October 6, 1972 (Friday)
- A train crash near Saltillo, in Mexico killed 208 people and injured more than 700. The train, carrying more than 1,500 religious pilgrims, derailed near the bridge over the Moreno River. An engineer and four crewmen who survived were found to have been intoxicated, and were charged with homicide.
- Faraday School kidnapping: Six schoolgirls, ranging in age from 5 to 11 years old, were kidnapped along with their teacher at Faraday, Victoria. Parents arrived at the school to find a demand for one million Australian dollars (worth US $1,190,000 at the time. The seven escaped from an unguarded van the next day near Lancefield.
- Died: Solomon Lefschetz, 88, American mathematician who made major contributions to algebraic geometry, topology and differential equations.
Read more about this topic: October 1972
Famous quotes containing the word october:
“The autumnal change of our woods has not yet made a deep impression on our own literature yet. October has hardly tinged our poetry.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)