- 772 Pope Adrian I [Hadrian I] elected
Event of Interest
800 Charlemagne judges the accusations against Pope Leo III in the Vatican.
Charlemagne
Appointment of Interest
1566 Spanish King Philip II names Fernando Alvarez, duke of Alva
Philip II of Spain
- 1626 Pasha Muhammad ibn Farukh tyrannical gov of Jerusalem, driven out
- 1640 Portugal regains independence after 60 years of Spanish rule
- 1641 Massachusetts becomes the first colony to give statutory recognition to slavery
- 1653 An athlete from Croydon is reported to have run 20 miles from St Albans to London in less than 90 minutes
- 1656 Germany promises Poland aid against Sweden
- 1708 Great Alliance occupies Brussels
- 1742 Empress Elisabeth orders expulsion of all Jews from Russia
- 1750 First school in America to offer manual training courses opens in Maryland
- 1768 The slave ship Fredensborg sinks off Tromøy in Norway.
- 1783 Jacques Charles and Nicolas Roberts make first untethered ascension with gas hydrogen balloon in Paris
- 1821 Santo Domingo (Dominican Rep) proclaims independence from Spain
- 1822 Dom Pedro crowned emperor of Brazil
Event of Interest
1822 Franz Liszt, aged 11, debuts as pianist in Vienna
Franz Liszt
Election of Interest
1824 US House of Representatives begins to decide outcome of election deadlock between John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson (Adams wins)
John Quincy Adams
Andrew Jackson
Event of Interest
1868 John D. Rockefeller begins anti oil war
John D. Rockefeller
Event of Interest
1884 Society of Independent Artists hold 1st exhibition in Polychrome Pavilion, Paris, includes Georges Seurat's "Bathers at Asnières"
Georges Seurat
Event of Interest
1887 Sherlock Holmes first appears in print in "Study in Scarlet" by Arthur Conan Doyle
Arthur Conan Doyle
Event of Interest
1900 Exiled South African President of Transvaal Paul Kruger visits Flanders and on the same day is declined a visit from the German Kaiser
Paul Kruger
- 1900 Portifiro Diaz is inaugurated for his 6th consecutive term as President of Mexico
- 1903 "The Great Train Robbery", the 1st Western film, released
- 1906 Cinema Omnia Pathe, world's 1st cinema, opens (Paris)
- 1906 German Shoemaker Wilhelm Voigt (Capt of Köpenick) sentenced to 4 years for forgery after posing as Prussian officer
- 1909 1st Christmas Club payment made, to Carlisle Trust Co, Pa
- 1909 1st Israeli kibbutz founded, Deganya Alef
- 1912 Boston Braves MLB franchise owner James Gaffney buys the Allston Golf Club on Commonwealth Avenue, Boston with a plan to construct a ball park there; ground breaking for Braves Field starts on March 20, 1915
- 1913 1st drive-up gasoline station opens (Pitts)
Model T
1913 Ford Motor Company institutes world's 1st moving assembly line for the Model T Ford
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Event of Interest
1916 There is virtual civil war in Greece as royalists fight Eleftherios Venizelos' Liberal Party, the Allies ensure a Venizelist victory
Eleftherios Venizelos
Event of Interest
1919 Lady Nancy Astor sworn-in as 1st female member of British Parliament
Nancy Astor
Event of Interest
1922 Polish state Chief Marshal Józef Piłsudski resigns
Józef Piłsudski
George Gershwin
Historic Publication
1924 "La Révolution surréaliste" publishes its first issue in Paris, edited by André Breton
André Breton
- 1924 The Boston Bruins beat fellow expansion Montreal Maroons, 2-1 at Boston Arena; first NHL game to be played in the United States
- 1925 Treaty of Locarno signed
- 1928 Railroad museum opens in Utrecht Neth
- 1928 National League President John Heydler first to propose a baseball rule change calling for a 10th man, or 'designated hitter', to bat in place of the pitcher; ironically, the NL vote in favour of proposal, but the American League turn it down
- 1928 CFL Grey Cup, AAA Grounds, Hamilton: Hamilton Tigers win 3rd Cup with 30-0 shutout of Regina Roughriders
- 1929 Game of Bingo invented by Edwin S Lowe
- 1930 NHL drops 20 minute slashing-about-the-head penalty
- 1931 Ottawa branch of Royal Mint begins operation as Royal Canadian Mint
Event of Interest
1933 Rudolf Hess & Ernest Rohm become ministers in Hitler government
Rudolf Hess
Adolf Hitler
Assassination
1934 Leningrad mayor Sergey Kirov is assassinated and Joseph Stalin uses it as an excuse to begin his Great Purge of 1934-38
Joseph Stalin
NHL Record
1934 Toronto Maple Leafs beat St. Louis Eagles, 4-3 to set an NHL record for the most wins to start the season with 8; Leafs do it again 59 years later; won 10 in a row to start 1993-94 season
George Hainsworth
Event of Interest
1937 Japan recognizes Franco government
Francisco Franco
- 1938 School bus & train collide in Salt Lake City Utah
Heinrich Himmler
- 1941 US Civil Air Patrol (CAP) organizes
- 1942 Gasoline rationed in US
- 1942 The Beveridge Report is published by the British government unveiling plans for a post-war welfare state
- 1942 With WWII travel restrictions in mind, MLB owners decide to restrict travel to a 3-trip schedule rather than customary 4; Spring training in 1943 limited to locations north of Potomac or Ohio rivers and east of the Mississippi
- 1943 At the end of the Tehran Conference, the Big Three (Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt) agree that the invasion of Normandy should take place in May 1944
Event of Interest
1944 Béla Bartòk's Concerto for orchestra, premieres
Béla Bartok
Event of Interest
1947 In first cricket Test match between the 2 nations, India is dismissed for 58 by Australia in Brisbane; fast bowler Ernie Toshack takes 5 for 2 off 2.3 overs; Don Bradman scores 185 as Australia wins by an innings & 226 runs
Donald Bradman
- 1948 Arabic Congress names Abdullah of Trans Jordan as King of Palestine
- 1948 Piet Roozenburg becomes world champion checker player
- 1949 WBNG TV channel 12 in Binghamton, NY (CBS) begins broadcasting
- 1949 WKTV TV channel 2 in Utica, NY (NBC) begins broadcasting
- 1949 MLB announces attendance for the season is 20.2 million, down from 20.9 in 1948; New York Yankees and the Cleveland Indians each finish with over 2.2 million, but the St. Louis Browns fall to 270,000
- 1951 17th Heisman Trophy Award: Dick Kazmaier, Princeton (HB)
Music Premiere
1951 Benjamin Britten's opera "Billy Budd" premieres in London
Benjamin Britten
- 1951 Golden Gate Bridge closes due to high winds
- 1951 Legendary Australian cricket fast bowler Ray Lindwall takes his 100th Test wicket when he bowls West Indian spinner Sonny Ramadhin in the 2nd Test in Sydney; Australia wins by 7 wickets
- 1952 The New York Daily News reports the first successful sexual reassignment operation
- 1953 Red Sox trade for slugger Jackie Jensen, sending pitcher Mickey McDermott and outfielder Tom Umphlett to Washington; Jensen averages 25 HRs a year for his 7 seasons in Boston; AL RBI leader x 3, and AL MVP in 1958
- 1953 WAIM (now WAXA) TV channel 40 in Anderson, SC (IND) 1st broadcast
- 1953 WCSH TV channel 6 in Portland, ME (NBC) begins broadcasting
Historic Publication
1953 Hugh Hefner publishes 1st edition of Playboy magazine, featuring Marilyn Monroe as the magazine's 1st centerfold
Marilyn Monroe
Hugh Hefner
Event of Interest
1955 Rosa Parks is arrested for refusing to move to the back of a bus and give her seat to a white passenger in Montgomery, Alabama
Rosa Parks
Event of Interest
1956 Frank Robinson (NL) & Luis Aparicio (AL) voted Rookie of the Year
Frank Robinson
- 1956 Indonesian VP Mohammed Hatta resigns
- 1956 In front of 100,000 fans at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, a US Army baseball team beats an Australian all-star team, 11–5 in an Olympic exhibition game; Sergeant Vance Sutton belts a grand slam for Army
- 1956 US men's 4 x 100m relay team of Thane Baker, Leamon King, Bobby Morrow & Ira Murchison sets world record 39.60s to win the gold medal at the Melbourne Olympics; Morrow's 3rd gold medal of the Games
- 1956 Australian women's 4 x 100m relay team of Norma Croker, Betty Cuthbert, Fleur Mellor & Shirley Strickland de la Hunty run world record 44.65 to win the gold medal at the Melbourne Olympics; Cuthbert's 3rd gold of the Games
- 1956 American Mildred McDaniel jumps world record 1.76m to win the women's high jump gold medal at the Melbourne Olympics; Briton Thelma Hopkins and Russian Mariya Pisareva dead-heat for silver (1.67m)
- 1956 Hungarian boxer László Papp wins his 3rd straight Olympic gold medal when he beats future Hall of Famer José Torres representing the US on points in the light-middleweight final at the Melbourne Olympics
- 1956 Legendary Australian swimmer Dawn Fraser sets world record 1:02.0 to win the women's 100m freestyle at the Melbourne Olympics; first of Fraser's 3 consecutive gold medals in the event
Olympic Gold
1956 Led by future Basketball Hall of Famers Bill Russell and K.C. Jones, the US wins it's 4th consecutive Olympic gold medal with an 89-55 victory over the Soviet Union at the Melbourne Games
Bill Russell
- 1956 Romanian canoeist Leon Rotman wins the men's C-1,000m gold medal at the Melbourne Olympics; claims the singles double after also winning the C-1 10,000m gold
- 1956 Gert Fredriksson of Sweden wins his 3rd consecutive K-1 1,000m canoeing gold medal by 2.5s from Igor Pissarov of the Soviet Union at the Melbourne Olympics; also wins K-1 10,000m gold
Event of Interest
1957 Sam Cooke, Buddy Holly and the Crickets debut on Ed Sullivan Show
Buddy Holly
Ed Sullivan
- 1958 "Flower Drum Song" opens at St James Theater NYC for 602 performances
- 1958 Central African Rep made autonomous member of Fr Comm (National Day)
- 1958 Our Lady of Angels School fire kills 92 students & 3 nuns in Chicago, Illinois
- 1959 12 nations sign treaty for scientific peaceful use of Antarctica
- 1959 25th Heisman Trophy Award: Billy Cannon, LSU (HB)
- 1959 The 1st color photograph of Earth received from outer space
- 1960 Patrice Lumumba caught in the Congo
Event of Interest
1960 Paul McCartney and Pete Best arrested then deported from Hamburg, Germany for accusation of attempted arson.
Paul McCartney
Pete Best
- 1961 The independent Republic of West Papua is proclaimed in modern-day Western New Guinea.
- 1962 KGMB TV channel 9 in Honolulu, HI (CBS) begins broadcasting
- 1962 Classifications in minor league baseball are overhauled; Eastern and South Atlantic leagues are promoted from Class-A to Class-AA; classes B, C and D are abolished with those leagues being promoted to Class-A
- 1963 Nagaland becomes a state of Indian union
- 1963 Wendell Scott wins the Grand National Series Jacksonville 200 at Speedway Park in Jacksonville, Florida, becoming the first black driver to win a race at NASCAR's premier level
- 1964 After just 3 seasons in MLB the Houston Colt .45s change name of the team to Astros; owners say move signals a step into the future for the franchise and the city of Houston
Event of Interest
1964 Martin Luther King Jr. speaks to J. Edgar Hoover about his slander campaign
J. Edgar Hoover
Martin Luther King Jr.
- 1965 Airlift of refugees from Cuba to US began
- 1965 South Africa's government says children of white fathers are white
- 1966 Georg Kiesinger elected West German chancellor
- 1966 Radio time signal WWV moves from Greenbelt, Maryland to Boulder, Colorado
- 1966 Ecuadorian national baseball team defends its title with a 4-3 win over Brazil in the South American Championship; last win for next 50 years; Eloy Guerrero drives in Ramón Sotomayor with the winning run
Event of Interest
1967 Queen Elizabeth II inaugurates 98-inch (249-cm) Isaac Newton telescope
Elizabeth II
- 1967 Seattle awarded one of the 2 AL expansion franchise teams
NBA Record
1967 Philadelphia center Wilt Chamberlain scores 52 points in 76ers' 133-109 win over Seattle SuperSonics; sets NBA record for 22 free throw misses
Wilt Chamberlain
- 1967 Pacific Northwest Sports, Inc. is awarded one of the 2 American League baseball expansion franchises; new team named the Seattle Pilots
- 1968 "Promises Promises" opens at Shubert Theater NYC for 1281 performances
- 1968 Burt Bacharach/Hal David's musical premieres in NYC
- 1968 Gonzalo Barrios, Venezuelan presidential candidate
- 1968 Pirate Radio Modern (259) (England) begins transmitting
- 1969 US government holds its 1st draft lottery since WW II
- 1969 LAPD Police Chief Edward Davis announces warrants for the arrest of the Manson cult for murder
- 1970 Luis Echeverria Alvarez sworn in as president of Mexico
- 1970 Independent People's Republic of South Yemen renames itself as People's Democratic Republic of Yemen
Baseball Record
1971 Chicago Cubs release longtime star and future Hall of Famer Ernie Banks, ending his 19-year MLB career; announce Banks will serve as a coach on manager Leo Durocher's staff; Banks finishes with 512 home runs and 1,636 RBI
Ernie Banks
Leo Durocher
- 1971 Galt MacDermot and John Guare's "Two Gentlemen of Verona" opens at St James Theater NYC for 613 performances
Event of Interest
1971 John Lennon and Yoko Ono release "Happy Xmas (War is Over)" in US
John Lennon
Yoko Ono
- 1971 Cambodian Civil War: Khmer Rouge rebels intensify assaults on Cambodian government positions, forcing their retreat from Kompong Thmar and nearby Ba Ray.
- 1972 Wings release "Hi, Hi, Hi" in UK
- 1972 2 people killed and 127 injured when 2 car bombs explode in the centre of Dublin, Republic of Ireland
- 1973 Australia grants self-government to Papua New Guinea
Golf Tournament
1973 Jack Nicklaus finishes at 13-under-par 275 to win the Walt Disney World Open by 1 stroke from Mason Rudolph; becomes the first player to reach $2 million in PGA Tour career earnings
Jack Nicklaus
- 1974 Boeing 727 crashes in Upperville Virginia, 92 died
- 1974 American Jacqueline Hansen runs female world record marathon 2:43:54.5 in Culver City, California
- 1974 LA Skid Row slasher kills 1st of 8
- 1974 South Africa is awarded the Davis Cup tennis title after India refuses to travel to South Africa for the final in protest of the South African government's apartheid policies
Event of Interest
1975 US President Gerald Ford visits People's Republic of China
Gerald Ford
Sex Pistols' Break Up
1976 Sex Pistols using profanity on TV, gets them branded as "rotten punks"
Learn More
Event of Interest
1978 US President Jimmy Carter more than doubles national park system size
Jimmy Carter
Event of Interest
1978 Australian cricket fast bowler Rodney Hogg debuts in 1st Test v England in Brisbane; after Australia all out 116, Hogg makes instant impact by dismissing both high profile England openers Graham Gooch (2) and Geoff Boycott (13)
Graham Gooch
- 1978 US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
- 1979 Australia's World Series Cricket men return to the fold in the drawn 1st Test v West Indies in Brisbane; ex-WSC players Bruce Laird (92), Greg Chappell (74) & David Hookes (33no) provide the scoring on Day 1 in home side's 229/5
- 1980 46th Heisman Trophy Award: George Rogers, South Carolina (RB)
- 1980 Mel Harris appears on M*A*S*H in "Cementing Relationships"
- 1980 US Justice Department sues Yonkers siting racial discrimination
- 1981 Yugoslavian charter flight crashes into Mont San-Pietro in Corsica, 180 killed
Event of Interest
1981 Kareem Abdul-Jabbar passes Oscar Robertson (26,710) to become the NBA’s second all-time leading scorer behind Wilt Chamberlain; scores 14 points in 117-86 Lakers' win over Utah Jazz in Los Angeles
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Film Premier
1982 "Tootsie" directed by Sydney Pollack and starring Dustin Hoffman and Jessica Lange premieres in Hollywood
Film Premier
1984 "Beverly Hills Cop" directed by Martin Brest and starring Eddie Murphy and Judge Reinhold premieres in Los Angeles
Eddie Murphy
Event of Interest
1984 American tennis icon Chris Evert wins her 1,000th career professional match; beats Pascale Paradis of France 6-1, 6-7, 6-2 in the round of 16 at the Australian Open; Evert goes on to win the event
Chris Evert
Event of Interest
1985 TV mini series "Anne of Green Gables" based on the novel by Lucy Maud Montgomery, starring Megan Follows is first shown on CBS in Canada
Lucy Maud Montgomery
- 1986 Musée d'Orsay opens in Paris
- 1986 Paul McCartney releases "Only Love Remains"
- 1987 Digging begins to link England & France under English Channel
- 1988 596 dead after cyclone hits Bangladesh, half a million homeless
Event of Interest
1988 Benazir Bhutto named 1st female Prime Minister of a Muslim country (Pakistan)
Benazir Bhutto
- 1988 Chinese minister of Foreign affairs Qian Qichen visits Moscow
- 1988 NBC bids a record $401 million to capture television broadcasting rights for the 1992 Barcelona Summer Olympic Games
- 1988 First World AIDS day to raise awareness of the AIDS global epidemic
- 1989 Romanian 5-time Olympic gold medal winning gymnast Nadia Comăneci arrives in NYC requesting political asylum to the United States; granted
- 1989 "Day Without Art" - Artists demonstrate against AIDS
