January 4 » Utah is admitted as the 45th U.S. state.
March 1 » Henri Becquerel discovers radioactive decay.
May 18 » Khodynka Tragedy: A mass panic on Khodynka Field in Moscow during the festivities of the coronation of Russian Tsar Nicholas II results in the deaths of 1,389 people.
June 28 » An explosion in the Newton Coal Company's Twin Shaft Mine in Pittston, Pennsylvania results in a massive cave-in that kills 58 miners.
July 9 » William Jennings Bryan delivers his Cross of Gold speech advocating bimetallism at the 1896 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
August 17 » Bridget Driscoll became the first recorded case of a pedestrian killed in a collision with a motor car in the United Kingdom.
Christening day August 2, 1896
The temperature on August 2, 1896 was about 17.3 °C. The airpressure was 76 cm mercury. The atmospheric humidity was 75%. Source: KNMI
January 28 » Walter Arnold of East Peckham, Kent, becomes the first person to be convicted of speeding. He was fined one shilling, plus costs, for speeding at 8mph (13km/h), thereby exceeding the contemporary speed limit of 2mph (3.2km/h).
February 1 » La bohème premieres in Turin at the Teatro Regio (Turin), conducted by the young Arturo Toscanini.
February 21 » An Englishman raised in Australia, Bob Fitzsimmons, fought an Irishman, Peter Maher, in an American promoted event which technically took place in Mexico, winning the 1896 World Heavyweight Championship in boxing.
December 10 » Alfred Jarry's Ubu Roi premieres in Paris. A riot breaks out at the end of the performance.
December 17 » Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's Schenley Park Casino, which was the first multi-purpose arena with the technology to create an artificial ice surface in North America, is destroyed in a fire.
December 30 » Canadian ice hockey player Ernie McLea scores the first hat-trick in Stanley Cup play, and the Cup-winning goal as the Montreal Victorias defeat the Winnipeg Victorias 6–5.
Day of death October 15, 1952
The temperature on October 15, 1952 was between 2.1 °C and 9.6 °C and averaged 6.4 °C. There was 7.4 mm of rain during 9.1 hours. There was 2.2 hours of sunshine (20%). The partly or heavily clouded was. The average windspeed was 3 Bft (moderate breeze) and was prevailing from the west. Source: KNMI
February 6 » Elizabeth II becomes Queen of the United Kingdom and her other Realms and Territories and Head of the Commonwealth upon the death of her father, George VI. At the exact moment of succession, she was in a tree house at the Treetops Hotel in Kenya.
March 20 » The US Senate ratifies the Security Treaty Between the United States and Japan.
June 17 » Guatemala passes Decree 900, ordering the redistribution of uncultivated land.
July 23 » General Muhammad Naguib leads the Free Officers Movement (formed by Gamal Abdel Nasser, the real power behind the coup) in overthrowing King Farouk of Egypt.
September 8 » The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation makes its first televised broadcast on the second escape of the Boyd Gang.
October 3 » The United Kingdom successfully tests a nuclear weapon to become the world's third nuclear power.
When copying data from this family tree, please include a reference to the origin: Gert Esterhuizen, "Family tree Eric Esterhuizen", database, Genealogy Online (https://www.genealogieonline.nl/stamboom-eric-esterhuizen/I16411.php : accessed January 20, 2026), "Johannes Jacobus PRETORIUS (1896-1952)".
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