Today in History
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1998 20 people die in the Cavalese cable car disaster
A low-flying US military plane’s wings severed the aerial tramway’s cables, causing the cabin to plummet 80 meters.
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1989 Paraguay’s dictator, Alfredo Stroessner, is overthrown
Stroessner had come to power in 1954 with a military coup.
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1972 The deadliest snowstorm in history kills 4000
The Iran Blizzard lasted a week and killed off entire villages.
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1969 Yasser Arafat becomes leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)
Even after his death in 2011, Arafat remained a divisive figure, with many Arabs hailing him as a freedom fighter and many Israelis condemning him as a terrorist.
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1966 Luna 9 touches down on the Moon
The unmanned Soviet spacecraft made the first soft landing there.
Births On This Day, February 3
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1935 Johnny “Guitar” Watson
American singer, guitarist
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1927 Kenneth Anger
American actor, director, author
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1874 Gertrude Stein
American poet, art collector
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1830 Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury
English politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
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1809 Felix Mendelssohn
German pianist, composer, conductor
Deaths On This Day, February 3
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1985 Frank Oppenheimer
American physicist
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1961 Anna May Wong
American actress
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1924 Woodrow Wilson
American politician, 28th President of the United States, Nobel Prize laureate
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1820 Gia Long
Vietnamese Emperor
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1468 Johannes Gutenberg
German publisher, invented the Printing press
