Skip to main content

The Really Small Bad Day Almanac: January 4

871: In England, Aethelred of Wessex loses the Battle of Reading to the Danes.
1903: Topsy, an Asian circus elephant, dies by electrocution and strangling.  The owners of the Luna Park amusement park at Coney Island in Brooklyn, New York, put her down after several violent incidents. Her death by electrocution was filmed by Edison Studios for the movie Electrocuting an Elephant as a demonstration of alternating current.
1960: French author Albert Camus dies.
1965: English poet T.S. Eliot dies.
1975: Italian author Carlo Levi dies.
1987: Sixteen people die when an Amtrak passenger train and Conrail engines collide in Chase, Maryland.

Comments