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Births on December 17

Peter Snell
1938Dec, 17

Peter Snell

Peter Snell, New Zealand runner
Sir Peter George Snell (17 December 1938 – 12 December 2019) was a New Zealand middle-distance runner. He won three Olympic gold medals, and is the only man since 1920 to have won the 800 and 1500 metres at the same Olympics, in 1964.

Snell had a relatively short career as a world-famous international sportsman, 1960–1965, yet achieved so much that he was voted New Zealand's "Sports Champion of the (20th) Century" and was one of 24 inaugural members of the International Association of Athletics Federations Hall Of Fame named in 2012. A protégé of the New Zealand athletics coach Arthur Lydiard, Snell is known for the three Olympic and two Commonwealth Games gold medals he won, and the several world records he set.

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Events on 1938

  • 18Feb

    Nanking Massacre

    Second Sino-Japanese War: During the Nanking Massacre the Nanking Safety Zone International Committee is renamed "Nanking International Rescue Committee" and the safety zone in place for refugees falls apart.
  • 12Mar

    Austria

    Anschluss: German troops occupy and absorb Austria.
  • 23Sep

    Munich Agreement

    Mobilization of the Czechoslovak army in response to the Munich Agreement.
  • 30Sep

    Munich Agreement

    Britain, France, Germany and Italy sign the Munich Agreement, allowing Germany to occupy the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia.
  • 30Oct

    The War of the Worlds (radio drama)

    Orson Welles broadcasts his radio play of H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds, causing anxiety in some of the audience in the United States.