Saturday 29th of January 1763

Poet Louis Racine dies of unknown causes at the age of 71 in Paris, Île-de-France, France.

Sunday 29th of January 1843

25th President of the United States William McKinley is born in Niles, Ohio, United States.

Wednesday 29th of January 1845

The Evening Mirror first publishes 'The Raven' by 36-year-old Writer of mystery and the macabre Edgar Allan Poe in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States.

He was paid $9 for its publication.

Sunday 29th of January 1860

Writer Anton Pavlovich Chekhov is born in Kupecheskaya Street, Taganrog, Rostov Oblast, Russia.

Thursday 29th of January 1880

Comedian, actor and juggler W. C. Fields is born as William Claude Dukenfield in Darby, Pennsylvania, United States.

Friday 29th of January 1892

Mass murderer Szilveszter Matuska aka The Orient-Express Wrecker is born in Csantavér, Vojvodina, Serbia.

Friday 29th of January 1904

Murderer H. D. Egbert is executed by hanging at the age of 26 in Oregon State Penitentiary, Salem, Oregon, United States.

Egbert was the first man to be hanged at the Oregon State Penitentiary.

Sunday 29th of January 1905

Murderess Winnie Ruth Judd aka The Trunk Murderess is born in Oxford, Indiana, United States.

Sunday 29th of January 1905

Artist Barnett Newman known for Who’s Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue? is born in New York City, New York, United States.

Monday 29th of January 1906

32-year-old Serial killer Jeanne Weber aka l’Ogresse de la Goutte d’Or is brought to trial for the strangling of two children, but found not guilty in Paris, Île-de-France, France.

Tuesday 29th of January 1924

Composer Luigi Nono is born in Zattere al Ponte Lungo, Venezia, Dorsoduro, Veneto, Italy.

Wednesday 29th of January 1930

33-year-old Doctor and serial killer Marcel André Henri Félix Petiot aka The Triangular Chamber of Death Murderer is sentenced to 3 months imprisonment and fined 200,- Francs for attempted fraud in Tribunal de Première Instance, 1 Rue du Palais de Justice, Sens, Yonne, France.

Sunday 29th of January 1939

Feminist theorist and writer Germaine Greer known for The Female Eunuch is born in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Monday 29th of January 1940

190 die in train derailment in Ajikawaguchi station, Osaka, Kinki, Japan.

Wednesday 29th of January 1941

General and dictator Ioannis Metaxas dies of a phlegmon of the pharynx at the age of 70 in Ithakē, Ionian Islands, Greece.

Thursday 29th of January 1942

Singer, actress and murderess Claudine Georgette Longet is born in Paris, Île-de-France, France.

Monday 29th of January 1945

Actor Tom Thomas William Selleck known from Magnum P. I. is born in Detroit, Michigan, United States.

Tuesday 29th of January 1952

Musician Tommy Ramone is born as Erdélyi Tamás in Budapest, Közép-Magyarország, Hungary.

Friday 29th of January 1954

Talk show host Oprah Gail Winfrey is born in Kosciusko, Mississippi, United States.

Winfrey was born to an unmarried teenage mother who said that her conception was due to a single sexual encounter.

Wednesday 29th of January 1958

Edith Middleton dies of Spontaneous Human Combustion in London, Pimlico, Greater London, United Kingdom.

Wednesday 29th of January 1958

35-year-old Merle Collison is shot dead by spree killer Charles Starkweather aka Little Red in Douglas, Wyoming, United States.

Starkweather later accused his girlfriend Caril Fugate of performing a coup-de-grace after his shotgun jammed. They were arrested when their stolen car stalled and Starkweather got hit by shattered glass from the windshield as pursuing officers chased him. Converse County Sheriff Earl Heflin said "He thought he was bleeding to death. That's why he stopped. That's the kind of yellow son of a bitch he is."

Thursday 29th of January 1959

34-year-old Patricia Vinico Berkman aka Pnina is stabbed to death by serial killer Eric Edgar Cooke aka The Australian Nightmare in Perth, Western Australia, Australia.

Friday 29th of January 1971

A 20-year-old unidentified woman is assaulted and robbed by 20-year-old Serial killer Gustaaf Van Eyken aka De Vampier van Muizen in Raghenotunnel, Mechelen, Antwerpen, Belgium.

Monday 29th of January 1973

35-year-old Geologist and art vandal László Tóth is committed to a psychiatric hospital in Rome, Lazio, Italy.

Tuesday 29th of January 1974

Unidentified serial killer the Zodiac Killer sends an ‘Exorcist’-review to the San Francisco Chronicle Newspaper in San Francisco, California, United States.

It was the Zodiac's last authenticated piece of correspondence.

Wednesday 29th of January 1975

45-year-old George Frias is stabbed to death by serial killer Vaughn Greenwood aka The Skid Row Slasher in Los Angeles, California, United States.

Monday 29th of January 1979

17-year-old Murderess Brenda Spencer known for Not Liking Mondays opens fire on a school across he street in Grover Cleveland Elementary School, 6365 Lake Atlin Avenue, San Diego, San Carlos, California, United States.

Spencer killed 53-year-old principal Burton Wragg and 56-year-old custodian Mike Suchar and wounded 9 children. After firing thirty rounds of ammunition, Spencer barricaded herself inside her home for several hours before surrendering. During the siege she had a telephone conversation with a journalist who reported that she had said "I don't like Mondays".

Tuesday 29th of January 1980

Comedian and actor Jimmy James Francis Durante aka The Great Schnozzola dies of pneumonia at the age of 87 in Santa Monica, California, United States.

Tuesday 29th of January 1985

Kidnapper Dieter Engelbrecht commits suicide by hanging in his cell at the age of 46 in Düsseldorf, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany.

Engelbrecht and his 29-year-old wife Helma were sentenced to 10 years imprisonment the day before for torturing and sexually abusing 16-year-old Silvia Hantke in their basement from 10 February 1982 until 23 May 1983.

Thursday 29th of January 1987

32-year-old Serial killer Philippe Pacque aka L'Épervier d'Amiens is sentenced to life imprisonment for one murder and several attacks in La Cour d'Assises de la Somme, 14 Rue Robert de Luzarches, Amiens, Nord-Pas-de-Calais, France.

Friday 29th of January 1988

25-year-old Serial killer Kenneth Erskine aka The Stockwell Strangler is sentenced to life imprisonment with a recommended minimum term of 40 years in Old Bailey Criminal Court, London, Greater London, United Kingdom.

Erskine has since been found suffering chronic schizophrenia and antisocial personality disorder and now held at the maximum security Broadmoor Hospital.

Monday 29th of January 2001

Murderer Alexander Caruthers aka Gus is executed by lethal injection at the age of 53 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States.

Tuesday 29th of January 2002

Multiple murderer Stephen Wayne Anderson is executed by lethal injection at the age of 49 in San Quentin State Prison, San Quentin, California, United States.

Anderson's last meal request was for two grilled cheese sandwiches, one pint of cottage cheese, a hominy/corn mixture, one slice of peach pie, one pint of chocolate chip ice cream, and radishes.

Wednesday 29th of January 2003

Theoretical chemist Ilya Romanovich Prigogine dies of unknown causes at the age of 86 in Brussel, Brabant, Belgium.

Wednesday 29th of January 2003

Double murderer Richard Eugene Dinkins is executed by lethal injection at the age of 41 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States.

Dinkins was sentenced to death for the murders of 46-year-old Katherine Thompson and 32-year-old Shelly Cutler in Thompson's Massage Therapy Clinic in Beaumont, Texas on 12 September 1990. His last meal request was for liver and onions, two double meat hamburgers with bacon and mayonnaise, two orders of French fries, vanilla ice cream, two Dr. Peppers, salad with ranch dressing and M&M's.

Thursday 29th of January 2004

A late night dinner of green curry chicken at Kansama Restaurant on Serangoon Road in Singapore, Singapore.

Saturday 29th of January 2005

Guitarist Eric Ronald Griffiths known from The Quarrymen dies of pancreatic cancer at the age of 65 in Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom.

Saturday 29th of January 2005

Mass murderess Priscilla Joyce Ford dies of emphysema at the age of 76 in Southern Nevada Women's Correctional Facility, Las Vegas, Nevada, United States.

Ford was the only women on Nevada's Death Row, sentenced to death for killing six people, and injuring 23 more, driving down a Reno sidewalk on Thanksgiving Day in 1980.

Sunday 29th of January 2006

Video artist Nam June Paik dies of complications from a stroke at the age of 74 in Miami, Florida, United States.

In 1996 Paik had a stroke which paralyzed his left side.

Wednesday 29th of January 2020

Double murderer Donnie Cleveland Lance is executed by lethal injection at the age of 67 in Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison, Highway 36, Jackson, Georgia, United States.