August 18: On this day …

In 2005, American  Dennis Rader was sentenced to 175 years in prison, as the BTK (blind, torture, kill) serial murderer of 10 people, 8 of whom were women.

In 1981, American playwright, screenwriter and author of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes Anita Loos died in New York aged 93.

In 1977, anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko was arrested in South Africa, later dying because of injuries sustained during arrest. Biko was the twentieth man to die in similar circumstances in a year.

In 1958, Vladimir Nabokov’s novel Lolita was published, detailing the story of a middle-aged man who becomes sexually obsessed with a 12-year-old girl.

In 1920, the 19th Amendment to the US Constitution guaranteed voting rights for women.

In 1877, cosmetics wizard Max Factor was born in Lodz, Poland.

In 1587, the first American child of British ancestry, Virginia Dare, (pictured in a more recent ad, probably looking nothing like her) was born in the settlement of Roanake, North Carolina.