622: The traditional starting day of the Islamic Era, when a persecuted Muhammad fled from Mecca to Medina.

1821: Mary Baker Eddy, US religious leader who founded the Christian Science movement, was born.

1918: The last Tsar, Nicholas II, was murdered by the Bolsheviks along with his entire family in the cellar of a house in Ekaterinburg.

1926: The film Son Of The Sheikh, starring heart-throb Rudolph Valentino, opened in America just five weeks before his death, aged 31, from an ulcer.

1935: The world's first parking meters went into service in Oklahoma.

1945: The first atomic bomb was detonated at an airbase in the desert of New Mexico.

1953: Writer Hilaire Belloc died. He had written his own epitaph, which read: "When I am dead, I hope it may be said, His sins were Scarlet but his books were read."

1965: The seven-mile Mont Blanc road tunnel was opened, linking France with Italy.

1970: The first state of emergency in Britain since 1926 was called by Prime Minister Edward Heath as dockers went on strike.

LAST YEAR: Twelve-year-old Shevaun Pennington was reunited with her parents in the UK after running away to meet ex-US Marine Toby Studabaker, whom she had met over the Internet. Studabaker was held in Germany.