Reuters historical calendar - May 6

LONDON, May 5 (Reuters) Following are some of the major events to have occurred on May 6 in history: 1910 - Britain's King Edward VII died.

1919 - L. Frank Baum, U.S. author of children's stories about the imaginary land of Oz, died. The film version of ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' became a classic.

1932 - French president Paul Doumer was assassinated by a Russian emigre in Paris.

1937 - The German airship Hindenburg burst into flames on arrival at Lakehurst, New Jersey; 36 people were killed but 62 escaped.

1945 - At the end of World War Two, General Johannes Blaskowitz surrendered the German armies in the Netherlands.

1954 - Britain's Roger Bannister became the first athlete to run a mile in under four minutes, recording a time of three minutes 59.4 seconds.

1968 - The worst street fighting in Paris since the city's liberation at the end of World War Two shook the Left Bank as students and police fought for control of the fashionable Boulevard St Germain.

1974 - West German Chancellor Willy Brandt resigned after an aide was arrested on charges of spying for East Germany.

1976 - An earthquake struck the town of Udine in northern Italy, killing 973 people and leaving over 100,000 homeless.

1981 - The United States expelled all Libyan diplomats because of what it called the Libyan government's support for international terrorism.

1992 - Marlene Dietrich, film's legendary femme fatale, died. The German-born actress shot to fame as the cabaret singer Lola-Lola in ''The Blue Angel'' and then took Hollywood by storm.

1994 - The Channel Tunnel opened, linking Britain and France.

1996 - Guatemala's leftist guerrillas signed an accord with the government of President Alvaro Arzu aimed at ending 35 years of civil war.

1998 - At least 150 people were killed when torrential rain drove rivers of mud and rocks through towns in southern Italy.

2000 - James Andanson, French photographer who photographed crowned heads and film stars for decades, was found dead. He was 54.

2002 - Aung San Suu Kyi, National League for Democracy leader, was unconditionally freed from 19 months of house arrest telling supporters she would carry on her fight for democracy in Myanmar.

2002 - Marc Ravalomanana was sworn in as president of Madagascar despite veteran ruler Didier Ratsiraka's refusal to step down.

2002 - Dutch anti-immigrant politician Pim Fortuyn was shot and killed as he left a radio interview in Hilversum.

2003 - US President Bush named former State Department counterterrorism chief L Paul Bremer as the top civil administrator for Iraq, supplanting Jay Garner.

2004 - Serbian police arrested Milan ''Bulidza'' Bulic accused of crimes against prisoners of war in Vukovar in 1991.

2005 - British Prime Minister Tony Blair survived public anger over the Iraq war to secure an historic third straight victory in elections.

2006 - Lillian Gertrud Asplund, the last American to remember seeing hundreds of fellow passengers drown in the icy North Atlantic when the Titanic sank 94 years ago, died aged 99.

REUTERS DS KN0940