What are the important events that happened on May 17? Here are historical events, facts, and some myths about this day.
May 17: Facts & Myths About This Day
May 17 is the 137th day of the year 2025 in the Gregorian calendar. There are 228 days remaining until the end of this year. The day of the week is Saturday.
Under the Julian calendar, this day is May 4, 2025 – a Saturday. Both day of the week are the same but did you notice the difference with the Gregorian calendar?
When this day started, 29,124,000 minutes 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 ‘hectatriacontaheptagon’ 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 276 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 4,530 days since this fabled cataclysmic event.
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May 17 Historical Events
- 1673 –Louis Joliet and Jacques Marquette begin exploring the Mississippi River.
- 1792 –The New York Stock Exchange is formed.
- 1814 –Occupation of Monaco changes from French to Austrian.
- 1875 –Aristides wins the first Kentucky Derby.
- 1902 –Greek archaeologist Valerios Stais discovers the Antikythera mechanism, an ancient mechanical analog computer.
- 1969 –Venera program: Soviet Venera 6 begins its descent into the atmosphere of Venus, sending back atmospheric data before being crushed by pressure.
- 1974 –Police in Los Angeles, California, raid the Symbionese Liberation Army’s headquarters, killing six members, including Camilla Hall.
- 1983 –The U.S. Department of Energy declassifies documents showing world’s largest mercury pollution event in Oak Ridge, Tennessee (ultimately found to be 4.2 million pounds), in response to the Appalachian Observer’s Freedom of Information Act request.
- 1990 –The General Assembly of the World Health Organization (WHO) eliminates homosexuality from the list of psychiatric diseases.
- 1994 –Malawi holds its first multi-party elections.
Who were born on May 17?
- 1628 –Archduke Ferdinand Charles of Austria, Regent of Tyrol (d. 1662)
- 1844 –Julius Wellhausen, German biblical scholar (d. 1918)
- 1895 –Mary Josephine Ray, Canadian supercentenarian (d. 2010)
- 1897 –Odd Hassel, Norwegian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1981)
- 1947 –Andrew Latimer, English musician (Camel (band))
- 1955 –Bill Paxton, American actor and film director
- 1956 –Sugar Ray Leonard, American boxer
- 1973 –Josh Homme, American musician and songwriter (Queens of the Stone Age)
- 1974 –Wiki González, Venezuelan baseball player
- 1981 –Leon Osman, English footballer
Who died on May 17?
- 1536 –Henry Norris, English courtier and Groom of the Stool (executed) (b. c. 1482)
- 1536 –William Brereton, English courtier and Groom of the Privy Chamber (executed)
- 1575 –Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1504)
- 1626 –Juan Pujol, Catalan composer (b. 1570)
- 1911 –Frederick August Otto Schwarz, American entrepreneur (b. 1836)
- 1936 –Panagis Tsaldaris, twice Greek prime minister (b. 1868)
- 1974 –Ernest Nash, German-born archaeologist (b. 1898)
- 1996 –Kevin Gilbert, American singer, composer and instrumentalist (b. 1966)
- 2006 –Captain Nichola Goddard, Canadian soldier (b. 1980)
- 2010 –Walasse Ting, Chinese/American painter (b. 1929)
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