January 8 » Herman Hollerith is issued US patent #395,791 for the 'Art of Applying Statistics' — his punched card calculator.
February 11 » Meiji Constitution of Japan is adopted.
June 3 » The first long-distance electric power transmission line in the United States is completed, running 14 miles (23km) between a generator at Willamette Falls and downtown Portland, Oregon.
November 2 » North Dakota and South Dakota are admitted as the 39th and 40th U.S. states.
November 14 » Pioneering female journalist Nellie Bly (aka Elizabeth Cochrane) begins a successful attempt to travel around the world in less than 80 days. She completes the trip in 72 days.
November 15 » Brazil is declared a republic by Marshal Deodoro da Fonseca as Emperor Pedro II is deposed in a military coup.
Day of death October 15, 1953
The temperature on October 15, 1953 was between 11.7 °C and 14.5 °C and averaged 13.0 °C. There was 0.1 mm of rain. The almost completely overcast was. The average windspeed was 2 Bft (weak wind) and was prevailing from the north. Source: KNMI
January 19 » Almost 72 percent of all television sets in the United States are tuned into I Love Lucy to watch Lucy give birth.
January 31 » A North Sea flood causes over 1,800 deaths in the Netherlands and over 300 in the United Kingdom.
March 18 » An earthquake hits western Turkey, killing 265 people.
May 29 » Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay become the first people to reach the summit of Mount Everest, on Tenzing Norgay's (adopted) 39th birthday.
June 8 » An F5 tornado hits Beecher, Michigan, killing 116, injuring 844, and destroying 340 homes.
June 9 » The Flint–Worcester tornado outbreak sequence kills 94 people in Massachusetts.
When copying data from this family tree, please include a reference to the origin: Hendrik Dreyer, "Dreyer Tree", database, Genealogy Online (https://www.genealogieonline.nl/dreyer-tree/I8393.php : accessed January 20, 2026), "Jacobus Johannes van Niekerk (1889-1953)".
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