A tiny chink of light, not much, but a faint glimmer of hope at the far end of the Apartheid tunnel

Did You Know?

Iceland, the Faroe Islands, and the Isle of Man all have claims to having the oldest parliament in history, all of which were founded in the 9th and 10th centuries.

On this day in history

644 Umar ibn al-Khattab, the second Muslim caliph, is assassinated by a Persian slave.

1534 The English Parliament passes the first Act of Supremacy, making King Henry VIII the head of the Anglican Church, replacing the Roman Catholic Church, which is led by the pope, with whom Henry had quarrelled.

1838 The Times Of India, the world’s largest English language daily broadsheet newspaper (over 3 million copies daily) is founded as The Bombay Times And Journal Of Commerce.

1913 The elastic bra is patented.

1948 ‘Dewey Defeats Truman’, screams the banner headline on the front page of the Chicago Tribune newspaper. The problem was that Harry Truman defeated Republican candidate Thomas Dewey for the US presidency, but the editorial staff had put the paper to bed deciding that Dewey would win because of preliminary results.

1957 The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 2. On board is the first animal to enter orbit, a dog named Laika. She didn’t didn’t survive.

1967 The Battle of Dak To begins. It is one of the bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War.

1982 The Salang Tunnel fire in Afghanistan kills up to 2 000 people.

1983 White South Africans vote to allow Indians and coloureds limited power in the government. The government conveniently leaves blacks out of the process.

1987 Gordon Gould gets a US patent for the laser, ending his 30-year battle to get it.

2014 One World Trade Center opens. It is the replacement for the World Trade Center Twin Towers in New York, which were attacked and destroyed by two hijacked airliners during the September 11, 2001, attacks.

2021 South African writer Damon Galgut wins literature’s Booker Prize for his novel, The Promise, making him the third writer from South Africa to win the Booker, following Nadine Gordimer, and JM Coetzee, who has won it twice.

2024 Air quality is so bad in Lahore, Pakistan, due to crop burning in India, that Pakistan’s second-largest city closes schools for a week.

2024 People affected by severe flooding in Valencia throw mud at Spanish King Felipe VI, PM Pedro Sánchez and other officials during a visit to Paiporta.

DAILY NEWS