- 401 St. Innocent I begins his reign as Catholic Pope
- 1135 Norman nobles recognize Stefanus van Blois as English king
- 1216 Pope Honorius III delegates decree "Religiosam vitam eligentibus"
- 1465 Peace of St Truiden: Louis van Bourbon becomes bishop of Liège
- 1536 English scholar Reginald Pole appointed cardinal
- 1590 Army of Moroccan Pasha Ahmad al-Mansur begins its epic 135 day crossing of the Saharan desert on his way to defeat the Songhai Empire
- 1596 Ferryboat Meuniers crashes in Paris, 150 die
- 1642 Pope Urbanus VIII publishes decree In eminente
Historic Event
1688 Earl of Danby occupies York for King William III, Prince of Orange
- 1689 Heavy earthquake strikes Innsbruck, Austria
- 1715 English pretender to the throne James III lands at Peterhead
- 1731 Dutch people revolt against meat tax
- 1772 Moravian missionary constructs 1st schoolhouse west of Allegheny
- 1775 Continental navy organized with 7 ships
- 1790 Supposedly impenetrable Turkish fortress of Izmail stormed and captured by Suvorov and his Russian armies during the Russo-Turkish War (1787–92)
Historic Event
1807 US Congress passes Embargo Act and President Thomas Jefferson signs into law. Prohibits American ships from trading in foreign ports, as result of involvement in hostilities between France and Britain
Historic Event
1849 The execution of Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky by firing squad is called off at the last second
Thomas Edison's Phonograph
1877 Thomas Edison's phonograph is announced by Scientific American
Historic Event
1882 1st string of Christmas tree lights created by Thomas Edison
- 1883 August Strindberg's "Lycko-Pers Reja" premieres
Historic Event
1885 Itō Hirobumi, a samurai, becomes the first Prime Minister of Japan
Historic Event
1894 French officer Alfred Dreyfus court-martialed for treason, triggers worldwide charges of anti-Semitism (Dreyfus later vindicated)
- 1905 Arrest of St Petersburg Soviet members leads to an uprising of Moscow workers and fighting in the street
- 1907 Saint-Saëns'/Fokine's ballet "Le Cygne" premieres in St Petersburg
- 1910 US postal savings stamps 1st issued
- 1917 Flanders declares its independence, under Pieter Tack
- 1919 US deports 250 alien radicals, including anarchist Emma Goldman
- 1922 Belgian parliament rejects Dutch university in Ghent
- 1924 Philip Barry's "Youngest" premieres in NYC
- 1930 Convention of Economic Rapprochement/Oslo Agreesments signed between some European countries in response to the Great Depression
Historic Event
1931 Retrospective show of Mexican artist Diego Rivera opens at The Museum of Modern Art in New York
- 1934 1st flight from Netherland to Curacao (Christmas flight 1934)
- 1934 Miss Theo Trowbridge sets female bowling record 702 pins in games
- 1935 Yaeko Iwasaki, student of D S Harada Roshi, 1st awakening in Kamakura
- 1936 1st common carrier license issued by ICC, Scranton, Pa
- 1937 Lincoln Tunnel, under the Hudson River, opens to traffic, connecting Weehawken, New Jersey to Midtown Manhattan, New York City
- 1939 Finnish counter offensive at Petsamo
- 1939 Freight train and passenger train head-on collision kills 101 at Markdorf, Germany
- 1939 Genthin, Germany rail disaster - 186 die in train wreck as an express has a rear-end collision with a train stopped at the station
- 1940 World War II: Himarë is captured by the Greek army.
- 1941 Japan's invasion leader lands on Luzon, Philippines
Conference of Interest
1941 Winston Churchill arrives in Washington, D.C. for a wartime conference
Historic Invention
1942 World War II: Adolf Hitler signs the order to develop the V-2 rocket as a weapon
- 1944 Germans demand surrender of American troops at Bastogne, Belgium
- 1944 Sub Swordfish departs Pearl Harbor for Japan
- 1945 Utrecht: Catholic People's party (KVP) established
- 1947 Italian constituent assembly adopts new constitution
- 1950 2 self-propelled trains of Long Island RR collide, killing 77
- 1952 French government of Pinay, resigns
- 1956 Colo is born, the first gorilla to be bred in captivity at Columbus Zoo and Aquarium, Columbus, Ohio
- 1956 Last British & French troops leave Egypt
- 1958 2nd Dutch Beel government forms
- 1959 Continental League awards its last franchise to Dallas-Fort Worth
- 1961 US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
- 1962 Harris County voters approve all-weather stadium for Houston Colt .45s
- 1962 Kinderman Place in the Bronx named
- 1962 USSR performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya USSR
- 1963 Cruise ship Lakonia burns 180 miles north of Madeira with the loss of 128 lives
- 1963 Oakland Raider Tom Flores passes for 6 touchdowns vs Houston (52-49)
Historic Event
1963 Official 30-day mourning period for President John F. Kennedy ends
- 1964 First flight of the US aircraft Lockheed SR-71, reaches 3,530 kph (record for a jet)
- 1965 Belgian government shuts 6 coal mines
- 1965 Great Britain sets national maximum road speed at 70 miles per hour
- 1965 Radio Mil (Domincan Republic) transmitter blown up
- 1970 Treblinka SS commander Franz Stangl sentenced to life imprisonment
Historic Event
1971 UN General Assembly ratifies former Austrian President Kurt Waldheim as Secretary-General
- 1971 USSR performs underground nuclear test
- 1972 6.25 earthquake strikes Managua Nicaragua, 12,000+ killed
- 1973 OPEC Gulf Six decides to raise the posted price of marker crude from $5.12 to $11.65 per barrel effective January 1, 1974
- 1974 2nd cease-fire between IRA & British; lasts until approx April 1975
- 1974 Iraq announces plans to increase its oil production capacity
Historic Event
1974 Provisional Irish Republican Army bomb home of former UK Prime Minister, Edward Heath, just before announcing Christmas ceasefire
- 1974 Referenda in Comoros-3 islands for independence, 1 stays French
Historic Event
1975 US President Gerald Ford signs the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA)
Historic Event
1980 US President-elect Ronald Reagan appoints Jeanne Kirkpatrick (UN Ambassador) & James Watt (Secretary of the Interior)
Historic Event
1981 Argentine general Leopoldo Galtieri sworn in as military dictator and President of Argentina
- 1981 Belgium's 5th government of Martens forms
- 1982 William Mastrosimone's play "Extremities" premieres in NYC
Meeting of Interest
1983 Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak meets with PLO leader Yasser Arafat
- 1984 Bernhard Goetz shoots 4 black muggers on NYC subway train
- 1985 STS 51-L vehicle moves to Launch Pad 39B
- 1988 2 robbers wearing police uniforms rob armored truck of $3 M in NJ
- 1988 South Africa signs accord granting independence to South West Africa
- 1988 Tug hits oil barge, spreads 231,000 gal on 300 mi of WA & BC coast
Historic Event
1989 After 23 years of dictatorial rule, Romania ousts Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu
- 1989 Cold wave: -6°F in Tulsa, Oklahoma; -12°F in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; -18°F in Denver, Colorado; -23°F in Kansas City, Missouri; -42°F in Scottsbluff, Nebraska; -47°F in Hardin, Montana; and -60°F in Black Hills, South Dakota
- 1989 Republic of Chad (Africa) adopts its Constitution
- 1990 Iraq announces it will never give up Kuwait
- 1990 Israeli ferry capsizes killing 21 US servicemen
Election of Interest
1990 Lech Wałęsa sworn in as Poland's 1st popularly elected president
Historic Event
1992 Archives of Terror detailing police repression under Dictator Alfredo Stroessner and proving existence of Operation Condor, found by activist Dr. Martín Almada in Asunción, Paraguay [1]
- 1992 Libyan MIG-23UB attacks Boeing 727 at Souk al-Sabt, 158 die
Historic Event
1994 Italian government of Silvio Berlusconi resigns
- 1997 Acteal massacre: Attendees at a prayer meeting of Roman Catholic activists for indigenous causes in the small village of Acteal in the Mexican state of Chiapas are massacred by paramilitary forces.
- 1997 Merck baldness pill for men approved by FDA
- 1999 The Spanish Civil Guard finds near Calatayud (Zaragoza) another van loaded by ETA with 750 kg of explosives (see related event on December 21, 1999).
- 2000 On This Day launched as HistoryOrb.com
Historic Event
2001 Burhanuddin Rabbani, political leader of the Afghan Northern Alliance, hands over power in Afghanistan to the interim government headed by President Hamid Karzai
- 2001 Richard Reid attempts to destroy a passenger airliner by igniting explosives hidden in his shoes aboard American Airlines Flight 63.
- 2003 A magnitude 6.6 earthquake hits near San Simeon, California.
- 2006 Australian archaeologist Sue O'Connor finds first evidence of modern humans in Jerimalai cave, near Lene Hara cave in East Timor
Historic Event
2010 Repeal of the "Don't Ask Don't Tell policy", a 17-year-old policy banning homosexuals serving openly in the US military, signed into law by President Barack Obama
- 2012 6 people are killed by a car bomb in Damascus
- 2012 8 people are killed by a suicide bomber in Peshawar, Pakistan
- 2016 Ebola vaccine VSV-EBOV is found to be 70-100% effective in a study published in The Lancet, becoming the world's first proven vaccine against Ebola
- 2017 UN Security Council votes 15 to 0 for additional sanctions on North Korea, including measures to slash the country's petrol imports by up to 90%
- 2018 Partial shutdown of US federal government begins
Krakatoa: The World’s Mightiest Explosion
2018 Tsunami hits Indonesia's Sunda Strait killing over 400 after part of the Anak Krakatoa volcano slips into the sea
- 2022 Major winter storm across the US causes widespread disruption, prompting states of emergency to be issued in Wisconsin and New York [1]
- 2022 US Drug Enforcement Administration says it seized enough fentanyl in 2022 to kill every American, more than 379 million doses of [1]