December 2nd
 

1547 ~ Death of Hernán Cortés, Spanish explorer and conqueror.

1804 ~ At Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned as the first Emperor of France in a thousand years.

1814 ~ Death of Marquis de Sade, Writer

1859 ~ Militant abolitionist leader John Brown was hanged for his October 16th raid on Harper's Ferry.

1915 ~ Albert Einstein completed his presentations before the Prussian Academy of Sciences of the general theory of relativity.

1923 ~ Birthday of Maria Callas, Opera Singer.

1942 ~ Manhattan Project: Below the bleachers of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago, a team led by Enrico Fermi initiatd the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction (a coded message, "The Italian navigator has landed in the new world" was then sent to US President Franklin D. Roosevelt).

1961 ~ Cold War: In a nationally broadcast speech, Cuban leader Fidel Castro declared that he was a Marxist-Leninist and that Cuba was going to adopt Communism.

1972 ~ Gough Whitlam became Prime Minister of Australia. His first action using executive power was to withdraw all Australian personnel from the Vietnam War.

1990 ~ War on Drugs: Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar was shot and killed in Medellín.

December 3rd
 

1815 ~ Death of John Carroll - First Roman Catholic Archbishop in the U.S.

1854 ~ Eureka Stockade: More than twenty gold miners at Ballarat, Australia were killed by state troopers in an uprising over mining licenses. Claimed by some to be the birth of Australian democracy.

1857 ~ Birthday of Joseph Conrad, Writer,

1894 ~ Death of Robert Louis Stevenson, Writer.

1917 ~ After nearly 20 years of planning and construction, the Quebec Bridge opened to traffic (the bridge partially collapsed on August 29, 1907 and September 11, 1916).

1919 ~ Death of Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Painter.

1967 ~ At Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa, Lewis Washkansky became the first human to receive a heart transplant. The transplant team was headed by Christiaan Barnard.

1970 ~ October Crisis: In Montreal, Quebec, kidnapped British Trade Commissioner James Cross was released by the Front de Libération du Québec terrorist group after being held hostage for 60 days. Police negotiate his release and in return the Government of Canada grants five terrorists from the FLQ's Chenier Cell their request for safe passage to Cuba.

1984 ~ Bhopal Disaster: A methyl isocyanate leak from a pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, killed more than 3,800 people in one of the worst industrial disasters in history.

1989 ~ Cold War: In a meeting off the coast of Malta, US President George H. W. Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev released statements indicating that the cold war between their nations may be coming to an end.

December 4th
 

1110 ~ First Crusade: The Crusaders conquered Sidon.

1642 ~ Death of Cardinal Richelieu, French statesman.

1674 ~ Father Jacques Marquette founded a mission on the shores of Lake Michigan which would later grow into the city of Chicago, Illinois.

1679 ~ Death of Thomas Hobbes, political philosopher.

1849 ~ Birthday of Crazy Horse, American Indian leader.

1872 ~ The crewless American ship Mary Celeste was found by the British brig Dei Gratia. The ship had been abandoned for 9 days but was only slightly damaged.

1952 ~ Great Smog of 1952: A "killer fog" descended on London. "Smog" for "smoke" and "fog" becomes a word.

1976 ~ Death of Benjamin Britten, Composer.

1991 ~ Pan Am Airlines ceased operations.

1991 ~ Journalist Terry Anderson was released after a seven years' captivity as a hostage in Beirut. He was the last and longest-held American hostage in Lebanon.

December 5th
 

1492 ~ Christopher Columbus discovered the island of Hispaniola, now Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

1766 ~ In London, James Christie held his first sale. He later founded Christie's, the world's oldest auction house.

1791 ~ Death of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Composer.

1839 ~ Birthday of George Armstrong Custer, American general.

1890 ~ Birthday of Fritz Lang, film director.

1901 ~ Birthday of Werner Karl Heisenberg, physicist.

1901 ~ Birthday of Walt Disney, film producer.

1926 ~ Sergei Eisenstein's "Battleship Potemkin", debuted.

1933 ~ Prohibition ends: Utah became the 36th U.S. state to ratify the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution, establishing the required 3/4th of states needed to enact the amendment. This overturned the 18th Amendment, which had outlawed the sale of alcohol in the United States.

1945 ~ Flight 19, a United States Navy training flight was lost in the Bermuda Triangle.

December 6th
 

1768 ~ First edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica waspublished.

1884 ~ The Halifax explosion killed more than 1900 people, and destroyed part of the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

1896 ~ Birthday of Ira Gershwin, Lyricist.

1920 ~ Birthday of Dave Brubeck, jazz musician.

1929 ~ Birthday of Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Conductor.

1933 ~ Federal judge John M. Woolsey ruled that the James Joyce novel Ulysses was not obscene.

1972 ~ Launch of the last manned Saturn V, carrying the Apollo 17 astronauts on the last manned lunar landing mission.

1989 ~ The École Polytechnique Massacre: a man killed 14 young women in Montreal, Quebec.

1992 ~ In Ayodhya, India, right-wing Hindus belonging to the nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party and allied organizations demolished the Babri Masjid, a 16th century mosque, which they claim was built upon the birth place of Lord Rama.

2002 ~ Death of Philip Berrigan, civil rights activist.

December 7th
 

43 B.C. ~ Death of Cicero, Roman politician and author.

1761 ~ Birthday of Marie Tussaud, museum proprietress and waxwork modeler.

1817 ~ Death of William Bligh, British naval officer.

1905 ~ Birthday of Gerard Kuiper, Astronomer.

1928 ~ Birthday of Noam Chomsky, Linguist.

1941 ~ The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor officially brought the United States into World War II.

1965 ~ Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras simultaneously lift mutual excommunications that had been in place since 1054.

1970 ~ Death of Rube Goldberg, cartoonist.

1975 ~ Indonesia invaded East Timor.

1982 ~ First US execution by lethal injection was carried out.

December 8th
 

1542 ~ Birthday of Mary Queen of Scots.

1864 ~ Death of George Boole, Mathematician.

1914 ~ Battle of the Falkland Islands fought.

1925 ~ Birthday of Sammy Davis Jr., Actor & Singer.

1939 ~ Birthday of James Galway, Irish flutist.

1949 ~ Chinese Civil War: The capital of the Republic of China was moved from Nanjing to Taipei, Taiwan.

1978 ~ Death of Golda Meir, former Prime Minister of Israel.

1980 ~ Mark David Chapman kills former Beatle John Lennon.

1991 ~ Leaders of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine met and signed an agreement ending the U.S.S.R. and establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in the Belovezhskaya Pushcha Nature Reserve in Belarus.

1993 ~ The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is signed into law by US President Bill Clinton.

December 9th
 

1608 ~ Birthday of John Milton, Poet & Writer.

1793 ~ New York City's first daily newspaper, the “American Minerva”, is established by Noah Webster.

1851 ~ First YMCA in North America established in Montreal.

1868 ~ Birthday of Fritz Haber, German chemist, Nobel prize winner in 1918.

1937 ~ Battle of Nanjing began. The Rape of Nanjing followed

1950 ~ Harry Gold sentenced to thirty years in jail for stealing United States nuclear weapon secrets for the Soviet Union.

1961 ~ Adolf Eichmann found guilty of war crimes in Israel.

1962 ~ Birthday of Tanganyika became a republic.

1987 ~ First Intifada begins in the Gaza Strip and West Bank.

1996 ~ Death of Mary Leakey, Archeologist & Anthropologist.

December 10th
 

1815 ~ Birthday of Ada Lovelace, first computer programmer.

1822 ~ Birthday of César Franck, Composer & Organist

1830 ~ Birthday of Emily Dickinson, Poet.

1864 ~ William Tecumseh Sherman reached Savannah, Georgia, ending his "March to the Sea".

1896 ~ Death of Alfred Nobel, chemist, founder of the Nobel Prize.

1901 ~ Theodore Roosevelt won the Nobel Peace Prize.

1931 ~ Japanese forces landed in the Philippines, captured Guam and sank the HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse.

1953 ~ Dr. Albert Schweitzer was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

1965 ~ The Grateful Dead played their first concert, at the Fillmore in San Francisco.

1984 ~ Desmond Tutu won the Nobel Peace Prize.

December 11th
 

1725 ~ Birthday of George Mason, American patriot, "Father of the Bill of Rights"

1803 ~ Birthday of Hector Berlioz, Composer.

1882 ~ Birthday of Max Born, physicist and 1954 Nobel laureate.

1918 ~ Birthday of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Russian author, 1970 Nobel laureate.

1931 ~ Statute of Westminster gave legislative independence to Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Ireland and Newfoundland.

1937 ~ Edward VIII's abdication as King of the United Kingdom became effective.

1941 ~ Germany and Italy declared war on the United States.

1943 ~ Birthday of John Kerry, US politician.

1981 ~ Muhammad Ali's last fight – he lost to Trevor Berbick.

1994 ~ A small bomb exploded on Philippine Airlines Flight 434, killing a Japanese businessman. The bombing done by Ramzi Yousef to test explosives that would have been used in Project Bojinka.

December 12th
 

1531 ~ Apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Mexico City.

1901 ~ First radio transmission across the Atlantic Ocean by Guglielmo Marconi.

1913 ~ Mona Lisa recovered in Florence, two years after it was stolen.

1915 ~ Birthday of Frank Sinatra, Singer & Actor.

1927 ~ Birthday of Robert Noyce, one of the men credited with the invention of the integrated circuit.

1939 ~ Finland defeated the Soviet Union in the Battle of Tolvajärvi, their first major victory in the Winter War.

1963 ~ Kenya gained its independence from the United Kingdom.

1971 ~ Death of David Sarnoff, radio and television pioneer.

1999 ~ Death of Joseph Heller, Author.

2003 ~ Death of Keiko, the killer whale in the “Free Willy” movies.

December 13th
 

1204 ~ Death of Maimonides, Sephardi Philosopher.

1642 ~ Abel Janszoon Tasman reaches New Zealand.

1784 ~ Death of Samuel Johnson, Essayist.

1816 ~ Birthday of Werner von Siemens, Engineer, Inventor & Industrialist.

1925 ~ Birthday of Dick Van Dyke, Actor & Comedian.

1938 ~ 100 deportees from Sachsenhausen built the Neuengamme concentration camp near Hamburg.

1949 ~ The Knesset voted to move the capital of Israel to Jerusalem.

1974 ~ Malta became a republic.

1996 ~ Kofi Annan elected as Secretary-General of the United Nations.

2003 ~ Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was captured near Tikrit.

December 14th
 

1503 ~ Birthday of Nostradamus, Astrologer & Mathematician.

1546 ~ Birthday of Tycho Brahe, Astronomer.

1799 ~ Death of George Washington, first President of the United States.

1900 ~ Max Planck published his study of the quantum theory.

1902 ~ First telegraph cable laid across the Pacific Ocean.

1911 ~ First expedition reached the South Pole, led by Roald Amundsen.

1939 ~ USSR expelled from the League of Nations.

1962 ~ Birthday of Ginger Lynn Allen, Actress.

1962 ~ Mariner 2 became the first spacecraft to fly by Venus.

1995 ~ The Dayton Agreement was signed in Paris to end the Yugoslav wars.

December 15th
 

37 ~ Birthday of Nero, Roman emperor.

1702 ~ Forty-seven ronin, formerly in the service of Asano Naganori, assaulted the household of Kira Yoshinaka, and killed him in vengeance for their lord. Their display of the ideals of bushido became a national legend.

1832 ~ Birthday of Gustave Eiffel, civil engineer.

1852 ~ Birthday of Antoine Henri Becquerel, physicist and recipient of the Nobel Prize in physics.

1916 ~ France defeated Germany in Battle of Verdun.

1923 ~ Birthday of Freeman Dyson, Physicist.

1952 ~ Death of Wolfgang Ernst Pauli, Physicist.

1961 ~ An Israeli war crimes tribunal sentenced Adolph Eichmann to die for his part in the Jewish holocaust.

1966 ~ Death of Walt Disney, Animator & Cartoonist.

1994 ~ Netscape Navigator 1.0 first released.

December 16th
 

1653 ~ Oliver Cromwell became Lord Protector of England, Scotland and Ireland.

1770 ~ Birthday of Ludwig van Beethoven, Composer.

1773 ~ The Boston Tea Party.

1775 ~ Birthday of Jane Austen, Writer.

1893 ~ World premiere of Antonin Dvorak's "New World Symphony"

1901 ~ Birthday of Margaret Mead, Anthropologist.

1917 ~ Birthday of Sir Arthur C. Clarke, Science Fiction Writer.

1928 ~ Birthday of Philip K. Dick, Science Fiction Writer.

1944 ~ World War II: The Battle of the Bulge began. A V-2 rocket hit the Rex Cinema in Antwerp killing 567 people.

1998 ~ Operation Desert Fox: American and British aircraft began to bomb Iraqi targets after Iraq obstructed UN weapons inspectors.

December 17th
 

1778 ~ Birthday of Humphry Davy, chemist.

1830 ~ Death of Simón Bolívar, Latin American politician & Activist.

1843 ~ ”A Christmas Carol”, a fictional short story by Charles Dickens, was first published.

1903 ~ The first controlled, powered heavier-than-air flight occurred when the Wright brothers took to the air, both of them twice at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

1961 ~ India seized Goa from Portugal.

1969 ~ U.S. Air Force announced that its UFO investigations found no evidence of extraterrestrial spacecraft.

1973 ~ The American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses.

1982 ~ ”Tootsie” opened in theaters.

1989 ~ Brazil held its first free election in 25 years.

1989 ~ The first half-hour length episode of The Simpsons debuted with their Christmas special, "Simpsons Roasting Over an Open Fire".

December 18th
 

1642 ~ Abel Tasman landed at Mohua Golden Bay becoming the first European in New Zealand.

1737 ~ Death of Antonio Stradivari, Italian violin maker.

1786 ~ Birthday of Carl Maria von Weber, Composer.

1863 ~ Birthday of Franz Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria (d. 1914)

1865 ~ Slavery was abolished in the United States, with the passing of the 13th Amendment.

1912 ~ Piltdown Man "discovered"

1916 ~ Battle of Verdun ended, with an estimated 700,000 casualties.

1936 ~ Death of Andrija Mohorovičić, Croatian seismologist.

1946 ~ Birthday of Steven Spielberg, movie director.

2002 ~ California Governor Grey Davis announced that the state would face a budget deficit of $35 billion, roughly double the figure reported during his reelection campaign one month earlier. The budget issue was used to support his 2003 recall from office.

December 19th
 

1732 ~ Benjamin Franklin first published Poor Richard's Almanack.

1848 ~ Death of Emily Brontë, Author.

1888 ~ Birthday of Fritz Reiner, Conductor.

1906 ~ Birthday of Leonid Brezhnev, Soviet politician.

1961 ~ The Indian Army invaded the Portuguese colony of Goa.

1962 ~ Nyasaland seceded from Rhodesia and Nyasaland.

1974 ~ The Altair 8800, the first personal computer, went on sale.

1979 ~ ”Kramer vs. Kramer” opened in theaters, starring Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep.

1984 ~ The United Kingdom and People's Republic of China signed the Sino-British Joint Declaration, which returned Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty in 1997.

1988 ~ The U.S. House of Representatives passed articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton over the Lewinsky scandal.

December 20th
 

1833 ~ Birthday of Samuel Mudd, physician, possible conspirator in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

1860 ~ South Carolina became the first state to secede from the United States.

1901 ~ Birthday of Robert Van de Graaff, Physicist & Inventor.

1915 ~ Last Australian troops evacuated from Gallipoli.

1968 ~ Death of John Steinbeck, writer.

1982 ~ Death of Artur Rubinstein, musician.

1995 ~ NATO begins peacekeeping in Bosnia.

1996 ~ Death of Carl Sagan, Astronomer & Writer.

1999 ~ Vermont's Supreme Court ruled that homosexual couples are entitled to the same benefits and protections as married heterosexual couples.

1999 ~ Macau was returned to the People's Republic of China by Portugal.

December 21st
 

1118 ~ Birthday of Thomas Becket, lord chancellor and archbishop of Canterbury.

1375 ~ Death of Giovanni Boccaccio, writer.

1804 ~ Birthday of Benjamin Disraeli, Politician & Writer.

1872 ~ HMS Challenger sailed from Portsmouth on the 4 year scientific expedition that would lay the foundation for the science of oceanography.

1898 ~ Marie and Pierre Curie discovered radium.

1914 ~ First feature-length silent film comedy, “Tillie's Punctured Romance”, starring Marie Dressler, Mabel Normand and Charles Chaplin, was released.

1940 ~ Death of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Writer.

1945 ~ Death of George S. Patton, U.S. General.

1988 ~ A terrorist bomb exploded in Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland killing 270, including 11 on the ground.

1999 ~ The Spanish Civil Guard intercepted a Madrid-bound van driven by ETA and loaded with 950 kg of explosives. The next day, another van loaded with 750 kg was found not far from there. Shortly after 9/11, ETA confirmed their plan had been to blow down Torre Picasso.

December 22nd
 

1858 ~ Birthday of Giacomo Puccini, Composer.

1880 ~ Death of George Eliot, Writer

1898 ~ The Dreyfus affair began in France when Alfred Dreyfus was wrongly convicted of treason.

1939 ~ Death of Ma Rainey, blues singer.

1944 ~ German forces demanded the surrender of Allied troops at Bastogne, Belgium.

1989 ~ Ion Iliescu takes over as president of Romania, ending Nicolae Ceauşescu's Communist dictatorship.

1989 ~ Berlin's Brandenburg Gate re-opened after nearly 30 years, effectively ending the division of East and West Germany.

1990 ~ Lech Wałęsa sworn in as President of Poland.

2001 ~ Birthday of Cc the cat, first cloned pet.

2001 ~ Richard Reid tried to destroy a passenger airliner by igniting explosives hidden in his shoes.

December 23rd

1790 ~ Birthday of Jean François Champollion, Egyptologist. He deciphered the Rosetta Stone.

1823 ~ “A Visit From St. Nicholas”, by Clement Clarke Moore, was first published

1834 ~ Death of Thomas Malthus, Demographer and Economist

1939 ~ Death of Anthony Fokker, aircraft manufacturer.

1947 ~ The transistor was first demonstrated at Bell Laboratories.

1953 ~ Death of Lavrenty Beria, Soviet Communist leader.

1954 ~ The first organ transplant of a kidney was performed by Doctors Murray and Harrison in Boston. Dr. Murray would later win a Nobel prize for his pioneering work.

1979 ~ Soviet military occupies Kabul, Afghanistan.

2012 ~ The Mayan calendar comes to an end (may also be December 21). This day was predicted by the Mayans to be when life on Earth is going to end.

Feastdays & Holidays

Fans of Seinfeld - Festivus (for the restofus) held.

December 24th
 

1491 ~ Birthday of Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus (Jesuit order)

1818 ~ Silent Night composed by Franz Xaver Gruber.

1818 ~ Birthday of James Prescott Joule, Physicist.

1910 ~ Birthday of Fritz Leiber, Science Fiction writer.

1914 ~ Birthday of John Muir, Naturalist.

1957 ~ Birthday of Hamid Karzai, first democratically elected President of Afghanistan.

1968 ~ The crew of the USS Pueblo was released by North Korea after being held for 11 months on suspicion of spying.

1974 ~ Cyclone Tracy devastated Darwin, Australia.

2003 ~ The Spanish police prevented ETA from detonating 50 kg of explosives at 3:55 PM inside Madrid's busy Chamartín Station.

December 25th
 

800 ~ Coronation of Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor, in Rome.

1066 ~ Coronation of William the Conqueror as king of England, at Westminster Abbey, London.

1223 ~ Saint Francis of Assisi assembles the first Nativity scene.

1642 ~ Birthday of Sir Isaac Newton, physicist and mathematician.

1821 ~ Birthday of Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross.

1914 ~ World War I: The "Christmas truce" began.

1918 ~ Birthday of Anwar Sadat, Egyptian president.

1938 ~ Birthday of Karel Čapek, Czech author, inventor of the word robot.

1989 ~ Death of Nicolae Ceauşescu, Romanian dictator (executed).

1991 ~ Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as president of the Soviet Union (the union itself is dissolved the next day).

December 26th
 

1620 ~ Elizabeth Bathory's crimes were uncovered.

1791 ~ Birthday of Charles Babbage, Mathematician and designer of computing machines.

1792 ~ Final trial of Louis XVI of France began in Paris.

1890 ~ Death of Heinrich Schliemann, German archaeologist.

1893 ~ Birthday of Mao Zedong, Chinese Politician.

1925 ~ Turkey adopted the Gregorian Calendar.

1933 ~ FM radio was patented.

1966 ~ The first Kwanzaa was celebrated.

1982 ~ TIME magazine's “Man of the Year” was for the first time given to a non-human; a computer.

1998 ~ Iraq announced its intention to fire upon US and British warplanes that patroled the northern and southern "no-fly zones".

December 27th
 

1571 ~ Birthday of Johannes Kepler, astronomer.

1822 ~ Birthday of Louis Pasteur, Scientist.

1831 ~ Charles Darwin embarked on his journey aboard the HMS Beagle.

1904 ~ James Barrie's play Peter Pan premiers in London.

1943 ~ Birthday of Cokie Roberts, journalist.

1949 ~ Queen Juliana of the Netherlands granted Indonesia sovereignty.

1978 ~ Spain became a democracy after 40 years of dictatorship.

1985 ~ Naturalist Dian Fossey is found murdered in Rwanda.

1985 ~ Palestinian guerrillas killed twenty people inside Rome and Vienna airports.

2002 ~ Two truck bombs kill 72 and wound 200 at the pro-Moscow headquarters of the Chechen government in Grozny, Chechnya.

January1st
 

45 BC ~ 45 BC - Julian calendar went into effect.

404 ~ Last known gladiator competition in Rome.

1752 ~ Birthday of Betsy Ross, American seamstress.

1801 ~ Discovery of 1 Ceres, first known asteroid.

1879 ~ Birthday of E. M. Forster, English novelist.

1892 ~ Ellis Island opens to begin accepting immigrants to the United States.

1894 ~ Birthday of Satyendra Nath Bose, Indian mathematician

1901 ~ Establishment of the Commonwealth of Australia (Federation).

1983 ~ The ARPANET officially changed to use the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.

2002 ~ Euro banknotes and coins became legal tender.

January 2nd
 

1492 ~ Granada, the last Moorish stronghold in Spain, surrendered.

1727 ~ Birthday of James Wolfe, British general in French and Indian War.

1757 ~ The United Kingdom captures Calcutta, India.

1872 ~ Brigham Young was arrested for bigamy (25 wives).

1882 ~ John D. Rockefeller united his oil holdings into the Standard Oil trust.

1901 ~ Female fair-ground boxer, Mrs. Grace O'Malley, mother of 6, from Great Howard street, Liverpool, KO'ed twelve Yorkshire miners in an all comers bout, with a prize purse of five shillings

1904 ~ Death of James Longstreet, Confederate general.

1920 ~ Birthday of Isaac Asimov, Russian-born American science fiction author.

1929 ~ Canada and the United States agreed on a plan to preserve Niagara Falls.

1942 ~ World War II: Manila was captured by Japanese forces.

January 3rd
 

106 B.C. ~ Birthday of Cicero, Roman statesman and philosopher.

1521 ~ Pope Leo X excommunicated Martin Luther.

1833 ~ Britain seized control of the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic.

1892 ~ Birthday of J. R. R. Tolkien, South African-born writer and philologist.

1899 ~ The first known use of the word automobile, in an editorial in the New York Times.

1925 ~ Benito Mussolini announced that he was taking dictatorial powers over Italy.

1945 ~ Birthday of Stephen Stills, American singer, songwriter, and guitarist.

1956 ~ Birthday of Mel Gibson, Australian actor and director.

1979 ~ Death of Conrad Hilton, American hotelier.

1993 ~ In Moscow, George Bush and Boris Yeltsin signed the second Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START).

January 4th
 

1643 ~ Birthday of Isaac Newton, English scientist and philosopher.

1710 ~ Birthday of Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, Composer.

1785 ~ Birthday of Jakob Grimm, German philologist, one half of the Brothers Grimm.

1809 ~ Birthday of Louis Braille, Inventor of a writing system for the blind.

1847 ~ Samuel Colt sold his first revolver pistol to the United States government.

1884 ~ The Fabian Society was founded in London.

1948 ~ Burma gained its independence from the United Kingdom.

1961 ~ Death of Erwin Schrödinger, Austrian physicist.

1965 ~ Death of T. S. Eliot, Anglo-American poet.

1967 ~ Death of Donald Campbell when his jet-powered “Bluebird K7” crashed during an attempt to break the water speed record.

2004 ~ Spirit, the first of two NASA Mars Rovers, landed successfully on Mars.

January 5th
 

1500 ~ Duke Ludovico Sforza conquered Milan.

1781 ~ American Revolutionary War: Richmond, Virginia was burned by British naval forces led by Benedict Arnold.

1896 ~ An Austrian newspaper reported that Wilhelm Roentgen discovered a type of radiation later known as X-rays.

1900 ~ Irish leader John Edward Redmond called for a revolt against British rule.

1914 ~ Ford Motor Company announced an eight-hour workday and a minimum wage of $5 for a day's labor.

1943 ~ Death of George Washington Carver, American educator, activist, botanist.

1964 ~ Pope Paul VI met the Greek patriarch Athenagoras I in Jerusalem, the first meeting of Catholic and Orthodox Christianity leaders since 1439.

1972 ~ President of the United States Richard Nixon ordered the development of a space shuttle program.

1997 ~ Withdrawal of Russian forces from Chechnya.

2000 ~ The 1st day of the 2000 Al Qaeda Summit.

January 6th
 

1412 ~ Birthday of Joan of Arc, French Patriot & Saint.

1822 ~ Birthday of Heinrich Schliemann, German archaeologist.

1838 ~ Samuel Morse first successfully tested the electrical telegraph.

1838 ~ Birthday of Max Bruch, German composer.

1884 ~ Death of Gregor Johann Mendel, the father of genetics.

1907 ~ Maria Montessori opened her first school and daycare center for working class children in Rome.

1918 ~ Death of Georg Cantor, German mathematician.

1942 ~ Pan American Airlines became the first commercial airline to have a flight go around the world.

1946 ~ William Joyce (Lord Haw-Haw) hanged for treason.

1995 ~ A chemical fire in an apartment complex in Manila, Philippines lead to the discovery of plans for Project Bojinka, a mass-terrorist attack.

January 7th
 

1558 ~ France took Calais, the last continental possession of England.

1610 ~ Galileo Galilei observed the four largest moons of Jupiter for the first time.

1785 ~ Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American John Jeffries travel from Dover, England to Calais, France in a gas balloon, becoming the first to cross the English Channel by air.

1899 ~ Birthday of Francis Poulenc, French composer.

1916 ~ Birthday of Paul Keres, Estonian chess player.

1922 ~ Birthday of Jean-Pierre Rampal, French flutist.

1924 ~ George Gershwin completed Rhapsody in Blue.

1927 ~ First international telephone call - New York City to London.

1943 ~ Death of Nikola Tesla, Serbian-born inventor, electrical engineer.

1999 ~ The impeachment trial of U.S. President Bill Clinton began.

January 8th
 

1324 ~ Death of Marco Polo Italian explorer.

1642 ~ Death of Galileo Galilei, Tuscan astronomer, father of the scientific method.

1735 ~ Birthday of John Carroll, first Roman Catholic Archbishop in the U.S.

1746 ~ Bonnie Prince Charlie occupied Stirling.

1889 ~ Herman Hollerith received a patent for his electric tabulating machine.

1925 ~ Birthday of Gerald Durrell, British naturalist and writer.

1926 ~ Abdul-Aziz ibn Saud became the King of Saudi Arabia.

1942 ~ Birthday of Stephen Hawking, English theoretical physicist.

1958 ~ 14 year old Bobby Fischer won the U.S. Chess Championship.

1999 ~ Cosmologists announced that the expansion rate of the universe is increasing.

January 9th
 

1431 ~ Trial of Joan of Arc began in Rouen.

1768 ~ Philip Astley staged the first modern circus in London.

1793 ~ Jean-Pierre Blanchard became the first to fly in a balloon in the United States.

1859 ~ Birthday of Carrie Lane Chapman Catt, women's rights leader, founder of the League of Women Voters.

1882 ~ Oscar Wilde gave his first lecture on "The English Renaissance of Art" in New York.

1890 ~ Birthday of Karel Čapek, Czech writer.

1903 ~ Hallam Tennyson, 2nd Baron Tennyson, son of the poet Alfred Tennyson, became the second Governor-General of Australia

1951 ~ United Nations headquarters officially opened in New York City.

1960 ~ Construction of the Aswan Dam begins in Egypt.

2005 ~ Elections held to elect successor to Yasser Arafat.

January 10th
 

49 BC ~ Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon.

1776 ~ Thomas Paine published Common Sense.

1778 ~ Death of Carolus Linnaeus, Swedish botanist.

1862 ~ Death of Samuel Colt, Inventor.

1927 ~ The film “Metropolis” by Fritz Lang premiered.

1929 ~ Tintin, a comic book character created by Hergé, made his debut. He went on to be published in over 200 million comic books in 40 languages.

1945 ~ Birthday of Rod Stewart, English singer.

1949 ~ Birthday of Linda Lovelace, pornographic film actress.

1951 ~ Death of Sinclair Lewis, American writer.

1994 ~ Lorena Bobbitt went on trial for severing the penis of her husband John.

January 11th
 

1571 ~ Austrian nobility is granted freedom of religion.

1693 ~ Eruption of Mt. Etna.

1787 ~ William Herschel discovered Titania and Oberon, two moons of Uranus.

1843 ~ Death of Francis Scott Key, Composer.

1935 ~ Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly solo from Hawaii to California.

1938 ~ Birthday of Arthur Scargill, trade union leader.

1964 ~ U.S. Surgeon General Luther Terry reported smoking may be hazardous to health. First such statement from US government.

1972 ~ East Pakistan became Bangladesh.

1980 ~ Nigel Short, 14, became the youngest chess player to be awarded the degree of International Master.

1992 ~ Paul Simon became the first major artist to tour South Africa after the end of the cultural boycott.

January 12th
 

1665 ~ Death of Pierre de Fermat, mathematician & lawyer.

1709 ~ Little Ice Age: Two-month freezing period begins in France - The coast of the Atlantic and Seine River froze, crops failed and at least 24.000 Parisians die.

1838 ~ In order to avoid anti-Mormon persecution, Joseph Smith, Jr. and his followers left Ohio for Missouri.

1856 ~ Birthday of John Singer Sargent, artist.

1893 ~ Birthday of Hermann Göring, Nazi official.

1908 ~ A long-distance radio message was sent from the Eiffel Tower for the first time.

1976 ~ Death of Agatha Christie, Writer.

1991 ~ Persian Gulf War: An act of the U.S. Congress authorized the use of military force to drive Iraq out of Kuwait.

1992 ~ In the movie ”2001: A Space Odyssey”, the computer HAL 9000 was supposed to have been initially activated on this date.

2003 ~ Death of Leopoldo Fortunato Galtieri, dictator of Argentina.

January 13th
 

888 ~ Death of Charles the Fat, Holy Roman Emperor, King of Swabia, East Francia, Saxony, Bavaria and Italy.

1599 ~ Death of Edmund Spenser, Poet (The Faerie Queene)

1625 ~ John Milton, 16, admitted to Christ's College, Cambridge.

1832 ~ Birthday of Horatio Alger, Jr., Unitarian minister & Author.

1854 ~ The accordion is patented by Anthony Faas.

1929 ~ Death of Wyatt Earp, Western legend.

1941 ~ Death of James Joyce, Writer.

1977 ~ Birthday of Orlando Bloom, Actor.

1991 ~ Soviet military troops attacked Lithuanian independence supporters in Vilnius.

1992 ~ Japan apologizes for forcing Korean women into sexual slavery during World War II.

January 14th
 

1690 ~ The clarinet was invented in Nuremberg, Germany.

1741 ~ Birthday of Benedict Arnold, General in United States' War of Independence, turncoat.

1784 ~ The U.S. Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris, formally ending the American War of Independence.

1857 ~ Birthday of Albert Schweitzer, Alsatian physician, Christian missionary, philosopher, and musician, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize 1952.

1898 ~ Death of Lewis Carroll, Writer & Mathematician.

1900 ~ Giacomo Puccini's opera Tosca premiered in Rome.

1957 ~ Death of Humphrey Bogart, Actor

1978 ~ Death of Kurt Gödel, Mathematician.

1994 ~ U.S. President Bill Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed the Kremlin accords which ended the preprogrammed aiming of nuclear missiles to targets and also provided for the dismantling of the nuclear arsenal in Ukraine.

2000 ~ A United Nations tribunal sentenced five Bosnian Croats to up to 25 years for the 1993 killing of over 100 Muslims in a Bosnian village.