This day in history. Read about what happened today. A short and interesting account of historical events and facts about this day as well as any other day of the year. Find historical birthdays, deaths, tragedies, war events, disasters and sports events.

This year in history
In the year 1956

	January 3rd	American actor, Mel Gibson, was born in Peekskill, New York. Between 1968 and 1985 he resided in Australia where he established himself as an actor after the Mad Max and later Lethal Weapon series of movies.
	January 21st	American actress, Geena Davis, was born in Massachusetts. She was a very popular actress in the 1980's and early 1990's, in 1995 however she starred in the movie Cutthroat Island, which turned out to be the biggest box office failure in the history of Hollywood, after which she did not recover her previous stardom.
	January 27th	American actress, Mimi Rogers, was born in Florida. Apart from an actress, she is also a competitive poker player.
	March 2nd	Morocco declared its independence from the rule of France.
	March 15th	The Broadway musical My Fair Lady premiered in New York City.
	March 17th	French physicist, Irene Joliot-Curie, died from leukaemia at the age of 58. She was the daughter of the famous scientists Marie and Pierre Curie. She developed leukaemia after an accident in one of her laboratories exposed her to the radioactive element polonium. Like her parents she was also the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, which she shared with her husband, Frederic Joliot
	March 20th	Tunisia gained its independence from France.
	March 23th	Pakistan became the worlds first Islamic republic. In an Islamic state, Islamic laws are technically considered to override laws of the state.
	April 12th	Cuban actor, Andy Garcia, was born in Havana, Cuba. His family fled to the United States after Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba.
	April 18th	American actress, Grace Kelly, married Prince Rainier of Monaco.
	May 1st	The Poliomyelitis vaccine is made available to the public for the first time. While the world health organization had vowed to eliminate poliomyelitis by the year 2000, several thousand cases still surface each year, primarily in Muslim countries, where the vaccine is viewed with some scepticism.
	May 3rd	The first judo World Championships were held. It became a men's Olympic sport in 1964 and for women as well in 1988.
	May 6th	Greek comedian, Lakis Lazopoulos, was born in Larissa, Central Greece.
	June 23th	Gamal Abdel Nasser was elected president of Egypt.
	June 26th	American singer, Chris Isaak, was born in Stockton, California. His best-known songs are Wicked Game and Blue Hotel.
	July 9th	American actor, Tom Hanks, was born in Concord, California.
	August 11th	American artist, Jackson Pollock, died at the age of 44. He died in an automobile accident in East Hampton, NY, at age 44.
	August 16th	Hungarian actor, Bela Lugosi, died at the age of 73. He is best known for his portrayal of Dracula and his subsequent participation in the films of director Ed Wood.
	August 20th	American actress, Joan Allen, was born in Rochelle, Illinois. She is most known for her leading role in the critically acclaimed movie, The Contender.
	September 14th	Greek politician, Konstantinos Alexandrou Karamanlis, was born in Athens, Greece. In 2004 he was head of the New Democracy party that won the general elections in Greece, effectively becoming prime minister of Greece. He is the youngest ever Greek Prime Minister.
	September 16th	Play-Doh was first introduced to the world. It was invented in 1956 by accident as it was meant to be a wallpaper cleaner.
	September 16th	American magician, David Copperfield, was born in New Jersey, USA. He is one of the most famous illusionists in history with such remarkable feats that include making the Statue of Liberty disappear and walking through the Great Wall of China.
	September 16th	American actor, Mickey Rourke, was born Schenectady, New York. A controversial figure of the American movie industry, who during the early 90's gave up acting and associated himself with the motorcycle group Hells Angels. He also made an attempt at professional boxing, although his age prevented him from actually competing for any title against the top boxers of the time. As of 2000 he has returned to Hollywood and gradually is making his way back to mainstream acting.
	October 18th	Czech-born tennis player, Martina Navratilova, was born in Revnice, Czechoslovakia. One of the greatest female tennis players who defected to the United States in 1975 and was the dominant player in the late 1970's and all throughout the 1980's.
	October 29th	Israeli armed forces invaded the Sinai Peninsula and forced the Egyptian army to retreat to the Suez Canal.
	November 4th	Soviet troops invaded Hungary in order to bring an end to the revolution that had started on October the 23rd. Thousands of people were killed several hundred thousands were forced to flee the country.
	December 7th	American basketball player, Larry Bird, was born in Indiana. He is considered as one of greatest basketball players of all time.

Click here to return to the Home page.

  Also Visit :
  Mixer
  Greek Recipes
  Greek Wine
  BiG
  Ecofind
  Start
  Free
  Hello
  Starbuzz
  Art.gr
  Evresi

All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.