What are the important events that happened on October 17? Here are historical events, facts, and some myths about this day.
October 17: Facts & Myths About This Day
October 17 is the 290th day of the year 2025 in the Gregorian calendar. There are 75 days remaining until the end of this year. The day of the week is Friday.
Under the Julian calendar, this day is October 4, 2025 – a Friday. Both day of the week are the same but did you notice the difference with the Gregorian calendar?
When this day started, 489,072 hours 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 ‘dihectaenneacontagon’ day.
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Libra is the zodiac sign of a person born on this day. Opal is the modern birthstone for this month. Jasper is the mystical birthstone from Tibetan origin that dates back over a thousand years.
According to the lunisolar Chinese calendar, there are 123 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 4,683 days since this fabled cataclysmic event.
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October 17 Historical Events
- 1346 –Battle of Neville’s Cross: King David II of Scotland is captured by Edward III of England near Durham, and imprisoned in the Tower of London for eleven years.
- 1448 –Second Battle of Kosovo, where the mainly Hungarian army led by John Hunyadi is defeated by an Ottoman army led by Sultan Murad II.
- 1610 –French king Louis XIII is crowned in Rheims.
- 1800 –Britain takes control of the Dutch colony of Curaçao.
- 1806 –Former leader of the Haitian Revolution, Emperor Jacques I of Haiti is assassinated after an oppressive rule.
- 1931 –Al Capone convicted of income tax evasion.
- 1964 –Prime Minister of Australia Robert Menzies opens the artificial Lake Burley Griffin in the middle of the capital Canberra.
- 1979 –Mother Teresa awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
- 1979 –The Department of Education Organization Act is signed into law creating the US Department of Education and US Department of Health and Human Services.
- 2000 –Train crash at Hatfield, north of London, leading to collapse of Railtrack.
Who were born on October 17?
- 1577 –Cristofano Allori, Italian painter (d. 1621)
- 1946 –Michael Hossack, American musician (The Doobie Brothers)
- 1948 –Robert Jordan, American novelist (d. 2007)
- 1956 –Mae Jemison, American astronaut and physician
- 1966 –Tommy Kendall, American race car driver and television personality
- 1967 –René Dif, Danish musician (Aqua)
- 1968 –Ziggy Marley, Jamaican musician
- 1969 –Ernie Els, South African golfer
- 1969 –Wood Harris, American actor
- 1988 –Christina Crawford, American dancer and professional wrestler
Who died on October 17?
- 1660 –Adrian Scrope, English regicide (b. 1601)
- 1673 –Thomas Clifford, 1st Baron Clifford of Chudleigh, English statesman (b. 1630)
- 1934 –Santiago Ramón y Cajal, Spanish histologist and neuroscientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1852)
- 1956 –Anne Crawford, British film actor (b. 1920)
- 1981 –Albert Cohen, Swiss author (b. 1895)
- 1987 –Abdul Malek Ukil, Bangladeshi politician (b. 1925)
- 1996 –Chris Acland, English drummer (Lush) (b. 1966)
- 1999 –Nicholas Metropolis, Greek-American mathematician, physicist and computer scientist (b. 1915)
- 2001 –Rehavam Zeevi, Israeli politician (b. 1926)
- 2007 –Teresa Brewer, American pop and jazz singer (b. 1931)
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