Wikipedia defines history as the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. It came from the Greek word ‘historia’ – which means ‘inquiry, knowledge acquired by investigation’.
Did you know? There are many who claim Herodotus, a fifth century BC Greek historian, as the “father of history”.
This website utilizes pages from Wikipedia to extract historical events from 3761 BC up to the present. There are 105,060 records in the database that include events, births and deaths of popular individuals. The present day Gregorian calendar was adopted to show dates of interest.
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What are the important events that happened on May 1? Here are historical events, facts, and some myths about this day.
May 1: Facts & Myths About This Day
May 1 is the 121st day of the year 2025 in the Gregorian calendar. There are 244 days remaining until the end of this year. The day of the week is Thursday.
Under the Julian calendar, this day is April 18, 2025 – a Thursday. Both day of the week are the same but did you notice the difference with the Gregorian calendar?
When this day started, 1,746,057,600 seconds has elapsed since midnight of January 1, 1970 – the Unix epoch.
Strange as it may, if we name this day after a polygon then it will be called ‘hectaicosahenagon’ day.
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Taurus is the zodiac sign of a person born on this day. Emerald is the modern birthstone for this month. Sapphire is the mystical birthstone from Tibetan origin that dates back over a thousand years.
According to the lunisolar Chinese calendar, there are 292 days remaining before the start of the next Chinese New Year.
The ancient Maya civilization believes that the end of the world will happen on December 21, 2012. There are now 4,514 days since this fabled cataclysmic event.
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May 1 Historical Events
- 1753 –Publication of Species Plantarum by Linnaeus, and the formal start date of plant taxonomy adopted by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature.
- 1863 –American Civil War: The Battle of Chancellorsville begins.
- 1886 –Rallies are held throughout the United States demanding the eight-hour work day culminating in the Haymarket Affair.
- 1925 –The first Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer is held at the University of Toronto, Canada.
- 1971 –Amtrak (the National Railroad Passenger Corporation) takes over operation of U.S. passenger rail service.
Who were born on May 1?
- 1901 –Antal Szerb, Hungarian author and historian (d. 1945)
- 1954 –Joel Rosenberg, science fiction author
- 1978 –Sachie Hara, Japanese actress
- 1982 –Darijo Srna, Croatian football player
- 1984 –Patrick Eaves, American ice hockey player
Who died on May 1?
- 1539 –Isabella of Portugal, queen of Spain and empress of Germany (b. 1503)
- 1731 –Johann Ludwig Bach, German composer (b. 1677)
- 1970 –Crown Prince Euimin, Crown Prince of Korea (b. 1897)
- 1993 –Pierre Bérégovoy, French Prime Minister (b. 1925)
- 2006 –Johnny Paris, American saxophonist (Johnny and the Hurricanes) (b. 1940)
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