1386 Lisbon, Politics: Queen Eleanor signed the Treaty of Windsor, and it is remains in force, pledging Portugal and England to mutual aid. It was evoked in World War II to protect Portuguese neutrality while allowing England to use the Azores for strategic purposes and Portugal sold wolfram to Germany. The fine line that Portugal walked during World War II figures in the biography of Salazar reviewed elsewhere on this blog.
1788 London, Politics: The British parliament voted to abolish the slave trade.
1901 Melbourne, Politics. The first sitting of the Australian Parliament convened. On the same date in 1927 it convened for the first time in Canberra. On the same date in 1988 Queen Elizabeth II opened the new Parliament House in Canberra.
1922 Paris, Science: The International Astronomical Union adopted Annie Cannon’s stellar classification system which, slightly amended, remains in use today. It is based on hydrogen absorption as indicated by temperatures and spectral type. She was nearly deaf due to scarlet fever and an ardent suffragette. She worked at the Harvard Observatory after graduating in mathematics from Wellesley College.
1960 Washingotn, D.C, Technology: The Federal Drugs Administration approved the first commercial produced birth control pill which was manufactured by Searle of Chicago. The original research for the Pill had been commissioned by Margaret Sanger and funded by Katherine McCormick (whose fortune also built the hall where I had my 8:00 am poetry class).
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