Karl Kautsky, the leading theorist of the Second International and sharp critic of the Bolsheviks, died Oct. 17, 1938. Kautsky was close friend of Engels, editor of Marx's Theories of Surplus Value, and a leader of the German Social Democratic Party. #OTD #Germany #Marxism

Leader of the Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO) and President of the country, Samora Machel died Oct. 18, 1986 when his plane crashed just inside South Africa. The apartheid regime is widely suspected of responsibility for the crash. #Mozambique #OTD #Africa

On October 18, 1859, a detachment of over 100 U.S. Marines under the command of Robert E. Lee overwhelmed and captured the forces of abolitionist John Brown who had seized control of the U.S. armory at Harper's Ferry, Virginia. The raid would hasten the U.S. Civil War. #OTD

Chinese feminist, nationalist and revolutionary Wu Shuqing led a Women's Revolutionary Army into the Battle of Hankou on Oct. 18, 1911 against the forces of the Qing Dynasty. While the battle was lost, it tied down Qing forces, contributing to the fall of the dynasty. #OTD #China

Prime Minister and revolutionary leader of Grenada, Maurice Bishop was executed on Oct. 19, 1983 in the course of a coup d'etat led by Bernard Coard that would result in a U.S. invasion of the island a week later. #OTD #Grenada

Cuban revolutionary Aleida March was born Oct. 19, 1936 into a campesino family. March joined the July 26 Movement in 1956, acting as a messenger and then guerrilla fighter, in which capacity she met Che Guevara whom she later married. #OTD #Cuba #WomensHistory

Eugene Debs died Oct. 20, 1926. A labor organizer who led major railway strikes, Debs became a convinced socialist in prison. He was a founder, leader and 5 time presidential candidate of the Socialist Party of America and an early leader of the IWW. #OTD #DemocraticSocialism

Six member of the Black Liberation Army and four former members of the Weather Underground, now belonging to the May 19th Communist Organization, carried out an armed robbery of a Brink's armored car near Nyack, New York on Oct. 20, 1981, killing a guard and two police. #OTD

The Communist University of the Toilers of the East, established in Moscow by the Comintern as a training college for communist cadres in the colonial world, officially opened on Oct. 21, 1921. Many of its alumni would go on to lead anti-colonial movements. #OTD #Decolonize #USSR

Thomas Russell, an abolitionist, social radical and founder and leader of the United Irishmen, was hanged and beheaded on Oct. 21, 1803 for his role in an abortive uprising against British rule led by Robert Emmet. #OTD #Ireland

French Marxist philosopher Louis Althusser died Oct. 22, 1990. A lifelong member of the French Communist Party, he suffered from severe mental illness and in 1980 killed his wife, Hélène Rytmann. His major works include "Reading Capital" and "Lenin and Philosophy." #OTD #France

Mexican feminist, surgeon, and microbiologist, Esther Chapa was born Oct. 22, 1904. A leader in in the Mexican Communist Party, Chapa fought for women's suffrage in the 1930s and 40s and led the Mexican-Chinese Peoples Friendship Committee in the 1960s. #OTD #Mexico #Maoism

5,000 workers with the Communist Party of Germany stormed 23 police stations on Oct. 23, 1923 to launch the Hamburg Uprising. The rising would be defeated two days later. #OTD #Germany #Communism #Revolution

Hungarian State Protection Police opened fire on demonstrators outside the Magyar Radio building in Budapest on Oct. 23, 1956, killing 3 and sparking a 19 day uprising against the ruling Hungarian Working People's Party that would be put down by Soviet troops. #OTD #Hungary

Harry Hay, who after 15 years as a member, left the Communist Party in 1951 to build the Mattachine Society, the first major gay rights organization in the United States, and who later co-founded the Radical Faeries, died on Oct. 24, 2002. #OTD #RadicalFaeries #LGBTQ #Communist

Soviet cinematographer and director Yuri Zhelyabuzhsky died Oct. 24, 1955. Zhelyabuzhsky documented both the February and October Revolutions, co-directed "The Stationmaster" and pioneered Soviet animation before returning to documentary work after World War II. #OTD #USSR

Gender bending anti-fascist surrealist artist and writer Claude Cahun was born Oct. 25, 1894. Sentenced to die along with their partner, Marcel Moore, for surrealist propaganda targeting the Nazi occupiers of the Isle of Jersey, they were rescued by the end of the war. #OTD

The United States invaded the small Caribbean island nation of Grenada on Oct. 25, 1983 following a power struggle inside the revolutionary government of the New Jewel Movement in which Prime Minister Maurice Bishop had been killed. #OTD #Grenada

Painter and communist Pablo Picasso was born in Spain on Oct. 25, 1881. A founder of Cubism, Picasso worked in a wide range of media. He joined the Communist Party of France in 1944 and remained a member until his death in 1973. #OTD #Picasso #Spain #France

Indigenous leader and member of the Communist Party of Ecuador, Dolores Cacuango was born Oct. 26, 1881. A strike leader and founder of the Federación Ecuatoriana de Indios she played an important role in the May 1944 Revolution in Ecuador. #OTD #Ecuador #WomensHistory