About May 17
May 17, 2025 is the 137th day of the year 2025 in the Gregorian calendar. There are 228 days remaining until the end of this year. The day of the week is Saturday.
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Taurus is the sun sign of a person born on this day. Emerald is the modern birthstone for this month. Sapphire is the mystical birthstone from Tibetan origin that dates back over a thousand years.
According to the lunisolar Chinese calendar, there are 276 days remaining before the start of the next Chinese New Year.
What Happened On May 17
- 1642 –Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve (1612–1676) founds the Ville Marie de Montréal.
- 1673 –Louis Joliet and Jacques Marquette begin exploring the Mississippi River.
- 1849 –A large fire nearly burns St. Louis, Missouri to the ground.
- 1863 –Rosalía de Castro publishes Cantares Gallegos, the first book in the Galician language.
- 1865 –The International Telegraph Union (later the International Telecommunication Union) is established in Paris.
- 1869 –Imperial Japanese forces defeat the remnants of the Tokugawa shogunate in the Battle of Hakodate to end the Boshin War.
- 1875 –Aristides wins the first Kentucky Derby.
- 1915 –The last British Liberal Party government (led by Herbert Henry Asquith) falls.
- 1939 –The Columbia Lions and the Princeton Tigers play in the United States’ first televised sporting event, a collegiate baseball game in New York City.
- 1940 –World War II: Germany occupies Brussels, Belgium.
- 1943 –The United States Army contracts with the University of Pennsylvania’s Moore School to develop the ENIAC.
- 1969 –Venera program: Soviet Venera 6 begins its descent into the atmosphere of Venus, sending back atmospheric data before being crushed by pressure.
- 1970 –Thor Heyerdahl sets sail from Morocco on the papyrus boat Ra II to sail the Atlantic Ocean.
- 1974 –Dublin and Monaghan bombings: Thirty-three civilians are killed when the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) explodes car bombs in Dublin and Monaghan, Republic of Ireland.
- 1980 –General Chun Doo-hwan of South Korea seizes control of the government and declares martial law in order to suppress student demonstrations.
- 1984 –Prince Charles calls a proposed addition to the National Gallery, London, a “monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much-loved and elegant friend,” sparking controversies on the proper role of the Royal Family and the course of modern architecture.
- 1990 –The General Assembly of the World Health Organization (WHO) eliminates homosexuality from the list of psychiatric diseases.
- 1992 –Three days of popular protests against the government of Prime Minister of Thailand Suchinda Kraprayoon begin in Bangkok, leading to a military crackdown that results in 52 officially confirmed deaths, many disappearances, hundreds of injuries, and over 3,500 arrests.
- 1997 –Troops of Laurent Kabila march into Kinshasa. Zaire is officially renamed Democratic Republic of the Congo.
- 2007 –Trains from North and South Korea cross the 38th Parallel in a test-run agreed by both governments. This is the first time that trains have crossed the Demilitarized Zone since 1953.
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