October 15 Birthday
Mata Hari was executed on October 15, 1917, by a French firing squad at Vincennes. Born Margaretha Geertruida Zelle in the Netherlands, she had been an exotic dancer in Paris who claimed to be a Javanese princess. She was convicted of spying for Germany, though the evidence was thin. She refused a blindfold and blew a kiss to the firing squad. Recent scholarship suggests she may have been a double agent for France, or simply a convenient scapegoat for French military failures. Friedrich Nietzsche, born this day in 1844, declared "God is dead" — not as a celebration but as a warning. He predicted that the loss of religious belief would lead to nihilism. He proposed the "Übermensch" — the person who creates values in the absence of God. He went insane in 1889 at forty-four, possibly from syphilis, and was cared for by his sister, who edited his work to support her own anti-Semitic agenda. His philosophy was later appropriated by the Nazis, who would have disgusted him. People born on October 15 fall under the zodiac sign of Libra. The birthstone is Opal and the birth flower is Marigold. Historical events on October 15 include 1917: Mata Hari executed by French firing squad for espionage, 1951: I Love Lucy premieres on CBS, 1860: Eleven-year-old Grace Bedell writes to Lincoln suggesting he grow a beard. Famous people born on October 15 include Friedrich Nietzsche (1844), Mario Puzo (1920), Penny Marshall (1943).