Monday 15th of May 1567

Composer Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi is born in Cremona, Lombardia, Italy.

Tuesday 15th of May 1827

Beta Schmidt is poisoned with arsenic by serial poisoner Gesche Gottfried aka Der Engel von Bremen in Bremen, Freie Hansestadt Bremen, Germany.

Sunday 15th of May 1859

Magnetism, piezoelectricity and radioactivity pioneer Pierre Curie is born in Paris, Île-de-France, France.

Monday 15th of May 1905

Actor Joseph Cheshire Cotten is born in Petersburg, Virginia, United States.

Monday 15th of May 1905

Amateur filmmaker Abraham Zapruder known for his JFK Assassination Movie is born in Kovel, Volyn Oblast, Russia.

Saturday 15th of May 1909

Actor James Neville Mason is born in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, United Kingdom.

Monday 15th of May 1911

Physician at the Ravensbrück concentration camp Herta Oberheuser is born in Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany.

Tuesday 15th of May 1923

Photographer Richard Avedon is born in New York City, New York, United States.

Wednesday 15th of May 1929

123 die in hospital fire in Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio, United States.

Thursday 15th of May 1930

Drip artist Jasper Johns is born in Augusta, Georgia, United States.

Wednesday 15th of May 1935

Abstract art pioneer Kazimir Severinovich Malevich dies of cancer at the age of 56 in Leningrad, Northwestern Federal District, Russia.

On his deathbed Malevich was exhibited with the black square above him, and mourners at his funeral rally were permitted to wave a banner bearing a black square.

Friday 15th of May 1936

Murderer Jack Sullivan is executed by the gas chamber at the age of 23 in Arizona State Prison Complex, 1305 E Butte Avenue, Florence, Arizona, United States.

Asked if he had a last request before he was executed Sullivan replied “You might get me a gas mask.”

Saturday 15th of May 1937

Singer and actor Trini Lopez is born as Trinidad López III in Dallas, Texas, United States.

Saturday 15th of May 1948

Musician Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno is born in Woodbridge, Suffolk, United Kingdom.

Tuesday 15th of May 1951

Victim of Ian Brady and Myra Hindley aka The Moors Murderers John Kilbride is born in Ashton-under-Lyne, Lancashire, United Kingdom.

Saturday 15th of May 1954

Murderess Suzanne Margaret 'Sue' Basso is born as Suzanne Burns in Schenectady, New York, United States.

Tuesday 15th of May 1956

Artist and occultist Austin Osman Spare dies of anaemia, bronchitis, high blood pressure and gall stones at the age of 70 in South Western Hospital, London, Lambeth, Greater London, United Kingdom.

Monday 15th of May 1961

Victim of Joachim Kroll aka The Ruhr Hunter Ilona Harke is born in Wuppertal, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany.

Monday 15th of May 1967

Artist Edward Hopper dies of unknown causes at the age of 85 in Edward Hopper Studio, 3 Washington Square North, New York, Manhattan, New York, United States.

Monday 15th of May 1972

Gerta Buddenberg, wife of 60-year-old federal judge Wolfgang Buddenberg is injured in a car bomb explosion by die Rote Armee Fraktion aka Baader-Meinhof Gruppe in Klosestraße, Karlsruhe, Baden-Württemberg, Germany.

The Manfred Grashof Commando claims responsability for the attack.

Monday 15th of May 1972

53-year-old George Corley Wallace aka the most influential loser in 20th-century U.S. politics is shot five times by would-be assassin Arthur Bremer in Laurel Shopping Center, Laurel, Maryland, United States.

The assassination attempt left Wallace paralyzed from the waist down. Bremer's actions inspired the screenplay for the 1976 movie Taxi Driver, with which John Hinckley became obsessed before he attempted to assassinate Ronald Reagan in 1981.

Monday 15th of May 1972

Student and hero of the Lithuanian resistance Romas Kalanta aka The Young Man with the Mesmerizing Eyes commits suicide by self-immolation at the age of 19 in Laisvės Alėja, Kaunas, Trakai Voivodeship, Lithuania.

Kalanta's suicide was a protest against the occupation of Lithuania by the USSR.

Saturday 15th of May 1976

42-year-old Journalist and leader of the Rote Armee Fraktion Ulrike Marie Meinhof is buried in Dreifaltigkeitskirchhof III, Eisenacher Straße 61, Berlin, Mariendorf, Berlin, Germany.

Der Kampf geht weiter! Meinhof's brain, removed during the autopsy, was buried with her on 22 December 2002.

Thursday 15th of May 1980

25-year-old Jean Reyner is strangled and mutilated by serial killer Richard Cottingham aka The Torso Killer in Hotel Seville Room #1139, 22 East 29th Street, New York, New York, United States.

Reyner's breasts were severed and her body set afire.

Friday 15th of May 1981

22-year-old Performance artist Danny Devos aka DDV performs 'Death-Threat' in 'Echelle 1/1981' in Brussel, Brabant, Belgium.

In a room closed for the audience I made an installation with vacuum cleaners and noise music.

Friday 15th of May 1981

41-year-old Serial killer Clifford Robert Olson aka The Vancouver Butcher marries Joan Hale, his long-time girlfriend and mother of his one-month-old son Stephen in People’s Full Gospel Chapel, 14455 104 Ave, Surrey, British Columbia, Canada.

Friday 15th of May 1981

10-year-old Ulrike Hellmann is attacked by serial killer Bernd Bopp aka Der Hammermörder in Mainz, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany.

Hellmann survived and remembered the licence plate number of her attacker's car. Later that day with the car registration number in their hands, Mainz police searched the area for the red Renault car driven by Bernd Bopp. Finding the car parked twenty miles away in Alzey, Bopp was lying in the sunshine near the car reading a book as police approached and arrested him.

Wednesday 15th of May 1985

43-year-old Mathematician and serial bomber Theodore John 'Ted' Kaczynski aka The Unabomber places Bomb #8, a spiral binder booby trap in Cory Hall Room #264, Berkeley, California, United States.

Air Force captain John Hauser is severely injured.

Wednesday 15th of May 1985

Murderer Jesse De La Rosa is executed by lethal injection at the age of 25 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States.

De La Rosa's last meal request was for Spanish rice, refried beans, flour tortillas, T-bone steak, tea, chocolate cake, and jalapeno peppers.

Thursday 15th of May 1986

Double murderer Jay Kelly Pinkerton is executed by lethal injection at the age of 24 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States.

Sunday 15th of May 1988

9-year-old Aleksey Voronko is stabbed to death by serial killer Andrei Chikatilo aka The Rostov Ripper in Ilovaisk, Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine.

Chikatilo encountered Voronko while on a business trip to Artyomovsk.

Saturday 15th of May 1993

Mass murderer Érick Schmitt aka Human Bomb is shot dead by a special 'Recherche, Assistance, Intervention, Dissuasion' police commando at the age of 42 in .

Schmitt had been keeping a class of young children hostage for 46 hours, dynamite wired around his body.

Monday 15th of May 1995

24-year-old Renee Blackwell is asphyxiated by serial killer Hubert Geralds aka The Englewood Rapist in 6336 S. Ashland Avenue, Chicago, Englewood, Illinois, United States.

Geralds tossed Blackwell's body in a dumpster behind a McDonald's.

Thursday 15th of May 2003

Murderer Bruce Charles Jacobs is executed by lethal injection at the age of 57 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States.

His last meal request was for a whole fried chicken, 12 buttered bread slices, fried onion rings, fried okra, a six-pack of RC Cola, two tomatoes and a large bag of Fritos corn chips. For his last words Jacobs recited the 23rd Psalm. He spent the last six months memorizing it.

Thursday 15th of May 2003

Visuals during a concert by Dez Mona in Borgerhout, Antwerpen, Belgium.

Monday 15th of May 2017

Serial killer Ian Brady aka The Moors Murderers (with Myra Hindley) dies of lung cancer at the age of 79 in Ashworth Hospital, Parkbourn, Liverpool, Maghull, Merseyside, United Kingdom.

Brady was receiving 'end of life treatment' at Ashworth after 30 years in their care. In a statement Ashworth Hospital said: “We can confirm a 79 year old patient in long term care has died after becoming physically unwell.”