On this day
Revisit the news, notable people, and historical moments connected to this date.
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150 Kikuyus slain by Mau Mau group in massacre aimed at loyal tribesmen, Uplands area; others in Mau Mau seize arms in raid on Naivasha police station; free 150 suspects; map; 500 held; Gov Baring comments; some in Mau Mau illus
Statement on Repub Chmn Roberts resignation; text
Sen, 74-13
2 NY Central Passenger trains, westbound Buffalo-Chicago and eastbound St Louis-NY Southwestern Ltd, crash into freight train derailed when it struck steel casings dropped by 4th train as it passed through Conneaut; 11-25 killed, about 150 hurt; map; Ohio and Penna towns rush rescue workers; ARC disaster teams on way; survivor and some rescuers int
Dulles rejects Mayer insistence on prior Saar solution
1953Melchior Ndadaye, Burundian banker and politician, 4th President of Burundi (died 1993)[†]
Melchior Ndadaye was a Burundian banker and politician who became the first democratically elected and first Hutu president of Burundi after winning the landmark 1993 election. Though he attempted to smooth the country's bitter ethnic divide, his reforms antagonised soldiers in the Tutsi-dominated army, and he was assassinated amidst a failed military coup in October 1993, after only three months in office. His assassination sparked an array of brutal tit-for-tat massacres between the Tutsi and Hutu ethnic groups, and ultimately led to the decade-long Burundi Civil War.
1953Jim Thorpe, American football player and Olympic gold medalist (born 1887)[†]
James Francis Thorpe was an American athlete who won Olympic gold medals and played professional football, baseball, and basketball. A citizen of the Sac and Fox Nation, he was the first Native American to win a gold medal for the United States in the Olympics. Considered one of the most versatile athletes of modern sports, Thorpe won two Olympic gold medals in the 1912 Summer Olympics.
In 1953, the world population was approximately 2,634,106,235 people[†]