Hats Off
2nd Of December; First Nuclear Reaction------------------
Italian-born American physicist Enrico Fermi demonstrates the first controlled nuclear fission reaction in an unused squash court in a basement at the University of Chicago. Two years earlier, Fermi, along with Hungarian-born physicist Leo Szilard and German-born physicist Albert Einstein, wrote to President Franklin Roosevelt warning of the danger of Nazi development of an atomic weapon. Roosevelt approved a U.S. atomic program; the "Manhattan Project" to build an atomic bomb began in 1942. Fermi, who won the 1938 Nobel Prize in physics, scored one of the program's early triumphs with his demonstration of a nuclear reaction. In July 1945, the United States successfully tested the world's first atomic bomb, and in August two such bombs were dropped on Japan. Fermi died in 1954, and the element fermium was named in his honor one year later.
More On This Day
1998 In Britain, Conservative leader William Hague sacks his leader in the House of Lords, Lord Cranborne, for going behind his back to negotiate a deal with the Labour Government over the scrapping of Hereditary Peers.
1993 Colombian drugs baron, Pablo Escobar, the so-called King of Cocaine, is shot dead in a gun battle with police.
1990 West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl wins the first all-German election since 1933 following the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the unification of East and West Germany.
1966 In Britain, the symbol of the Swinging Sixties, the Mini skirt is banned from the Houses of Parliament at Westminster.
1965 The hit musical 'Hello Dolly' opens at Drury Lane in London.
1954 The anti-Communist witchhunt comes to an end in America when its main instigator, Senator Joseph McCarthy, is condemned for conduct unbecoming a US Senator.
1950 United Nations agree to hand over Eritrea to Ethiopia.
1927 The successor to the Model T Ford, the Model A, first goes on sale.
1907 English footballers form the Professional Footballers' Association.
1904 Members of the British Parliament representing Ulster, form an organisation that becomes the Ulster Unionist Council.
1901 American businessman King Gillette patents the safety razor with a double-edged disposable blade.
1859 American anti-slavery campaigner John Brown is hanged for killing five pro-slavery men and leading an attack on the US arsenal at Harper's Ferry in October, 1859.
1852 Second French Empire is declared by Emperor Napoleon III.
1823 In the United States, the 'Monroe Doctrine', announced by US President James Monroe, warns all European powers against interfering in the politics of the American Republics-including any further colonisation of land on the American continent. Any breach would be considered a threat to US peace and security.
1816 Spa Fields Riots in England: a large crowd, gathered to demand political reform, decides to march on London.
1805 Napoleon defeats Austro-Russian armies at the battle of Austerlitz.
1804 Napoleon Bonaparte is crowned Emperor Napoleon I by Pope Pius VII.
1697 Opening of the new St. Paul's Cathedral in London.
1934 English Actress Maggie Smith
1924 Former US Secretary of State General Alexander Haig.
1923 Greek-American operatic soprano Maria Callas born in New York.
1899 British conductor and cellist Sir john Barbirolli
1993 Colombian drugs baron, Pablo Escobar, the so-called King of Cocaine, is shot dead in a gun battle with police.
1969 English writer Stephen Potter, inventor of 'gamesmanship'.
1859 Anti-slavery campaigner John Brown is executed in Charleston, West Virginia.
1814 The Marquis de Sade, the French aristocrat whose perverted lifestyle gave the world the word 'sadism'.
