420 AD: Death of Jerome, bible scholar who translated the Hebrew and Greek Testaments to give the world the Latin Vulgate.
1452: TRaditional date for printing of the World’s first printed Bible, the Gutenberg Bible. It is a copy of the Latin Vulgate of Jerome.
1399: Henry of Bolingbroke is proclaimed Henry IV, king of England, having dethroned Richard II (to much popular acclaim, Richard being a sort of proto- absolute monarch), thus planting a large seed for the Wars of the Roses.
1791: The first performance of Mozart’s last opera, The Magic Flute, took place in Vienna.
1888: Jack the Ripper kills two women in one night (probably), Liz Stride and Catherine Eddowes.
1927: Babe Ruth becomes the first baseball player to score 60 home runs in a season.
1955: James Dean, movie star, dies in auto accident at age 24.
