Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/May 18
This is a list of selected May 18 anniversaries that appear in the "On this day" section of the Main Page. To suggest a new item, in most cases, you can be bold and edit this page. Please read the selected anniversaries guidelines before making your edit. However, if your addition might be controversial or on a day that is or will soon be on the Main Page, please post your suggestion on the talk page instead.
Please note that the events listed on the Main Page are chosen based more on relative article quality and to maintain a mix of topics, not based solely on how important or significant their subjects are. Only four to five events are posted at a time and thus not everything that is "most important and significant" can be listed. In addition, an event is generally not posted this year if it is also the subject of the scheduled featured article or picture of the day.
To report an error when this appears on the Main Page, see Main Page errors. Please remember that this list defers to the supporting articles, so it is best to achieve consensus and make any necessary changes there first.
Images
Use only ONE image at a time
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F-104 Starfighter -
Ulysses S. Grant -
Flag of Somaliland -
Eruption of Mount St. Helens -
Jackie Cochran -
Vietnamese refugees transferring ships
Ineligible
| Blurb | Reason |
|---|---|
| Armed Forces Day in the United States (2013) | refimprove |
| 1268 – Baibars and his Mamluk forces captured Antioch, capital of the crusader state, the Principality of Antioch. | needs more footnotes |
| 1848 – During the aftermath of the March Revolution in the German Confederation, the Frankfurt Parliament opened in Paulskirche, Frankfurt. | needs more footnotes |
| 1912 – The first Indian film, Shree Pundalik by Dadasaheb Torne, was released. | refimprove section |
| 1926 – Evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson disappeared near California's Venice Beach, and generated much media coverage before being found 35 days later in Agua Prieta, Sonora, Mexico. | multiple issues |
| 1933 – U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an act establishing the Tennessee Valley Authority to stimulate the economic development of the Tennessee Valley, a region particularly impacted by the Great Depression. | refimprove |
| 1944 – World War II: Polish forces under Lieutenant General Władysław Anders captured Monte Cassino, Italy, after a four-month battle. | refimprove section |
| 1948 – The first session of the Legislative Yuan of the Republic of China convened in the then-Chinese capital of Nanjing. | refimprove section |
| 1953 – At Rogers Dry Lake, California, in her Canadair Sabre, American Jackie Cochran became the first female pilot to break the sound barrier. | refimprove section |
| 1958 – The Lockheed F-104 Starfighter, a supersonic interceptor aircraft, set a then-world speed record of 1,404.19 miles per hour (2,259.82 km/h). | refimprove section |
| 1980 – A popular uprising against the nationwide martial law imposed by South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan's government began in Gwangju, but it was ultimately crushed by the army about nine days later. | unreferenced section |
| 1991 – The Somali National Movement declared the independence of Somaliland, a de facto state that is internationally recognised as an autonomous region of Somalia, following the collapse of central government during the Somali Civil War. | refimprove |
Eligible
- 1896 – The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the landmark case Plessy v. Ferguson, upholding the legality of racial segregation in public transportation under the "separate but equal" doctrine.
- 1927 – Disgruntled school board treasurer Andrew Kehoe set off a series of explosives in the Bath Consolidated School, killing 44 people in the deadliest mass murder in a school in United States history.
- 1944 – The Soviet Union forcibly deported the entire population of Crimean Tatars to the Uzbek SSR and elsewhere in the country.
- 1955 – Operation Passage to Freedom, the evacuation of 310,000 Vietnamese civilians, soldiers and non-Vietnamese members of the French Army from communist North Vietnam to South Vietnam following the end of the First Indochina War, ended.
- 1974 – India conducted its first nuclear test explosion at Pokhran, the first confirmed nuclear test by a nation outside the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.
- 1980 – The stratovolcano Mount St. Helens erupted, killing 57 people in southern Washington State, reducing hundreds of square miles to wasteland, and causing over US$1 billion in damage.
- 2005 – A second photo by the Hubble Space Telescope confirmed the discovery of two new moons of Pluto: Nix and Hydra.
- 2006 – The Parliament of Nepal unanimously voted to strip King Gyanendra of many of his powers.
- Born/died this day: John George Children (b. 1777) · Thomas Midgley Jr. (b. 1889) · Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran (d. 1922) · Frank Hsieh (b. 1946) · Mary McLeod Bethune (d. 1955) · Ian Curtis (d. 1980)
Notes
- Pokhran-II (1998) is listed on May 11, so Smiling Buddha should not appear in the same year
- Brown v. Board of Education (1954) appears on May 17, so Plessy v. Ferguson should not appear the same year
- Lassen Peak is listed on May 22, so 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens should not appear the same year
May 18: Flag and Universities Day in Haiti; Day of Revival, Unity, and the Poetry of Magtymguly in Turkmenistan
- 1388 – During the Battle of Buir Lake, General Lan Yu led a Chinese army forward to crush the Mongol hordes of Toghus Temur, the khan of Northern Yuan.
- 1863 – American Civil War: General Ulysses S. Grant led his Army of the Tennessee across the Big Black River in preparation for the Siege of Vicksburg.
- 1936 – In a crime that shocked Japan, Sada Abe (pictured) strangled her lover Kichizo Ishida, cut off his genitals, and carried them around with her for several days until her arrest.
- 1965 – Eli Cohen, a spy who is credited with gathering significant intelligence for Israel in the Six-Day War against Syria, was publicly hanged after having been captured four months earlier.
- 2009 – The Sri Lanka Army killed Velupillai Prabhakaran, the leader and founder of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, to bring an end to the 26-year Sri Lankan Civil War.
Guido Luca Ferrero (b. 1537) · Elijah Craig (d. 1808) · Jean-François Théodore (d. 2015)