October 3 carries two unrelated anniversaries that both turn on a single date choice: Germany's formal reunification into one state, and a rocket test fourteen years before the Space Age officially began.
On this day
1990East and West Germany formally reunified into a single state at midnight, ending 45 years of Cold War division. The date was chosen over November 9 — the anniversary of the Berlin Wall's fall — specifically to avoid also marking Kristallnacht, the 1938 Nazi pogrom that fell on the same November date.IloopMapping via Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
1942A German V-2 rocket launched from Peenemünde became the first human-made object to reach the edge of space, climbing to an altitude of 84.5 km. It was also the first long-range ballistic missile, a design lineage that fed directly into the post-war American and Soviet space programmes.Burley Packwood via Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
1977IndiaFormer prime minister Indira Gandhi was arrested in New Delhi on corruption charges, including allegations over the procurement of jeeps for an election campaign. She was released the next day after a magistrate found insufficient grounds to hold her.Anefo via Wikimedia Commons · CC0
Did you know
Germany's national holiday isn't the anniversary of the Berlin Wall falling — officials picked October 3 specifically because November 9, the Wall's actual fall date, is also the anniversary of Kristallnacht.