Important Events From This day in History – 06 March

Today in History

• 1987 193 people die when a ferry capsizes in the North Sea

  The Herald of Free Enterprise sank just minutes after leaving Zeebrugge, Belgium.

• 1967 Stalin’s daughter defects to the West

  Svetlana Alliluyeva, the Soviet dictator’s daughter, sparked international outrage when she approached the US embassy in New Delhi and later became a naturalized US citizen.

• 1957 Ghana becomes the first African country to gain independence from colonial rule

  Ghana was formed from the former British colonies of the Gold Coast and Togoland. The country’s first leader was Kwame Nkrumah.

• 1899 The painkiller Asprin is registered as a trademark

  Felix Hoffmann, a German chemist, discovered acetylsalicylic acid in 1897. Bayer now sells the medication, which is on the World Health Organization’s list of essential medicines.

• 1869 The first periodic table of chemical elements is presented

  Dmitri Mendeleev presented the system to the Russian Chemical Society on that day.