Born on May 5
May 5 birthdays & history
If you were born on May 5, you share a birthday with Karl Marx, Søren Kierkegaard and Henryk Sienkiewicz. May 5 babies are Taurus, with emerald as their birthstone and the lily of the valley as their birth flower. May 5 is the 126th day of the year in leap years (125th in other years).
Famous people born on May 5
- 1818Karl Marx, German philosopher, sociologist, and journalist
- 1813Søren Kierkegaard, Danish philosopher and author
- 1846Henryk Sienkiewicz, Polish journalist and author, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1988Adele, English singer-songwriter
- 1983Henry Cavill, English actor
- 1921Arthur Leonard Schawlow, American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
- 1747Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor
- 1864Nellie Bly, American journalist and author
- 2003Carlos Alcaraz, Spanish tennis player
- 1943Michael Palin, English actor and screenwriter
What happened on May 5
- 1809Mary Kies becomes the first woman awarded a U.S. patent, for a technique of weaving straw with silk and thread.
- 1821The first edition of The Manchester Guardian, now The Guardian, is published.
- 1835The first railway in continental Europe opens between Brussels and Mechelen.
- 1866Memorial Day first celebrated in United States at Waterloo, New York.
- 1887The Peruvian Academy of Language is founded.
- 1891Carnegie Hall in New York City, built by the philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, officially opened with a concert conducted by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
- 1904Pitching for the Boston Americans, Cy Young threw the first perfect game in modern professional baseball.
- 1912The first issue of the Bolshevik newspaper Pravda is published.
- 1941Emperor Haile Selassie returns to Addis Ababa; the country commemorates the date as Liberation Day or Patriots' Victory Day.
- 1961Project Mercury: American astronaut Alan Shepard made a sub-orbital spaceflight on board Freedom 7, becoming the second person to travel into outer space.
- 1992The Twenty-seventh Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified, 202 years after it was first proposed.
- 2020Philippine broadcast network ABS-CBN was forced to go off-air by the National Telecommunications Commission after Congress failed to renew its franchise granted in 1995.
Also observed on May 5
- Children's Day (Japan, South Korea)
- Cinco de Mayo (Mexico, United States)
- Constitution Day (Kyrgyzstan)
- Europe Day (Council of Europe)
- Feast of al-Khadr or Saint George (Palestinian)
- Indian Arrival Day (Guyana)
Questions, answered
What star sign is May 5?
People born on May 5 are Taurus. Their birthstone is emerald and their birth flower is the lily of the valley.
Which famous people were born on May 5?
Karl Marx (1818), Søren Kierkegaard (1813), Henryk Sienkiewicz (1846), Adele (1988), Henry Cavill (1983), Arthur Leonard Schawlow (1921) were all born on May 5.
What happened on May 5 in history?
Among other things: in 1961, Project Mercury: American astronaut Alan Shepard made a sub-orbital spaceflight on board Freedom 7, becoming the second person to travel into outer space; in 1992, The Twenty-seventh Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified, 202 years after it was first proposed; in 2020, Philippine broadcast network ABS-CBN was forced to go off-air by the National Telecommunications Commission after Congress failed to renew its franchise granted in 1995.
Can I get a newspaper front page from May 5?
Yes. The Birthday Gazette makes a personalised vintage-style front page for any May 5 birth year, with their name in the headline, events, famous birthdays and typical US prices. The preview is free and the print files cost $9.
Events, birthdays and observances are adapted from Wikipedia contributors, “May 5”, English Wikipedia, under CC BY-SA 4.0 (shortened and filtered). Ranking uses Wikidata (CC0). Sources.