October 22 is the 295th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar; 70 days remain until the end of the year.
We have some interesting facts & historic events all about October 22nd, including areas in religion, crime, health and more.
Keep reading for more interesting facts about October 22nd in history!
Table of Contents
Global Celebrations
- International Caps Lock Day
- National Nut Day
- Smart is Cool Day
- International Stuttering Awareness Day
Historic Events
What Happened On This Day – October 22
2008: India Launches its First Lunar Mission
The unmanned space probe called Chandrayaan-1 was launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation. The probe successfully landed on the Moon on November 14, 2008, making India the 5th country to land a spacecraft on the Moon.
1957: François Duvalier takes office
François Duvalier, also known as Papa Doc, became the President of Haiti.
1936: End of the Long March in China
The Long March, a 6000-mile journey made by members of the Red Army led by Mao Zedong came to an end. The March was undertaken as a way to escape the Nationalist army of Chiang Kai-shek. The end of the March is also known in China as the “union of the three armies”.
1884: International Meridian Conference Adopts Greenwich, England as initial longitudinal meridian
26 countries participated in the conference which was held in Washington, D.C. In addition to making the meridian passing through the Observatory of Greenwich as the initial meridian for longitude or 0 degree longitude, the conference also defined a universal day which would “begin for all the world at the moment of mean midnight at the initial meridian, coinciding with the beginning of the civil day and date of that meridian; and is to be counted from zero up to twenty-four hours”.
1797: First Person to Jump With a Parachute
French balloonist André-Jacques Garnerin jumped out of a balloon over Parc Monceau in Paris using a silk parachute that he made himself.
2008: the first Android phone goes on sale.

1977: International Sun-Earth Explorers 1 & 2 was launched into Earth orbit.

1975: October 22, 1975 – The Soviet unmanned space mission Venera 9 lands on Venus.

Famous Birthdays
Births On This Day, October 22
1973: Ichiro Suzuki, Japanese baseball player
1949: Arsène Wenger, French footballer, manager
1870: Ivan Bunin, Russian author, poet, Nobel Prize laureate
1844: Louis Riel, Canadian politician
1811: Franz Liszt, Hungarian pianist, composer
Heartbreaking Deaths
Deaths On This Day, October 22
2002: Richard Helms, American diplomat, 8th Director of Central Intelligence
1995: Kingsley Amis, English author, poet, critic
1954: Jibanananda Das, Bengali poet
1906: Paul Cézanne, French painter
741: Charles Martel, Frankish military leader, politician