brahms' Concerto for Violin and Cello in A minor, Opus 102, in Cologne, Germany, with Brahms conducting and violinist Joseph Joachim and cellist Robert Hausmann as the soloists.
• Oct 18 1893: Charles Gounod, composer, died in Saint-Cloud, a suburb of Paris, France, at the age of 75.
• Oct 18 1904: World première performance of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 5, in Cologne, Germany, conducted by the composer.
• Oct 18 1946: Howard Shore, composer best known for film scores, especially for The Lord of the Rings, born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

• Oct 18 1356: Occurrence of the Basel Earthquake, a large intraplate 'quake, with an estimated magnitude of 6.0-7.1. The earthquake affected a large area of central Europe and is the most significant in that region in recorded history. The city of Basel was virtually destroyed, and damage extended into France and Germany.
• Oct 18 1871: Charles Babbage, mathematician and first to design a programmable computer, died in London, England, at the age of 79.
• Oct 18 1929: Grand Banks Earthquake, an undersea earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 7.2, and an epicentre at the mouth of the Laurentian Channel south of Newfoundland, caused massive turbidity flows that cut transatlantic cables. It also caused a tsunami that resulted in an estimated 28 deaths in the Burin Peninsula of Newfoundland.

• Oct 18 1840: Reverend Robert Rundle, Wesleyan Methodist missionary, arrives in Edmonton, Alberta.
• Oct 18 1856: James Bird, fur trader, died in Red River settlement, Manitoba, at the age of about 73.
• Oct 18 1873: George Arthur French appointed first Commissioner of the North-West Mounted Police by Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald.

• Oct 18 1970: The Colour of Man exhibition closes.
• Oct 18 2007: Time Travellers XIV lecture series, second presentation: "Archaeological Research and Interpretive Programming at Wanuskewin Heritage Park: A Retrospective" given by Ernie Walker.
• Oct 18 2012: Time Travellers XIX lecture series, second presentation: "'You Can't Go Home Again': How the Built Environment Becomes Archaeological" given by Margaret Kennedy.

This presentation has been compiled and is © 1998-2012 by
Alwynne B. Beaudoin (bluebulrush@gmail.com)
Last updated March 12, 2012
You are visitor #6104

For optimal viewing, the following browsers are recommended:
Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera, Safari and SeaMonkey.