1897: Friedrich Franz III, the penultimate Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin.
1898: Sarah Edmonds, Union infantry veteran; spent the war disguised as a man.
1899: Martha Place
She was convicted of murdering her stepdaughter and became the first woman to be executed in the electric chair.
1900: Arthur Seymour Sullivan of Gilbert and Sullivan; he also composed the tune for “Onward Christian Soldiers.”
Also, the Crown Prince of England, Edward, Prince of Wales, later Edward VII, survived an assassination attempt on this day.
1901: Benjamin Harrison, 23rd President of the USA (1889-1893)
1902: Charles Lewis Tiffany, jeweller
1903: Topsy the elephant, electrocuted.
1904: Georges Gilles de la Tourette, neurologist for whom Tourette’s syndrome is named.
1905: Virgil Earp, an OK gunfighter who corralled some outlaws
1906: Susan B. Anthony
1907: Edvard Grieg, Norwegian composer
1908: Nikolai Rimski-Korsakov
1909: Mary MacKillop
Canonized as Australia’s first Saint in 2010
1910: O. Henry
1911: Thursday October Christian II, Pitcairn Islands political leader, grandson of Fletcher Christian.
1912: Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross
(and the name of my first elementary school)
1913: Harriet Tubman
1914: John Muir, American naturalist.
1915: W.G. Grace, magnificently bearded cricket player
1916: Hetty Green, “The Witch of Wall Street”