Event of Interest
1431 Judges' investigations for the trial of Joan of Arc begin in Rouen, France, the seat of the English occupation government
Joan of Arc
- 1464 1st meeting of States-General of Netherlands
Event of Interest
1493 1st sight of manatees by Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus
Event of Interest
1570 Tsar Ivan the Terrible kills 1,000-2,000 residents of Novgorod
Ivan the Terrible
Constitution of the United States
1788 Connecticut becomes 5th state to ratify the US constitution
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Event of Interest
1799 British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger introduces income tax to raise funds for the war against Napoleon
William Pitt the Younger
Napoléon Bonaparte
Event of Interest
1806 Admiral Viscount Horatio Nelson receives a state funeral and is interred in St Paul's Cathedral, London
Horatio Nelson
- 1811 1st Women's Golf Tournament held
Napoléon Bonaparte
First Photograph of a Person
1839 Daguerreotype photo process announced at French Academy of Science
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- 1839 Thomas Henderson measures 1st stellar parallax (Alpha Centauri)
- 1847 1st San Francisco newspaper published (California Star)
- 1848 1st commercial bank in San Francisco established
- 1848 People's uprising in Palermo, Sicily
- 1854 Astor Library opens in New York City
- 1855 Clipper "Guiding Star" disappears in Atlantic, 480 dead
- 1857 7.9 earthquake shakes Fort Tejon, California
- 1858 Anson Jones, the last President of the Republic of Texas, commits suicide
Battle of Fort Sumter
1861 A Union merchant ship, the Star of the West, is fired upon as it tries to deliver supplies to Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina
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- 1861 Mississippi secedes from the Union (US Civil War)
- 1862 The first petroleum shipment (1,329 barrels) from the U.S. to Europe arrives at Victoria Docks, London, England aboard the Elizabeth Watts
- 1863 -Jan 11th] Battle of Arkansas Post, AR (Ft Hindman)
- 1866 Fisk University opens in Nashville, Tennessee
- 1878 Umberto I becomes King of Italy.
- 1879 Cheyenne prisoners led by Dull Knife revolt at Ft Robinson
- 1879 Kirland Warbler discovered on Andros Island in Bahamas
- 1880 6' (1.83 metres) of snow falls in Seattle in 5 days
- 1880 The Great Gale of 1880 devastates parts of Oregon and Washington with high wind and heavy snow
- 1894 "Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze" released in movie theaters
- 1894 Georges Feydeau's "Un à la Patte" premieres in Paris
- 1894 New England Telephone and Telegraph installs the first battery-operated telephone switchboard in Lexington, Massachusetts.
- 1901 New South Wales (918) defeat South Australia (157 & 156) by innings & 605
- 1903 Baseball's National & American Leagues make peace
- 1903 Wind Cave National Park, South Dakota, established
- 1903 Frank Farrell and Bill Devery purchase the American League's Baltimore baseball franchise for $18,000 and move it to NYC (later the NY Yankees)
- 1908 Frans Schollaert succeeds De Trooz as premier of Belgium
- 1908 Muir Woods National Monument, California, established
Historic Expedition
1909 Ernest Shackleton as part of the British Nimrod Expedition reaches a record farthest South latitude (88°23' south)
Ernest Shackleton
- 1912 US Marines send troops to Honduras
- 1915 Exposition (now Civic) Auditorium dedicated in San Francisco
- 1916 The Ottoman Empire prevails in the Battle of Çanakkale, as the last British troops evacuated
- 1917 World War I: the Battle of Rafa occurs near the Egyptian border with Palestine.
- 1922 KQV-AM in Pittsburgh PA begins radio transmissions
- 1922 Rotterdam metalworkers strike ends
- 1923 Juan de la Cierva makes 1st autogiro flight, Spain
- 1923 Swaraj political party founded in India with Chittaranjan Das as president and Motilal Nehru its secretary
- 1925 German Postal Minister A Hofle resigns due to corruption
Event of Interest
1927 Dmitri Shostakovich' Octet opus 11 premieres in Moscow
Dmitri Shostakovich
- 1927 Fire in Laurier Palace cinema in Montreal, 78 children died
- 1928 Eugene O'Neill's "Marco Millions" premieres in NYC
- 1929 Buddy DeSylva & Lew Brown's musical "Follow Thru" premieres in NYC
- 1929 KDB-AM in Santa Barbara CA begins radio transmissions
- 1930 Boston Bruins wins then NHL record 14th straight game
Event of Interest
1930 Albert Kahn Associates architectural firm become consulting architects for all industrial construction in the Soviet Union
Albert Kahn
- 1933 Amsterdam confectionery worker go on strike against wage reduction
Event of Interest
1936 Noël Coward's "Astonished Heart" premieres in London
Noël Coward
- 1936 Semi-automatic rifles adopted by US army
- 1937 Italian regime bans marriages between Italians & Abyssinians
- 1937 Maxwell Anderson's "High Tor" premieres in NYC
- 1940 2 German officers make emergency landing in Belgium
- 1940 J Thurber & E Nugent's "Male Animal" premieres in NYC
- 1941 6,000 Jews exterminated in pogrom in Bucharest, Romania
- 1941 Maiden flight by Canada's British-built Avro Lancaster military plane
Event of Interest
1945 US soldiers led by Gen Douglas MacArthur invades Philippines
Douglas MacArthur
Event of Interest
1947 Elizabeth "Betty" Short, the black dahlia, is last seen alive.
Elizabeth Short
- 1947 Providence Steamrollers guard Dino Martin becomes the first NBA player to ever score 40 points in a game, in a 91-68 win over Cleveland Rebels at Rhode Island Auditorium
- 1948 Walter Piston's 3rd Symphony in E, premieres in Boston
- 1951 "Life After Tomorrow", 1st film to receive an "X" rating, premieres
- 1951 Washington Capitals NBA club folds
- 1952 Belgian Pholien government resigns
- 1952 Karel Sys wins European heavyweight boxing title
Event of Interest
1952 Marines give notice that they will recall Ted Williams to active duty
Ted Williams
- 1953 Bevo Francis, Rio Grande College, scores 116 pts in basketball game
- 1953 Korean ferryboat "Chang Tyong-Ho" sank off Pusan killing 249
- 1954 -87°F (-66°C), Northice Station, Greenland (Greenland record)
- 1954 Bert Olmstead of the Montreal Canadiens, ties NHL record of 8 points in game
- 1954 Bollingen Prize for poetry awarded to Louise Bogan & Leonie Adams
- 1956 Abigail Van Buren's [Pauline Phillips] "Dear Abby" advice column 1st appears in newspapers
- 1956 Samir el-Rifai forms government in Jordan
- 1957 Checheno-Ingush ASSR reformed in RSFSR
- 1957 Dutch Newspaper Society expels communist daily paper "Truth"
- 1957 Kalmyk Autonomous Region reformed in RSFSR
- 1957 Karachayevo-Cherkess Autonomous Region reestablished in RSFSR
Event of Interest
1958 In basketball Oscar Robertson (Cin) scores 56, Seton Hall team 54
Oscar Robertson
Television Premiere
1959 "Rawhide" with Clint Eastwood premieres on CBS TV
Clint Eastwood
- 1959 Dam across Tera River in Northwestern Spain collapses after heavy winter rains, killing 135
- 1959 Pat O'Connor beats Dick Hutton in St Louis, to become NWA champ
- 1960 Building of Aswan dam in Egypt, begins
- 1961 Twins agree on $500,000 payment to AA for Minn/St Paul territory
- 1962 Mister M (Dr X) beats Verne Gagne in Minn, to become NWA champ
- 1962 NFL prohibits grabbing of face masks
- 1962 US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
Event of Interest
1963 Mao Zedong writes his poem "Reply to Comrade Kuo Mo-jo"
Mao Zedong
- 1964 Anti-US rioting broke out in Panama Canal Zone
- 1965 The Beatles' 65 album goes #1 & stays #1 for 9 weeks
- 1966 Polish government denies exit visa to Cardinal Wyszynski revisionism
- 1967 Georgia legislature seats Rep Julian Bond
- 1967 NFL New Orleans' franchise takes name "Saints"
- 1967 "More of the Monkees" 2nd album by The Monkees is released
- 1968 1st ABA All-Star Game: East 126 beats West 120 at Indiana
- 1968 Surveyor 7 space probe soft lands on Moon
- 1969 First trial flight of Concorde supersonic jetliner, Bristol, England
Event of Interest
1969 Prime Minister of Northern Ireland Terence O'Neill travels to London to meet Home Secretary James Callaghan and brief him on the growing violence in Northern Ireland
Terence O'Neill
James Callaghan
Event of Interest
1972 Billionaire Howard Hughes says Clifford Irving's autobiography is a fake
Howard Hughes
- 1972 Retired passenger liner Queen Elizabeth destroyed by fire in Hong Kong harbour
Event of Interest
1972 Led by future Lakers star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Milwaukee Bucks beat LA Lakers, 120-104, ending LA's consecutive win streak at 33, the longest winning streak in major league sports history
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Event of Interest
1976 Bryan Trottier failed in 4th Islander penalty shot
Bryan Trottier
- 1976 C. W. McCall CB song "Convoy" hits #1 on the country music charts
Event of Interest
1976 Ringo Starr releases "Oh My My" in UK
Ringo Starr
- 1977 "Porgy & Bess" closes at Uris Theater NYC after 122 performances
Super Bowl
1977 Super Bowl XI, Rose Bowl, Pasadena, CA: Oakland Raiders beat Minnesota Vikings, 32-14; MVP: Fred Biletnikoff, Oakland, WR
John Madden
Australian Men's Tennis Open
1977 Australian Open Men's Tennis: American Roscoe Tanner wins his first and only Grand Slam event; beats Guillermo Vilas of Argentina 6-3, 6-3, 6-3
Roscoe Tanner
Guillermo Vilas
Event of Interest
1979 K-Mart pulls Steve Martin's "Let's Get Small" for being in "bad taste"
Steve Martin
- 1979 Supreme Court strikes down (6-3) PA law requiring doctors performing an abortion to try to preserve lives of potentially viable fetuses
Event of Interest
1983 British PM Margaret Thatcher visits Falkland Islands
Margaret Thatcher
Music Single
1984 John Lennon single "Nobody Told Me" released posthumously
John Lennon
- 1984 Rock band Van Halen release their most successful album "1984"
- 1985 Flames set NHL record 264th regular season game without being shut-out
- 1986 NY Islanders repeat their greatest shutout margin (9-0) vs Pittsburgh Penguins
- 1986 After losing a patent battle with Polaroid, Kodak must give up its instant camera business.
- 1987 Chinese Vietnamese border fights, 1,500 killed
- 1987 New Nicaraguan constitution takes effect
- 1988 August Wilson's "Piano Lesson" premieres in Boston
- 1988 US male Figure Skating championship won by Brian Boitano
- 1989 "Pat Sajak Show" premieres on CBS
Hall of Fame
1989 Johnny Bench & Carl Yastrzemski elected to Baseball Hall of Fame
Johnny Bench
Carl Yastrzemski
- 1990 64th US manned space mission STS 32 (Columbia 10) launches into orbit
- 1990 Boston Celtics worst ever (6 pts in 2nd vs NJ Nets) & lose 87-78
- 1990 Jim Palmer & Joe Morgan elected to Baseball Hall of Fame
- 1990 US Supreme Court strikes down Dallas' ordinance imposing strict zoning on sexually oriented businesses
- 1991 Baker & Aziz meet in Geneva; talks fail to defuse gulf crisis
- 1991 Dean Smith of NC is 6th to win 700 career coaching basketball games
Event of Interest
1991 Chicago's Michael Jordan scores a game-high 40 points to lead the Bulls to a 107-99 win over Philadelphia at the Spectrum; reaches the 15,000 point mark of his career
Michael Jordan
- 1992 Alison Halford, Assistant Chief Constable of Merseyside Police (Britain's most senior policewoman) is suspended after allegations of misconduct
- 1993 Franziska van Almsick swims world record 100m free style (53.33)
- 1994 14th United Negro College Fund raises $11,000,000
- 1994 Gunda Niemann skates world record (167.282 pts)
- 1994 Rintje Ritsma skates world record (156.201 points)
- 1995 Ecuador & Peru involved in boundary fight
- 1995 Worker accidentally cuts electrial wires at Newark Airport
- 1996 First episode of "Third Rock from the Sun" screened on NBC
Event of Interest
1997 Heart attacks sends Frank Sinatra back to hospital
Frank Sinatra
- 1997 After 5 days missing, Tony Bullimore rescued alive after his boat capsized in Southern Ocean
- 1998 Anatoly Karpov defeats Viswanathan Anand to retain chess title
- 1998 Anatoly Solovyov & Pavel Vinogradov spacewalk record 3 hrs 8 mins
- 1998 Boston Red Sox Mo Vaughn pleads not guilty to drunken driving
- 1998 Decapitated head of Danish Little Mermaid is returned
Event of Interest
1998 Hockey News selects Wayne Gretzky as the best NHL player ever
Wayne Gretzky
- 1999 Hopman Cup Tennis, Perth: Mark Philippoussis clinches Australia's unassailable 2-0 lead, (ends 2-1), with a 6-3, 7-6 win over Sweden's Jonas Björkman; Australia's first title
Film and TV Awards
2000 26th People's Choice Awards: Harrison Ford & Julia Roberts win (Motion Picture) and Drew Carey & Calista Flockhart win (TV)
Event of Interest
2000 Dan Marino wins his last career NFL game (20-17 vs Seattle)
Dan Marino
Music Awards
2002 Michael Jackson receives the Artist of the Century award at the American music awards
Michael Jackson
Music Awards
2002 29th American Music Awards: Janet Jackson & Lenny Kravitz win
Janet Jackson
Lenny Kravitz
- 2005 The signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, commonly known as the Naivasha Agreement between the Government of Sudan and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement rebel group in Naivasha, Kenya.
Election of Interest
2005 Elections are held to replace Yasser Arafat as head of the Palestine Liberation Organization. He is succeeded by Rawhi Fattouh.
Yasser Arafat
Film and TV Awards
2005 31st People's Choice Awards: Johnny Depp & Julia Roberts win (Motion Picture) and Matt LeBlanc & Marg Helgenberger win (TV)
Event of Interest
2007 Apple Inc CEO Steve Jobs announces the iPhone
Steve Jobs
- 2007 33rd People's Choice Awards: Johnny Depp & Jennifer Aniston win (Movie Star) and Patrick Dempsey & Eva Longoria win (TV)
- 2009 Hopman Cup Tennis, Perth: Dominik Hrbatý beats Russia's Marat Safin 6-7, 7-5, 7-6 for an unassailable 2-0 lead, and Slovakia's 3rd title
