Oct 6 1014

Czar Samuil of Bulgaria dies after an army of 15,000 of his men is returned, blinded by his enemy Emperor Basil of the Byzantine Empire. One out of every hundred of his men was permitted to keep one eye, such that they were able to return home. For this victory Basil earned the title Bulgaroctonus, slayer of Bulgars.

Oct 6 1536

The man to translate the Holy Bible into English, William Tyndale, is strangled and burnt at the stake in Brussels, Belgium. Translations of the Bible into vernacular had been long suppressed, but oddly most of the work in the KJV's New Testament is Tyndale's.

Oct 6 1815

Mayfield, New York resident Barent Becker is hanged for serving his wife Ann a dish of stewed tomatoes and arsenic.

Oct 6 1976

During a televised debate, President and candidate Gerald Ford asserts that there is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe. Ford loses the election. [He and Dan Quayle should do lunch.]

Oct 6 1977

Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono, Jr., Los Angeles' infamous "Hillside Stranglers," rape and murder their first victim, 21-year-old waitress Elissa Kastin. They dump her naked corpse on Chevy Chase Drive.

Oct 6 1980

John Lydon, of band PiL and formerly the Sex Pistols, arrested for disorderly conduct in a Dublin bar.

Oct 6 1981

During a commemoration of the Yom Kippur War, armed gunmen leap from a truck and begin shooting into the reviewing stand at Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. Along with Sadat, the assassins kill eight others.

Oct 6 1997

Six boys watch as a female classmate is held down and raped in a locker room at Paramount High School in Boligee, Alabama. In all, about twelve boys are present at the incident; only six are ever charged.