Historic Event
1431 Judges' investigations for the trial of Joan of Arc begin in Rouen, France, the seat of the English occupation government
- 1464 1st meeting of States-General of Netherlands
Historic Event
1493 1st sight of manatees by Christopher Columbus
Historic Event
1570 Tsar Ivan the Terrible kills 1,000-2,000 residents of Novgorod
Constitution of the United States
1788 Connecticut becomes 5th state to ratify the US constitution
Historic Event
1799 British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger introduces income tax to raise funds for the war against Napoleon
Historic Event
1806 Admiral Viscount Horatio Nelson receives a state funeral and is interred in St Paul's Cathedral, London
- 1811 1st Women's Golf Tournament held
First Photograph of a Person
1839 Daguerreotype photo process announced at French Academy of Science
- 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
- 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
- 1868 Last convict ship the Hougoumont arrives in Fremantle, ending 80 years of penal transportation to Australia [1]
- 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 William K.L. Dickson's motion picture "Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze" aka "Fred Ott's Sneeze" receives first US copyright for the format; it was filmed a few days earlier at Edison Studio, West Orange, New Jersey [1]
- 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)
- 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
Music History
1927 Dmitri Shostakovich' Octet opus 11 premieres in Moscow
- 1927 Fire in Laurier Palace cinema in Montreal, 78 children died
Historic Event
1928 Eugene O'Neill's "Marco Millions" premieres in NYC
Historic Event
1930 Albert Kahn Associates architectural firm become consulting architects for all industrial construction in the Soviet Union
- 1933 Amsterdam confectionery worker go on strike against wage reduction
Music History
1936 Noël Coward's stage drama "Astonished Heart" premieres in London
Theater Premiere
1937 Maxwell Anderson's stage drama "High Tor" premieres at Martin Beck Theatre, NYC; runs for 171 performances, wins Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Play
- 1940 2 German officers make emergency landing in Belgium
- 1940 James Thurber and Elliott Nugent's stage comedy "The Male Animal" premieres at the Cort Theater. NYC; runs for 243 performances
- 1941 6,000 Jews murdered in a pogrom in Bucharest, Romania
- 1941 Maiden flight by Canada's British-built Avro Lancaster military plane
Historic Event
1945 US soldiers led by Gen Douglas MacArthur invades Philippines
Historic Event
1947 Elizabeth "Betty" Short, the black dahlia, is last seen alive.
- 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
Music Premiere
1948 Walter Piston's 3rd Symphony in E, premieres in Boston by the Boston Symphony Orchestra; conducted by Serge Koussevitzky; wins 1947 Pulitzer Prize
Sports History
1952 Marines give notice that they will recall Ted Williams to active duty
- 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
Music History
1956 Musical "Peter Pan", starring Mary Martin broadcast live, for a 2nd time, on NBC as part of "Producers' Showcase" series
Sports History
1958 In basketball Oscar Robertson (Cin) scores 56, Seton Hall team 54
Television Premiere
1959 "Rawhide" with Clint Eastwood premieres on CBS TV
- 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
Historic Event
1963 Mao Zedong writes his poem "Reply to Comrade Kuo Mo-jo"
Hey, Hey – We're The Monkees
1967 "More of the Monkees" second album by The Monkees is released
Historic Event
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
Historic Event
1972 Billionaire Howard Hughes says Clifford Irving's autobiography is a fake
- 1972 Retired passenger liner Queen Elizabeth destroyed by fire in Hong Kong harbour
Sports History
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
Sports History
1976 Bryan Trottier failed in 4th Islander penalty shot
- 1976 C. W. McCall CB song "Convoy" hits #1 on the country music charts
Music Single
1976 Ringo Starr releases single "Oh My My" in the UK
- 1977 Revival of George Gershwin's "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
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
Film & TV History
1979 K-Mart pulls Steve Martin's "Let's Get Small" for being in "bad taste"
- 1979 Supreme Court strikes down (6-3) PA law requiring doctors performing an abortion to try to preserve lives of potentially viable fetuses
Historic Event
1983 British PM Margaret Thatcher visits Falkland Islands
Music Single
1984 John Lennon single "Nobody Told Me" released posthumously
- 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
Historic Event
1988 August Wilson's "Piano Lesson" premieres in Boston
Sports History
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
Hall of Fame
1990 Jim Palmer & Joe Morgan elected to Baseball Hall of Fame
- 1991 Dean Smith of NC is 6th to win 700 career coaching basketball games
Sports History
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
- 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 electrical wires at Newark Airport
- 1996 First episode of "Third Rock from the Sun" screened on NBC
Music History
1997 Heart attacks sends singer Frank Sinatra back to hospital
Sports History
1998 Anatoly Karpov defeats Viswanathan Anand to retain chess title
Sports History
1998 Hockey News selects Wayne Gretzky as the best NHL player ever
- 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)
Sports History
2000 Miami Dolphin QB Dan Marino wins his last career NFL game (20-17 vs Seattle)
Music Awards
2002 Michael Jackson receives the Artist of the Century award at the American Music Awards
Music Awards
2002 29th American Music Awards: Janet Jackson & Lenny Kravitz win
- 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.
Film and TV Awards
2005 31st People's Choice Awards: Johnny Depp & Julia Roberts win (Motion Picture) and Matt LeBlanc & Marg Helgenberger win (TV)
