Events in History
Election of Interest
Jan 4 The 110th United States Congress convenes and elects Nancy Pelosi as the 1st female Speaker of the House
Nancy Pelosi
Event of Interest
Jan 9 Apple Inc CEO Steve Jobs announces the iPhone
Steve Jobs
Event of Interest
Jan 11 Author J. K. Rowling finishes the 7th and last Harry Potter novel in room 552 of the Balmoral Hotel, Edinburgh
J. K. Rowling
Event of Interest
Jan 14 Legendary Russian test pilot Marina Popovich is awarded the honorary title "The Hero of the Nation" by the Russian Federation
Marina Popovich
- Jan 15 Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, former Iraqi intelligence chief and half-brother of Saddam Hussein, and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, former chief judge of the Revolutionary Court, are executed by hanging in Iraq.
Historic Publication
Jan 15 Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s novel about the Biafran War, "Half of a Yellow Sun", is published
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
- Jan 17 Doomsday Clock set to five minutes to midnight in response to North Korea's 1st nuclear test
- Jan 18 Hurricane Kyrill: kills at least 44 in Western Europe: strongest British storm in 17 years kills 14 people, worst German storm since 1999 with 13 deaths and causes container Ship MSC Napoli to be destroyed off coast of Devon
- Jan 19 Armenian Journalist Hrant Dink assassinated in front of his newspaper's office by 17 year old Turkish ultranationalist Ogün Samast.
- Jan 21 Awashima Marine Park in Japan catches a video tape of the rare frilled shark.
- Jan 22 The jury portion of the trial against Robert Pickton, accused of being Canada's worst serial killer, opens in New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada.
- Jan 31 Suspects are arrested in Birmingham in the UK, accused of plotting the kidnap, holding and eventual beheading of a serving Muslim British soldier in Iraq
- Feb 3 A Baghdad market bombing kills at least 135 people and injures a further 339.
- Feb 11 A national referendum in Portugal legalises non-therapeutic abortion when requested by the woman during the first 10 weeks of pregnancy.
- Feb 12 A gunman opens fire in a mall in Salt Lake City, killing 5 people in the Trolley Square shooting.
- Feb 13 Taiwan opposition leader Ma Ying-jeou resigns as chairman of the Kuomintang party after being indicted by Taiwan High Prosecutors Office on charges of embezzlement when mayor of Taipei; Ma also announces his candidacy for 2008 presidential election.
- Feb 19 Three Salvadoran deputies to the Central American Parliament and their driver are murdered in Guatemala
- Feb 19 Blogging website Tumblr is founded by David Karp in New York
- Feb 21 Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi resigns from office. His resignation is rejected by the President of Italy, Giorgio Napolitano.
- Feb 23 Japan launches its fourth spy satellite, stepping up its ability to monitor potential threats such as North Korea.
- Feb 23 A train derails on an evening express service near Grayrigg, Cumbria, England, killing one person and injuring 22. This results in hundreds of points being checked over the UK after a few similar accidents.
- Feb 27 The general strike against Lansana Conté in Guinea ends
- Feb 27 The Chinese Correction: the Shanghai Stock Exchange falls 9%, the largest drop in 10 years
- Feb 28 Jupiter flyby of the New Horizons Pluto-observer spacecraft.
- Mar 1 Tornadoes swarm across the southern United States, killing at least 20; eight of the deaths were at a high school in Enterprise, Alabama.
- Mar 1 "Squatters" are evicted from Ungdomshuset in Copenhagen, Denmark, provoking the March 2007 Denmark Riots
- Mar 4 Estonian parliamentary election: approximately 30,000 voters take advantage of electronic voting in Estonia, world's 1st nationwide vote where part of the vote casting allowed by remote electronic voting
- Mar 6 Former White House aide I. Lewis Libby, Jr. is found guilty on four of five counts of perjury and obstruction of justice trial.
- Mar 7 British House of Commons votes to make the upper chamber, the House of Lords, 100% elected
- Mar 9 The US Justice Department releases an internal audit that found that the Federal Bureau of Investigation had acted illegally in its use of the USA Patriot Act to secretly obtain personal information about US citizens
- Mar 23 Burnley Tunnel catastrophe occurs in Melbourne, Australia
- Mar 23 Iranian Navy seize Royal Navy personnel in Iraqi waters
- Mar 24 The Australian Labor Party is reinstated after the New South Wales state elections.
- Mar 31 In Sydney, Australia, 2.2 million people take part in the first Earth Hour.
- Apr 3 Conventional train world speed record: a French TGV train on the LGV Est high speed line sets an official new world speed record.
- Apr 4 15 British Royal Navy personnel held in Iran are released by the Iranian President.
- Apr 11 Two bombings in the Algerian capital of Algiers kill 33 people and wounds a further 222
Event of Interest
Apr 14 At least 200,000 demonstrators in Ankara, Turkey protest against the possible candidacy of incumbent Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
- Apr 16 Virginia Tech massacre: The deadliest mass shooting in modern American history. The gunman, Seung-Hui Cho, kills 32 people and injures 23 others before committing suicide.
- Apr 18 The Supreme Court of the United States upholds the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act in a 5-4 decision
- Apr 20 Johnson Space Center Shooting: A man with a handgun barricades himself in NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas before killing a male hostage and himself.
- Apr 24 Iceland announces that Norway will shoulder the defense of Iceland during peacetime
Event of Interest
Apr 25 Boris Yeltsin's funeral - the first to be sanctioned by the Russian Orthodox Church for a head of state since the funeral of Emperor Alexander III in 1894.
Boris Yeltsin
- Apr 26 Queen's Pier is officially closed by the Hong Kong Government, after a bitter struggle by conservationists, in order to facilitate land reclamation in Hong Kong's Central district
- Apr 27 Estonian authorities remove the Bronze Soldier, a Soviet Red Army war memorial in Tallinn, amid political controversy with Russia.
- Apr 29 2nd Republic protest in support of state secularism held in Istanbul, Turkey
- May 1 The Los Angeles May Day mêlée occurs, in which the Los Angeles Police Department's response to a May Day pro-immigration rally become a matter of controversy.
Historic Publication
May 1 Christopher Hitchens publishes his bestseller "God is not Great" making a case against organized religion
Christopher Hitchens
- May 3 British girl Madeleine McCann disappears from her bed in a holiday apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal
- May 4 Greensburg, Kansas is almost completely destroyed by a 1.7m wide EF-5 tornado
- May 4 The Scottish National Party wins the Scottish general election and becomes the largest party in the Scottish Parliament for the first time ever
- May 5 Kenya Airways Flight KQ 507 crashes in Cameroon.
- May 7 Ehud Netzer of Hebrew University announces he has discovered the tomb of Herod the Great at Herodium, West Bank
Event of Interest
May 8 A new Northern Ireland Executive is formed with Ian Paisley (Democratic Unionist Party) as First Minister and Martin McGuinness (Sinn Féin) as Deputy First Minister
Ian Paisley
Martin McGuinness
Canonization
May 11 Pope Benedict XVI canonizes the first Brazilian-born saint, Frei Galvão
Benedict XVI
- May 12 Riots in Karachi, Pakistan are started by the arrival at Karachi's airport of independently minded Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry and go on to kill 48 people
- May 13 Construction of the Calafat-Vidin Bridge between Romania and Bulgaria begins.
- May 13 5th Republic protest in support of state secularism held in İzmir, Turkey
- May 16 Alex Salmond is elected First Minister of Scotland. He is first Scottish National Party leader to be elected First Minister after winning a historic victory at the Scottish general election on the 3rd May.
Event of Interest
May 16 Nicolas Sarkozy becomes the 23rd President of France
Nicolas Sarkozy
- May 17 Trains from North and South Korea cross the 38th Parallel in a test-run agreed by both governments. This is the first time that trains have crossed the Demilitarized Zone since 1953.
- May 17 Demolition work begins at Dublin's famous Lansdowne Road Stadium to be replaced by the new Aviva Stadium, opened in 2010
- May 21 Cutty Sark, the last surviving tea clipper, is badly damaged by fire in Greenwich, England.
Murder of Interest
Jun 1 Jack Kevorkian is released from prison after serving eight years of his 10-25 year prison term for the 1998 second-degree murder of Thomas Youk
Jack Kevorkian
- Jun 3 USS Carter Hall (LSD-50) engages with pirates after they board Danish ship Danica White off the coast of Somalia
- Jun 5 MESSENGER spacecraft performs a second flyby of Venus
- Jun 8 Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia is hit by the State's worst storms and flooding in 30 years resulting in the death of nine people and the grounding of trade ship, the MV Pasha Bulker
- Jun 10 61st Tony Awards: Spring Awakening & The Coast of Utopia win
Event of Interest
Jun 12 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Russian novelist and historian, is awarded the State Prize of the Russian Federation for his humanitarian work by President Putin
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Vladimir Putin
- Jun 13 The Al Askari Mosque in Samarra is bombed reportedly by Iraqi Baathists, destroying the mosque's two ten-story minarets
Event of Interest
Jun 13 First large scale exhibition of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo's work in Mexico opens at Palacio de Bellas Artes on the 100th anniversary of her birth
Frida Kahlo
- Jun 24 The Angora Fire starts near South Lake Tahoe, California destroying 200+ structures in its first 48 hours
- Jun 25 Flooding in parts of Lincolnshire and Yorkshire in the United Kingdom including Louth, Horncastle and worst affected, Hull
- Jun 27 The Brazilian Military Police invades the favelas of Complexo do Alemão in an episode which is remembered as the Complexo do Alemão massacre.
Election of Interest
Jun 27 Gordon Brown becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
Gordon Brown
- Jun 29 Two car bombs are found in the heart of London at Picadilly Circus.
- Jun 30 A car crashes into Glasgow International Airport in Scotland, believed to be a terrorist attack
- Jul 1 Smoking is banned from English public places and all the UK after earlier bans in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
- Jul 1 Smoking in England is banned in all public indoor spaces: with the ban already in force in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, this means it is illegal to smoke in indoor public places anywhere in the UK. Australia implements a similar ban.
- Jul 7 Pope Benedict XVI issues the Apostolic Letter Summorum Pontificum, removing restrictions on celebrating the old Tridentine Mass
- Jul 11 15th ESPY Awards: LaDainian Tomlinson, Taryne Mowatt win
- Jul 14 Russia withdraws from the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe
- Jul 16 An earthquake of magnitude 6.8 and aftershock of 6.6 occurs off the Niigata coast, Japan, killing 8 people with at least 800 injured and damaging a nuclear power plant. See 2007 Chūetsu offshore earthquake.
- Jul 17 TAM Airlines (TAM Linhas Aéreas) Flight 3054 crashes upon landing during rain in São Paulo. Brazil's deadliest aviation accident to date with estimated 199 deaths.
- Jul 21 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the final book in the series by J. K. Rowling is published worldwide. 11 million copies sell in 24 hrs
- Jul 24 Libya frees all six of the Medics in the HIV trial in Libya
- Jul 25 Pratibha Patil is sworn in as India's 1st female President
- Jul 31 Operation Banner, the presence of the British Army in Northern Ireland, and longest-running British Army operation ever, comes to an end
- Aug 1 The I-35W Mississippi River Bridge spanning the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, Minnesota, collapses during the evening rush hour
- Aug 4 NASA's Phoenix spaceship is launched
Historic Publication
Aug 7 "Eclipse" 3rd book in Stephenie Meyer's "Twilight Saga" is published by Little Brown - initial print run 1 million copies
Stephenie Meyer
- Aug 8 An EF2 tornado touches down in Kings County and Richmond County, New York State, the most powerful tornado in New York to date and the first in Brooklyn since 1889.
Event of Interest
Aug 8 Carlos Slim overtakes Bill Gates as world's richest person with estimated net worth of US$59 billion, according to "Fortune"
Carlos Slim
Bill Gates
Birthdays in History
- Feb 28 Princess Lalla Khadija of Morocco, born in Rabat, Morocco
- Mar 19 Prince Abdullah bin Ali, Prince of Jordan
- Apr 6 Princess Haalah bint Hashim, Princess of Jordan
- Apr 10 Princess Ariane of the Netherlands, Dutch Princess, daughter of King Willem-Alexander and Queen Máxima, born in The Hague, Netherlands
- Apr 18 Princess Haya Bint Al Hamzah, Princess of Jordan, born in Amman, Jordan
- Apr 21 Princess Isabella of Denmark
- Apr 29 Infanta Sofía of Spain, Princess of Spain
- Sep 22 Albert Windsor, descendant of British monarch
- Dec 17 James Windsor, Viscount Severn, son of Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex
Weddings in History
- Feb 3 Jackass prankster Bam Margera (27) weds Missy Rothstein (26) in downtown Philadelphia
- Feb 14 Former Atomic Kitten member Kerry Katona (26) weds Mark Croft in Gretna Green
- Mar 3 Countess of Frederiksborg Alexandra Christina (42) weds Martin Jorgensen at Oster Egende Church in Fakse City, Denmark
- Jul 7 Celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck (57) weds handbag designer Gelila Assefa (38) in a three-day celebration on the Italian island of Capri
- Jul 12 World's tallest man who measures 7'9" Bao Xishun (56) weds Xia Shujian (28) in a traditional Mongolian ceremony at the tomb of Kublai Khan in Beijing, China
- Sep 1 The first Apprentice winner Bill Rancic (36) weds E! News anchor Giuliana DePandi (32) at the Church of Santa Sofia in Capri, Italy
- Sep 8 Duchess Maria-Anna Henriette Gabrielle Julie in Bavaria (32) weds investment banker Klaus Runow near Munich, Germany
- Oct 6 "The Montel Williams Show" talk show host Montel Williams (51) weds American Airlines flight attendant Tara Fowler on a beach in Bermuda
Wedding of Interest
Oct 20 Future French President Emmanuel Macron (30) marries teacher Brigitte Trogneux (54)
Emmanuel Macron
Deaths in History
Deaths 1 - 100 of 384
- Jan 1 Tillie Olsen, American writer, dies at 94
- Jan 1 Leon Davidson, American scientist known for studying UFOs, dies at 84
- Jan 1 Roland Levinsky, South African medical scientist, dies at 63
- Jan 1 Leonard Fraser, Australian serial killer, dies of heart attack at 55
- Jan 2 Teddy Kollek, Israeli politician (Mayor of Jerusalem), dies at 95
- Jan 2 David Perkins, Stanford University geneticist, dies at 87
- Jan 2 Mauno Jokipii, Finnish professor & World War II researcher, dies at 82
- Jan 2 Paek Nam-sun, North Korean Foreign Affairs minister, dies at 77
- Jan 2 Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, American historian, dies at 65
- Jan 2 Robert C. Solomon, American scholar of continental philosophy, dies at 64
- Jan 2 A. Richard Newton, Australian-born technology pioneer & professor, dies at 55
- Jan 2 Garry Betty, American CEO of Earthlink, dies at 49
- Jan 3 William Verity Jr., United States Secretary of Commerce 1987-1989 (b. 1917)
- Jan 3 Michael Yeats, Irish Fianna Fáil senator 1961-1981 and son of W.B. Yeats (b. 1921)
- Jan 3 Sir Cecil Walker, Ulster Unionist Member of Parliament for North Belfast 1983-2001 (b. 1924)
- Jan 4 Marais Viljoen, former State President of South Africa (b. 1915)
- Jan 4 Sir Lewis Hodges, British Air Chief Marshal (b. 1918)
- Jan 4 Osman Waqialla, Sudanese artist and calligrapher (b. 1925)
- Jan 4 Gren, Welsh newspaper cartoonist (b. 1934)
- Jan 4 Gáspár Nagy, Hungarian poet and writer (b. 1949)
- Jan 4 Ben Gannon, Australian theatre film and television producer (b. 1952)
Momofuku Ando
Jan 5 Momofuku Ando, Taiwanese-Japanese inventor of instant noodles and cup noodles, dies of heart failure at 96
Momofuku Ando
- Jan 5 Chih Ree Sun, Chinese-American physicist and poet. dies of kidney and lung cancer at 83 [1]
- Jan 6 Roberta Wohlstetter, military historian and strategist (b. 1912)
- Jan 8 Jane Bolin, first African American female judge, dies at 98
- Jan 8 Francis Cockfield, British politician (b. 1916)
- Jan 8 David Ervine, Northern Irish politician (b. 1953)
- Jan 10 Bradford Washburn, American explorer and cartographer, dies at 96
- Jan 11 Robert Anton Wilson, American author (b. 1932)
- Jan 12 Sir James Killen, Australian politician (b. 1925)
- Jan 15 Bo Yibo, Chinese politician (b. 1908)
- Jan 15 James Hillier, Canadian-American inventor (co-created the electron microscope), dies at 91
- Jan 15 Pura Santillan-Castrence, Filipino writer and diplomat (b. 1905)
- Jan 15 Awad Hamed al-Bandar, former chief judge of the Iraqi Revolutionary Court (b. 1945) (executed)
- Jan 17 Yevhen Kushnaryov, Ukrainian politician (b. 1951)
- Jan 19 Hrant Dink, Turkish-Armenian newspaper editor (b. 1954)
- Jan 20 Anatol Rapoport, Ukrainian-American mathematician and biologist (game theory), dies at 95
- Jan 21 U;Nee, Korean pop artist (b. 1981)
- Jan 22 Doug Blasdell, American personal trainer
- Jan 22 Ngô Quang Trưởng, South Vietnamese general (b. 1929)
- Jan 22 Abbé Pierre, French priest (b. 1912)
- Jan 23 E. Howard Hunt, American intelligence officer involved in Watergate break-in, dies at 88
- Jan 23 Ryszard Kapuściński, Polish journalist and writer (b. 1932)
- Jan 23 Syed Hussein Alatas, Malaysian Politician (b. 1928)
- Jan 24 Guadalupe Larriva, Ecuadorian politician (b. 1956)
- Jan 24 Emiliano Mercado del Toro, World's oldest living man 2004-2007, dies at 115
- Jan 26 Hans J. Wegner, Danish furniture designer (b. 1914)
- Jan 28 Father Robert Drinan, Roman Catholic Priest and American politician (b. 1920)
- Jan 28 Emma Tillman, the world's oldest living person from January 24-28, 2007 (b. 1892)
- Jan 29 Dia Abdul Zahra Kadim, Iraqi extremist leader (b. 1970)
- Jan 31 Molly Ivins, American political columnist and author, dies at 62
- Jan 31 Adelaide Tambo, South African anti-apartheid activist, politician and wife of Oliver Tambo, dies at 77
- Feb 1 Ahmad Abu Laban, Danish Muslim leader, dies at 60
- Feb 2 Filippo Raciti, Italian police officer (b. 1967)
- Feb 3 Ralph de Toledano, Moroccan-born American political columnist and author (b. 1916)
- Feb 3 George Becker, American president of United Steelworkers (1993-2001) (b. 1928)
- Feb 4 Ilya Kormiltsev, Russian poet and translator (b. 1959)
- Feb 4 Jules Olitski, Ukrainian-born American abstract painter and sculptor (b. 1922)
- Feb 5 Alfred Worm, Austrian investigative journalist (b. 1945)
- Feb 5 Leo T. McCarthy, American politician and 43rd Lieutenant Governor of California (1983-1995) (b. 1930)
- Feb 6 Lee Hoffman, American author (The Valdez Horses), dies at 74
- Feb 6 Len Hopkins, Canadian politician (b. 1930)
- Feb 8 Ian Stevenson, Canadian-American parapsychologist and reincarnation expert, dies at 88
- Feb 11 Marianne Fredriksson, Swedish author (Simon and the Oaks), dies at 79
- Feb 13 Elizabeth Jolley, British-born Australian writer (Palomino), dies at 83
- Feb 13 Charlie Norwood, American politician (b. 1941)
- Feb 13 Richard Gordon Wakeford, Air Marshal, Royal Air Force (b. 1922)
- Feb 15 Robert Adler, Austrian-American inventor (remote control for television), dies at 93
- Feb 17 Jurga Ivanauskaitė, Lithuanian writer (b. 1961)
- Feb 17 Maurice Papon, French Nazi collaborator, dies at 92
- Feb 20 F. Albert Cotton, American chemist, dies at 76
- Feb 22 Howard Verne Ramsey, oldest U.S. veteran of WWI (b. 1898)
- Feb 22 Samuel Hinga Norman, Sierra Leonean alleged war criminal (b. 1940)
- Feb 22 George Jellicoe, Lord Privy Seal and Leader of the House of Lords & Special Boat Service veteran, dies at 88
- Feb 25 William R. Anderson, CO USS Nautilus submarine, US Congressman (b. 1921)
- Feb 27 Bernd von Freytag-Loringhoven, German soldier (b. 1914)
- Feb 28 John Smith, English landowner, financier and Philanthropist (National Trust, Landmark Trust), dies at 83 [1]
- Feb 28 Charles Forte, Italian-British hotel magnate (Savoy), dies at 98
- Feb 28 Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. American historian (1946 Pulitzer-Age of Jackson), dies at 89
- Mar 2 Ivan Safronov, Russian journalist (b. 1956)
- Mar 2 Thomas S. Kleppe, U.S. politician (b. 1919)
- Mar 2 Henri Troyat, Russian-French author and historian, dies at 95
- Mar 4 Bob Hattoy, American activist (b. 1950)
- Mar 4 Sunil Kumar Mahato, Indian parliamentarian (b. 1966)
- Mar 4 Jorge Kolle Cueto, Bolivian politician
- Mar 4 Thomas Eagleton, American politician (38th Lieutenant Governor of Missouri), dies at 77
- Mar 6 Jean Baudrillard, French cultural theorist, philosopher, political commentator and photographer (b. 1929)
- Mar 6 Ernest Gallo, American winemaker (b. 1909)
- Mar 9 Jeanne Hopkins Lucas, North Carolina politician (b. unknown)
- Mar 14 Lucie Aubrac, French history teacher and member of the French Resistance (b. 1912)
- Mar 15 Charles Harrelson, American hitman and father of Woody Harrelson (b. 1938)
- Mar 15 Stuart Rosenberg, American film and television director (b. 1927)
- Mar 17 John Backus, American computer scientist and inventor (FORTRAN computer language), dies at 82
- Mar 17 Jim Cronin, Animal welfare campaigner and founder of Monkey World in Dorset, England. (b. 1951)
- Mar 20 Gilbert E. Patterson, presiding bishop of COGIC (b. 1939)
- Mar 20 Hawa Yakubu, Ghanaian politician (b. 1948)
- Mar 20 Taha Yassin Ramadan, Iraqi politician (b. 1938)
- Mar 20 Raynald Fréchette, Quebec politician and judge, dies at 73
- Mar 21 Drew Hayes, American writer & graphic artist (b. 1969)
- Mar 21 Sven O. Høiby, the father of Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway (b. 1936)