By the 1970s, she was internationally famed as a humanitarian and advocate for the poor and helpless, due in part to a documentary and book Something Beautiful for God by Malcolm Muggeridge. She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 and India’s highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, in 1980 for her humanitarian work. Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity continued to expand, and at the time of her death it was operating 610 missions in 123 countries, including hospices and homes for people with HIV/AIDS, leprosy and tuberculosis, soup kitchens, children’s and family counselling programs, orphanages, and schools. [link]

The 1960 U-2 incident occurred during the Cold War on May 1, 1960, during the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower and during the leadership of Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, when an American U-2 spy plane was shot down over Soviet Union airspace. The United States government at first denied the plane’s purpose and mission, but then was forced to admit its role as a covert surveillance aircraft when the Soviet government produced its remains (largely intact) and surviving pilot, Francis Gary Powers. Coming just over two weeks before the scheduled opening of an East–West summit in Paris, the incident was a great embarrassment to the United States and prompted a marked deterioration in its relations with the Soviet Union. [link]

• The following list provides important anniversaries that could be commemorated in 2010.
• It can be used by teachers preparing assemblies, extension tasks and one-off lessons.
• I am limiting the list to multiples of 50 years (1960 (50 years ago today), 1910 (100 years ago today), 1860 (150 years ago today) etc).
• This is more meaningful than the “on this day in history” format (there is a 1/365 chance that any event from the entire history of civilisation has a 1/365 chance it happened “today”!)
• If you’d like to add to this list, please contact me with your suggestion or send a tweet using the hashtag #history2010.

2nd September 1910 (100 years ago today) Rousseau died
5th September 1960 (50 years ago today) Summer Olympics: Cassius Clay wins the gold medal in boxing.
7th September 1910 (100 years ago today) Holman Hunt died
13th September 1860 (150 years ago today) General “Blackjack” Pershing was born
21st September 1860 (150 years ago today) Schopenhauer died
26th September 1960 (50 years ago today) Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy, participate in the first televised presidential debate.
27th September 1960 (50 years ago today) Sylvia Pankhurst died
29th September 1810 (200 years ago today) Elizabeth Gaskell was born

The Florence Nightingale museum is a good place to start learning about the famous nurse. You may also like to listen to this rare recording of Nightingale speaking in 1890.

Annie Oakley (August 13, 1860 – November 3, 1926), born Phoebe Ann Mosey, was an American sharpshooter and exhibition shooter. Oakley’s amazing talent and timely rise to fame led to a starring role in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show, which propelled her to become the first American female superstar…[wikipedia article]

Camillo Paolo Filippo Giulio Benso, Count of Cavour, of Isolabella and of Leri (August 10, 1810 – June 6, 1861) was a leading figure in the movement toward Italian unification. He was the founder of the original Italian Liberal Party and Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia, a position he maintained (except for a six-month resignation) throughout the Second Italian War of Independence and Garibaldi’s campaigns to unite Italy. Cavour died only three months after the declaration of a united Kingdom of Italy, and thus did not live to see Venetia or Rome included in the kingdom…[full wikipedia article]