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1786 – Wilhelm Carl Grimm, Hanau Germany (d. 1859)
1804 – London’s Drury Lane Theatre burns to the ground, leaving owner Richard Brinsley Sheridan destitute. As the theater was in flames, Sheridan was found having an insouciant drink in a neighboring alehouse, saying that no man could be blamed for having a glass in front of his fire.
1825 – Thomas Bowdler, self-appointed Shakespearean censor, died. He thought of his work as being like that of a painting restorer, putting the original back in its untainted state. He bowdlerized other works as well.
1848 – 29-year-old German philosopher Karl Marx publishes The Communist Manifesto. Marx lived in London and did much of his writing in the reading room of the British Museum.
1876 – Henrik Ibsen’s Peer Gynt premiered in Oslo on this day in 1876.
< --1909 - August Derleth, American writer (d. 1971)
1970 – National Public Radio is founded in the United States.
1988 – The U.S. Supreme Court overturned a $200,000 award to Rev. Jerry Falwell that had been won against “Hustler” magazine. The ruling expanded legal protections for parody and satire.