This is a list of selected October 16 anniversaries that appear in the "On this day" section of the Main Page. To suggest a new item, in most cases, you can be bold and edit this page. Please read the selected anniversaries guidelines before making your edit. However, if your addition might be controversial or on a day that is or will soon be on the Main Page, please post your suggestion on the talk page instead.
Please note that the events listed on the Main Page are chosen based more on relative article quality and to maintain a mix of topics, not based solely on how important or significant their subjects are. Only four to five events are posted at a time and thus not everything that is "most important and significant" can be listed. In addition, an event is generally not posted this year if it is also the subject of the scheduled featured article or picture of the day.
To report an error when this appears on the Main Page, see Main Page errors. Please remember that this list defers to the supporting articles, so it is best to achieve consensus and make any necessary changes there first.
Images
Use only ONE image at a time
- Hans FrankHans Frank
Marie Antoinette, Queen of France
Bibliotheca Alexandrina
William Rowan Hamilton
Broom Bridge
Walt Disney
Ineligible
| Blurb | Reason |
|---|---|
| World Food Day | outdated |
| 1813 – The Sixth Coalition attacked Napoleon and the First French Empire in the Battle of Leipzig, the largest conflict in the Napoleonic Wars with over 500,000 troops involved. | needs more footnotes |
| 1843 – William Rowan Hamilton first wrote down the fundamental formula for quaternions, carving the equation into the side of Broom Bridge in Cabra, Dublin, Ireland. | needs more footnotes |
| 1972 – Emmerdale Farm, the United Kingdom's second-oldest soap opera, was first broadcast in the daytime on ITV. | original research |
| 1996 – At least 83 people were killed and more than 140 injured when an excessive number of fans attempted to squeeze into Guatemala City's Estadio Mateo Flores to see the 1998 FIFA World Cup qualification match between Guatemala and Costa Rica. | refimprove |
| 2002 – Bibliotheca Alexandrina in Alexandria, Egypt, a commemoration of the Library of Alexandria that was lost in antiquity, was officially inaugurated. | Tagged because of missing content |
Eligible
- 1841 – The Church of Scotland established Queen's College in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
- 1846 – American dentist William T. G. Morton made a widely publicized demonstration of ether as a general anaesthetic.
- 1859 – Hoping to start an armed slave revolt, American abolitionist John Brown led a raid on the Harpers Ferry Armory in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia.
- 1869 – Workers in Cardiff, New York, uncovered a petrified man, which was later revealed to be a hoax.
- 1875 – Brigham Young University, the United States' largest religious university, was founded in Provo, Utah.
- 1923 – Roy and Walt Disney founded the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio in Hollywood that eventually grew to become one of the largest media and entertainment corporations in the world.
- 1940 – World War II: Nazi Governor-General Hans Frank established the Warsaw Ghetto, the largest Jewish ghetto in occupied Poland.
- 1951 – The first Prime Minister of Pakistan, Liaquat Ali Khan, was assassinated in Rawalpindi.
- 1968 – To protest racism in the United States, African American athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos performed the Black Power salute during a medal ceremony at the Mexico City Summer Olympics.
- 1978 – Karol Józef Wojtyła, a cardinal from Kraków, Poland, became Pope John Paul II, the first non-Italian pope since the 16th century and the first ever from a Slavic country.
- 1984 – The Bill debuted on ITV, eventually becoming the longest-running police procedural in British television history.
- 1995 – Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam convened the Million Man March in Washington, D.C., in an effort to unite in self-help and self-defense against economic and social ills plaguing the African American community.
- 456 – Magister militum Ricimer defeated Emperor Avitus at Piacenza and became master of the Western Roman Empire.
- 1793 – Marie Antoinette, queen consort of Louis XVI, was guillotined at the Place de la Révolution in Paris at the height of the French Revolution.
- 1834 – Most of the Palace of Westminster in London was destroyed in a fire.
- 1916 – Margaret Sanger (pictured) established the United States' first family planning clinic in Brooklyn, New York.
- 1934 – Long March: Surrounded by Kuomintang troops, Zhou Enlai, Bo Gu, and Otto Braun led a breakout of 130,000 Red Army soldiers and civilians from Jiangxi.
- 1986 – Italian mountaineer Reinhold Messner made his ascent of Lhotse, making him the first person to climb all fourteen "eight-thousanders".