September 10 birthdays & history

Famous people born on September 10

• 1964Jack Ma, Chinese businessman, co-founder of Alibaba Group [citation needed]
• 1892Arthur Compton, American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
• 1960Colin Firth, English actor and producer
• 1487Pope Julius III, Head of the Catholic Church from 1550 to 1555
• 1933Karl Lagerfeld, German-French fashion designer and photographer[citation needed]
• 1839Charles Sanders Peirce, American mathematician, statistician, and philosopher
• 1897Georges Bataille, French philosopher, novelist, and poet
• 1659Henry Purcell, English organist and composer
• 1937Jared Diamond, American biologist, geographer, and author
• 1941Stephen Jay Gould, American paleontologist, biologist, and author

What happened on September 10

• 1724Johann Sebastian Bach led the first performance of Jesu, der du meine Seele, BWV 78, a chorale cantata based on a passion hymn by Johann Rist.
• 1845John Doubleday completed a "masterly" restoration of the Portland Vase, which had been smashed into hundreds of pieces seven months prior.
• 1846Elias Howe is granted a patent for the sewing machine.
• 1858George Mary Searle discovered the asteroid 55 Pandora from the Dudley Observatory near Albany, New York; it was his only asteroid discovery.
• 1932The New York City Subway's third competing subway system, the municipally owned IND, is opened.
• 1936The first world individual Speedway World Championship was held at London's Wembley Stadium.
• 1960Running barefoot in the marathon event at the Rome Olympics, Abebe Bikila became the first athlete from sub-Saharan Africa to win an Olympic gold medal.
• 1960At the Summer Olympics in Rome, Abebe Bikila becomes the first sub-Saharan African to win a gold medal, winning the marathon in bare feet.
• 1967The people of Gibraltar vote to remain a British dependency rather than becoming part of Spain.
• 1974After centuries of Portuguese rule, the country of Guinea-Bissau was formally recognized as independent.
• 1990Pope John Paul II consecrated the Basilica of Our Lady of Peace, one of the largest churches in the world, in Yamoussoukro, Ivory Coast.
• 2002Switzerland, traditionally a neutral country, becomes a full member of the United Nations.

Also observed on September 10

• Amerindian Heritage Day (Guyana)
• Children's Day (Honduras)
• Gibraltar National Day
• Saint George's Caye Day (Belize)
• Teachers' Day (China)