Today in History: Cemal Gürsel Elected President

October 26 is the 299th (300th in leap years) day of the year according to the Gregorian calendar. The number of days left until the end of the year is 66.

Railways

• October 26, 1936 Eskiköy-Çetinkaya line was opened. The first coal train arrived in Ankara.
• 26 October 1953 Gaziantep-Narlı Railway line was opened.

Events 

• 740 – Earthquake in Constantinople causing many deaths and injuries.
• 1461 - The Empire of Trebizond surrenders to the Ottoman forces under the command of Mehmet the Conqueror.
• 1825 - The Erie Canal, opened in New York's upper region, connects the Hudson River and Lake Erie.
• 1863 – The International Red Cross organization was founded in Genoa.
• 1918 – Atatürk stopped the attack of the invaders in the north of Aleppo.
• 1922 – Just before the Lausanne Conference, Yusuf Kemal Tengirşenk, who left the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was replaced by İsmet İnönü.
• 1923 – Turkey national football team drew 2-2 with Romania in its first match.
• 1924 – Kazım Karabekir Pasha resigned from the First Army Inspectorate; He stated that he will now work as a member of parliament.
• 1933 – General Amnesty Law was enacted on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Republic.
• 1933 – Women in Turkey were given the right to be elected to village elders' councils and mukhtars.
• 1936 – 16-year-old painter Turgut Cansever opened his first painting exhibition.
• 1936 – The first generator of the Hoover Dam was commissioned.
• 1947 – The British military occupation of Iraq ends.
• 1951 – Winston Churchill, 77, becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom again.
• 1958 - Pan American Airlines made the first commercial flight of the Boeing 707 from New York to Paris.
• 1961 – Cemal Gürsel was elected President.
• 1966 – The North Atlantic Council (NATO) decides to move its headquarters to Brussels.
• 1975 – Anwar Sadat became the first Egyptian President to make an official visit to the United States.
• 1975 – General census was held. Turkey's population is 40.347.719 people.
• 1982 – Yılmaz Güney was stripped of his citizenship.
• 1984 – For the first time in the history of the Republic of Turkey, a minister was dismissed. When Minister of Finance and Customs Vural Arıkan did not resign, he was dismissed by the President upon the proposal of the Prime Minister.
• 1991 – Turkish Armed Forces entered the Iraqi border and started an operation.
• 1993 – Neşe Alten, a teacher working in Diyarbakır, lost her life as a result of the attack of PKK militants.
• 1994 – historic peace agreement ending 46 years of war between Israel and Jordan; It was signed at the border between the two countries with a spectacular ceremony attended by 5 thousand people.
• 1995 – Islamic Jihad leader Fethi Shikaki was killed in his hotel in Malta by Mossad agents.
• 1995 – The Democracy Party (DEP) case was decided. The Supreme Court upheld the sentences of Leyla Zana, Hatip Dicle, Orhan Doğan and Selim Sadak to fifteen years each, and Mahmut Alinak and Sırrı Sakık to three years and six months each. Ahmet Türk and Sedat Yurtdaş, whose sentences were overturned, were released.
• 2002 – The three-day hostage-taking action in the Moscow theater ends with an operation by Russian special forces (Spetsnaz), which killed about 50 Chechen rebels and 800 of the 118 hostages.
• 2017 – IYI Party was founded under the leadership of Meral Akşener.

Births 

• 968 Kazan, Emperor of Japan (d. 1008)
• 1491 – Zhengde, 10th emperor of China's Ming Dynasty (d. 1521)
• 1673 – Dimitri Kantemiroğlu, Romanian historian and writer (d. 1723)
• 1685 – Domenico Scarlatti, Italian composer (d. 1757)
• 1759 – Georges Danton, French lawyer and leader of the French revolution (d. 1794)
• 1798 – Giuditta Negri Pasta, Italian singer (d. 1865)
• 1800 – Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke, Prussian field marshal (d. 1891)
• 1842 – Vasily Vereschagin, Russian martial artist (d. 1904)
• 1849 – Ferdinand Georg Frobenius, German mathematician (d. 1917)
• 1873 – Thorvald Stauning was Denmark's first social democratic Prime Minister (d. 1942)
• 1874 – Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, American socialite and philanthropist (d. 1948)
• 1883 – Napoleon Hill, American author (d. 1970)
• 1893 – Miloš Crnjanski, Serbian poet, writer and diplomat (d. 1977)
• 1909 – Affonso Eduardo Reidy, Brazilian architect (d. 1964)
• 1911 – Mahalia Jackson, American singer (d. 1972)
• 1912 – Don Siegel, American film director (d. 1991)
• 1914 – Jackie Coogan, American actress (d. 1984)
• 1916 – François Mitterrand, President of France (d. 1996)
• 1919 – Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, last Shah of Iran (d. 1980)
• 1921 – Joe Fulks, American basketball player (d. 1976)
• 1925 – John Mulvaney, Australian archaeologist (d. 2016)
• 1934 – Ulrich Plenzdorf, German writer (d. 2007)
• 1936 – Shelley Morrison, American stage, film and television actress (d. 2019)
• 1942 – Bob Hoskins, English actor (d. 2014)
• 1945 – Pat Conroy, American novelist and author (d. 2016)
• 1945 - Jaclyn Smith is an American actress.
• 1947 – Hillary Clinton, American politician and wife of US President Bill Clinton
• 1947 – Trevor Joyce, Irish poet
• 1949 – Kevin Sullivan, American former professional wrestler, manager, and coach
• 1951 – Bootsy Collins, American musician
• 1951 – Julian Schnabel, American film producer
• 1955 – Ahmet Selcuk Ilkan, Turkish poet and composer
• 1956 – Telman Ismailov, Russian and Turkish businessman of Azerbaijani Jewish descent
• 1959 - Evo Morales, former president of Bolivia
• 1961 – Uhuru Kenyatta, Kenyan politician
• 1961 – Dylan McDermott, American actor
• 1962 – Cary Elwes, English actor and producer
• 1963 – Tom Cavanagh, Canadian actor
• 1963 – Ted Demme, American director, producer, and actor (d. 2002)
• 1963 – Natalie Merchant, American musician and songwriter
• 1967 – Keith Urban, Australian guitarist and pop singer
• 1973 – Seth MacFarlane, American writer, actor, and director
• 1974 – Nihan Özcan, Turkish actress
• 1977 – Aslı Gökyokuş, Turkish singer
• 1978 – Caner Kurtaran, Turkish theater, film and TV series actor
• 1980 – Cristian Chivu, Romanian former football player
• 1981 – Guy Sebastian, Australian singer and composer
• 1983 – Dmitri Sychov, Russian former football player
• 1983 – Özgür Emre Yıldırım, Turkish cinema and TV series actor
• 1984 – Sasha Cohen, American figure skater
• 1984 – Adriano Correia, Brazilian football player
• 1984 – Jefferson Farfán is a Peruvian football player.
• 1985 – Andrea Bargnani, Italian professional basketball player
• 1985 – Kafoumba Coulibaly, Ivory Coast football player
• 1985 - Monta Ellis is an American professional basketball player.
• 1986 - Schoolboy Q is an American hip hop artist.
• 1988 – Markéta Štroblová, Czech porn star
• 1988 - Greg Zuerlein, American figure skater
• 1991 – Berk Atan, Turkish model, model and actor
• 1993 – Dimitris Pelkas, Greek football player

Deaths 

• 899 – Alfred, king of the East Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex between 871 and 899 (b. 849)
• 1440 – Gilles de Rais, Breton knight (b. 1405)
• 1694 – Samuel von Pufendorf, German philosopher (b. 1632)
• 1764 – William Hogarth, English painter (b. 1697)
• 1817 – Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin, Dutch-Austrian physician, chemist, and botanist (b. 1727)
• 1852 – Ádám Récsey, Hungarian politician and general who served as prime minister for 1848 days during the 4 Hungarian Revolution (b. 1775)
• 1874 – Peter Cornelius, German composer, actor, writer of musical subjects, poet, and translator (b. 1824)
• 1890 – Carlo Collodi, Italian journalist and author (author of the novel Pinocchio) (b. 1826)
• 1902 – Elizabeth Cady Stanton, American author and activist (b. 1815)
• 1909 – Itō Hirobumi, Japanese politician and soldier (b. 1841)
• 1931 – John Isaac Briquet, Swiss botanist (b. 1870)
• 1932 – Margaret Brown, American socialite, philanthropist, and activist (b. 1867)
• 1941 – Arkady Gaydar, Russian-born Soviet writer (b. 1904)
• 1944 – Beatrice was a British princess (b. 1857)
• 1945 – Paul Pelliot, a French orientalist (b. 1878)
• 1946 – Yannis Rallys, Greek politician (b. 1878)
• 1952 – Hattie McDaniel, first black American actress to win an Academy Award (b. 1895)
• 1957 - Gerty Theresa Cori, Czech biochemist. First woman scientist to win the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1896)
• 1957 – Nikos Kazantzakis, Greek writer (b. 1883)
• 1963 – Behzat Butak, Turkish theater artist (b. 1891)
• 1966 – Alma Cogan, English pop singer (b. 1932)
• 1967 – Ali Canip Method, Turkish poet and writer (b. 1887)
• 1968 – Sergey Natanovich Bernstein, Russian mathematician (b. 1880)
• 1972 – Igor Sikorsky, Russian-American aviation pioneer (who built the first successful helicopter) (b. 1889)
• 1973 – Semyon Budyonni, Marshal of the Soviet Union (b. 1883)
• 1979 – Park Chung-hee, South Korean soldier and politician (b. 1917)
• 1983 – Feyzullah Çınar, Turkish folk poet (b. 1937)
• 1989 – Charles Pedersen, American organic chemist (b. 1904)
• 1993 – Siyami Ersek, Turkish academic and surgeon (who started open heart surgeries in Turkey) (b. 1920)
• 1993 – Neşe Alten, Turkish teacher
• 2001 – Hüseyin Hilmi Işık, Turkish writer (b. 1911)
• 2005 – Fahrettin Aslan, Turkish casino operator and owner of Maksim Casino (b. 1932)
• 2005 – George Swindin, English football player (b. 1914)
• 2007 – Arthur Kornberg, American biochemist (b. 1918)
• 2012 – Natina Reed, American rapper, singer and songwriter (b. 1979)
• 2014 – Dudley Knowles, British political philosopher (b. 1947)
• 2014 – Senzo Meyiwa, South African international football player (b. 1987)
• 2016 – Nail Güreli, Turkish journalist and writer (b. 1932)
• 2016 – Ali Hussein Shihab, Iraqi national football player (b. 1961)
• 2017 – Ali Eşref Dervişyan, Iranian story writer, educator and academic (b. 1941)
• 2017 – Nelly Olin, former environment minister of France (b. 1941)
• 2017 – Stephen Toulouse, American IT specialist (b. 1972)
• 2018 – Ana González de Recabarren, Chilean female activist (b. 1925)
• 2018 – Nikolay Karachentsov, Soviet-Russian actor (b. 1944)
• 2019 – Enriqueta Basilio, Mexican Olympic athlete (b. 1948)
• 2019 – Robert Evans, American film producer and set supervisor (b. 1930)
• 2019 – Pascale Roberts, French film and television actor (b. 1930)
• 2020 – Osman Durmuş, Turkish doctor, former Minister of Health (b. 1947)
• 2020 – Jacques Godin, Canadian stage, film and television actor (b. 1930)
• 2020 – Juan R. Torruella, American politician, lawyer, and former Olympic sailor (b. 1933)