March 22 » Before the Société pour L'Encouragement à l'Industrie, brothers Auguste and Louis Lumière demonstrate movie film technology publicly for the first time.
May 25 » Playwright, poet and novelist Oscar Wilde is convicted of "committing acts of gross indecency with other male persons" and sentenced to serve two years in prison.
May 25 » The Republic of Formosa is formed, with Tang Jingsong as its president.
June 27 » The inaugural run of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad's Royal Blue from Washington, D.C., to New York City, the first U.S. passenger train to use electric locomotives.
June 28 » The United States Court of Private Land Claims rules James Reavis’s claim to Barony of Arizona is "wholly fictitious and fraudulent."
August 31 » German Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin patents his navigable balloon.
Day of death April 8, 1959
The temperature on April 8, 1959 was between 6.1 °C and 12.2 °C and averaged 8.7 °C. There was 3.3 mm of rain during 2.6 hours. There was 5.8 hours of sunshine (43%). The partly clouded was. The average windspeed was 5 Bft (very strong wind) and was prevailing from the southwest. Source: KNMI
May 30 » The Auckland Harbour Bridge, crossing the Waitematā Harbour in Auckland, New Zealand, is officially opened by Governor-General Charles Lyttelton, 10th Viscount Cobham.
July 1 » Specific values for the international yard, avoirdupois pound and derived units (e.g. inch, mile and ounce) are adopted after agreement between the US, the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth countries.
July 21 » NSSavannah, the first nuclear-powered cargo-passenger ship, is launched as a showcase for Dwight D. Eisenhower's "Atoms for Peace" initiative.
August 14 » Founding and first official meeting of the American Football League.
September 18 » Vanguard 3 is launched into Earth orbit.
September 27 » Typhoon Vera kills nearly 5,000 people in Japan.
When copying data from this family tree, please include a reference to the origin: Hilbert Botter, "Family tree Botter", database, Genealogy Online (https://www.genealogieonline.nl/stamboom-botter/I650.php : accessed January 9, 2026), "Berend Durks Lawant (1895-1959)".
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