1942: The first 'selection' for gassing takes place at the Nazi extermination camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
1979: Margaret Thatcher becomes Britain's first female prime minister following a landslide election victory.
1980: Josip Broz Tito, whose rule had held the ethnic factions of Yugoslavia together since 1945, dies.

MORE BIZARRE...........

Neale Cooper left today in 2005.

cooper, tito, thatcher - 3 leaders - one in a job way too long, one just a bit too long, one nowhere near long enough

I visited Tito's grave and museum last year when I was passing through Belgrade. It's right out in the suburbs and a pain to find but definitely worth a visit. My favourite Tito story is of the time, just after the war, when he fell out with Stalin over Yugoslavia's refusal to join the Soviet Union. Stalin sent four assassins to kill Broz but all were captured and executed. Broz wrote a letter to Stalin kindly explaining what had happened, and assured him that if he tried to repeat his exercise, Broz would send one assassin to Moscow and wouldn't need to send another. As we know, Tito lived until 1980.