Blognewsandmore: much more than just news

Democracy in Video Pills - Don't Ask Don't Tell

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Thu, 24 May 2007 17:33:00 +0000

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Democracy in Video Pills: The Gas price well over $3 a Gallon

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Thu, 24 May 2007 13:04:00 +0000

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acy in Video Pills: DemocrThe truth about Weapons of Mass Destruction

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Thu, 24 May 2007 12:52:00 +0000

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Officials: Smith's death caused by overdose

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Mon, 26 Mar 2007 16:09:00 +0000

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FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida (CNN) -- An accidental drug overdose killed former reality TV star and Playboy playmate Anna Nicole Smith, Seminole tribal police Chief Charlie Tiger said Monday.

Tiger said there was no evidence of foul play.

"We are convinced, based on extensive review of the evidence, that this case is an accidental overdose with no other criminal element present," Tiger said Monday.

The medical examiner's office had said on March 7 that the cause of Smith's death had been determined, but it would not be announced for one to two weeks to give police time to finish the investigation.

Broward County Medical Examiner Joshua Perper wanted to make sure none of the investigators' findings change any of his own findings, his office said then.

Perper said Monday that Smith was taking nine different kinds of medication in the days before her death, including a sleeping aid.

Tiger said Monday the case was now closed.

Smith, 39, was pronounced dead February 8 after being found unconscious in her hotel room at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino near Hollywood, Florida.

(to see the entire article, click on the title).

Eye To Eye: Gore And Branson

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Mon, 12 Feb 2007 02:09:00 +0000

Super Bowl XLI - Bears Vs. Colts

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 18:16:00 +0000

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Will iPhone keep its promises? Watch the videos and think about them

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 14:50:00 +0000

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What happened this coming weekdays (Events): January 8th - 12th

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 05:26:00 +0000

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January 8th

871 - Battle of Ashdown - Ethelred of Wessex defeats a Danish invasion army.
1198 - Innocent III becomes Pope.
1297 - Monaco gains its independence.
1499 - Louis XII of France marries Anne of Brittany.
1734 - Premiere of George Frideric Handel's Ariodante at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.
1746 - Bonnie Prince Charlie occupies Stirling.
1790 - George Washington delivers the first State of the Union Address address in New York City.
1806 - Cape Colony becomes a British colony.
1811 - Unsuccessful slave revolt led by Charles Deslandes in St. Charles and St. James, Louisiana.
1815 - War of 1812: Battle of New Orleans - Andrew Jackson leads American forces in victory over the British.
1838 - Alfred Vail demonstrates a telegraph using dots and dashes (this is the forerunner of Morse code).
1863 - American Civil War: Second Battle of Springfield
1863 - Yorkshire County Cricket Club is founded at the Adelphi Hotel in Sheffield, England.
1867 - African American men granted the right to vote in the District of Columbia.
1877 - Crazy Horse and his warriors fight their last battle with the United States Cavalry (Montana).
1889 - Herman Hollerith receives a patent for his electric tabulating machine.
1900 - United States President William McKinley places Alaska under military rule.
1906 - A landslide in Haverstraw, New York, kills 20 people due to the excavation of clay along the Hudson River.
1908 - A train collision occurs in the Park Avenue Tunnel in New York City killing 17 people, injuring 38 and leading to increased demand for electric trains.
1912 - The African National Congress was founded.
1916 - World War I: Allied forces withdraw from Gallipoli.
1918 - President Woodrow Wilson announces his "Fourteen Points" for the aftermath of World War I.
1920 - The Czechoslovak Hussite Church was founded by Dr. Karel Farský.
1922 - The Social Democratic Youth League of Norway is founded.
1926 - Abdul-Aziz ibn Saud becomes the King of Hejaz and renames it Saudi Arabia.
1935 - Arthur C. Hardy patents the spectrophotometer.
1953 - René Mayer becomes Prime Minister of France.
1956 - Operation Auca: Five U.S. missionaries are killed by the Huaorani of Ecuador shortly after making contact with them.
1958 - Fourteen-year-old Bobby Fischer wins the United States Chess Championship.
1959 - Conquest of Cuba by Fidel Castro is completed with the conquest of Santiago de Cuba.
1959 - Michel Debré becomes Prime Minister of France.
1962 - Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is exhibited in the United States for the first time (National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.).
1962 - Harmelen train disaster kills 93 people in The Netherlands.
1964 - President Lyndon B. Johnson declares a "War on Poverty" in the United States.
1973 - Watergate scandal: The trial of seven men accused of illegal entry into Democratic Party headquarters at Watergate begins.
1975 - Ella Grasso becomes Governor of Connecticut, becoming the first woman to serve as a Governor in the United States who did not succeed her husband.
1977 - Soviet space mission Luna 21 is launched.
1979 - The tanker Betelgeuse explodes in Bantry Bay, Ireland (The Betelgeuse incident).
1982 - AT&T agrees to divest itself of twenty-two subdivisions.
1987 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average gains 8.30 to close at 2,002.25 -- The Dow's first close above 2,000.
1989 - Kegworth air disaster kills 47 people in Great Britain.
1989 - Beginning of Japanese Heisei era.
1994 - Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov on Soyuz TM-18 leaves for Mir. He will stay on the space station until March 22, 1995, for a record 437 days in space.
1996 - An Antonov 32 cargo turboprop powered plane crashes into the central market in Kinshasa, Zaire killing more than 350 people.
2004 - RMS Queen Mary 2, the largest passenger ship ever built, was christened by her namesake's granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth II.
2006 - A magnitude 6.9 earthquake epicentered just off the Greek island of Kythira hits much of the country and is felt throughout the entire eastern Mediterranean Sea.

January 9th

475 - Byzantine Emperor Zeno is forced to flee his capital at Constantinople.
1349 - The Jewish population of Basel, Switzerland, is rounded up and incinerated, believed by the residents to be the cause of the ongoing bubonic plague.
1431 - Judges' investigations for the trial of Joan of Arc begin in Rouen, France, the seat of the English occupation government.
1760 - Afghans defeat Marathas in Battle of Barari Ghat.
1768 - Philip Astley stages the first modern circus (London).
1788 - Connecticut becomes the fifth state to join the United States.
1793 - Jean-Pierre Blanchard becomes the first to fly in a balloon in the United States.
1816 - Sir Humphry Davy tests the Davy lamp for Miners at Hebburn Colliery.
1822 - The Portuguese prince Pedro I of Brazil decides to stay in Brazil against the orders of the Portuguese king João VI, starting the Brazilian independence process.
1839 - The French Academy of Sciences announces the Daguerreotype photography process.
1857 - The Fort Tejon earthquake of California occurs, registering an estimated magnitude of 7.9.
1858 - Anson Jones, the final President of the Republic of Texas, commits suicide.
1861 - American Civil War: The "Star of the West" incident occurs near Charleston, South Carolina. It is considered by some historians to be the "First Shots of the American Civil War.")
1861 - Mississippi becomes the second state to secede from the Union before the outbreak of the American Civil War.
1863 - American Civil War: the Battle of Fort Hindman occurs in Arkansas.
1878 - Umberto I becomes King of Italy.
1880 - The Great Gale of 1880 devastates parts of Oregon and Washington with high wind and heavy snow.
1882 - Oscar Wilde gives his first lecture on "The English Renaissance of Art" in New York.
1894 - New England Telephone and Telegraph installs the first battery-operated telephone switchboard in Lexington, Massachusetts.
1900 - S.S. Lazio is founded in Rome, Italy.
1903 - Hallam Tennyson, 2nd Baron Tennyson, son of the famous poet Alfred Tennyson, becomes the second Governor-General of Australia.
1905 - According to the Julian Calendar which was used at the time, Russian workers stage a march on the Winter Palace that ends in the massacre by Czarist troops known as Bloody Sunday, setting off the Russian Revolution of 1905.
1912 - United States Marines invade Honduras.
1916 - The Ottoman Empire prevails in the Battle of Çanakkale, as the last British troops are evacuated.
1917 - World War I: the Battle of Rafa occurs near the Egyptian border with Palestine.
1923 - Juan de la Cierva makes the first autogyro flight.
1929 - The Seeing Eye is established in Nashville, Tennessee, with the mission to train dogs for assisting the blind.
1945 - The United States invades Luzon in the Philippines.
1951 - United Nations headquarters officially opens in New York City.
1960 - Construction of the Aswan Dam begins in Egypt.
1964 - Several Panamanian youths try to put up the Panamanian flag on the US-controlled Panama Canal Zone, during the fight the Panama flag is torn, setting off four days of fighting between US armed forces and civilian Panamanians around the country. This day is known as Martyrs' Day.
1965 - The Hope Slide in British Columbia kills 4 people near Hope, British Columbia.
1972 - RMS Queen Elizabeth is destroyed by fire in Victoria Harbour, Hong Kong.
1977 - The Oakland Raiders defeat the Minnesota Vikings 32-14 at Super Bowl XI. Wide receiver Fred Biletnikoff is named Most Valuable Player.
1986 - After losing a patent battle with Polaroid, Kodak leaves the instant camera business.
1991 - The Soviets storm Vilnius to stop Lithuanian independence.
1995 - Valeri Poliakov completes 366 days in space while aboard the Mir space station, breaking a duration record.
1997 - A Comair Embraer 120 crashes during approach into Detroit Metro Airport, killing 29 people.
2002 - The United States Department of Justice announces it is going to pursue a criminal investigation of Enron.
2005 - Elections are held to replace Yasser Arafat as head of the Palestine Liberation Organization. He is succeeded by Rawhi Fattouh.
2006 - The Phantom of the Opera surpasses the record set by Cats for the title of longest running show on Broadway.
2006 - The first The Howard Stern Show via Sirius Satellite Radio is broadcast.

January 10th

49 BC - Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon, signaling the start of civil war.
236 - Saint Fabian begins his reign as a Catholic Pope.
1072 - Robert Guiscard conquers Palermo.
1475 - Stephen III of Moldavia defeats the Ottoman Empire at the Battle of Vaslui.
1776 - Thomas Paine publishes Common Sense.
1806 - Dutch settlers in Cape Town surrender to the British.
1810 - Marriage of Napoleon and Josephine is annulled.
1811 - African-American slaves in Louisiana rebel in two parishes.
1861 - American Civil War: Florida secedes from the US.
1863 - The first section of the London Underground Railway opens, between Paddington and Farringdon Street.
1870 - John D. Rockefeller incorporates Standard Oil.
1901 - The first great Texas gusher, oil discovered at Spindletop in Beaumont, Texas.
1920 - League of Nations holds its first meeting and ratifies the Treaty of Versailles ending World War I.
1922 - Arthur Griffith is elected President of the Irish Free State.
1923 - Lithuania seizes and annexes Memel.
1927 - The film Metropolis by Fritz Lang premieres.
1929 - Tintin, a comic book character created by Hergé, makes his debut. He went on to be published in over 200 million comic books in 40 languages.
1941 - Lend-Lease is introduced into the US Congress.
1946 - First General Assembly of the United Nations opens in London. Fifty-one nations are represented.
1957 - Harold Macmillan becomes the prime minister of the United Kingdom.
1962 - Apollo Project: NASA announces plans to build the C-5 rocket booster. It became better known as the Saturn V moon rocket, which launched every Apollo moon mission.
1969 - After 147 years, the last issue of The Saturday Evening Post is published.
1982 - The lowest ever UK temperature of -27.2°C was recorded at Braemar in Aberdeenshire. This equaled the record set in the same place on February 11, 1995. The record would be equalled again at Altnaharra on December 30, 1995
1982 - The Catch - Dwight Clark of the San Francisco 49ers made a leaping catch from Joe Montana with 58 seconds to play to defeat the Dallas Cowboys 28-27 in the NFC Championship Game at Candlestick Park.
1984 - The US and the Vatican establish full diplomatic relations after 117 years.
1989 - Cuban troops begin withdrawing from Angola.
1990 - Time Warner is formed from the merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications Inc.
1999 - The Sopranos airs its pilot episode on HBO.
1999 - A large piece of the chalk cliff at Beachy Head collapsed into the sea.
2000 - America Online announces an agreement to buy Time Warner for $162 billion, the largest corporate merger in history.
2001 - Wikipedia starts as part of Nupedia. It becomes a separate site five days later.
2005 - A mudslide occurred in La Conchita, CA killing 10 people, injuring many more and closing the Highway 101, the main coastal corridor between San Francisco and Los Angeles, for 10 days.
2007 - Start of the 12th ASEAN Summit and 2nd East Asia Summit in Metro Cebu, Philippines. Meetings involve heads of the 10 member states and 6 dialogue partners with major discussions on relevance, diplomacy, security, economy and free trade and other important global issues.

January 11th

314 - Pope Miltiades ends his reign as the Catholic Pope.
532 - Nika riots in Constantinople.
1158 - Vladislav II becomes King of Bohemia.
1569 - First recorded lottery in England.
1571 - Austrian nobility is granted freedom of religion.
1693 - Mt. Etna erupts in Sicily, Italy.
1759 - In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the first American life insurance company is incorporated.
1779 - Ching-Thang Khomba crowned King of Manipur
1787 - William Herschel discovers Titania and Oberon, two moons of Uranus.
1794 - Robert Forsythe, a US Marshal was killed in Augusta, Georgia when trying to serve court papers, the first US Marshal to die in action.
1805 - Michigan Territory is created.
1861 - Alabama secedes from the United States.
1863 - American Civil War: Battle of Arkansas Post - General John McClernand and Admiral David Dixon Porter capture the Arkansas River for the Union.
1867 - Benito Juárez becomes Mexican president again.
1879 - Anglo-Zulu War begins.
1880 - Total solar eclipse blackens the sky of San Francisco one day after the funeral of Emperor Norton.
1902 - Popular Mechanics magazine was published for the first time.
1908 - Grand Canyon National Monument is created.
1912 - Lawrence textile strike begins in Lawrence, Massachusetts.
1919 - Romania annexes Transylvania.
1922 - First use of insulin to treat diabetes in a human patient.
1923 - Troops from France and Belgium occupy the Ruhr area to force Germany to pay its reparation payments.
1935 - Amelia Earhart is the first woman to fly solo from Hawaii to California.
1938 - Frances Moulton is the first woman to become president of a U.S. national bank.[citation needed]
1942 - Japan declares war on the Netherlands and invades the Netherlands East Indies.
1942 - The Japanese capture Kuala Lumpur.
1943 - The United States and United Kingdom give up territorial rights in China.
1946 - Enver Hoxha declares the People's Republic of Albania with himself as dictator.
1946 - Porfirio Barba-Jacob's ashes go back to Colombia.
1949 - First recorded case of snowfall in Los Angeles, California.
1957 - The African Convention is founded in Dakar.
1960 - Chad declares its independence.
1962 - Eruption of the Huascaran volcano in Peru; 4,000 deaths.
1963 - The Whisky a Go Go night club in Los Angeles, the first disco in the USA, is opened.
1964 - United States Surgeon General Luther Leonidas Terry reports smoking may be hazardous to health. First such statement from U.S. government.
1972 - East Pakistan becomes Bangladesh.
1973 - Beginning of the Watergate burglars trial.
1974 - The world's first surviving set of sextuplets are born to Susan Rosenkowitz in Cape Town, South Africa.
1980 - Nigel Short, 14, is the youngest chess player to be awarded the degree of International Master.
1982 - A cold snap sends temperatures to record lows in dozens of cities throughout the Midwestern United States.
1986 - The Gateway Bridge, Brisbane in Queensland, Australia is officially opened.
1990 - 300,000 march in favor of Lithuanian independence.
1992 - Paul Simon is the first major artist to tour South Africa after the end of the cultural boycott.
1994 - Irish Government announces the end of a 15-year broadcasting ban on the IRA and its political arm Sinn Féin
1995 - The WB Television Network begins operations.
1996 - Haiti becomes a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.
1998 - Sidi-Hamed massacre in Algeria; over 100 people killed.
2001 - The Federal Trade Commission approved the merger of AOL and Time Warner to form AOL Time Warner.
2003 - Illinois governor George H. Ryan announces decision to grant clemency to all inmates of death row.
2005 - Black Tuesday bushfires swept across the southern Eyre Peninsula in South Australia.

January 12th

475 - Basiliscus becomes Byzantine Emperor, with a coronation ceremony in the Hebdomon palace in Constantinople.
1528 - Gustav I of Sweden crowned king of Sweden.
1592 - Titus Andronicus first staged at the Rose Theatre.
1773 - The first public Colonial American museum opens in Charleston, South Carolina.
1777 - Mission Santa Clara de Asís is founded in what is now Santa Clara, California.
1838 - In order to avoid prosecution under laws banning polygamy, Joseph Smith, Jr. and his followers leave Ohio for Missouri.
1848 - The Palermo rising in Sicily rises against the Bourbon kingdom of the Two Sicilies
1866 - Royal Aeronautical Society is formed in London.
1872 - Yohannes IV is crowned Emperor of Ethiopia in Axum, the first imperial coronation in that city in over 200 years.
1875 - Kwang-su becomes emperor of China.
1898 - Ito Hirobumi begins his third term as Prime Minister of Japan.
1908 - A long-distance radio message is sent from the Eiffel Tower for the first time.
1915 - The Rocky Mountain National Park is formed by an act of U.S. Congress.
1915 - United States House of Representatives rejects proposal to give women the right to vote.
1926 - Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll premiere their radio program Sam 'n' Henry, a precursor to Amos 'n' Andy; possibly the first situation comedy.
1932 - Hattie W. Caraway becomes the first woman elected to the United States Senate.
1940 - World War II: Russia bombs cities in Finland.
1942 - President Franklin Roosevelt creates the National War Labor Board.
1945 - World War II: The Soviets begin a large offensive in Eastern Europe against the Nazis.
1964 - Rebels in Zanzibar begin a revolt known as the Zanzibar Revolution and proclaimed a republic.
1966 - Lyndon B. Johnson states that the United States should stay in South Vietnam until Communist aggression there is ended.
1966 - Batman the TV series debuts on ABC.
1967 - Dr. James Bedford becomes the first person to be cryonically preserved with intent of future resuscitation.
1969 - Led Zeppelin's debut album released.
1970 - Biafra capitulates, ending the Nigerian civil war.
1971 - All in the Family debuts on CBS.
1971 - Harrisburg Six: The Reverend Philip Berrigan and five others are indicted on charges of conspiring to kidnap Henry Kissinger and of plotting to blow up the heating tunnels of federal buildings in Washington, DC.
1976 - UN Security Council votes 11-1 to allow the Palestinian Liberation Organization to participate in a Security Council debate (without voting rights).
1986 - Space Shuttle program: STS-61-C mission - Space Shuttle Columbia takes-off with the first Hispanic-American astronaut, Dr. Franklin R. Chang-Diaz. It was the last successful mission before STS-51-L.
1991 - Persian Gulf War: An act of the U.S. Congress authorizes the use of military force to drive Iraq out of Kuwait.
1992 - A new constitution, providing for freedom to form political parties, is approved by referendum in Mali.
1995 - Malcolm X's daughter, Qubilah Shabazz, is arrested for conspiring to kill Louis Farrakhan.
1998 - Nineteen European nations agree to forbid human cloning.
2005 - Deep Impact (space mission) launches from Cape Canaveral by a Delta 2 rocket.
2006 - The foreign ministers of the United Kingdom, France, and Germany declare that negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program have reached a dead end and recommend that Iran be referred to the United Nations Security Council. (ABC)
2006 - A stampede during the Stoning the Devil ritual on the last day at the Hajj in Mina, Saudi Arabia, kills at least 362 Muslim pilgrims. (BBC)
2006 - Turkey releases Mehmet Ali Ağca from jail after serving 25 years for shooting Pope John Paul II. (BBC)
2006 - The French warship Clemenceau reaches Egypt and is barred access to the Suez Canal. Greenpeace activists board the ship. (BBC)

What happened this coming weekend: January 6th and 7th

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 23:09:00 +0000

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Jannuary 6th

Events
1066 - Harold Godwinson is crowned King of England.
1205 - Philip of Swabia becomes King of the Romans.
1494 - First Mass celebrated in the New World at La Isabela, Hispaniola.
1540 - King Henry VIII of England marries Anne of Cleves.
1579 - The Union of Atrecht was signed.
1661 - The fifth monarchy men unsuccessfully attempt to seize control of London.
1690 - Joseph, son of Emperor Leopold I, becomes King of the Romans.
1720 - The Committee of Inquiry on the South Sea Bubble publishes its findings.
1838 - Samuel Morse first successfully tested the electrical telegraph.
1853 - American President-Elect Franklin Pierce, wife Jane, and son Ben are involved in a train wreck near Andover, Massachusetts. Franklin and Jane survive but eleven-year-old Ben is killed.
1870 - The inauguration of the Musikverein (Vienna).
1887 - `Abd-allah II of Harar opens the Battle of Chelenqo with an attack on the camp of the Shewan army of Negus Menelik II early in the morning; prepared for the assault, the Negus orders a counter-attack which routs the enemy, resulting with the capture of Harar a few days later.
1893 - Washington National Cathedral is chartered by Congress. The charter is signed by President Benjamin Harrison.
1893 - Ben Lafargues, white, lynched in Avangeles Parish, LA for murder
1893 - black man, identity unknown, lynched in Pocket Township, NC for murder
1893 - Paul Scroggs and Henry Allen, both black, lynched in Brinkley, AK for murder
1897 - Lawerence Brown, black, lynched in Stilton, SC for suspected arson
1900 - Boers attack Ladysmith, South Africa - over 1,000 people killed
1907 - Maria Montessori opens her first school and daycare center for working class children in Rome.
1912 - New Mexico is admitted as the 47th U.S. state.
1921 - Sam Williams, black, lynched in Talbor, GA for unknown offense
1929 - King Alexander of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes suspends his country's constitution (the so-called January 6th Dictatorship, Šestojanuarska diktatura.)
1929 - Mother Teresa arrives in Calcutta to begin a legacy of work amongst India's poorest and diseased people
1930 - The first diesel-engine automobile trip is completed (Indianapolis, Indiana, to New York City).
1931 - Thomas Edison submits his last patent application.
1936 - Supreme Court of the United States rules the 1933 Agricultural Adjustment Act unconstitutional in the case United States v. Butler et al..
1936 - Porky Pig premieres.
1940 - Mass execution of Poles, committed by Germans in the city of Poznań, Warthegau.
1941 - Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivers his Four Freedoms Speech in the State of the Union Address.
1941 - Keel of USS Missouri (BB-63) is laid at New York Navy Yard in Brooklyn
1942 - Pan American Airlines becomes the first commercial airline to have a flight go around the world.
1950 - The United Kingdom recognizes the People's Republic of China. The Republic of China severs diplomatic relations with Britain in response.
1961 - A fire at the Thomas Hotel in San Francisco kills 20 people.
1967 - United States Marine Corps and ARVN troops launch "Operation Deckhouse Five" in the Mekong River delta.
1974 - In response to the energy crisis, daylight saving time commences nearly four months early in the United States.
1977 - The music publisher EMI ends its contract with the notorious punk rock group Sex Pistols after reports of abusive behaviour at Heathrow Airport, London.
1978 - The Crown of St. Stephen (also known as the Holy Crown of Hungary) is returned to Hungary from the United States, where it was held after the Second World War.
1994 - Nancy Kerrigan is clubbed on the right leg by an assailant under orders from figure skating rival Tonya Harding.
1995 - A chemical fire in an apartment complex in Manila, Philippines, leads to the discovery of plans for Project Bojinka, a mass-terrorist attack.
2004 - Jaya Bharata Jananiya Tanujate is declared the official anthem of Karnataka
2005 - Mississippi Civil Rights Workers Murders: Edgar Ray Killen is arrested as a suspect for the 1964 murders of three Civil Rights workers.
2005 - First World Congress of Imams and Rabbis for Peace begins in Brussels, Belgium.
2006 - Tropical Storm Zeta (2005) dissipates, ending the notorious 2005 hurricane season.

Births
1367 - Richard II of England (d. 1400)
1412 - Joan of Arc, Roman Catholic Saint and national heroine of France (legendary date) (d. 1431)
1486 - Martin Agricola, German composer (d. 1556)
1488 - Helius Eobanus Hessus, German poet (d. 1540)
1525 - Caspar Peucer, German reformer (d. 1602)
1561 - Thomas Fincke, Danish mathematician (d. 1656)
1587 - Gaspar de Guzmán y Pimentel, Count-Duke of Olivares, Spanish statesman (d. 1645)
1595 - Claude Favre de Vaugelas, French man of letters (d. 1650)
1617 - Kristoffer Gabel, Danish statesman (d. 1673)
1706 - Benjamin Franklin, American statesman (d. 1790)
1714 - Percivall Pott, English physician (d. 1788)
1745 - Étienne Montgolfier, French inventor (d. 1799)
1793 - James Madison Porter, American politician (d. 1862)
1795 - Anselme Payen, French chemist (d. 1871)
1807 - Jozef Maximilián Petzval, Slovak inventor (d. 1891)
1822 - Heinrich Schliemann, German archaeologist (d. 1890)
1832 - Gustave Doré, French painter and sculptor (d. 1883)
1838 - Max Bruch, German composer (d. 1920)
1848 - Hristo Botev, Bulgarian poet (d. 1876)
1870 - Gustav Bauer, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1944)
1872 - Alexander Scriabin, Russian composer (d. 1915)
1878 - Carl Sandburg, American poet and historian (d. 1967)
1880 - Tom Mix, American actor (d. 1940)
1882 - Fan S. Noli, Albanian bishop (d. 1965)
1882 - Sam Rayburn, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives (d. 1961)
1882 - Aleksandra Ekster, Russian painter (d. 1949)
1883 - Khalil Gibran, Lebanese writer (d. 1931)
1898 - James Fitzmaurice, Irish aviation pioneer (d. 1965)
1899 - Phyllis Haver, American actress (d. 1960)
1899 - Heinrich Nordhoff, German automobile engineer (d. 1968)
1903 - Maurice Abravanel, Greek-born conductor (d. 1993)
1905 - Idris Davies, Welsh poet (d. 1953)
1910 - Morris Wright, American writer (d. 1998)
1913 - Loretta Young, American actress (d. 2000)
1913 - Edward Gierek, Polish politician (d. 2001)
1914 - Danny Thomas, American actor (d. 1991)
1915 - Alan Watts, English writer (d. 1973)
1917 - Koo Chen-fu, Chinese negotiator (d. 2005)
1920 - Sun Myung Moon, Korean evangelist
1920 - John Maynard Smith, English biologist (d. 2004)
1920 - Early Wynn, baseball player (d. 1999)
1920 - Doris Stokes, British psychic medium (d. 1987)
1921 - Cary Middlecoff, American golfer (d. 1998)
1923 - Jacobo Timerman, Argentine writer (d. 1999)
1924 - Earl Scruggs, American musician
1925 - John De Lorean, American auto maker (d. 2005)
1926 - Ralph Branca, baseball player
1926 - Kim Dae-jung, President of South Korea and Nobel Prize laureate
1926 - Kid Gavilan, Cuban boxer (d. 2003)
1926 - Mickey Hargitay, Hungarian-born actor and bodybuilder (d. 2006)
1926 - Pat Flaherty, American racecar driver (2002)
1929 - Babrak Karmal, Afghani politician (d. 1996)
1930 - Vic Tayback, American actor (d. 1990)
1931 - Capucine, French actress (d. 1990)
1931 - E. L. Doctorow, American author
1931 - Dickie Moore, Canadian hockey player
1932 - Stuart A. Rice, American chemist
1933 - Oleg Makarov, cosmonaut (d. 2003)
1933 - Emil Steinberger, Swiss comedian
1935 - Nino Tempo, American singer and actor
1936 - Julio María Sanguinetti Coirolo, President of Uruguay
1936 - Rubén Amaro, Sr., baseball player
1937 - Lou Holtz, football coach
1937 - Paolo Conte, Italian singer
1937 - Doris Troy, American singer (d. 2004)
1940 - Penny Lernoux, American journalist (d. 1989)
1940 - Van McCoy, American musician (d. 1979)
1943 - Terry Venables, English football manager
1944 - Bonnie Franklin, American actress
1944 - Rolf M. Zinkernagel, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine laureate
1945 - Allen Appel, American novelist
1945 - Kojo Nnamdi, host on NPR station WAMU
1946 - Syd Barrett, English guitarist, singer and songwriter; formed Pink Floyd (d. 2006)
1947 - Sandy Denny, English vocalist (d. 1978)
1951 - Kim Wilson, American musician
1951 - Don Gullett, Major League Baseball pitcher
1952 - Frank Sivero, Italian-American actor
1952 - Moondog Spot, wrestler (d. 2003)
1953 - Malcolm Young, Scottish-born Australian guitarist (AC/DC)
1954 - Hans Robert Hiegel, German architect
1954 - Yuji Horii, Japanese video game designer
1954 - Anthony Minghella, British director
1955 - Rowan Atkinson, British comedian and actor
1956 - Angus Deayton, British comedian, actor and television presenter
1957 - Nancy Lopez, American golfer
1959 - Kapil Dev, Indian cricketer
1959 - Kathy Sledge, American singer
1960 - Nigella Lawson, British chef and writer
1960 - Howie Long, American football star
1960 - Paul Azinger, American golfer
1962 - Michael Houser, American musician (d. 2002)
1963 - Jazzie B, American musician
1964 - David Wall, Programmer, Public Servant
1964 - Henry Maske, German boxer
1964 - Charles Haley, Former Dallas Cowboy
1964 - Rafael Vidal, Venezuelan athlete (d. 2005)
1964 - Mark O'Toole, British musician
1965 - Muhammed al-Ahari, American Muslim writer
1965 - Konnan, professional wrestler
1966 - Fernando Carrillo, Venezuelan actor
1966 - A. R. Rahman, Indian Music Composer
1966 - Andrew Wood, American singer (Mother Love Bone) (d. 1990)
1968 - John Singleton, American film director
1970 - Julie Chen, American television presenter
1970 - Gabrielle Reece, American volleyball player
1972 - Nek, Italian singer
1973 - Scott Ferguson, Canadian ice hockey player
1974 - Nicole DeHuff. American actress (d. 2005)
1975 - James Farrior, American football player
1975 - Yukana, Japanese seiyū
1976 - Danny Pintauro, American actor
1976 - Richard Zedník, Slovak ice hockey player
1978 - Nikki Einfeld, Canadian opera singer
1980 - Steed Malbranque, French footballer
1980 - Hiromi Oshima, Japanese adult model
1981 - Mike Jones, American rapper
1981 - Jérémie Renier, Belgian actor
1982 - Gilbert Arenas, American basketball player
1984 - AJ Hawk, American footbal player

Deaths
664 - Amr ibn al-A'as, Muslim general (bc. 583)
1088 - Berengar of Tours, French theologian (bc. 999)
1448 - Christopher of Bavaria, King of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden (b. 1418)
1537 - Alessandro de' Medici, Duke of Florence (b. 1510)
1537 - Baldassare Peruzzi, Italian architect and painter (b. 1481)
1616 - Philip Henslowe, English theatrical entrepreneur (bc. 1550)
1689 - Seth Ward, English mathematician and astronomer (b. 1671)
1711 - Philipp van Almonde, Dutch admiral (b. 1646)
1718 - Giovanni Vincenzo Gravina, Italian writer and jurist (b. 1664)
1718 - Richard Hoare, English goldsmith and banker (b. 1648)
1724 - Chikamatsu Monzaemon, Japanese dramatist (b. 1653)
1731 - Étienne François Geoffroy, French chemist (b. 1672)
1734 - John Dennis, English critic and dramatist (b. 1657)
1813 - Louis Baraguey d'Hilliers, French general (b. 1764)
1831 - Rodolphe Kreutzer, French violinist, composer and conductor (b. 1766)
1840 - Fanny Burney, English novelist and diarist (b. 1752)
1852 - Louis Braille, French teacher of the blind (b. 1809)
1855 - Giacomo Beltrami, Italian explorer (b. 1779)
1884 - Gregor Johann Mendel, Austrian geneticist (b. 1822)
1885 - Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, Norwegian writer and scientist (b. 1812)
1913 - Frederick Hitch, English Victoria Cross Winner (b. 1856)
1918 - Georg Cantor, German mathematician (b. 1845)
1919 - Max Heindel, Danish astrologer and mystic (b. 1865)
1919 - Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States (b. 1858)
1922 - Jakob Rosanes, German mathematician (b. 1842)
1928 - Alvin Kraenzlein, American athlete (b. 1876)
1937 - André Besette, Canadian religious figure (b. 1845)
1941 - Charley O'Leary, American baseball player (b. 1882)
1942 - Henri de Baillet-Latour, Belgian International Olympic Committee president (b. 1876)
1944 - Ida Tarbell, American journalist (b. 1857)
1945 - Vladimir Vernadsky, Russian mineralogist (b. 1863)
1949 - Victor Fleming, American director (b. 1883)
1972 - Chen Yi, Chinese military commander and politician (b. 1901)
1978 - Burt Munro, New Zealand motorcycle racer (b. 1899)
1981 - A.J. Cronin, Scottish writer (b. 1896)
1990 - Ian Charleson, Scottish actor (b. 1949)
1990 - Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov, Russian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1904)
1993 - Dizzy Gillespie, American jazz trumpeter (b. 1917)
1993 - Rudolf Nureyev, Russian ballet dancer (b. 1938)
1995 - Joe Slovo, South African politician (b. 1926)
1996 - Yahya Ayyash, Palestinian leader (b. 1966)
1997 - Catherine Scorsese, Italian-American actress (b. 1912)
1999 - Michel Petrucciani, French jazz pianist (b. 1962)
2000 - Don Martin, American cartoonist (b. 1931)
2004 - Pierre Charles, Prime Minister of Dominica (b. 1954)
2004 - Charles Dumas, American athlete (b. 1937)
2004 - Francesco Scavullo, American photographer (b. 1921)
2005 - Lois Hole, Lt. Governor of Alberta (b. 1933)
2005 - Louis Robichaud, Premier of New Brunswick (b. 1925)
2006 - Lou Rawls, American singer (b. 1933)
2006 - Hugh Thompson, Jr., decorated Vietnam War helicopter pilot (b. 1943)

Holidays and observances
Christianity
Epiphany
(except Eastern and Oriental Orthodox who follow the Julian Calendar) - Twelfth Day of Christmas, also known as Twelfth Day and Three Kings Day
Public holiday in Spain, Italy and Puerto Rico to mark Epiphany
In the Irish Calendar - Little Christmas (Nollaig na mBan, "Women's Christmas")
Rastafari movement - Celebration of the ceremonial birthday of Haile Selassie
Armenian Christmas (except in the Holy Land where it is on 18 January - old calendar)
Ancient Latvia - Zvaigznes Diena observed

External links
BBC: On This Day
NY Times: On this day
On This Day in Canada

January 7th

Events
1325 - Alfonso IV becomes King of Portugal.
1558 - France takes Calais, the last continental possession of England.
1566 - Pius V becomes Pope.
1598 - Boris Godunov seizes the throne of Russia.
1608 - Fire destroys Jamestown, Virginia.
1610 - Galileo Galilei observes the four largest moons of Jupiter for the first time. He named them and in turn the four are called the Galilean moons.
1782 - The first American commercial bank opens (Bank of North America).
1785 - Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American John Jeffries travel from Dover, England, to Calais, France, in a gas balloon.
1797 - The current flag of Italy is first used.
1835 - HMS Beagle anchors off the Chonos Archipelago.
1894 - W.K. Dickson receives a patent for motion picture film.
1904 - The distress signal "CQD" is established only to be replaced two years later by "SOS."
1922 - Dáil Éireann ratifies the Anglo-Irish Treaty by a 64-57 vote.
1924 - George Gershwin completes Rhapsody in Blue.
1924 - The International Hockey Federation (FIH) is founded in Paris by seven member states: Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, France, Hungary, Spain, and Switzerland.
1927 - First transatlantic telephone call - New York City to London.
1927 - The Harlem Globetrotters play their first game.
1935 - World War II: Benito Mussolini and French Foreign Minister Pierre Laval sign the Italo-French agreements.
1942 - World War II: Siege of the Bataan Peninsula begins.
1945 - British General Bernard Montgomery holds a press conference in which he claims credit for victory in the Battle of the Bulge.
1950 - A fire at the Mercy Hospital in Davenport, Iowa, kills 41 people.
1953 - President Harry Truman announces that the United States has developed a hydrogen bomb.
1954 - Georgetown-IBM experiment, the first public demonstration of a machine translation system, was held in New York at the head office of IBM.
1959 - The United States recognizes the new Cuban government of Fidel Castro.
1972 - Iberia Airlines Caravelle 6-R crashed into Mont San Jose on approach to Ibiza Airport killing all 104 on board.
1979 - Phnom Penh fell to the advancing Vietnamese troops, driving out Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.
1980 - President Jimmy Carter authorizes legislation giving $1.5 billion in loans to bail out Chrysler Corporation.
1984 - Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
1989 - Hirohito, Emperor of Japan during World War II, dies.
1990 - The Leaning Tower of Pisa is closed to the public due to safety concerns.
1999 - The impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton begins.

[edit] Births
1 BC (O.S.) - Jesus of Nazareth, central figure of Christianity, (date celebrated by Eastern Orthodox churches as Christmas)
1355 - Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester, son of Edward III of England (d. 1397)
1502 - Pope Gregory XIII (d. 1585)
1528 - Jeanne d'Albret, Queen of Navarre (d. 1572)
1647 - Wilhelm Ludwig, Duke of Württemberg (d. 1677)
1685 - Jonas Alströmer, Swedish industrialist (d. 1761)
1706 - Johann Heinrich Zedler, German publisher (d. 1751)
1718 - Israel Putnam, American Revolutionary War general (d. 1790)
1768 - Joseph Bonaparte, King of Naples (d. 1844)
1800 - Millard Fillmore, 13th President of the United States (d. 1874)
1827 - Sir Sandford Fleming, Canadian engineer; introduced Universal Standard Time (d. 1915)
1830 - Albert Bierstadt, an German-American painter (d. 1902)
1831 - Heinrich von Stephan, German labor organizer (d. 1897)
1834 - Johann Philipp Reis, German physicist and inventor (d. 1874)
1844 - Bernadette Soubirous, French saint (d. 1879)
1860 - Emanuil Manolov, Bulgarian composer (d. 1902)
1871 - Émile Borel, French mathematician and politician (d. 1956)
1873 - Adolph Zukor, Hungarian producer (d. 1976)
1873 - Charles Péguy, French poet and essayist (d. 1914)
1875 - Thomas Hicks, American runner (d. 1963)
1891 - Zora Neale Hurston, American author (d. 1960)
1896 - Arnold Ridley, British playwright and actor (d. 1984)
1899 - Francis Poulenc, French composer (d. 1963)
1903 - Warren Hull, American actor (d. 1974)
1903 - Alan Napier, English actor (d. 1988)
1908 - Red Allen, American musician (d. 1967)
1910 - Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Pakistani poet (d. (1984)
1910 - Orval Faubus, Governor of Arkansas (d. 1994)
1911 - Butterfly McQueen, American actress (d. 1995)
1912 - Charles Addams, American cartoonist (d. 1988)
1913 - Johnny Mize, baseball player (d. 1993)
1916 - Paul Keres, Estonian chess player (d. 1975)
1922 - Vincent Gardenia, Italian-born actor (d. 1992)
1922 - Jean-Pierre Rampal, French flutist (d. 2000)
1922 - Alvin Dark, baseball player and manager
1923 - Hugh Kenner, Canadian literary critic (d. 2003)
1925 - Gerald Durrell British naturalist (d. 1995)
1928 - William Peter Blatty, American screenwriter
1929 - Terry Moore, American actress
1934 - Charlie Jenkins, American runner
1934 - Jean Corbeil, Canadian politician (d. 2002)
1935 - Kenny Davern, American jazz clarinetist
1935 - Tommy Johnson, American tubist (d. 2006)
1935 - Valeri Kubasov, Soviet cosmonaut
1937 - Paul Revere, American musician
1938 - Roland Topor, French illustrator (d. 1997)
1938 - Rory Storm, British singer (d. 1972)
1938 - Lou Graham, American golfer
1939 - Maury Povich, American TV host
1939 - Prince Michael of Greece and Denmark
1941 - Iona Brown, British violinist and conductor (d. 2004)
1941 - John E. Walker, English chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
1942 - Vasily Alexeev, Russian weightlifter
1942 - Danny Williams, South African singer (d. 2005)
1942 - Jim Lefebvre, Major League Baseball player
1944 - Arne Scheie, Norwegian sports commentator
1945 - Tony Conigliaro, American baseball player (d. 1990)
1945 - Dick Marty, Swiss politician
1946 - Jann Wenner, American publisher
1947 - Shobha De, Indian writer
1948 - Kenny Loggins, American singer
1949 - Steven Williams, American actor
1950 - Erin Gray, American actress
1950 - Juan Gabriel, Mexican singer and songwriter
1950 - Ross Grimsley, Major League Baseball pitcher
1951 - Helen Worth, British actress
1951 - James Beard, American wrestling referee
1952 - Sammo Hung, Hong Kong actor
1956 - David Caruso, American actor
1956 - Mike Liut, National Hockey League goaltender
1957 - Nicholson Baker, American novelist
1957 - Katie Couric, American television host
1957 - Julian Solis, Puerto Rican boxer
1959 - Kathy Valentine, American musician (The Go-Gos)
1962 - Aleksandr Dugin, Russian politician
1964 - Nicolas Cage, American actor
1966 - Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, American publicist (d. 1999)
1967 - Mark Lamarr, British comedian and broadcaster
1967 - Guy Hebert, American hockey player
1970 - Doug E. Doug, American actor
1970 - Joao Ricardo, Angolan footballer
1971 - David Yost, American actor
1971 - C.W. Anderson, American professional wrestler
1972 - Donald Brashear, American hockey player
1973 - Jonna Tervomaa, Finnish singer
1976 - Eric Gagné, Canadian baseball player
1976 - Alfonso Soriano, Dominican baseball player
1977 - Michelle Behennah, British model
1977 - Dustin Diamond, American actor
1979 - Bipasha Basu, Indian model
1980 - Mariangel Ruiz, Venezuelan actress and model
1981 - Marquis Daniels, American basketball player
1981 - Alex Auld, Canadian hockey player
1982 - Francisco Rodriguez, Venezuelan baseball player
1985 - Lewis Hamilton, British racing driver
1990 - Liam Aiken, American actor
1990 - Elene Gedevanishvili, Georgian figure skater

[edit] Deaths
1400 - Thomas Holland, 1st Duke of Surrey, English politician (executed) (b. 1374)
1451 - Count Amadeus VIII of Savoy (b. 1383)
1536 - Catherine of Aragon, first wife of Henry VIII of England (b. 1485)
1566 - Louis de Blois, Flemish mystic (b. 1506)
1619 - Nicholas Hilliard, English painter (bc. 1547)
1625 - Ruggiero Giovannelli, Italian composer (bc. 1560)
1658 - Theophilus Eaton, Connecticut colonist (b. 1590)
1694 - Charles Gerard, 1st Earl of Macclesfield, English royalist general (bc. 1618)
1700 - Raphael Fabretti, Italian antiquarian (b. 1618)
1715 - François Fénelon, French catholic theologian and writer (b. 1651)
1758 - Allan Ramsay, Scottish poet (b. 1686)
1767 - Thomas Clap, first president of Yale University (b. 1703)
1770 - Carl Gustaf Tessin, Swedish politician (b. 1695)
1783 - William Tans'ur, English hymnist (b. 1700)
1786 - Jean-Étienne Guettard, French physician and scientist (b. 1715)
1830 - Thomas Lawrence, English painter (b. 1769)
1864 - Caleb Blood Smith, 6th U.S. Secretary of the Interior (b. 1808)
1872 - James Fisk, American entrepreneur (b. 1834)
1878 - François-Vincent Raspail, French chemist (b. 1794)
1892 - Tewfik Pasha, Khedive of Egypt (b. 1852)
1893 - Jožef Stefan, Slovenian physicist, mathematician, and poet (b. 1835)
1913 - Jack Boyle, baseball player (b. 1866)
1919 - Henry Ware Eliot American industrialist and philantropist (b. 1843)
1920 - Edmund Barton, first Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1849)
1943 - Nikola Tesla, Serbian-born inventor and electrical engineer (b. 1856)
1951 - René Guénon, French-Egyptian author (b. 1886)
1964 - Cyril Davies, American musician (b. 1932)
1972 - John Berryman, American poet (b. 1914)
1980 - Larry Williams, American singer, pianist and songwriter (b. 1935)
1984 - Alfred Kastler, French physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1902))
1986 - Juan Rulfo, Mexican novelist (b. 1917)
1988 - Trevor Howard, English actor (b. 1913)
1988 - Michel Auclair, French actor (b. 1922)
1989 - Hirohito, Emperor of Japan (b. 1901)
1990 - Bronko Nagurski, American football player (b. 1908)
1992 - Richard Hunt, American puppeteer (The Muppets) (b. 1951)
1995 - Murray Rothbard, American economist (b. 1926)
1996 - Károly Grósz, Hungarian politician (b. 1930)
1998 - Vladimir Prelog, Croatian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1906)
1998 - Owen Bradley, American record producer (b. 1915)
2000 - Gary Albright, professional wrestler (b. 1963)
2002 - Naughtia Childs porn star (suicide) (b. 1979)
2002 - Jon Lee, Welsh drummer (Feeder) (suicide) (b. 1968)
2002 - Avery Schreiber, American actor (b. 1935)
2004 - Ingrid Thulin, Swedish actress (b. 1926)
2005 - Pierre Daninos, French novelist (b. 1913)
2005 - Eileen Desmond, Irish politician (b. 1932)
2006 - Heinrich Harrer, Austrian mountaineer and explorer (b. 1912)

[edit] Holidays and observances
Catholicism - Feast day of St. Raymond of Peñafort.
Christmas Day in the Julian calendar.
European traditional - Distaff day: women's traditional work begins again after Epiphany.
Japan - Nanakusa (Seven Herbs Festival).

[edit] External links
BBC: On This Day
NY Times: On this day
On This Day in Canada

2007 New Years Celebrations Worldwide Coverage

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 21:37:00 +0000

HAPPY NEW YEAR

What happened on "Christmas Day" and on "New Year's Day"?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Tue, 19 Dec 2006 15:53:00 +0000

Offered by:

December 25th

Events
274 - Roman Emperor Aurelian has a temple dedicated to Sol Invictus on the supposed day of the solstice and day of rebirth of the Sun.
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 - St. Francis of Assisi assembles the first Nativity scene.
1261 - John IV Lascaris of the restored Eastern Roman Empire is deposed and blinded by orders of his co-ruler Michael VIII Palaeologus.
1599 - The city of Natal, Brazil is founded.
1643 - Christmas Island founded and named by Captain William Mynors of the East India Ship Company vessel, the Royal Mary.
1776 - George Washington and his army cross the Delaware River to attack the Kingdom of Great Britain's Hessian mercenaries in Trenton, New Jersey.
1818 - The first performance of "Silent Night" takes place in the Church of St. Nikolaus in Oberndorf, Austria.
1837 - Battle of Okeechobee: United States forces defeat Seminole Indians.
1868 - U.S. President Andrew Johnson grants unconditional pardon to all Civil War Confederate soldiers.
1868 - Shogunate rebels found Ezo Republic in Hokkaidō.
1914 - World War I: Known as the Christmas truce, German and British troops on the Western Front temporarily cease fire.
1917 - Why Marry?, first dramatic play to win a Pulitzer Prize, opens at the Astor Theatre in New York City.
1926 - Hirohito becomes Emperor of Japan, succeeding the Taisho Emperor.
1932 - A magnitude 7.6 earthquake in Gansu, China kills ~70,000 people.
1939 - Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol is read on the radio for the first time (CBS radio).
1939 - Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is introduced by Montgomery Ward stores.
1941 - World War II: Battle of Hong Kong ends, beginning the Japanese Occupation of Hong Kong.
1947 - The Constitution of the Republic of China goes into effect.
1971 - In the longest game in NFL history (82m40s), the Miami Dolphins defeat the Kansas City Chiefs.
1973 - The ARPANET crashes when a programming bug causes all ARPANET traffic to be routed through the server at Harvard University, causing the server to freeze.
1974 - Cyclone Tracy devastates Darwin, Northern Territory Australia.
1974 - Marshall Fields drives a vehicle through the gates of the White House, resulting in a four-hour standoff.
1977 - Prime Minister of Israel Menachem Begin meets in Egypt with President of Egypt Anwar Sadat.
1987 - In one of the highest-rated episodes in Coronation Street history, Hilda Ogden leaves her home of 23 years to be a char to her doctor in the country.
1989 - Nicolae Ceauşescu, former communist dictator of Romania, and his wife Elena are condemned to death and executed under a wide range of charges.
1991 - Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as president of the Soviet Union (the union itself is dissolved the next day).
2003 - The ill-fated Beagle 2 probe which was released from the Mars Express Spacecraft on December 19, disappears shortly before its scheduled landing.
2004 - Cassini orbiter releases Huygens probe which successfully landed on Saturn's moon, Titan on January 14, 2005.

Births
For the birth of Jesus, see below.
1250 - John IV Lascaris, Eastern Roman Emperor (d. circa 1305)
1583 - Orlando Gibbons, English composer (d. 1625)
1628 - Noël Coypel, French painter (d. 1707)
1642 (O.S.) - Sir Isaac Newton, English physicist and mathematician (d. 1727)
1652 - Archibald Pitcairne, Scottish physician (d. 1713)
1665 - Lady Grizel Baillie, Scottish songwriter (d. 1746)
1667 - Ehrengard von der Schulenburg, English royal mistress (d. 1743)
1674 - Thomas Halyburton, Scottish theologian (d. 1712)
1700 - Leopold II of Anhalt-Dessau, Prussian general (d. 1758)
1711 - Jean Joseph de Mondonville, French composer (d. 1772)
1716 - Johann Jakob Reiske, German scholar and physician (d. 1774)
1742 - Charlotte von Stein, German friend of Goethe (d. 1827)
1757 - Benjamin Pierce, U.S. politician (d 1839)
1763 - Claude Chappe, French telecommunications pioneer (d. 1805)
1771 - Dorothy Wordsworth, English diarist and sister of William Wordsworth (d. 1855)
1821 - Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross (d. 1912)
1856 - Hans von Bartels, German painter (d. 1913)
1861 - Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya, Indian founder of Banaras Hindu University (d. 1946)
1863 - Charles Pathé, French pioneer of film and record industries (d. 1957)
1865 - Evangeline Booth, the 4th General of The Salvation Army (d. 1950)
1875 - Theodor Cardinal Innitzer, Austrian archbishop (d. 1955)
1876 - Muhammad Ali Jinnah, founder of Pakistan (d. 1948)
1876 - Adolf Otto Reinhold Windaus, Nobel laureate (d. 1959)
1878 - Louis Chevrolet, Swiss-born race car driver (d. 1941)
1883 - Maurice Utrillo, French artist (d. 1955)
1884 - Evelyn Nesbit, American actress (d. 1967)
1886 - Kid Ory, American musician (d. 1973)
1887 - Conrad Nicholson Hilton, American hotelier (d. 1979)
1890 - Robert Ripley, collector of odd facts (d. 1949)
1899 - Humphrey Bogart, American actor (d. 1957)
1901 - Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester (d. 2004)
1902 - Barton MacLane, American actor (d. 1969)
1904 - Gerhard Herzberg, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1999)
1906 - Lew Grade, Ukrainian-born film producer (d. 1998)
1906 - Ernst Ruska, Nobel laureate (d. 1988)
1907 - Cab Calloway, American bandleader (d. 1994)
1907 - Glenn McCarthy, American oil tycoon and businessman (d. 1988)
1907 - Mike Mazurki, Ukrainian-born actor (d. 1990)
1908 - Quentin Crisp, English author (d. 1999)
1908 - Jo-Jo Moore, baseball player (d. 2001)
1908 - Zora Arkus-Duntov, Belgian-American automotive engineer (d. 1996)
1912 - Tony Martin, American singer and actor
1912 - Natalino Otto, Italian singer (d. 1969)
1913 - Henri Nannen, German journalist (d. 1966)
1915 - Pete Rugolo, Italian-born composer
1918 - Anwar Sadat, President of Egypt, Nobel laureate (d. 1981)
1918 - Ahmed Ben Bella, politician, first President of Algeria
1919 - Paul David, French Canadian cardiologist, founder of the Montreal Heart Institute (d. 1999)
1921 - Zaib-un-Nissa Hamidullah, Pakistani journalist (d. 2000)
1924 - Rod Serling, American television writer (d. 1975)
1924 - Atal Behari Vajpayee, Prime Minister of India
1925 - Carlos Castaneda, Peruvian-born author (d. 1998)
1927 - Nellie Fox, baseball player (d. 1975)
1928 - Dick Miller, American actor
1929 - Chris Kenner, American singer and songwriter (d. 1976)
1932 - Mabel King, American actress (d. 1999)
1935 - Al Jackson, baseball player
1936 - Princess Alexandra of Kent
1936 - Ismail Merchant, Indian-born film producer (d. 2005)
1937 - O'Kelly Isley, Jr., American singer (The Isley Brothers) (d. 1986)
1940 - Pete Brown, English poet and lyricist
1943 - Hanna Schygulla, German actress
1943 - Wilson Fittipaldi, Brazilian racing driver
1944 - Jairzinho, Brazilian footballer
1944 - Kenny Everett, British entertainer (d. 1995)
1945 - Noel Redding, English musician (d. 2003)
1945 - Gary Sandy, American actor
1946 - Jimmy Buffett, American singer and songwriter
1946 - Larry Csonka, American football player
1946 - Gene Lamont, American baseball player and manager
1948 - Barbara Mandrell, American singer and actress
1949 - Nawaz Sharif, Prime Minister of Pakistan
1949 - Sissy Spacek, American actress
1949 - Joe Louis Walker, American musician
1950 - Manny Trillo, baseball player
1950 - Karl Rove, American presidential advisor
1952 - CCH Pounder, Guyana-born actress
1952 - Desireless, French singer
1954 - Annie Lennox, Scottish singer
1955 - Alannah Myles, Canadian singer
1957 - Chris Kamara, English footballer and commentator
1957 - Shane MacGowan, Irish musician
1958 - Hanford Dixon, American football player
1958 - Rickey Henderson, baseball player
1959 - Michael P. Anderson, astronaut (d. 2003)
1961 - Ingrid Betancourt, Colombian senator
1962 - Dean Cameron, American actor
1964 - Gary McAllister, Scottish footballer
1967 - Jason Thirsk, American bass player
1968 - Helena Christensen, Danish model
1971 - Dido, English singer
1971 - Justin Trudeau, Canadian media personality
1971 - Noel Hogan, Irish musician
1972 - Josh Freese, American drummer
1973 - Alexandre Trudeau, Canadian journalist
1973 - Robbie Elliott, English footballer
1975 - Marcus Trescothick, English cricketer
1976 - Tuomas Holopainen, Finnish keyboardist
1976 - Armin van Buuren, Dutch keyboardist
1978 - Joel Porter, Australian footballer
1978 - Simon Jones English Cricketer
1979 - Jim Greco, American skateboarder
1980 - Marcus Trufant, American football player
1980 - Reika Hashimoto, Japanese actress
1980 - Locó, Angolan footballer
1981 - Katie Wright, American actress
1981 - Willy Taveras, Baseball player
1984 - Jessica and Lisa Origliasso, Australian pop singers
1984 - Alastair Cook, English cricketer
1984 - Georgia Moffett, British actress
1986 - Doug Loft, English footballer

Deaths
795 - Pope Adrian I
1156 - Peter the Venerable, Benedictine abbot of Cluny (b. c. 1092)
1635 - Samuel de Champlain, French explorer and founder of Quebec City (b. 1567)
1676 - Matthew Hale, Lord Chief Justice of England (b. 1609)
1676 - William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle, English soldier (b. 1592)
1683 - Kara Mustafa, Ottoman general (b. 1634)
1758 - James Hervey, English clergyman (b. 1714)
1784 - Yosa Buson, Japanese painter (b. 1716)
1824 - Barbara Juliana, Baroness von Krüdener, Russian writer (b. 1764)
1868 - Linus Yale, Jr., American mechanical engineer and inventor (b. 1821)
1880 - Fridolin Anderwert, Swiss Federal Councilor (b. 1828)
1916 - St. Albert Chmielowski, Polish Catholic Saint (b. 1845)
1921 - Vladimir Korolenko, Russian writer (b. 1853)
1925 - Karl Abraham, German psychoanalyst (b. 1877)
1926 - Taisho Emperor, Japanese emperor (b. 1879)
1933 - Francesc Macià, Catalonian statesman (b. 1859)
1935 - Paul Bourget, French novelist and critic (b. 1852)
1938 - Karel Capek, Czech author (b. 1890)
1940 - Agnes Ayres, American actress (b. 1898)
1946 - W. C. Fields, American comedian (b. 1880)
1950 - Neil Francis Hawkins, British fascist (b. 1903)
1953 - Patsy Donovan, Irish-born American baseball player (b. 1865)
1961 - Otto Loewi, Nobel laureate (b. 1873)
1961 - Owen Brewster, U.S. Senator from Maine (b. 1888)
1963 - Tristan Tzara, Romanian-born writer (b. 1896)
1971 - Maria Koepcke, ornithologist (b. 1924)
1973 - Ismet Inonu, Turkish statesman (b. 1884)
1973 - Gabriel Voisin, French aviation pioneer (b. 1880)
1977 - Charlie Chaplin, English actor (b. 1889)
1979 - Joan Blondell, American actress (b. 1906)
1983 - Joan Miró, Catalan painter (b. 1893)
1988 - Ooka Shohei, Japanese novelist (b. 1909)
1989 - Nicolae Ceauşescu, Romanian dictator (b. 1918)
1989 - Billy Martin, American baseball manager (b. 1928)
1992 - Monica Dickens, British writer (b. 1915)
1993 - Pierre Victor Auger, French physicist (b. 1899)
1994 - Zail Singh, President of India (b. 1916)
1995 - Dean Martin, American singer (b. 1917)
1997 - Denver Pyle, American actor (b. 1920)
1998 - John Pulman, English snooker player (b. 1926)
1999 - Peter Jeffrey, English actor (b. 1929)
2000 - Willard Van Orman Quine, American philosopher (b. 1908)
2003 - Nicholas Mavroules, American politician (b. 1929)
2005 - Birgit Nilsson, Swedish singer (b. 1918)
2005 - Robert Barbers, Philippine senator (b. 1944)

Holidays and observances
Christmas Day is a Christian holiday on this day celebrating the nativity of Jesus. It is a public holiday in many countries, including almost everywhere in the Americas, most European nations, the Philippines and most of Oceania, some African countries, the Commonwealth of Nations, and various other places. Many non-Christians, including non-theists, celebrate secular aspects of the holiday, such as decorating Christmas trees and exchanging gifts with family and friends. Some Christians celebrate Christmas on January 6, January 7, January 18, or even not at all. The date of Christmas Day is determined by various traditions rather than relying on historical research, which generally points to dates earlier in the year. Of those scholars who believe in a historical Jesus, the vast majority of them agree that the precise birthdate is unknown.
British Isles - a quarter day in England, Wales, Northern Ireland, and the Republic of Ireland. (but not in Scotland)
Roman festivals - (re)birth of Sol Invictus, the winter solstice feast in the Roman Empire since 274.
Pakistan - Quaid-e-Azam's Day is celebrated as a national holiday in Pakistan in honour of the birth of Mohammad Ali Jinnah.

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

January 1st

[edit] Events
45 BC - The Julian calendar first takes effect.
404 - The last known gladiator competition in Rome takes place.
630 - Prophet Muhammad sets out toward Mecca with the army that will capture it bloodlessly.
990 - Kievan Rus' adopts the Julian calendar.
1259 - Michael VIII Palaeologus is proclaimed co-emperor of the Empire of Nicaea with his ward John IV Lascaris.
1438 - Albert II of Habsburg is crowned King of Hungary.
1515 - King Francis I of France succeeds to the French throne.
1600 - Scotland begins using the Julian calendar.
1651 - Charles II is crowned King of Scotland.
1660 - Samuel Pepys starts his diary.
1673 - Regular mail delivery begins between New York and Boston.
1700 - Russia begins using the Julian calendar.
1707 - John V is crowned King of Portugal.
1739 - Bouvet Island is discovered by French explorer Jean-Baptiste Charles Bouvet de Lozier.
1772 - The first traveller's cheques, which can be used in 90 European cities, go on sale in London for the first time.
1788 - First edition of The Times of London, previously The Daily Universal Register, is published.
1797 - Albany replaces New York City as the capital of New York.
1800 - The Dutch East India Company ceases to exist.
1801 - The legislative union of Kingdom of Great Britain and Kingdom of Ireland is completed to form the United Kingdom.
1801 - The first known asteroid, 1 Ceres, is discovered by Giuseppe Piazzi.
1803 - Emperor Gia Long orders all bronze wares of the Tay Son dynasty to be collected and melted into nine cannons for the Royal Citadel in Hue, Vietnam
1804 - French rule ends in Haiti. Haiti becomes the first black republic and first country independent in the West Indies.
1806 - The French Republican Calendar is abolished.
1808 - The importation of slaves into the United States is banned.
1818 - Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus is published.
1833 - Britain claims sovereignty over the Falkland Islands.
1845 - The Cobble Hill Tunnel, in Brooklyn, was finished.
1861 - Porfirio Diaz conquers Mexico City.
1863 - American Civil War: The Emancipation Proclamation takes effect in Confederate territory.
1863 - The first claim under the Homestead Act is made by Daniel Freeman for a farm in Nebraska.
1876 - The Reichsbank opens in Berlin.
1877 - Queen Victoria of Britain is proclaimed Empress of India.
1880 - Ferdinand de Lesseps begins French construction of the Panama Canal.
1887 - Queen Victoria is proclaimed empress of India in Delhi.
1890 - The first Tournament of Roses is held in Pasadena, California.
1890 - First use of soccer goal nets in England.
1890 - Eritrea consolidates into a colony by the Italian government.
1892 - Ellis Island opens to begin accepting immigrants to the United States.
1893 - Japan begins using the Gregorian calendar.
1894 - The Manchester Ship Canal, England, is officially opened to traffic.
1898 - New York City annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York. The four initial boroughs, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and The Bronx, are joined on January 25 by Staten Island to create the modern city of five boroughs.
1899 - Spanish rule ends in Cuba.
1901 - Nigeria becomes a British protectorate.
1901 - The British colonies of New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania and Western Australia federate as the Commonwealth of Australia; Edmund Barton is appointed the first Prime Minister.
1901 - The first official Mummers Parade is held.
1902 - The first Rose Bowl game is played in Pasadena, California, with the University of Michigan beating Stanford University by a score of 49-0.
1906 - British India officially adopts the Indian Standard Time
1908 - For the first time, a ball is dropped in New York City's Times Square to signify the start of the New Year at midnight.
1909 - Drilling began on the Lakeview Gusher.
1910 - Captain David Beatty was promoted to Rear Admiral, and became the youngest admiral in the Royal Navy, except for Royal family members, since Horatio Nelson.
1911 - Northern Territory is separated from South Australia and transferred to Commonwealth control.
1912 - The Republic of China is established.
1916 - German troops abandon Yaoundé and their Kamerun colony to British forces and begin the long march to Spanish Guinea.
1925 - The American astronomer Edwin Hubble announces the discovery of galaxies outside the Milky Way.
1927 - Turkey adopts the Gregorian calendar: December 18, 1926 (Julian), is immediately followed by January 1, 1927 (Gregorian).
1934 - Alcatraz Island becomes a U.S. federal prison.
1934 - Nazi Germany passes the "Law for the Prevention of Genetically Diseased Offspring".
1935 - Bucknell University wins the first Orange Bowl 26-0 over the University of Miami.
1937 - The first Cotton Bowl game is played in Dallas, Texas. TCU defeats Marquette University 16-6.
1939 - The first Vienna New Year's Concert is held.
1939 - William Hewlett and David Packard found Hewlett-Packard.
1942 - The Declaration by the United Nations is signed by twenty-six nations.
1946 - The first civil flight from Heathrow Airport occurs.
1947 - The American and British occupation zones in Germany, after the World War II, merge to form the Bizone, that later became the Federal Republic of Germany.
1948 - British railways are nationalised to form British Rail.
1948 - After partition, India declines to pay the agreed share of Rs.550 million in cash balances to Pakistan.
1948 - The Constitution of Italy comes into force.
1949 - The British Nationality Act 1948 comes into force.
1949 - UN Cease-fire orders to operate in Kashmir from one minute before midnight. War between India and Pakistan stops accordingly.
1950 - The state of Ajaigarh acceded to the Government of India.
1956 - The Republic of the Sudan achieves independence from the Egyptian Republic and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
1958 - The European Community is established.
1959 - Cultivars of plants named after this date must be named in a modern language, not in Latin.
1959 - Fulgencio Batista, president of Cuba, is overthrown by Fidel Castro's forces during the Cuban Revolution.
1960 - The Republic of Cameroon achieves independence from France and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
1962 - Western Samoa achieves independence from New Zealand; its name is changed to the Independent State of Western Samoa.
1962 - Decca Records turn down the Beatles
1964 - The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland is divided into the independent republics of Zambia and Malawi, and the British-controlled Rhodesia.
1965 - The People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan was founded in Kabul.
1966 - A twelve day New York City transit strike begins.
1966 - After a coup, Colonel Jean-Bédel Bokassa assumes power as president of the Central African Republic.
1970 - Jimi Hendrix, Buddy Miles, and Billy Cox are recorded live at the Fillmore East. The resulting album, Band of Gypsys, is the last Hendrix album to be released before his death.
1971 - Cigarette advertisements are banned on American television.
1972 - Austrian diplomat Kurt Waldheim assumes as Secretary General of the United Nations.
1973 - The Kingdom of Denmark, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the Republic of Ireland are admitted into the European Community.
1978 - Air India Flight 855 Boeing 747 explodes and crashes into the sea off the coast of Bombay, killing 213.
1978 - The Constitution of the Northern Mariana Islands becomes effective.
1979 - Formal diplomatic relations are established between the People's Republic of China and the United States of America.
1980 - Victoria is crowned princess of Sweden.
1981 - The Republic of Greece is admitted into the European Community.
1981 - The Republic of Palau achieves self-government though it is not independent from the United States.
1982 - Peruvian Javier Pérez de Cuéllar becomes the first Latin American to hold the title of Secretary-General of the United Nations.
1983 - The ARPANET officially changes to using the Internet Protocol, creating the Internet.
1984 - AT&T is broken up into twenty-two independent units.
1984 - The Sultanate of Brunei becomes independent of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
1985 - The Internet's Domain Name System is created.
1985 - The first British mobile phone call is made by Ernie Wise to Vodafone.
1986 - Aruba becomes independent of Curaçao, though it remains in free association with the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
1986 - The Kingdom of Spain and the Portuguese Republic are admitted into the European Community.
1988 - The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America comes into existence, creating the largest Lutheran denomination in the United States.
1989 - The Montreal Protocol on Substances That Deplete the Ozone Layer comes into force.
1990 - David Dinkins is sworn in as New York City's first black mayor.
1991 - Republican John Engler assumes as governor of Michigan.
1993 - Dissolution of Czechoslovakia: Czechoslovakia is divided into the Slovak Republic and the Czech Republic.
1993 - A single market within the European Community is introduced.
1994 - The Zapatista Army of National Liberation initiates twelve days of armed conflict in the Mexican State of Chiapas.
1994 - The North American Free Trade Agreement comes into effect.
1994 - The European Economic Area comes into effect.
1994 - The International Tropical Timber Agreement comes into effect.
1995 - The World Trade Organization comes into effect.
1995 - The Kingdom of Sweden and the republics of Austria and Finland are admitted into the European Union.
1995 - The Conference for Security and Co-operation in Europe becomes the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.
1995 - The Draupner wave in the North Sea in Norway is detected, confirming the existence of freak waves.
1995 - Jean-Claude Juncker assumes as Prime Minister of Luxembourg.
1996 - Curaçao gains limited self-government, though it remains within free association with the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
1997 - The Republic of Zaïre officially joins the World Trade Organization, as Zaïre.
1997 - Ghanaian diplomat Kofi Annan assumes as Secretary General of the United Nations.
1998 - The European Central Bank is established.
1999 - The Euro currency is introduced.
1999 - The Polish administrative region of Opole Voivodeship is created, out of the former Opole Voivodeship and parts of Częstochowa Voivodeship.
2000 - As the world celebrates, no major crisis arises from the dreaded Y2K computer 'millennium bug'.
2000 - Hama Amadou assumes as Prime Minister of Niger.
2001 - Tommy Remengesau assumes as president of Palau.
2002 - Euro banknotes and coins become legal tender in twelve of the European Union's member states.
2002 - Taiwan officially joins the World Trade Organization, as Chinese Taipei.
2002 - The Open Skies mutual surveillance treaty, initially signed in 1992, officially enters into force.
2003 - Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva assumes as the President of Brazil.
2004 - In a vote of confidence, General Pervez Musharraf won 658 out of 1,170 votes in the Electoral College of Pakistan, and according to Article 41(8) of the Constitution of Pakistan, was "deemed to be elected" to the office of President until October 2007.
2006 - Sydney, Australia swelters in 45C heat, a record for the city.

[edit] Births
711 BC - Jimmu, emperor of Japan (d. 585 BC) [according to legend]
766 - Ali ar-Rida, Shia Imam (d. 818)
1431 - Pope Alexander VI (d. 1503)
1449 - Lorenzo de Medici, Italian statesman (d. 1492)
1467 - Sigismund I the Old, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania (d. 1548)
1484 - Huldrych Zwingli, Swiss Protestant leader (d. 1531)
1511 - The first Henry, Duke of Cornwall (d. 1511)
1516 - Margareta Leijonhufvud, queen of Gustav I of Sweden (d. 1551)
1557 - István Bocskay, Prince of Transylvania (d. 1606)
1600 - Friedrich Spanheim, Dutch theologian (d. 1649)
1614 - John Wilkins, English Bishop of Chester (d. 1672)
1618 - Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Spanish painter (d. 1682)
1638 - Emperor Go-Sai of Japan (d. 1685)
1648 - Elkanah Settle, English writer (d. 1724)
1655 - Christian Thomasius, German jurist (d. 1728)
1684 - Arnold Drakenborch, Dutch classical scholar (d. 1748)
1704 - Soame Jenyns, English writer (d. 1787)
1711 - Franz Freiherr von der Trenck, Austrian soldier (d. 1749)
1714 - Kristijonas Donelaitis, Lithuanian poet (d. 1780)
1735 - Paul Revere, American patriot (d. 1818)
1745 - Anthony Wayne, American general and statesman (d. 1796)
1750 - Frederick Muhlenberg, 1st Speaker of the United States House of Representatives (d. 1801)
1752 - Betsy Ross, American seamstress (d. 1836)
1767 - Maria Edgeworth, Anglo-Irish novelist (d. 1849)
1774 - André Marie Constant Duméril, French zoologist (d. 1860)
1779 - William Clowes, English printer (d. 1847)
1823 - Sándor Petőfi, Hungarian poet and revolutionary (d. 1849)
1833 - Robert Lawson, New Zealand architect (d. 1902)
1848 - John Goff, Irish lawyer (d. 1924)
1854 - Sir James George Frazer, Scottish anthropologist (d. 1941)
1860 - George Washington Carver, American educator (d. 1943)
1863 - Pierre de Coubertin, French Olympic Games initiator(d. 1937)
1864 - Alfred Stieglitz, American photographer (d. 1946)
1868 - Snitz Edwards, American actor (d. 1937)
1873 - Mariano Azuela, Mexican novelist (d. 1952)
1874 - Gustave Whitehead, German-born inventor (d. 1927)
1874 - Frank Knox, American Secretary of the Navy (d. 1944)
1876 - Harriet Brooks, Canadian physicist (d. 1933)
1878 - Agner Krarup Erlang, Danish scientist (d. 1929)
1879 - E. M. Forster, English novelist (d. 1970)
1881 - Vajiravudh, King of Thailand (d. 1925)
1883 - Gabrielle Chanel, French Designer (d. 1971)
1887 - Wilhelm Canaris, German admiral (d. 1945)
1890 - Anton Melik, Slovenian geographer (d. 1966)
1892 - Artur Rodziński, Croatian conductor (d. 1958)
1894 - Satyendra Nath Bose, Indian mathematician (d. 1974)
1895 - J. Edgar Hoover, American FBI director (d. 1972)
1900 - Xavier Cugat, Spanish musician (d. 1990)
1900 - Chiune Sugihara, Japanese diplomat (d. 1986)
1902 - Buster Nupen, South African cricketer (d. 1977)
1904 - Fazal Ilahi Chaudhry, Pakistani politician (d. 1982)
1904 - Ethan Allen, American baseball player (d. 1993)
1905 - Kamatari Fujiwara, Japanese actor (d. 1985)
1906 - Giovanni D'Anzi, Italian songwriter (d. 1974)
1909 - Dana Andrews, American actor (d. 1992)
1909 - Barry M. Goldwater, American politician (d. 1998)
1911 - Hank Greenberg, American baseball player (d. 1986)
1912 - Kim Philby, British spy (d. 1988)
1917 - Jule Gregory Charney, American meteorologist (d. 1981)
1917 - Albert Mol, Dutch actor (d. 2004)
1918 - Patrick Anthony Porteous, Scottish Victoria Cross recipient (d. 2000)
1919 - J. D. Salinger, American novelist
1920 - Virgilio Savona, Italian singer (Quartetto Cetra)
1921 - Isma'il Raji' al-Faruqi, Palestinian-born philosopher (d. 1986)
1922 - Rocky Graziano, American boxer (d. 1990)
1922 - Ernest Hollings, American politician
1925 - Stymie Beard, American actor (d. 1981)
1927 - Vernon L. Smith, American economist, Bank of Sweden Prize winner
1927 - Doak Walker, American football star (d. 1998)
1928 - Ernest Tidyman, American writer (d. 1984)
1930 - Hossain Mohammad Ershad, President of Bangladesh
1933 - Frederick Lowy, Canadian medical educator
1933 - Joe Orton, English writer (d. 1967)
1937 - Adam Wiśniewski-Snerg, Polish author (d. 1995)
1938 - Robert Jankel, British coachbuilder (d. 2005)
1940 - Frank Langella American actor
1942 - Martin Frost, American politician
1942 - Country Joe McDonald, American musician (Country Joe and the Fish)
1942 - Gennadi Sarafanov, Soviet cosmonaut (d. 2005)
1943 - Don Novello, American actor
1943 - Jimmy Hart, Wrestling manager
1944 - Zafarullah Khan Jamali former Prime Minister of Pakistan
1945 - Jacky Ickx, Belgian race car driver
1946 - Rivelino, Brazilian football player
1947 - Jon Corzine, American politician
1947 - Paula Tsui, Hong Kong singer
1948 - Pavel Grachev, Russian general
1951 - Ashfaq Hussain, Urdu poet
1951 - Nana Patekar, Indian Film and Stage Actor
1953 - Greg Carmichael, British guitarist
1954 - Robert Menendez, American politician
1956 - Mark R. Hughes, American enterpeneur (d. 2000)
1957 - Luis Guzmán, Puerto Rican actor
1958 - Grandmaster Flash, Barbados-born musician
1959 - Azali Assoumani, Comorese president
1960 - Adelaide Ferreira, Portuguese singer
1961 - Mark Wingett, British actor
1964 - Dedee Pfeiffer, American actress
1966 - Anna Burke, Australian politician
1966 - Embeth Davidtz, American actress
1967 - Derrick Thomas, American football player (d. 2000)
1967 - John Digweed, English DJ
1968 - Davor Šuker, Croatian footballer
1969 - Verne Troyer, American actor
1970 - Gabriel Jarret, American actor
1970 - Kimberly Page, American actress
1971 - Paul Luscher, singer/songwriter
1971 - Bobby Holik, Czech hockey player
1972 - Neve McIntosh, Scottish actress
1972 - Lilian Thuram, French footballer
1975 - Joe Cannon, American soccer player
1975 - Sonali Bendre, Indian Model and Film Actress
1975 - Robert Westerholt, Dutch guitarist (Within Temptation)
1975 - Eiichiro Oda, Japanese Manga artist
1976 - Caleb Wyatt, American motocross rider
1977 - Hasan Salihamidžić, Bosnian footballer
1977 - Saukrates, Canadian rapper.
1977 - Zachary Quinto, American actor
1978 - Nina Bott, German actress
1978 - Jared Fogle, American personality
1978 - Phillip Mulryne, Northern Irish footballer
1978 - Paramahamsa Sri Nithyananda, Indian spiritual guru
1979 - Brody Dalle, Australian singer (The Distillers)
1979 - Koichi Domoto, Japanese artist
1980 - Elin Nordegren, Swedish model
1980 - Nils-Eric Johansson, Swedish footballer
1981 - Zsolt Baumgartner, Hungarian race car driver
1981 - Abdulkadir Kocak, Turkish boxer
1981 - Eden Riegel, American actress
1982 - David Nalbandian, Argentinian tennis player
1983 - Calum Davenport, English footballer
1984 - Michael Witt, Australian rugby league footballer
1984 - Jose Paolo Guerrero, Peruvian footballer
1985 - Steven Davis, Irish footballer
1985 - Don Paysan, Canadian professional wrestler
1986 - Lee Sung Min, member of Korean boyband Super Junior
1987 - Registered birthday of Xiah Junsu, a member of Korean boyband TVXQ
1987 - Gilbert Brule, Canadian hockey player
1992 - Martin Leung, Canadian trombone player

[edit] Deaths
379 - Saint Basil of Caesarea (b. 330)
404 - Saint Telemachus
874 - Hasan al-Askari, eleventh Shia Imam (b. 846)
898 - Odo, Count of Paris (b. 860)
1204 - King Haakon III of Norway
1387 - King Charles II of Navarre (b. 1332)
1515 - King Louis XII of France (b. 1462)
1554 - Pedro de Valdivia, Spanish conquistador (bc. 1500)
1559 - Christian III of Denmark and Norway (b. 1503)
1560 - Joachim Du Bellay, French poet (bc. 1522)
1617 - Hendrik Goltzius, Dutch painter (b. 1558)
1679 - Jan Steen, Dutch painter
1697 - Filippo Baldinucci, Florentine biographer/ historian (b. 1624)
1716 - William Wycherley, English dramatist (bc. 1640)
1730 - Samuel Sewall, English-born judge (b. 1652)
1742 - Peregrine Bertie, 2nd Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven, English statesman (b. 1686)
1748 - Johann Bernoulli, Swiss mathematician (b. 1667)
1759 - Jacques-Joachim Trotti, marquis de La Chétardie, French adventurer (b. 1705)
1766 - James Francis Edward Stuart, "The Old Pretender" (b. 1688)
1782 - Johann Christian Bach, German composer (b. 1735)
1789 - Fletcher Norton, 1st Baron Grantley, English politician (b. 1716)
1793 - Francesco Guardi, Venetian painter (b. 1712)
1796 - Alexandre-Théophile Vandermonde, French mathematician (b. 1735)
1800 - Louis-Jean-Marie Daubenton, French naturalist (b. 1716)
1817 - Martin Heinrich Klaproth, German chemist (b. 1743)
1862 - Mikhail Vasilievich Ostrogradsky, Russian physicist (b. 1801)
1869 - Martin W. Bates, U.S. Senator from Delaware (b. 1786)
1892 - Roswell B. Mason, Mayor of Chicago (b. 1805)
1894 - Heinrich Hertz, German physicist (b. 1857)
1912 - Pyotr Nikolaevich Lebedev, Russian phsyicist (b. 1866)
1919 - Mikhail Drozdovsky, Russian general (b. 1881)
1921 - Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg, Chancellor of Germany (b. 1856)
1931 - Martinus Beijerinck, Dutch microbiologist and botanist (b. 1851)
1933 - Harriet Brooks, Canadian physicist (b. 1876)
1944 - Charles Turner, Australian cricketer (b. 1862)
1953 - Hank Williams, American singer (b. 1923)
1958 - Edward Weston, American photographer (b. 1886)
1960 - Margaret Sullavan, American actress (b. 1911)
1964 - Bechara El Khoury, President of Lebanon (b. 1890)
1971 - Saint Amphilochios, Ukrainian Orthodox Christian Saint (b. 1894)
1972 - Maurice Chevalier, French actor and singer (b. 1888)
1981 - Beulah Bondi, American actress (b. 1888)
1982 - Victor Buono, American actor (b. 1938)
1984 - Alexis Korner, British blues musician (b. 1928)
1985 - Kamatari Fujiwara, Japanese actor (b. 1905)
1986 - Alfredo Binda, Italian cyclist (b. 1902)
1992 - Grace Hopper, American computer pioneer (b. 1906)
1994 - Lord Arthur Espie Porritt, Governor-General of New Zealand (b. 1900)
1994 - Cesar Romero, American actor (b. 1907)
1995 - Fred West, British serial killer (suicide) (b. 1941)
1995 - Eugene Wigner, Hungarian physicist, Nobel laureate (b. 1902)
1996 - Arleigh Burke, American admiral (b. 1901)
1997 - Townes Van Zandt, American musician (b. 1944)
1998 - Helen Wills Moody, American tennis player (b. 1905)
2000 - Colin Vaughan, Australian-born political journalist
2001 - Ray Walston, American actor (b. 1914)
2002 - Julia Phillips, American film producer (b. 1944)
2003 - Joe Foss, American politician and fighter pilot (b. 1915)
2005 - Shirley Chisholm, American politician (b. 1924)
2005 - Hugh John Frederick Lawson, 6th Baron Burnham, British newspaperman (b. 1931)
2005 - Bob Matsui, American politician (b. 1941)
2005 - Eugene J. Martin, American painter, artist (b. 1938)
2006 - Harry Magdoff, American magazine editor (b. 1913)
2006 - Bryan Harvey, American musician (b. 1956)

[edit] Holidays and observances

[edit] By Observance
Many countries around the world using Gregorian Calendar - New Year's Day; often celebrated at 0:01 with fireworks.
Last day of Kwanzaa
Public Domain Day in many countries. This is the day on which copyrights expire and works are put into the public domain.

[edit] By Faith
The seventh day of Christmas (and eighth night of same) in Western Christianity.
Roman Catholicism - Feast of the Circumcision (Old calendar).
Roman Catholicism - Holy Day of Obligation in many countries. Final Day of Octave of Christmas, Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God (New calendar).
Roman Catholicism - National Migration Week begins (varying official support by the office of U.S. President, not strictly religious)

[edit] By Country
Cuba Liberation Day.
Haiti Independence Day.
Scotland: First day of New Year public Holiday (the second being January 2). Most shops and businesses closed on this day.
Slovakia: Establishment of Slovak Republic.
Sudan Independence Day.
Taiwan Founding of Republic of China Day.

[edit] By City
New Year’s Day Parade in London, United Kingdom.
Vienna New Year's Concert
Pasadena, California - The Tournament of Roses parade and, traditionally, the Rose Bowl football championship.

[edit] Day of the week
The day of the week of New Year determines the days of the week of 1 March of the previous year through 28 February of the new year, without distinguishing common years and leap years. It is the day before "Doomsday" of the previous year.

links
BBC: On This Day
NY Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened this week (Dec 18th - Dec 24th) - Events

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Mon, 18 Dec 2006 15:26:00 +0000

Offered by:

Dec 18th

Events
218 BC - Second Punic War: Battle of the Trebia - Hannibal's Carthaginian forces defeat those of the Roman Republic.
1271 - Kublai Khan renames his empire "Yuan" (元 yuán), officially marking the start of the Yuan Dynasty of China.
1352 - Innocent VI is elected Pope.
1642 - Abel Tasman becomes first European to land in New Zealand
1787 - New Jersey becomes the third state to ratify the United States Constitution.
1793 - Surrender of the frigate La Lutine by French royalists to Lord Hood; renamed HMS Lutine, she later becomes a famous treasure wreck.
1892 - The first performance of Tchaikovsky's ballet The Nutcracker is held at the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg.
1900 - The Upper Ferntree Gully to Gembrook Narrow-gauge (2 ft 6 in or 762 mm) Railway (now the Puffing Billy Railway) in Victoria, Australia opened for traffic.
1926 - The first performance of Leoš Janáček's opera The Makropulos Affair is held in Brno, Czechoslovakia.
1935 - The Lanka Sama Samaja Party is founded in Sri Lanka.
1944 - World War II 77 B-29 Superfortress and 200 other aircraft of U.S. Fourteenth Air Force bomb Hankow China, a Japanese supply base.
1961 - Indonesia invades Netherlands New Guinea.
1966 - Saturn's moon Epimetheus is discovered by Richard L. Walker.

Dec. 19th

Events
324 - Licinius abdicates his position as Roman Emperor.
1187 - Pope Clement III is elected.
1606 - The Susan Constant, the Godspeed, and the Discovery depart England carrying settlers who, at Jamestown, Virginia, would found the first of the thirteen colonies that became the United States.
1777 - American Revolutionary War: George Washington's Continental Army goes into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.
1828 - Nullification Crisis: Vice President of the United States John C. Calhoun pens the South Carolina Exposition and Protest, protesting the Tariff of 1828.
1835 - The first issue of The Blade newspaper is published in Toledo, Ohio.
1843 - A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens, is first published in England.
1910 - Edward Douglass White is sworn in as the 9th Chief Justice of the United States.
1912 - William H. Van Schaick, captain of the steamship General Slocum which caught fire and killed over 1,000 people, is pardoned by President Taft after 3-and-a-half-years in Sing Sing prison .
1916 - World War I: Battle of Verdun - On the Western Front, the French Army successfully holds off the German Army and drives it back to its starting position.
1920 - King Constantine I restored as King of the Hellenes after the death of his son Alexander I of Greece and a plebescite.
1941 - Hitler becomes Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the German Army
1961 - India annexes Daman and Diu, part of Portuguese India.
1963 - Zanzibar receives its independence from the United Kingdom, to become a constitutional monarchy under Sultan Hamoud bin Mohammed.
1965 - Prison guard George Hodson is killed during Ronald Ryan and Peter Walker's escape from HM Prison Pentridge in Coburg, Victoria.
1967 - Prime Minister of Australia Harold Holt is officially presumed dead.
1972 - Project Apollo: The last manned lunar flight, Apollo 17, crewed by Eugene Cernan, Ron Evans and Harrison Schmitt, returns to Earth.
1974 - The Altair 8800 microcomputer kit goes on sale.
1974 - Nelson A. Rockefeller is sworn is as the 41st Vice President of the United States under President Gerald Ford.
1975 - A bomb explodes in the centre of Dundalk, Ireland, killing two people.
1981 - Sixteen lives are lost when the Penlee lifeboat goes to the aid of the stricken coaster Union Star in heavy seas.
1984 - The Sino-British Joint Declaration, stating that the People's Republic of China would resume the exercise of sovereignty over Hong Kong and the United Kingdom would restore Hong Kong to China with effect from July 1, 1997, is signed in Beijing by Deng Xiaoping and Margaret Thatcher.
1988 - Lawn darts are banned from sale in the United States by the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
1997 - Silkair Flight 185 crashes into the Musi River, near Palembang in Indonesia, killing 104.
1997 - The film Titanic is released.
1998 - Lewinsky scandal: The United States House of Representatives forwards articles I and III of impeachment against President Bill Clinton to the Senate.
2000 - The Leninist Guerrilla Units wing of the Communist Labour Party of Turkey/Leninist attack a Nationalist Movement Party office in Istanbul, killing one person and injuring three.
2001 - The fire at the World Trade Center, as a result of the September 11, 2001 attacks, is finally extinguished after three months.
2001 - A record high barometric pressure of 1085.6 hPa (32.06 inHg) is recorded at Tosontsengel, Hövsgöl in Mongolia.
2001 - Argentine economic crisis: December 2001 riots - Riots erupt in Buenos Aires after Domingo Cavallo's corralito measures restrict the withdrawal of cash from bank deposits.
1969 - Capital punishment in the United Kingdom: Home Secretary James Callaghan's motion to remove the limit on the Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act, which suspended the death penalty in England, Wales and Scotland for all crimes, except treason, piracy with violence, and certain crimes under the jurisdiction of the armed forces for a period of five years, is carried by both the House of Commons and the House of Lords.
1973 - Soviet Soyuz Programme: Soyuz 13, crewed by cosmonauts Valentin Lebedev and Pyotr Klimuk, is launched from Baikonur in the Soviet Union.
1996 - The Oakland, California school board passes a resolution officially declaring "Ebonics" a language or dialect.
1997 - HTML 4.0 is published by the World Wide Web Consortium.
1999 - NASA launches into orbit the Terra platform carrying five Earth Observation instruments, including ASTER, CERES, MISR, MODIS and MOPITT.
2001 - The Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in Manhattan, New York City, is damaged by fire.
2002 - 2003 California recall: Governor of California Gray Davis announces that the state would face a record budget deficit of $35 billion, roughly double the figure reported during his reelection campaign one month earlier.

Dec 20th

Events
1522 - Suleiman the Magnificent accepts the surrender of the surviving Knights of Rhodes, who are allowed to evacuate. They eventually re-settle on Malta and become known as the Knights of Malta.
1803 - Louisiana Purchase completed at a ceremony in New Orleans.
1860 - South Carolina becomes the first state to secede from the United States.
1915 - World War I: Last Australian troops evacuated from Gallipoli.
1917 - Cheka, first Soviet secret police, founded.
1941 - World War II: First battle of the American Volunteer Group, better known as the "Flying Tigers" in Kunming, China.
1942 - World War II: Bombing of Calcutta by the Japanese.
1951 - Nuclear power first harvested when EBR-1 powers four light bulbs.
1952 - United States Air Force C-124 crashes and burns in Moses Lake, Washington killing 87.
1960 - National Front for the Liberation of Vietnam is formed.
1973 - The Spanish Prime Minister, Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco, is assassinated by a car bomb attack in Madrid
1981 - The first ever on-stage performance of the award-winning Broadway musical Dreamgirls at Imperial Theatre on Broadway.
1984 - The Summit tunnel fire is the largest underground fire in history, as a freight train carrying over 1 million litres of petrol derails near the town of Todmorden in the Pennines.
1988 - The United Nations Convention Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances is signed at Vienna.
1989 - United States invasion of Panama: United States sends troops into Panama to overthrow government of Manuel Noriega.
1991 - Paul Keating becomes Prime Minister of Australia.
1995 - NATO begins peacekeeping in Bosnia.
1995 - An American Airlines Flight 965 Boeing 757 crashes into a mountain 50 km north of Cali, Colombia killing 160.
1996 - NeXT merges with Apple Computer, starting the path to Mac OS X.
1999 - Vermont's Supreme Court rules that homosexual couples are entitled to the same benefits and protections as married heterosexual couples.
1999 - Macau is handed over to the People's Republic of China by Portugal.
2001 - Argentine economic crisis (1999-2002): President of Argentina Fernando de la Rúa is forced out of office.
2002 - US Senator Trent Lott resigns as majority leader.
2005 - 2005 New York City transit strike: New York City's Transport Workers Union Local 100 goes on strike, shutting down all New York City Subway and Bus services.
2005 - US District Court Judge John E. Jones III ruled against mandating teaching intelligent design in the Dover Area School District in his ruling of Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District.

Dec. 21st

Events
69 - Year of the four emperors: Following Galba, Otho and Vitellius, Vespasian becomes the fourth Emperor of Rome within a year.
1620 - Plymouth Colony: William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims land on what is now known as Plymouth Rock in Plymouth, Massachusetts.
1861 - Medal of Honor: Public Resolution 82, containing a provision for a Navy Medal of Valor, is signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln.
1872 - Challenger expedition: HMS Challenger, commanded by Captain George Nares, sails from Portsmouth.
1912 - The movie Das Mirakel premiered in Germany.
1913 - Arthur Wynne's "word-cross", the first crossword puzzle, is published in the New York World.
1917 - Meiji Dairies, a Japanese dairy industry company, is founded.
1936 - First flight of the Junkers JU-88 bomber prototype.
1937 - The film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is premiered at the Carthay Circle Theater in Los Angeles.
1958 - French presidential election, 1958: Charles de Gaulle is elected President of France as his Union des Démocrates pour la République party gain 78.5% of the vote.
1962 - Rondane National Park is established as Norway's first national park.
1968 - Project Apollo: Apollo 8, crewed by Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and William Anders, is launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
1973 - The Geneva Conference on the Arab-Israeli conflict opens.
1979 - Lancaster House Agreement: An independence agreement for Rhodesia is signed in London by Lord Carrington, Sir Ian Gilmour, Robert Mugabe, Joshua Nkomo, Bishop Abel Muzorewa and Dr S C Mundawarara.
1987 - The passenger ferry Doña Paz sinks after colliding with the oil tanker Vector 1 in the Tablas Strait in the Philippines, killing 1,565.
1988 - A bomb explodes on board Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Dumfries and Galloway, killing 270.
1999 - The Spanish Civil Guard intercepts a van loaded with 950 kg of explosives which ETA intend to use to blow up Torre Picasso in Madrid.
2012 - The Long Count of the Maya calendar recycles according to the most popular correlation. A minority argues it does so on December 23, 2012.

Dec. 22nd

Events
1603 - Mehmed III Sultan of the Ottoman Empire dies and is succeeded by his son Ahmed I.
1790 - Storm and capture Russian armies And. Century of Suvorov of a Turkish fortress Izmail.
1807 - The Embargo Act, forbidding trade with all foreign countries, is passed by the U.S. Congress, at the urging of President Thomas Jefferson.
1809 - The Non-Intercourse Act, lifting the Embargo Act except for the United Kingdom and France, passes the U.S. Congress.
1849 - The execution of Fyodor Dostoevsky is canceled at the last second.
1851 - The first freight train is operated in Roorkee in India.
1864 - Savannah, Georgia falls to General William Tecumseh Sherman, concluding his "March to the Sea".
1885 - Ito Hirobumi, a samurai, became the first Prime Minister of Japan.
1894 - The Dreyfus affair begins, in France, when Alfred Dreyfus is wrongly convicted of treason, on antisemitic grounds.
1920 - Opening of 8-th All-Russia congress of Advice in Moscow (on December, 29th). The statement of the GOELRO plan.
1937 - The Lincoln Tunnel opens to traffic in New York City.
1944 - World War II: German troops demand the surrender of United States troops at Bastogne, Belgium, prompting the famouse one word reply by General Anthony McAuliffe: "NUTS!" See Battle of the Bulge.
1944 - World War II: Vietnam People's Army is formed to resist Japanese occupation of Vietnam.
1947 - The Constituent Assembly of Italy approves its constitution.
1956 - Colo is born, the first gorilla to be bred in captivity.
1963 - Cruise ship Lakonia burns 180 miles north of Madeira with the loss of 128 lives.
1964 - Comedian Lenny Bruce is convicted of obscenity.
1964 - First SR-71 (Blackbird) flight.
1965 - In the United Kingdom, a 70mph speed limit is applied to all rural roads including motorways for the first time. Previously, there had been no speed limit.
1974 - Grande Comore, Anjouan and Mohéli vote to become the independent nation of Comoros. Mayotte remains under French administration.
1984 - Subway vigilante Bernhard Hugo Goetz shoots four African-American men on an express train in The Bronx borough of New York City.
1988 - Chico Mendes, a Brazilian rubber tapper, unionist and environmental activist, is assassinated.
1989 - After a week of bloody demonstrations, Ion Iliescu takes over as president of Romania, ending Nicolae Ceauşescu's Communist dictatorship.
1989 - Berlin's Brandenburg Gate re-opens after nearly 30 years, effectively ending the division of East and West Germany.
1989 - Two tourist coaches collide on the Pacific Highway north of Kempsey NSW (Kempsey bus crash).
1990 - Lech Wałęsa is sworn in as President of Poland.
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.
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).
1999 - Tandja Mamadou becomes President of Niger.
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.
2001 - Cc the cat, the first cloned pet, is born.

Dec. 23rd

Events
619 - Boniface V becomes Pope.
1493 - Georg Alt's German translation of Hartmann Schedel's Nuremberg Chronicle is published.
1783 - George Washington resigns as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army at the Maryland State House in Annapolis, Maryland.
1823 - The poem A Visit From St. Nicholas (AKA The Night Before Christmas) is published in the Sentinel.
1888 - Vincent van Gogh cuts off the lower part of his left ear, takes it to a brothel, and gives it to a prostitute named Rachel.
1913 - The Federal Reserve Act is signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson, creating the Federal Reserve.
1916 - World War I: Battle of Magdhaba - Allied forces defeat Turkish forces in Egypt's Sinai peninsula.
1921 - Visva-Bharati University inaugurated.
1936 - Colombia becomes a signatory to the Buenos Aires copyright treaty.
1937 - First flight of the Vickers Wellington bomber.
1941 - World War II: Japanese Imperial Army occupied Wake Island.
1947 - The transistor is first demonstrated at Bell Laboratories.
1948 - Seven former Japanese leaders sentenced to death by hanging at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East were executed at Sugamo Prison in Tokyo.
1954 - The first human kidney transplant is performed by Dr. Joseph E. Murray at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts.
1958 - Dedication of Tokyo Tower, world's highest self-supporting iron tower.
1970 - The North Tower of the World Trade Center is topped out at 1,368 feet, making it the tallest building in the world.
1972 - The Nicaraguan capital of Managua is struck by a 6.5 magnitude earthquake, killing more than 10,000.
1972 - All 16 survivors of the October 13 crash of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 are rescued.
1979 - Soviet war in Afghanistan: Soviet forces occupy Kabul, the Afghan capital.
1982 - The Environmental Protection Agency announces it has identified dangerous levels of dioxin in the soil of Times Beach, Missouri.
1986 - Voyager, piloted by Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager, lands at Edwards Air Force Base in California and becomes the first aircraft to fly non-stop around the world.
1990 - History of Slovenia: 88% of Slovenia's population vote for independence from Yugoslavia in a referendum.
2004 - Macquarie Island in the Southern Ocean is hit by an 8.1 magnitude earthquake.
2005 - Azerbaijan Airlines Flight 217 from Baku, Azerbaijan to Aktau, Kazakhstan crashed shortly after takeoff killing 23 people.
2005 - Chad declares a state of war against Sudan following a December 18th attack on Adre, which left about 100 people dead.

Dec. 24th

Events
640 - John IV becomes Pope.
1294 - Pope Boniface VIII is elected Pope, replacing St. Celestine V, who had abdicated.
1515 - Thomas Wolsey is named the English Lord Chancellor.
1715 - Swedish troops occupy Norway.
1777 - Kiritimati, also called Christmas Island, was discovered by James Cook.
1800 - Assassination attempt on Napoleon Bonaparte's life.
1814 - The Treaty of Ghent was signed which ended the War of 1812.
1818 - "Silent Night" composed by Franz Xaver Gruber.
1851 - Library of Congress burns.
1865 - Several US Civil War Confederate veterans form the Ku Klux Klan.
1906 - The first radio program, consisting of a poetry reading, a violin solo, and a speech, is broadcast.
1914 - World War I: The "Christmas truce" begins.
1924 - Albania becomes a republic.
1929 - Assassination attempt of Argentine President Hipólito Yrigoyen.
1939 - World War II: Pope Pius XII makes a Christmas Eve appeal for peace.
1941 - Hong Kong falls to the Japanese Imperial Army.
1941 - World War II: Kuching is conquered by Japanese forces.
1942 - World War II: French monarchist, Ferdinand Bonnier de La Chapelle, assassinates French Vichy admiral Darlan in Algiers
1943 - World War II: U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower becomes the Supreme Allied Commander.
1946 - France's Fourth Republic founded.
1951 - Libya becomes independent from Italy. Idris I is proclaimed King of Libya.
1953 - Tangiwai disaster: A railway bridge collapse at Tangiwai, New Zealand sends a fully loaded passenger train into the Whangaehu River, killing 153 people.
1953 - NBC's Dragnet becomes the first network-sponsored television program.
1954 - Laos becomes independent.
1966 - A Canadair CL44 chartered by the United States military crashes into a small village in South Vietnam, killing 129.
1968 - The crew of the USS Pueblo is released by North Korea after being held for 11 months on suspicion of spying.
1968 - The crew of Apollo 8 enter into orbit around the Moon, becoming the first humans to do so.
1969 - Curt Flood writes to Bowie K. Kuhn, the Commissioner of Baseball, asking to be declared a free agent .
1974 - Cyclone Tracy devastates Darwin, Australia.
1979 - The Soviet Union invades Afghanistan to support the country's Marxist government.
1979 - The first European Ariane rocket is launched.
1985 - A black bull blocks the Cross Harbour Tunnel in Hong Kong for three hours.
1987 - Japanese legendary rock band BOØWY declares their breakup at the Shibuya Kokaido.
1997 - The Sid El-Antri massacre (or Sidi Lamri) in Algeria kills 50-100 people.
1997 - The Dominican Republic becomes a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.
2000 - The Texas 7 holds up a sports store in Irving, Texas. Police officer Aubrey Hawkins is shot during the robbery.
2002 - The New Delhi Metro opens.
2003 - The Spanish police thwart an attempt by ETA to detonate 50 kg of explosives at 3:55 p.m. inside Madrid's busy Chamartín Station.
2004 - The 2004 Christmas Eve Snowstorm delivers an extremely unusual snowfall to the southern United States.

Space walk -- LIVE

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Sat, 16 Dec 2006 23:27:00 +0000

What happened this coming weekend Dec.16th and 17th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Sat, 16 Dec 2006 15:13:00 +0000

Offered by:

December 16th

Events
1392 - Historku-cho - Emperor Go-Kameyama abdicates in favor of rival claimant Go-Komatsu.
1431 - Henry VI of England is crowned King of France at Notre Dame in Paris.
1598 - Seven Year War: Battle of Noryang Point - The final battle of the Seven Year War is fought between the Korean and Japanese navies, resulting in a decisive Korean victory.
1653 - English Interregnum: The Protectorate - Oliver Cromwell becomes Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland.
1689 - Convention Parliament: The Declaration of Right is embodied in the Bill of Rights.
1761 - Seven Years' War: After four-month siege, the Russians under Pyotr Rumyantsev take the Prussian fortress of Kolobrzeg.
1773 - American Revolution: Boston Tea Party - Members of the Sons of Liberty disguised as Mohawks dump crates of tea into Boston harbor as a protest against the Tea Act.
1811 - The first two in a series of severe earthquakes occurs, in the vicinity of New Madrid, Missouri.
1838 - Battle of Blood River: Voortrekkers led by Andries Pretorius combat Zulu impis, led by Dambuza (Nzobo) and Ndlela kaSompisi in what is today KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.
1850 - History of New Zealand: The Charlotte-Jane and the Randolph bring the first of the Canterbury Pilgrims to Lyttelton.
1864 - American Civil War: Franklin-Nashville Campaign - Battle of Nashville - Major General George H. Thomas's Union forces defeat Lieutenant General John Bell Hood's Confederate Army of Tennessee.
1893 - Antonín Dvořák's Symphony No. 9 in E minor, Op. 95, "From The New World" was given its world premiere at Carnegie Hall.
1899 - Brooklyn Children's Museum opens.
1910 - During a ground test of his Coandă-1910 plane, Henri Coandă, caught unaware by the power of the engine, finds himself briefly airborne and loses control of the machine which crashes to the ground.
1922 - President of Poland Gabriel Narutowicz is assassinated by Eligiusz Niewiadomski at the Zachęta Gallery in Warsaw.
1925 - A regular broadcasting service was instituted in Ceylon.
1937 - Theodore Cole and Ralph Roe attempt to escape from Alcatraz island. Both men entered the bay on December 16th, neither was ever seen again.
1941 - World War II: Japanese occupy Miri, Sarawak
1942 - Holocaust: Porajmos - Heinrich Himmler orders that Roma candidates for extermination should be deported to Auschwitz.
1944 - World War II: Battle of the Bulge - General Dwight D. Eisenhower's allied forces and Field Marshall Gerd von Rundstedt's German army engage in the Belgian Ardennes.
1946 - Léon Blum becomes Prime Minister of France.
1957 - Sir Feroz Khan Noon replaces Ibrahim Ismail Chundrigar as Prime Minister of Pakistan.
1960 - 1960 New York air disaster: While approaching New York's Idlewild Airport, a United Airlines Douglas DC-8 collides with a TWA Lockheed Super Constellation in a blinding snowstorm over Staten Island, killing 134.
1971 - Liberation War of Bangladesh & Indo-Pakistani War of 1971: The surrender of the Pakistan army simultaneously brings an end to both conflicts.
1985 - Mafia: In New York City, Paul Castellano and Thomas Bilotti are shot dead on the orders of John Gotti, who assumes leadership of the Gambino family.
1986 - revolt in Kazakhstan against Communist party, known as Zheltoksan, which became the first signs of ethnic strife during Gorbachev's tenure
1989 - Protest breaks out in Timişoara in response to an attempt by the government to evict dissident Hungarian pastor, László Tőkés.
1991 - United Nations General Assembly: UN General Assembly Resolution 4686 revokes UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 after Israel makes revocation of resolution 3379 a condition of its participation in the Madrid Peace Conference of 1991.
1997 - Typhoon Paka makes landfall on the island of Guam with 150 mph winds.
1997 - The Pokémon episode Electric Soldier Porygon triggers attacks of photosensitive epilepsy in hundreds of Japanese children.
1998 - Iraq disarmament crisis: Operation Desert Fox - The United States and United Kingdom bomb targets in Iraq.
2005 - The last scheduled edition of US radio program The Howard Stern Show is broadcast on terrestrial radio.

Births
1485 - Catherine of Aragon, Queen of England (d. 1536)
1584 - John Selden, English jurist and oriental scholar (d. 1654)
1614 - Eberhard III, Duke of Württemberg (d. 1674)
1714 - George Whitefield, British-born Methodist leader (d. 1770)
1716 - Louis-Jules Mancini-Mazarini, Duc de Nivernais, French diplomat and writer (d. 1798)
1717 - Elizabeth Carter, British writer (d. 1806)
1742 - Gebhard Fürst Blücher von Wahlstatt, German Field Marshal (d. 1819)
1770 - Ludwig van Beethoven, German composer (d. 1827)
1775 - Jane Austen, British writer (d. 1817)
1775 - François-Adrien Boïeldieu, French composer (d. 1834)
1776 - Johann Wilhelm Ritter, German physicist (d. 1810)
1790 - King Léopold I of Belgium (d. 1865)
1804 - Viktor Bunyakovsky, Russian mathematician (d. 1889)
1834 - Léon Walras, French economist (d. 1910)
1861 - Antonio de La Gandara, French painter (d. 1917)
1863 - George Santayana, Spanish philosopher and writer (d. 1952)
1865 - Olavo Bilac, Brazilian poet (d. 1918)
1866 (N.S.) - Wassily Kandinsky, Russian-born French abstract painter (d. 1944)
1867 - Amy Carmichael - missionary in Dohnavur, India (d. 1951)
1869 - Hristo Tatarchev - Bulgarian revolutionary (d. 1952)
1872 - Anton Ivanovich Denikin, Russian general (d. 1947)
1882 - Sir Jack Hobbs, English test cricketer (d. 1963)
1882 - Zoltán Kodály, Hungarian composer (d. 1967)
1882 - Walther Meissner, German physicist (d. 1974)
1883 - Max Linder, French pioneer of silent film (d. 1925)
1888 - King Alexander I of Yugoslavia (d. 1934)
1888 - Alphonse Juin, marshall of France (d. 1967)
1899 - Sir Noel Coward, British playwright, actor and composer (d. 1973)
1900 - V. S. Pritchett, British author and critic (d. 1997)
1901 - Margaret Mead, American anthropologist (d. 1978)
1905 - Piet Hein, Danish mathematician and inventor (d. 1996)
1906 - Barbara Kent, Canadian Actress
1917 - Sir Arthur C. Clarke, British writer
1926 - James McCracken, American tenor (d. 1988)
1927 - Randall Garrett, American writer
1928 - Philip K. Dick, American writer (d. 1982)
1929 - Nicholas Courtney, British actor
1932 - Rodion Shchedrin, Soviet-born Russian composer
1934 - Elgin Baylor, American basketball player
1938 - Liv Ullmann, Norwegian actress
1941 - Lesley Stahl, American journalist
1943 - Steven Bochco, American television producer and writer
1943 - Tony Hicks, British guitarist (The Hollies)
1945 - Yukio Hattori, Japanese Iron Chef commentator
1946 - Benny Andersson, Swedish musician, singer and songwriter (ABBA)
1946 - Trevor Pinnock, British conductor and harpsichordist
1947 - Vincent Matthews, American sprinter and Olympic gold medalist
1947 - Ben Cross, British actor
1949 - Billy Gibbons, American guitarist (ZZ Top)
1950 - Roy Schuiten, Dutch cyclist (d. 2006)
1951 - Robben Ford, American guitarist
1952 - Joel Garner, West Indian test cricketer
1955 - Xander Berkeley, American actor
1961 - Bill Hicks, American comedian (d. 1994)
1962 - William Perry, American football player
1963 - Benjamin Bratt, American actor
1964 - Heike Drechsler, East German-born sprinter
1964 - Billy Ripken, former American baseball player
1965 - Nancy Valen, American actress
1966 - Denis Wise, English soccer player
1967 - Donovan Bailey, Jamaican-born Canadian sprinter
1967 - Miranda Otto, Australian actress
1971 - Paul van Dyk (real name Matthias Paul), German trance DJ and producer
1971 - Michael McCary, American singer (Boyz II Men)
1972 - Željko Kalac, Australian footballer
1973 - Scott Storch- Canadian / American hip-hop producer
1975 - Benjamin Kowalewicz, Canadian musician (Billy Talent)
1977 - Sylvain Distin, French footballer
1977 - Éric Bélanger, National Hockey League player
1978 - Gunter Van Handenhoven, Belgian footballer
1979 - Mihai Trăistariu, Romanian singer
1979 - Jessie Ward, American former professional wrestler
1981 - Anna Sedokova, Ukrainian singer
1981 - Gareth Williams, Scottish footballer
1981 - Took Leng How, Malaysian convicted of murder
1983 - Kelenna Azubuike, Basketball player
1985 - Keita Tachibana, Japanese singer
1987 - Hallee Hirsh, American actress
1988 - Anna Popplewell, English actress
1989 - Chen Yaoye, professional Go player

Deaths
705 - Empress Wu of Zhou (China; b. 625)
714 - Pippin of Herstal, Mayor of the Palace of Austrasia
999 - Saint Adelaide of Italy (b. 931)
1325 - Charles of Valois, son of Philip III of France (b. 1270)
1379 - John Fitzalan, Marshal of England
1470 - John II, Duke of Lorraine (b. 1425)
1515 - Afonso de Albuquerque Portuguese naval general (b. 1453)
1598 - Yi Sun-sin, Korean admiral (b. 1545)
1669 - Nathaniel Fiennes, English politician
1687 - William Petty, English scientist and philosopher (b. 1623)
1751 - Leopold II of Anhalt-Dessau, Prussian general (b. 1700)
1765 - Peter Frederick Haldimand, Swiss military officer and surveyor
1774 - François Quesnay, French economist (b. 1694)
1783 - Johann A. Hasse, German composer (b. 1699)
1783 - Sir William James British naval commander (b. 1720)
1809 - Antoine François, comte de Fourcroy, French chemist (b. 1755)
1859 - Wilhelm Grimm, German writer and folklorist (b. 1786)
1898 - Pavel Tretyakov, Russian businessman and art collector (b. 1832)
1914 - Ivan Zajc, Croatian composer (b. 1832)
1916 - Grigori Rasputin, Russian monk (b. 1869)
1921 - Camille Saint-Saëns, French composer (b. 1835)
1922 - Gabriel Narutowicz, first President of Poland (b. 1865)
1928 - Elinor Wylie, American poet and writer (b. 1885)
1945 - Giovanni Agnelli, Italian automobile manufacturer (b. 1866)
1945 - Fumimaro Konoye, Prime Minister of Japan (b. 1891)
1949 - Sidney Olcott, Canadian film director (b. 1873)
1956 - Nina Hamnett, British artist (b. 1890)
1965 - W. Somerset Maugham, British writer (b. 1874)
1976 - Réal Caouette, French Canadian politician (Social Credit Party of Canada) (b. 1917)
1977 - Risto Jarva, Finnish filmmaker (b. 1934)
1980 - Colonel Harland Sanders, American fast food entrepreneur (b. 1890)
1980 - Hellmuth Walter, German engineer and inventor (b. 1900)
1982 - Colin Chapman, British engineer and automobile manufacturer, founder of Lotus Cars (b. 1928)
1984 - Debs Garms, baseball player (b. 1907)
1985 - Paul Castellano, American mafioso (b. 1915)
1985 - Thomas Bilotti, American mafioso (b. 1940)
1988 - Sylvester James, American R&B singer, disco performer (b. 1948)
1989 - Lee Van Cleef, American actor (b. 1925)
1989 - Aileen Pringle, American actress (b. 1895)
1989 - Silvana Mangano, Italian actress (b. 1930)
1990 - Douglas Campbell, American pilot (b. 1896)
1993 - Moses Gunn, American actor (b. 1929)
1993 - Tanaka Kakuei, Prime Minister of Japan (b. 1918)
1995 - Mariele Ventre, Italian choir director (b. 1939)
1996 - Quentin Bell, British art historian (b. 1910)
1997 - Nicolette Larson, American singer (b. 1952)
2001 - Stuart Adamson, British musician (b. 1958)
2003 - Robert Stanfield, Premier of Nova Scotia (b. 1914)
2003 - Gary Stewart, American musician, singer and songwriter (b. 1945)
2004 - Ted Abernathy, American baseball player (b. 1933)
2005 - Kenneth Bulmer, British author (b.1921)
2005 - John Spencer, American actor (b. 1946)

Holidays and observances
R.C. Saints - O Sapientia ; Adelaide of Italy
Bahrain - National Day
Bangladesh - Victory Day
Kazakhstan - Independence Day
Nepal - Constitution Day (To be confirmed)
South Africa - Day of Reconciliation
Mexico - First day of Las Posadas
Philippines - First day of Misa de Gallo

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

December 17th

Events
283 - St Gaius becomes Pope.
384 - St Siricius becomes Pope.
546 - Gothic War (535–552): The Ostrogoths of King Totila conquer Rome bribing the Byzantine garrison.
1586 - Emperor Go-Yozei becomes Emperor of Japan.
1637 - Shimabara Rebellion: Japanese peasants led by Amakusa Shiro rise against daimyo Matsukura Shigeharu.
1843 - Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol is first published.
1862 - American Civil War: General Ulysses S. Grant issues General Order No. 11, expelling Jews from Tennessee, Mississippi, and Kentucky.
1903 - The Wright Brothers make the first powered heavier-than-air flight in the Wright Flyer at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.
1919 - Uruguay becomes a signatory to the Buenos Aires copyright treaty.
1935 - First flight of the Douglas DC-3 airplane.
1939 - World War II: Battle of the River Plate - The Admiral Graf Spee is scuttled by Captain Hans Langsdorff outside Montevideo.
1944 - World War II: Battle of the Bulge - Malmedy massacre - American 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion POWs are shot by Waffen-SS Kampfgruppe Peiper.
1961 - History of Goa: Operation Vijay - India seizes Goa from Portugal.
1967 - Prime Minister of Australia Harold Holt disappears while swimming near Portsea, Victoria.
1969 - Project Blue Book: The USAF closes its study of UFOs, stating that sightings were generated as a result of 'A mild form of mass hysteria, Individuals who fabricate such reports to perpetrate a hoax or seek publicity, Psychopathological persons, and Misidentification of various conventional objects'.
1970 - Polish 1970 protests: In Gdynia, soldiers fire at workers emerging from trains, killing hundreds.
1978 - The Workers Party of Jamaica is founded by Trevor Munroe.
1981 - Brigadier General James L. Dozier is abducted by the Red Brigade in Verona, Italy.
1983 - The IRA bomb Harrods Department Store in London, killing seven people. (See Harrods bombing)
1989 - The first episode of The Simpsons airs on FOX.
1989 - Romanian Revolution: Protests continue in Timişoara with rioters breaking into the Romanian Communist Party's District Committee building and attempting to set it on fire.
2002 - Second Congo War: The Congolese parties of the Inter Congolese Dialogue sign a peace accord which makes provision for transitional governance and legislative and prrresidential elections within two years.
2003 - SpaceShipOne flight 11P, piloted by Brian Binnie, makes the first privately-funded manned supersonic flight.
2003 - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King is released worldwide.
2005 - Anti-WTO protesters riot in Wan Chai, Hong Kong
2006 - The Metalocalypse begins

Births
1239 - Kujo Yoritsugu, Japanese Shogun (d. 1256)
1267 - Emperor Go-Uda of Japan (d. 1324)
1619 - Prince Rupert of the Rhine, Royalist commander in the English Civil War (d. 1682)
1632 - Anthony Wood, English antiqurian (d. 1695)
1685 - Thomas Tickell, English writer (d. 1740)
1706 - Émilie du Châtelet, French mathematician and physicist (d. 1749)
1734 - Maria I of Portugal, Portuguese queen (d. 1816)
1749 - Domenico Cimarosa, Italian composer (d. 1801)
1770 - (Baptism) - Ludwig van Beethoven, German composer (d. 1827)
1778 - Sir Humphry Davy, British chemist and physicist (d. 1829)
1796 - Thomas Chandler Haliburton, Canadian novelist (d. 1865)
1799 - Titian Peale, American artist (d. 1885)
1807 - John Greenleaf Whittier, American poet and abolitionist (d. 1892)
1830 - Jules de Goncourt, French publisher (d. 1870)
1847 - Émile Faguet, French writer and critic (d. 1916)
1853 - Émile Roux, French physician (d. 1933)
1859 - Paul César Helleu, French artist (d. 1927)
1873 - Ford Madox Ford, British writer (d. 1939)
1874 - William Lyon Mackenzie King, tenth Prime Minister of Canada (d. 1950)
1883 - Raimu, French actor (d. 1946)
1887 - Josef Lada, Czech painter (d. 1957)
1888 - King Alexander I of Yugoslavia (d. 1934)
1892 - Sam Barry, American basketball coach (d. 1950)
1893 - Erwin Piscator, German film director (d. 1966)
1894 - Arthur Fiedler, American conductor (d. 1979)
1900 - Mary Cartwright, English mathematician (d. 1998)
1903 - Erskine Caldwell, American author (d. 1987)
1903 - Ray Noble, British bandleader, composer, arranger and actor (d. 1978)
1905 - Simo Häyhä, Finnish sniper (d. 2002)
1906 - Fernando Lopes-Graça, Portuguese composer and musicologist (d. 1994)
1908 - Willard Frank Libby, American chemist and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1980)
1910 - Sy Oliver, American jazz arranger, trumpeter, composer and bandleader (d. 1988)
1915 - André Claveau, French singer (d. 2003)
1916 - Penelope Fitzgerald, British writer (d. 2000)
1920 - Kenneth E. Iverson, Canadian computer scientist
1922 - Alan Voorhees, American engineer and urban planner (d. 2005)
1923 - Jaroslav Pelikan, American historian
1926 - Ray Jablonski, baseball player (d. 1985)
1927 - Richard Long, American actor (d. 1974)
1929 - Jacqueline Hill, British actress (d. 1993)
1929 - William Safire, American columnist
1930 - Bob Guccione, American magazine publisher
1930 - Bob Mathias, American decathlete and congressman
1930 - Armin Mueller-Stahl, German actor
1934 - Ray Wilson, English footballer
1936 - Tommy Steele, British singer and actor
1937 - Kerry Packer, Australian businessman (d. 2005)
1938 - Peter Snell, New Zealander runner
1938 - Carlo Little, UK influential rock and roll drummer (d. 2005)
1939 - Eddie Kendricks, American singer (The Temptations) (d. 1992)
1940 - Kåre Valebrokk, Norwegian journalist
1942 - Paul Butterfield, American harmonica player (d. 1987)
1943 - Ron Geesin, British musician and composer
1944 - Jack L. Chalker, American novelist
1944 - Bernard Hill, British actor
1945 - Ernie Hudson, American actor
1945 - Jacqueline Wilson, British author
1946 - Eugene Levy, Canadian actor
1949 - Paul Rodgers, British singer (Free & Bad Company)
1950 - Laurence F. Johnson, American futurist and educator
1951 - Ken Hitchcock, Canadian ice hockey coach
1951 - Tatyana Kazankina, Soviet athlete
1953 - Bill Pullman, American actor
1955 - Brad Davis, American basketball player
1958 - Mike Mills, American bassist (R.E.M.)
1960 - Moreno Argentin, Italian cyclist
1962 - Rocco Mediate, American golfer
1962 - Paul Dobson, English footballer
1964 - Frank Musil, Czech ice hockey player and scout
1966 - Tracy Byrd Country musician
1966 - Kristiina Ojuland, Estonian politician
1966 - Valeri Liukin, Former Soviet Union Gymnast
1967 - Vincent Damphousse, Canadian ice hockey player
1968 - Paul Tracy, Canadian race car driver
1969 - Chuck Lidell, UFC Fighter
1970 - Joshua Seth, American voice actor
1971 - Antoine Rigaudeau, French basketball player
1971 - Alan Khan, South African radio disc jockey
1972 - John Abraham, Indian actor and model
1973 - Paula Radcliffe, British runner
1974 - Giovanni Ribisi, American actor
1975 - Nick Dinsmore, American professional wrestler
1975 - Milla Jovovich, Ukrainian-born actress and model
1976 - Zsanett Égerházi, Hungarian-born porn actress and nude model
1976 - Patrick Müller, Swiss footballer
1976 - Takeo Spikes, NFL Pro Bowl linebacker
1976 - Éric Bédard, Quebec speed skater
1978 - Riteish Deshmukh, Indian Actor
1978 - Manny Pacquiao, Filipino boxer
1978 - Chase Utley, former baseball player
1982 - Craig Kielburger, child labour activist
1982 - Dan Richmond, All round nice guy

Deaths
942 - William Longsword
1187 - Pope Gregory VIII
1195 - Baldwin V, Count of Hainaut (b. 1150)
1663 - Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba (b. 1583)
1721 - Richard Lumley, 1st Earl of Scarbrough, English statesman (b. 1640)
1830 - Simón Bolívar, Venezuelan-born libertator, six nations (b. 1783)
1833 - Kaspar Hauser, German foundling (b. 1812)
1897 - Alphonse Daudet, French writer (b. 1840)
1907 - William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin, Irish-born physicist (b. 1824)
1909 - Léopold II of Belgium (b. 1835)
1917 - Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, British physician (b. 1836)
1917 - Frank Gotch, wrestler (b. 1878)
1933 - Thubten Gyatso, 13th Dalai Lama (b. 1876)
1940 - Alicia Boole Stott, Irish mathematician (b. 1860)
1962 - Thomas Mitchell, American actor (b. 1892)
1987 - Linda Wong, Adult film actress (b. 1951)
1957 - Dorothy L. Sayers, British writer (b. 1893)
1964 - Victor Franz Hess, Austrian-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1883)
1967 - Harold Holt, Australian Prime Minister (b. 1908)
1978 - Ron Ellis, American jazz trumpeter, composer and big band leader (b. 1934)
1982 - Homer S. Ferguson, United States Senator (b. 1889)
1987 - Marguerite Yourcenar, Belgian novelist (b. 1903)
1992 - Dana Andrews, American actor (b. 1909)
1998 - Claudia Benton, Peruvian child psychologist (b. 1959)
1999 - Grover Washington, Jr., American saxophonist (b. 1943)
1999 - Rex Allen, American actor, singer and songwriter (b. 1920)
2002 - James Hazeldine, British actor, well kown for his role on series London's Burning (b. 1947)
2003 - Ed Devereaux, Australian actor (b. 1925)
2003 - Otto Graham, American football player (b. 1921)
2005 - Jack Anderson, American journalist (b. 1922)
2005 - Marc Favreau, Quebec humorist and actor (Sol) b. 1929)

Holidays and observances
Roman festivals – Saturnalia, in honor of Saturn, began.
R.C. Saints – O Sapientia ; Saint Lazarus
Greek Orthodox Church-Saint Barbaras day – Feast of Daniel the Prophet
Bhutan – National Day (1907)
USA – Wright Brothers Day (by Presidential Proclamation)

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 15th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Fri, 15 Dec 2006 04:30:00 +0000

Offered by:

Events
1290 BC - Seti I, Pharaoh of Egypt dies. Ramesses II becomes Pharaoh of Egypt.
533 - Byzantine general Belisarius defeats the Vandals, commanded by King Gelimer, at the Battle of Ticameron.
687 - St. Sergius I becomes Pope.
1167 - Sicilian chancellor Stephen du Perche moves the royal court to Messina to prevent a rebellion.
1256 - Hulagu Khan captures and destroys the Hashshashin stronghold at Alamut in present-day Iran as part of the Mongol offensive on Islamic southwest Asia.
1791 - The United States Bill of Rights becomes law when ratified by the Virginia legislature.
1818 - Irwin County, Georgia is created.
1891 - James Naismith introduces the first version of basketball, with thirteen rules, a peach basket nailed to either end of his school's gymnasium, and two teams of nine players.
1913 - Nicaragua becomes a signatory to the Buenos Aires copyright treaty.
1939 - Gone with the Wind premieres in Atlanta, Georgia.
1941 - Annihilation of Jews in Kharkiv, Ukraine: in the proximity of the Rogan works, 8 km away from Kharkiv, in "Drobitsky Ravine" (Drobitsky Yar), over 15 000 Jews were shot, at -15 degrees C below zero.
1945 - Occupation of Japan: General Douglas MacArthur orders that Shinto be abolished as state religion of Japan.
1960 - King Baudouin of Belgium marries Fabiola Fernanda María de las Victorias Antonia Adelaida de Mora y Aragón in Brussels.
1960 - Richard Paul Pavlick is arrested for attempting to blow up and assassinate the 35th U.S. President, John F. Kennedy only four days earlier.
1961 - In Jerusalem, Adolph Eichmann is sentenced to death after being found guilty of 15 criminal charges, including charges of crimes against humanity, crimes against the Jewish people and membership of an outlawed organization.
1965 - Gemini program: Gemini 6A, crewed by Wally Schirra and Thomas Stafford, is launched from Cape Kennedy, Florida.
1965 - The film The Sound of Music is released.
1970 - Illinois State Constitution is adopted at a special election.
1976 - Samoa becomes a member of the UN.
1992 - American rapper, Dr. Dre, releases his highly influential debut album, The Chronic. The Chronic is often labelled as the first ever G-Funk album.
1993 - History of Northern Ireland: The Downing Street Declaration is issued by British Prime Minister John Major and Irish Taoiseach Albert Reynolds.
1994 - The web browser Netscape Navigator 1.0 is released.
1994 - Palau becomes a member of the UN.
1995 - The European Communities Court of Justice passes the "Bosman ruling", giving EU footballers the right to a free transfer at the end of their contracts, with the provision that they are transferring from one UEFA Federation to another.
1997 - A chartered Tupolev TU-154 from Tajikistan crashes in the desert near Sharja, United Arab Emirates airport killing 85.
2002 - The digital radio station BBC7 is launched by the comedian Paul Merton.
2005 - The 43rd known Mersenne prime is discovered by Dr. Curtis Cooper & Dr. Steven Boone of USA, participants of the Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search distributed computing project. The prime number is 2nd largest known prime and has more than nine million digits.
2005 - Latvia edits its constitution to ban equal marriage rights to gays and lesbians.
2005 - Argentina's president Néstor Kirchner announces the early repayment of its external debt to the IMF.

Births
37 - Nero, Roman Emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty (d. 68)
1832 - Gustave Eiffel, French engineer and architect (Eiffel tower) (d. 1923)
1859 - L. L. Zamenhof, Russian initiator of Esperanto (d. 1917)
1860 - Niels Ryberg Finsen, Danish physician and Nobel laureate (d. 1904)
1860 - Abner Powell, American baseball player (d. 1953)
1861 - Charles Duryea, American automobile pioneer (d. 1938)
1878 - Hans Carossa, German writer (d. 1956)
1888 - Maxwell Anderson, American writer (d. 1959)
1892 - J. Paul Getty, American oil tycoon (d. 1976)
1899 - Harold Abrahams, British sprinter and Olympic gold medalist (d. 1978)
1907 - Oscar Niemeyer, Brazilian architect
1910 - John H. Hammond, American musician (d. 1987)
1911 - Stan Kenton, American musician (d. 1979)
1912 - Ray Eames, American designer (d. 1988)
1913 - Muriel Rukeyser, American poet (d. 1980)
1913 - Roger Gaudry, French Canadian chemist, businessman and corporate director (d. 2001)
1916 - Buddy Cole, American pianist (d. 1964)
1916 - Maurice Wilkins, New Zealand-born physicist, Nobel laureate (d. 2004)
1917 - Shan-ul-Haq Haqqee, Linguist and writer of Pakistan (d. 2005)
1918 - Jeff Chandler, American actor (d. 1961)
1922 - Alan Freed, American disc jockey (d. 1965)
1923 - Freeman Dyson, English-born American physicist
1923 - Valentin Varennikov, Russian general and statesman
1925 - Sam Pollock, National Hockey League general manager
1928 - Friedensreich Hundertwasser, Austrian artist (d. 2000)
1928 - Jerry Wallace, American country and popular music singer
1933 - Tim Conway, American actor and comedian
1938 - Billy Shaw, American football player
1939 - Cindy Birdsong, American singer (The Supremes)
1940 - Nick Buoniconti, American football player
1942 - Dave Clark, British musician (The Dave Clark Five)
1944 - Chico Mendes, Brazilian Campaigner (d. 1988
1946 - Art Howe, American baseball player
1949 - Don Johnson, American actor
1952 - Cassandra Harris, Australian actress (d. 1991)
1952 - Allan Simonsen, Danish footballer
1952 - Julie Taymor, American director
1953 - J. M. DeMatteis, American comic book writer
1955 - Paul Simonon, British musician (The Clash)
1961 - Karin Resetarits, Austrian journalist
1963 - Andrew Luster, Max Factor heir
1967 - Mo Vaughn, American baseball player
1968 - Javid Hussain, Indian film producer
1968 - Garrett Wang, American actor
1969 - Chantal Petitclerc, Quebec wheelchair athlete
1970 - Frankie Dettori, Italian champion jockey
1970 - Michael Shanks, Canadian actor
1972 - Stuart Townsend, Irish actor
1972 - Rodney Harrison, American football player
1973 - Surya Bonaly, French-born American figure skater
1973 - Ryu Seung-wan, South Korean actor and director
1976 - Baichung Bhutia, Indian footballer
1976 - Aaron Miles, American baseball player
1977 - Elix Skipper, American professional wrestler
1978 - Mark Jansen, Dutch guitarist (Epica)
1978 - Jerome McDougle, American football player
1979 - Adam Brody, American actor
1979 - Eric Young, Canadian wrestler
1981 - Najoua Belyzel, French singer
1981 - Thomas Herrion, American football player (d. 2005)
1981 - Creighton Lovelace, American Baptist minister
1982 - Borja Garcia, Spanish racing driver
1982 - George O. Gore II, American actor
1983 - René Goguen, Canadian wrestler
1986 - Snejana Onopka, Ukrainian supermodel

Deaths
1025 - Basil II, Byzantine Emperor (b. 958)
1072 - Alp Arslan, Turkish sultan in Persia (b. 1029)
1230 - King Otakar I of Bohemia
1263 - King Haakon IV of Norway (b. 1204)
1598 - Philips van Marnix, lord of Sint-Aldegonde, Dutch writer and statesman (b. 1538)
1621 - Charles de Luynes, Constable of France (b. 1578)
1673 - Margaret Cavendish, English writer (b. 1623)
1675 - Johannes Vermeer, Dutch painter (b. 1632)
1683 - Izaak Walton, English writer (b. 1593)
1688 - Gaspar Fagel, Dutch statesman (b. 1634)
1715 - George Hickes, English minister and scholar (b. 1642)
1753 - Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington, English architect (b. 1694)
1792 - Joseph Martin Kraus, Swedish composer (b. 1756)
1855 - Jacques Charles François Sturm, French mathematician (b. 1803)
1890 - Sitting Bull, Sioux nation leader (b. circa 1831)
1943 - Fats Waller, American musician (b. 1904)
1944? - Glenn Miller, American musician (b. 1904)
1947 - Arthur Machen, British author (b. 1863)
1950 - Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Indian political leader, Iron Man of India (b.1875)
1958 - Wolfgang Ernst Pauli, Austrian-born American physicist and Nobel laureate (b. 1900)
1962 - Charles Laughton, English actor (b. 1899)
1966 - Walt Disney, American animator (b. 1901)
1968 - Jess Willard, American boxer (b. 1881)
1968 - Antonio Barrette, politician, premier of Quebec (b. 1899]])
1971 - Paul Pierre Lévy, French mathematician (b. 1886)
1974 - Anatole Litvak, Russian-born filmmaker (b. 1902)
1977 - Wilfred Kitching, the 7th General of The Salvation Army (b. 1893)
1984 - Jan Peerce, American tenor (b. 1904)
1984 - Lennard Pearce, British actor (b. 1915)
1989 - Arnold Moss, American character actor (b. 1910)
1991 - Vasily Grigoryevich Zaitsev, Russian-born Soviet sniper (b. 1915)
2001 - Russ Haas, American professional wrestler (b. 1974)
2001 - Rufus Thomas, American musician (b. 1917)
2003 - George Fisher, American political cartoonist (b. 1923)
2003 - Keith Magnuson, National Hockey League defenceman (b. 1947)
2004 - Pauline Gore, mother of American Vice President Al Gore (b. 1912)
2005 - William Proxmire, U.S. Senator from Wisconsin (b. 1911)
2005 - Darrell Russell, American football player (b. 1976)
2005 - Heinrich Gross, Austrian physician (b. 1914)
2005 - Stan Leonard, Canadian professional golfer (b. 1915)

Holidays and observances
Roman festivals - Consualia in honor of Consus is held.
R.C. Saints - St. Valerian; Saint Wunibald of Heidenheim; Saint Nino; St. Drostan.
Zamenhof Day -celebrated in the Esperanto movement in honor of L. L. Zamenhof, the creator of Esperanto.
Hanukkah begins (2006).

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 13th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 04:51:00 +0000

Offered by:

Events
1294 - Saint Celestine V abdicates the papacy after only five months; Celestine hoped to return to his previous life as an ascetic hermit.
1545 - Council of Trent begins.
1577 - Sir Francis Drake sets out from Plymouth, England, on his round-the-world voyage.
1636 - The Massachusetts Bay Colony organizes three militia regiments to defend the colony against the Pequot Indians. This organization is recognized today as the founding of the United States National Guard.
1642 - Abel Janszoon Tasman reaches New Zealand.
1643 - English Civil War: The Battle of Alton takes place in Hampshire.
1769 - Dartmouth College founded by the Rev. Eleazar Wheelock, with a Royal Charter from King George III, on land donated by Royal Governor John Wentworth.
1862 - American Civil War: At the Battle of Fredericksburg, Confederate General Robert E. Lee defeats the Union Major General Ambrose E. Burnside.
1937 - Second Sino-Japanese War: Battle of Nanjing - Nanjing, defended by the National Revolutionary Army under the command of General Tang Shengzhi, falls to the Japanese.
1938 - The Holocaust: 100 deportees from Sachsenhausen build the Neuengamme concentration camp near Hamburg.
1939 - World War II: Battle of the River Plate - Captain Hans Langsdorff of the German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee engages with Royal Navy cruisers HMS Exeter, HMS Ajax and HMNZS Achilles.
1941 - World War II: Hungary and Romania declare war on the United States.
1949 - The Knesset votes to move the capital of Israel to Jerusalem.
1959 - Archbishop Makarios becomes the first President of Cyprus.
1973 - Rael, leader of the Raelian Movement claims to meet an ET he says is named Yahweh, during an alleged UFO encounter in Puy de Lassolas, France.
1974 - Malta becomes a republic.
1974 - The Detroit Wheels of the WFL are established.
1977 - A United States government aircraft DC-3 crashes near Evansville Regional Airport, killing 29, including the University of Evansville basketball team.
1978 - The first Susan B. Anthony dollar enters circulation.
1979 - The Canadian Government of Prime Minister Joe Clark is defeated in the House of Commons, prompting the 1980 Canadian election.
1981 - General Wojciech Jaruzelski declares martial law in Poland to prevent dismantling of the communist system by Solidarity.
1989 - The last issue of Gnistan (The Spark), the organ of the Solidaritetspartiet, is published in Sweden.
1996 - Kofi Annan is elected as Secretary-General of the United Nations.
2000 - The "Texas 7" escape from the John Connally Unit near Kenedy, Texas and go on a robbery spree, during which police officer Aubrey Hawkins is shot and killed.
2000 - American Vice President Al Gore delivers his concession speech ending his hopes of becoming the 43rd President of the United States.
2001 - the Indian Parliament Sansad is attacked by Terrorists, killing 15 people, including all the terrorists. Tensions escalate in South Asia, with nuclear war likelihoods.
2002 - Enlargement of the European Union: The European Union announces that Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia will become members from May 1, 2004.
2003 - Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein is captured near his home town of Tikrit (see Operation Red Dawn).
2003 - In the most-attended basketball game in history, 78,129 watch Michigan State University lose 79-74 to the University of Kentucky at Ford Field.
2004 - Former Chilean dictator, General Augusto Pinochet is put under house arrest, after being sued under accusations over 9 kidnapping actions and manslaughter. The house arrest is lifted the same day on appeal.

Births
1521 - Pope Sixtus V (d. 1590)
1533 - King Eric XIV of Sweden (d. 1577)
1553 - King Henry IV of France (d. 1610)
1585 - William Drummond of Hawthornden, Scottish poet (d. 1649)
1640 - Robert Plot, English naturalist (d. 1696)
1662 - Francesco Bianchini, Italian philosopher and scientist (d. 1729)
1678 - Yongzheng Emperor of China (d. 1735)
1720 - Carlo Gozzi, Italian dramatist (d. 1804
1724 - Franz Aepinus, German scientist (d. 1802)
1784 - Archduke Louis of Austria (d. 1864)
1797 - Heinrich Heine, German poet (d. 1856)
1804 - Joseph Howe, Canadian politician (d. 1873)
1813 - David Spangler Kaufman, American politician (d. 1851)
1816 - Ernst Werner von Siemens, German engineer, inventor, and industrialist (d. 1892)
1818 - Mary Todd Lincoln, First Lady of the United States (d. 1882)
1836 - Franz von Lenbach, German painter (d. 1904)
1854 - Thomas Watson, American assistant to Alexander Graham Bell (d. 1934)
1856 - Svetozar Boroević, Austro-Hungarian field marshal (d. 1920)
1860 - Lucien Guitry, French actor (d. 1925)
1864 - Emil Seidel, Mayor of Milwaukee (d. 1947)
1867 - Kristian Birkeland, Norwegian explorer and scientist (d. 1917)
1870 - Edward LeSaint, American actor and director (d. 1940)
1871 - Emily Carr, Canadian artist (d. 1945)
1874 - Josef Lhévinne, Russian-born pianist (d. 1944)
1883 - Belle da Costa Greene, American librarian, bibliographer and archivist (d. 1950)
1887 - George Polya, Hungarian-born mathematician (d. 1985)
1887 - Alvin York, American soldier & Medal of Honor recipient (d. 1964)
1897 - Drew Pearson, American journalist (d. 1969)
1903 - Carlos Montoya, Spanish guitarist (d. 1993)
1906 - Princess Marina, Duchess of Kent (d. 1968)
1906 - Sir Laurens van der Post, Afrikaner-born South African author (d. 1996)
1910 - Van Heflin, American actor (d. 1971)
1911 - Trygve Haavelmo, Norwegian economist and Bank of Sweden Prize winner (d. 1999)
1911 - Kenneth Patchen, American poet and painter (d. 1972)
1913 - Archie Moore, American boxer and World Light-Heavyweight Champion (d. 1998)
1913 - Arnold Brown, the 11th General of The Salvation Army (d. 2002)
1915 - Curd Jürgens, German actor (d. 1982)
1915 - Ross Macdonald, American-born author (d. 1983)
1919 - Hans-Joachim Marseille, German Fighter Ace of World War 2 (d. 1942)
1923 - Philip Warren Anderson, American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
1923 - Larry Doby, American baseball player (d. 2003)
1925 - Dick Van Dyke, American actor and comedian
1926 - George Rhoden, Jamaican athlete and Olympic gold medalist
1929 - Christopher Plummer, Canadian actor
1934 - Richard D. Zanuck, American film producer
1935 - Lindy McDaniel, American baseball player
1936 - His Highness Prince Karim Aga Khan (Prince Karim El Husseni)
1939 - Eric Flynn, British actor and singer (d. 2002)
1942 - Anna Eshoo, American politician
1943 - Ferguson Jenkins, Canadian baseball player
1944 - Hwang Jang Lee, Korean martial artist and film actor
1948 - Ted Nugent, American guitarist
1948 - Jeff Baxter, American guitarist (Steely Dan, The Doobie Brothers)
1948 - Lillian Board, British athlete (d. 1970)
1948 - Brian Wilson, British politician
1949 - Tom Verlaine, American singer/guitarist of Television
1950 - Tom Vilsack, Governor of Iowa
1952 - Sylvester Ritter, Professional wrestler better known as Junkyard Dog (d. 1998)
1953 - Ben Bernanke, American economist
1953 - Bob Gainey, Canadian hockey player
1954 - John Anderson, American country musician
1957 - Steve Buscemi, American actor
1957 - Morris Day, American singer (The Time)
1957 - Jean-Marie Messier, French businessman
1958 - Lynn-Holly Johnson, American figure skater and actress
1959 - Nadia Russ, Soviet-born artist
1959 - Jim Darrel, American professional wrestler
1961 - Harry Gregson-Williams, British composer
1963 - Jake White, South African rugby union coach
1964 - Matsumoto Hideto, Japanese guitarist and singer (X-Japan)
1965 - Marko Mäetamm, Estonian artist
1967 - Jamie Foxx, American actor
1969 - Sergei Fedorov, Russian hockey player
1972 - Mauricio Solís, Costa Rican footballer
1973 - Christie Clark, American actress
1974 - Nicholas McCarthy, British-born guitarist (Franz Ferdinand)
1974 - Sara Cox, TV and Radio presenter
1975 - Tom Delonge, American guitarist (Blink-182, Angels and Airwaves)
1976 - Josh Fogg, American baseball player
1976 - Radosław Sobolewski, Polish footballer
1977 - Christopher Hudgens, American Painter
1979 - Jon Elliott, Professional Athlete, Industry Mogu
1980 - Ivan Milković, Professional Basketball Player, Šibenik, Croatia
1981 - Amy Lee, American singer/songwriter (Evanescence)
1982 - Ricky Nolasco, Major League Baseball Pitcher, Florida Marlins
1983 - Otylia Jędrzejczak, Polish swimmer, FINA World Champion and Olympic gold medalist
1985 - Laurence Leboeuf, Canadian actress

Deaths
1048 - Al-Biruni, Persian mathematician (b. 973)
1124 - Pope Callixtus II
1204 - Maimonides, Spanish rabbi and philosopher (b. 1135)
1250 - Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 1194)
1404 - Albert, Count of Holland (b. 1336)
1466 - Donatello, Florentine artist and sculptor (b. 1386)
1516 - Johannes Trithemius, German cryptographer (b. 1462)
1521 - Manuel I of Portugal (b. 1469)
1557 - Niccolo Fontana Tartaglia, Italian mathematician
1565 - Conrad Gessner, Swiss naturalist (b. 1516)
1603 - François Viète, French mathematician (b. 1540)
1621 - Katarina Stenbock, Queen of Gustav I of Sweden (b. 1535)
1716 - Charles de La Fosse, French painter (b. 1640)
1721 - Alexander Selkirk, Scottish sailor and castaway (b. 1676)
1729 - Anthony Collins, English philosopher (b. 1676)
1754 - Mahmud I, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1696)
1769 - Christian Fürchtegott Gellert, German poet (b. 1715)
1783 - Pehr Wilhelm Wargentin, Swedish astronomer (b. 1717)
1784 - Samuel Johnson, British writer and lexicographer (b. 1709)
1814 - Charles Joseph, Prince de Ligne, Belgian-born Austrian field marshal (b. 1735)
1837 - Herman of Alaska, Russian Orthodox hermit (b. 1756)
1863 - Christian Friedrich Hebbel, German writer (b. 1813)
1868 - Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius, German botanist (b. 1794)
1881 - August Senoa, Croatian writer (b. 1838)
1883 - Victor de Laprade, French poet and critic (b. 1812)
1895 - Anyos Jedlik, Hungarian physicist (b. 1800)
1919 - Woldemar Voigt, German physicist (b. 1850)
1930 - Fritz Pregl, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1869)
1931 - Gustave le Bon, French psychologist (b. 1840)
1935 - Victor Grignard, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1871)
1940 - Jacques-Arsène d'Arsonval, French physicist (b. 1851)
1942 - Wlodimir Ledochowski, Polish-Austrian director of the Society of Jesus (b. 1866)
1944 - Wassily Kandinsky, Russian-born French artist (b. 1866)
1947 - Nicholas Roerich, Russian-born painter (b. 1874)
1955 - Egas Moniz, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1874)
1961 - Grandma Moses, American painter (b. 1860)
1983 - Alexander Schmemann, Orthodox Christian priest and theologian (b. 1921)
1983 - Nichita Stanescu, Romanian poet (b.1933)
1992 - Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney, American businessman and heir (b. 1899)
1992 - K.C. Irving, Canadian industrialist (b. 1899)
1993 - Vanessa Duriès, French novelist (b. 1972)
2001 - Chuck Schuldiner, American musician (Death) (b. 1967)
2002 - Zal Yanofsky, American musician (The Lovin' Spoonful) (b. 1945)
2003 - William V. Roth, Jr., U.S. Senator (b. 1921)
2004 - Andre Rodgers, Bahamian baseball player (b. 1934)
2004 - David Wheeler, British computer scientist (b. 1927)
2005 - Stanley Williams, co-founder of the Crips (b. 1953)

Holidays and observances
Roman festivals - Tellus was worshipped in the district Carinae at the Esquiline Hill, and a lectisternium or table was spread for Ceres.
R.C. Saints - memorial of Saint Lucy
Also see December 13 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
In the Julian calendar before the Gregorian reform, this was the shortest day and longest night, and widely celebrated as such
In the Irish calendar the Wednesday, Friday and Saturday following the Feast of Saint Lucy were observed as Quarter tense.
Malta - Republic Day (since 1974)
St. Lucia's Day in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland and some regions of Italy, mainly Sicily, Veneto and Trentino.

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 12th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 05:07:00 +0000

Offered by:

Events
627 - Battle of Nineveh: A Byzantine army under Emperor Heraclius defeated Emperor Khosrau II's Persian forces, commanded by General Rhahzadh.
1098 - First Crusade: Massacre of Ma'arrat al-Numan - Crusaders breach the town's walls and massacre about 20,000 inhabitants. After finding themselves with insufficient food, they resort to cannibalism.
1531 - Apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe to Juan Diego in Mexico City.
1719 - The Boston Gazette is published for the first time.
1781 - American Revolutionary War: Second Battle of Ushant - A Royal Navy squadron, commanded by Rear Admiral Richard Kempenfelt in HMS Victory, defeats a French fleet.
1787 - Pennsylvania becomes the 2nd state to ratify the United States Constitution.
1862 - USS Cairo sunk on the Yazoo River, becoming the first armored ship to be sunk by an electrically detonated mine.
1870 - Joseph H. Rainey of South Carolina becomes the first black U.S. congressman.
1897 - Belo Horizonte, the first planned city of Brazil, is inaugurated.
1901 - Guglielmo Marconi receives the first trans-Atlantic radio signal at Signal Hill in St John's, Newfoundland.
1903 - The city of Fairfield, California is incorporated.
1911 - Delhi replaces Calcutta as the capital of India.
1914 - The largest one-day percentage drop in the history of Dow Jones Industrial Average, down 24.39%.
1915 - President of the Republic of China, Yuan Shikai, reinstates the monarchy and proclaims himself Emperor of China.
1917 - In Nebraska, Father Edward J. Flanagan founds Boys Town as a farm village for wayward boys.
1925 - The Majlis of Iran votes to crown Reza Khan as the new Shah of Persia.
1936 - Xi'an Incident: The Generalissimo of the Republic of China, Chiang Kai-shek was kidnapped by Zhang Xueliang.
1937 - Panay incident: Japanese aircraft shell and sink US gunboat Panay on the Yangtze River in China.
1939 - Winter War: Battle of Tolvajärvi - Finnish forces defeat those of the Soviet Union in their first major victory of the conflict.
1940 - Approximately 70 people are killed in the Marples Hotel, Fitzalan Square, Sheffield as a result of a German air raid.
1941 - Fifty four Japanese A6M Zero fighters raid Batangas Field, Philippines. Jesus Villamor and four Filipino fighter pilots fend them off; Cesar Basa is killed.
1941 - World War II: Great Britain declares war on Bulgaria. Hungary and Romania declare war on the United States. India declares war on Japan.
1942 - A fire in a hostel in St. John's, Newfoundland kills 100 people.
1946 - A fire at a New York City ice plant spreads to a nearby tenement killing 37 people.
1948 - Malayan Emergency: Batang Kali Massacre - 14 members of the Scots Guards stationed in Malaysia allegedly massacre 24 unarmed civilians and set fire to the village.
1950 - Paula Ackerman, the first woman appointed to perform rabbinical functions in the United States, leads the congregation in her first services.
1956 - Commencement of the Irish Republican Army's Border Campaign.
1963 - Kenya gains its independence from the United Kingdom.
1964 - Prime Minister Jomo Kenyatta became the first President of the Republic of Kenya.
1969 - Strategia della tensione: Piazza Fontana bombing - The offices of Banca Nazionale dell'Agricoltura in Piazza Fontana, Milan, are bombed.
1972 - Two million people filled the streets of Azadi Square (Then Shahyad Square) in Tehran to protest against the Shah.
1979 - Coup d'état of December Twelfth: South Korean military officer Chun Doo-hwan orders the arrest of Army Chief of Staff General Jeong Seung-hwa without authorization from President Choi Kyu-ha, alleging involvement in the assassination of ex-President Park Chung Hee.
1979 - Pakistan President Zia-ul-Haq conferred Nishan-e-Imtiaz on Nobel laureate Dr Abdus Salam.
1979 - Rhodesia changes its name to Zimbabwe.
1982 - Women's peace protest at Greenham Common - 30,000 women hold hands and form a human chain around the 14.5 km (9 mi) perimeter fence.
1985 - Arrow Air Flight 1285 crashes after takeoff in Gander, Newfoundland killing 256, including 248 members of the United States Army's 101st Airborne Division.
1988 - Clapham Junction rail crash killed 35 and injured 100's after two collisions of three commuter trains. One of the worst train crashes in Britain.
1990 - Pakistan became the 37th country in the world to send an expedition to Antarctica.
1996 - Uday Hussein is seriously injured in an assassination attempt.
2000 - The United States Supreme Court releases its decision in Bush v. Gore
2003 - Paul Martin, Jr. is sworn-in as the 21st Prime Minister of Canada.

Births
1298 - Albert II of Austria (d. 1358)
1418 - Albert VI of Austria (d. 1463)
1574 - Anne of Denmark, wife of James I of England (d. 1619)
1610 - Saint Vasilije (d. 1671)
1659 - Francesco Galli-Bibiena, Italian architect/designer (d. 1739)
1712 - Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine, Austrian military leader (d. 1780)
1724 - Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood, British admiral (d. 1816)
1745 - John Jay, 1st Chief Justice of the United States (d. 1829)
1779 - Madeline Sophie Barat, French saint (d. 1865)
1783 - Ner Alexander Middleswarth, American politician (d. 1865)
1786 - William L. Marcy, American statesman (d. 1857)
1799 - Karl Briullov, Russian painter (d. 1852)
1805 - William Lloyd Garrison, American abolitionist (d. 1879)
1806 - Stand Watie, American Confederate general (d. 1871)
1821 - Gustave Flaubert, French writer (d. 1880)
1845 - Bruce Price, American architect (d. 1903)
1849 - William Kissam Vanderbilt, member of the Vanderbilt family (d. 1920)
1863 - Edvard Munch, Norwegian expressionist painter (d. 1944)
1864 - Paul Elmer More, American critic and essayist (d. 1937)
1866 - Alfred Werner, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1919)
1870 - Walter Benona Sharp, American oil baron (d. 1912)
1875 - Gerd von Rundstedt, German field marshal (d. 1953)
1876 - Alvin Kraenzlein, Olympic gold medalist (d. 1928)
1887 - Kurt Atterberg, Swedish composer (d. 1974)
1892 - Herman Potočnik Noordung, Austro-Hungarian-born rocket engineer (d. 1929)
1893 - Edward G. Robinson, American actor (d. 1973)
1900 - Sammy Davis, Sr., American dancer (d. 1988)
1903 - Dagmar Nordstrom, American composer and pianist (d. 1976)
1903 - Yasujiro Ozu, Japanese film director (d. 1963)
1904 - Nicolas de Gunzburg, magazine editor and socialite (d. 1981)
1905 - Mànes Sperber, Austro-Hungarian-born writer (d. 1984)
1907 - Roy Douglas, British composer and orchestrator
1909 - Karen Morley, American actress (d. 2003)
1914 - Patrick O'Brian (Richard Patrick Russ), British author (d. 2000)
1915 - Frank Sinatra, American singer and actor (d. 1998)
1918 - Joe Williams, American singer (d. 1999)
1919 - Olivia Barclay, British astrologer (d. 2001)
1923 - Bob Barker, American television game show host
1924 - Ed Koch, Mayor of New York City
1927 - Honor Blackman, British actress
1927 - Robert Noyce, American inventor (d. 1990)
1928 - Chinghiz Aitmatov, Soviet-born Kyrgyz writer
1929 - John Osborne, British dramatist (d. 1994)
1929 - Toshiko Akiyoshi, Japanese musician
1930 - Bill Beutel, American Journalist (d. 2006)
1931 - Lionel Blair, British actor, choreographer, tap dancer and television presenter
1932 - Bob Pettit, American basketball player
1934 - Miguel de la Madrid, President of Mexico
1938 - Connie Francis, American singer
1940 - Sharad Pawar, Indian politician
1940 - Dionne Warwick, American singer
1943 - Dickey Betts, American guitarist and singer (The Allman Brothers)
1943 - Grover Washington, Jr., American saxophonist (d. 1999)
1944 - Jean Doré, Quebec politician, mayor of Montreal
1946 - Emerson Fittipaldi, Brazilian racing driver
1948 - Tom Wilkinson, English actor
1949 - Rajnikanth (Shivaji Rao Gaekwad), Indian actor
1950 - Billy Smith, National Hockey League goaltender
1952 - Harbance Singh (Herb) Dhaliwal, Canadian politician
1952 - Cathy Rigby, American gymnast
1953 - Bruce Kulick, American guitarist (KISS)
1954 - Liz Claman, American television anchor
1956 - Johan Van der Velde, Dutch cyclist
1957 - Sheila E., American musician
1957 - Robert Lepage, Quebec playwright, actor and film director
1962 - Tracy Austin, American tennis player
1964 - Sabu, American professional wrestler
1966 - Royce Gracie, Brazilian martial artist
1967 - John Randle, American football player
1968 - Laurie Williams, Indian cricket player
1970 - Jennifer Connelly, American actress
1970 - Madchen Amick, American actress
1970 - Regina Hall, American actress
1972 - Hank Williams III, grandson of Hank Williams
1972 - Nicky Eaden, English footballer
1972 - Kevin Parent, Quebec singer and songwriter
1972 - Brandon Teena, American hate crime victim
1974 - Rey Mysterio, Jr., American wrestler
1974 - Nolberto Solano, Peruvian footballer
1975 - Mayim Bialik, American actress
1975 - Craig Moore, Australian footballer
1976 - Dan Hawkins, British guitarist (The Darkness)
1976 - Keiko, Orca Whale in Free Willy
1977 - Orlando Hudson, American baseball player
1977 - Bridget Hall, American supermodel
1978 - Monica Barladeanu, Romanian actress
1978 - Nicole, Erica and Jaclyn Dahm, Triplet models
1978 - Evren Genis, Turkish composer
1979 - Garrett Atkins, American baseball player
1979 - Nate Clements, American football player
1981 - Jeret Peterson, American aerial skier
1981 - Ronnie Brown, American football player
1981 - Yuvraj Singh, Indian cricket player
1981 - Stephen Warnock, British footballer
1981 - Pedro Ríos, Spanish footballer
1982 - Dmitry Tursunov, Russian tennis player
1983 - Katrina Elam, American singer
1983 - Brad Smith, American football player
1984 - Daniel Agger, Danish footballer
1988 - Nicholas Walsh, musician
1989 - Harry Eden, British actor

Deaths
884 - Carloman, King of the West Franks
1212 - Geoffrey, Archbishop of York
1569 - Metropolitan Philip of Moscow (b. 1507)
1574 - Selim II, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1524)
1586 - Stefan Batory, King of Poland (b. 1533)
1685 - John Pell, English mathematician (b. 1610)
1751 - Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke, English statesman and philosopher (b. 1678)
1754 - Wu Jingzi, Chinese writer (b. 1701)
1766 - Johann Christoph Gottsched, German writer (b. 1700)
1789 - John Ponsonby, Irish politician (b. 1713)
1790 - Mikhail Shcherbatov, Russian philosopher and writer (b. 1733)
1843 - King William I of the Netherlands, (b. 1772)
1858 - Jacques Viger, antiquarian and archeologist, first mayor of Montreal (b. 1787)
1889 - Robert Browning, British poet (b. 1812)
1889 - Viktor Bunyakovsky, Russian mathematician (b. 1804)
1894 - Sir John Thompson, fourth Prime Minister of Canada (b. 1845)
1913 - Emperor Menelek II of Ethiopia (b. 1844)
1923 - Raymond Radiguet, French author (b. 1903)
1926 - Jean Richepin, French poet (b. 1849)
1929 - Charles Goodnight, American cattle baron (b. 1836)
1939 - Douglas Fairbanks, American actor (b. 1883)
1952 - Bedřich Hrozný, Austro-Hungarian-born Czechoslovak orientalist and linguist (b. 1879)
1963 - Yasujiro Ozu, Japanese film director (b. 1903)
1968 - Tallulah Bankhead, American actress (b. 1902)
1970 - Doris Blackburn, Australian politician (b. 1889)
1971 - David Sarnoff, Russian-born American General Manager of RCA (b. 1891)
1976 - Vinko Zganec, Croatian ethnomusicologist (b. 1890)
1977 - Lady Spencer Churchill, wife of Winston Churchill (b. 1885)
1980 - Jean Lesage, politician, premier of Quebec (b. 1912)
1985 - Anne Baxter, American actress (b. 1923)
1985 - Ian Stewart, Scottish musician (b. 1938)
1993 - József Antall, Hungarian politician (b. 1932)
1994 - Stuart Roosa, American astronaut (b. 1933)
1996 - Vance Packard, American author (b. 1914)
1997 - Yevgeniy Landis, Russian mathematician (b. 1921)
1998 - Lawton Chiles, U.S. Senator from Florida and Governor of Florida (b. 1930)
1999 - Joseph Heller, American author (b. 1923)
2000 - George Montgomery, American actor (b. 1916)
2001 - Jean Richard, French actor (b. 1921)
2002 - Dee Brown, American author (b. 1908)
2002 - Jay Wesley Neill, American convicted murderer (b. 1965)
2002 - Brad Dexter, American actor (b. 1917)
2003 - Geidar Aliev, President of Azerbaijan
2003 - Joseph Anthony Ferrario, American Catholic prelate (b. 1926)
2003 - Keiko (Orca), Willy in Free Willy
2005 - Annette Vadim, Danish actress (b. 1936)

Holidays and observances
R.C. Saints - optional memorial of Our Lady of Guadalupe
Also see December 12 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Bahá'í Faith - Feast of Masá'il (Questions) - First day of the 15th month of the Bahá'í Calendar
Kenya - Jamhuri Day: Independence Day (from Britain, 1963)

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 11th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 04:24:00 +0000

Offered by:

Events
359 - The first known Prefect of the City of Constantinople, Honoratus, took office.
1282 - Llywelyn ap Gruffydd or Gruffudd (b. c. 1228) the last native Prince of Wales, was killed at Cilmeri, near Builth Wells, south Wales. He was the last prince of an independent Wales before its conquest by King Edward I of England. Some would say he was the penultimate, but in effect he was the last ruler. In Welsh, he is remembered by the alliterative soubriquet Llywelyn Ein Llyw Olaf (Llywelyn, Our Last Leader).
1602 - A surprise attack by forces under the command of the Duke of Savoy and his brother-in-law, Philip III of Spain, is repelled by the citizens of Geneva. (This actually takes place after midnight, in the early morning of December 12, but commemorations/celebrations on Fête de l'Escalade are usually held on December 11 or the closest weekend.)
1792 - French Revolution: King Louis XVI of France is put on trial for treason by the National Convention.
1816 - Indiana becomes the 19th U.S. state.
1872 - P.B.S. Pinchback is sworn in as the first black member of the U.S. House of Representatives.
1886 - Dial Square FC, a football club from Woolwich, London that will eventually become known as Arsenal FC, play their first match, a 6-0 win over Eastern Wanderers.
1927 - Guangzhou Uprising: Communist militia and worker red guards launch an uprising in the Chinese city of Guangzhou, taking over most of the city and announcing the formation of a Guangzhou Soviet.
1917 - British troops take Jerusalem from the troops of the Ottoman Empire
1931 - The British Parliament enacts the Statute of Westminster, which establishes a status of legislative equality between the self-governing dominions of the Commonwealth of Australia, the Dominion of Canada, the Irish Free State, Newfoundland, the Dominion of New Zealand, and the Union of South Africa.
1934 - A fire at the Hotel Kerns in Lansing, Michigan, kills 34 people.
1936 - Abdication Crisis: Edward VIII's abdication as King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the British Dominions beyond the Seas, and Emperor of India becomes effective.
1937 - Second Italo-Abyssinian War: Italy leaves the League of Nations
1941 - World War II: Germany and Italy declare war on the United States.
1946 - The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) is established.
1951 - Joe DiMaggio announces his retirement from baseball.
1958 - Upper Volta declares its independence from France, and becomes an autonomous republic in the French Community.
1961 - Melvin Calvin Awarded Nobel Prize in Chemistry for process of photosynthesis.
1964 - An unknown terrorist fired a mortar shell at the United Nations building in New York City during a speech by Che Guevara
1971 - The Libertarian Party of the United States is formed.
1972 - Apollo 17 becomes the sixth mission to land on the Moon.
1980 - The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (known as either CERCLA or Superfund) is enacted by the U.S. Congress.
1981 - In his last fight, Muhammad Ali is defeated by Trevor Berbick.
1981 - Javier Pérez de Cuéllar becomes UN Secretary-General
1981 - El Mozote massacre: Salvadoran armed forces kill an estimated 900 civilians in an anti-guerrilla campaign during the country's civil war.
1993 - Forty-eight people are killed when a block of the Highland Towers collapses near Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
1994 - First Chechen War: Russian President Boris Yeltsin orders Russian troops into Chechnya
1994 - A bomb assembled by Ramzi Yousef explodes on Philippine Airlines Flight 434, killing a Japanese businessman.
1997 - The Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change opens for signature.
1998 - A Thai Airways Airbus A310-200 crashes near Surat Thani Airport, killing 101.
2000 - Real Madrid football club is awarded 20th Century's Best Club award by FIFA.
2001 - The People's Republic of China joins the World Trade Organization.
2005 - The Buncefield Oil Depot in Hemel Hempstead is rocked by explosions, causing a huge oil fire.
2005 - 2005 Cronulla riots: Thousands of White Australians demonstrate against ethnic violence resulting in a riot against anyone thought to be Lebanese (and many who were not) in Cronulla Sydney. These are followed up by ethnic attacks on Cronulla.
2006 - The Holocaust conference is opened in Tehran, Iran by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Births
1465 - Ashikaga Yoshihisa, Japanese shogun (d. 1489)
1475 - Pope Leo X (d. 1521)
1566 - Manuel Cardoso, Portuguese composer (d. 1650)
1680 - Emanuele d'Astorga, Italian composer (d. 1736)
1712 - Francesco Algarotti. Italian philosopher and art critic (d. 1764)
1725 - George Mason, American statesman (d. 1792)
1761 - Gian Domenico Romagnosi, Italian physicist (d. 1835)
1781 - Sir David Brewster, British physicist (d. 1868)
1801 - Christian Dietrich Grabbe, German writer (d. 1836)
1803 - Hector Berlioz, French composer (d. 1869)
1810 - Alfred de Musset, French poet (d. 1857)
1838 - John Labatt, Irish-Canadian businessman and brewer (Labatt Brewing Company) (d. 1915)
1843 - Robert Koch, German bacteriologist, Nobel laureate (d. 1910)
1858 - Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko, Russian theatre director (d. 1943)
1863 - Annie Jump Cannon, American astronomer (d. 1941)
1873 - Josip Plemelj, Slovenian mathematician (d. 1967)
1880 - Frank Tarrant, Australian cricketer (d. 1951)
1882 - Subramanya Bharathy, Indian poet (d. 1921)
1882 - Max Born, German physicist, Nobel laureate (d. 1970)
1882 - Fiorello LaGuardia, American statesman (d. 1947)
1883 - Victor McLaglen, British-born American actor (d. 1959)
1889 - Walter Knott, American farmer (d. 1981).
1890 - Carlos Gardel, tango singer, composer, and actor (d. 1935)
1890 - Mark Tobey, American painter (d. 1976)
1905 - Gilbert Roland, American actor (d. 1994)
1905 - Robert Henriques, British writer (d. 1967)
1908 - Elliott Carter, American composer
1911 - Naguib Mahfouz, Egyptian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2006)
1911 - Val Guest, British film director (d. 2006)
1912 - Carlo Ponti, Italian film producer
1913 - Jean Marais, French actor (d. 1998)
1916 - Dámaso Pérez Prado, Cuban-born bandleader (d. 1989)
1918 - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Russian writer, Nobel Prize laureate
1919 - Marie Windsor, American actress (d. 2000)
1922 - Grace Paley, American writer
1923 - Betsy Blair, American actress
1925 - Paul Greengard, American neuroscientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
1926 - Big Mama Thornton, American singer (d. 1984)
1930 - Jean-Louis Trintignant, French actor
1931 - Rita Moreno, Puerto Rican actress
1931 - Pierre Pilote, National Hockey League defenseman
1933 - Aquilino Pimentel, Jr., Filipino politician
1935 - Pranab Mukherjee, Indian politician
1935 - Elmer Vasko, National Hockey League defenseman (d. 1998)
1936 - Taku Yamasaki, Japanese politician
1938 - McCoy Tyner, American jazz pianist
1938 - Enrico Macias, Algerian-born French singer
1939 - Tom Hayden, American politician
1940 - David Gates, American musician (Bread)
1942 - Donna Mills, American actress
1943 - John Kerry, American politician
1944 - Teri Garr, American film actress
1944 - Brenda Lee, American singer
1950 - Christina Onassis, American heiress (d. 1988)
1953 - Bess Armstrong, American actress
1954 - Jermaine Jackson, American musician
1954 - Guðlaugur Kristinn Óttarsson, Icelandic engineer
1958 - Nikki Sixx, American bassist (Mötley Crüe)
1959 - Lisa Gastineau, American reality show star
1962 - Ben Browder, American actor
1962 - Nele Karajlić, singer from Bosnia and Herzegovina
1964 - David Schools, American musician (Widespread Panic)
1964 - Cosy Sheridan, American singer
1964 - Michel Courtemanche, Quebec comedian and actor
1964 - Carolyn Waldo, Canadian synchronized swimmer
1966 - Gary Dourdan, American actor
1966 - Leon Lai, Cantopop singer/actor
1967 - DJ Yella, American music producer
1969 - Vishwanathan Anand, Indian chess grandmaster
1969 - Stig Inge Bjørnebye, Norwegian footballer
1969 - Sean Grande, American sportscaster
1972 - Daniel Alfredsson, Swedish hockey player
1972 - Dana Macsim, Romanian television news reporter
1973 - Mos Def, American emcee and actor
1974 - Oscar Gutierrez, professional wrestler (Rey Mysterio)
1974 - Ben Shephard, TV personality
1975 - Gerben de Knegt, Dutch cyclist
1977 - Mark Streit, National Hockey League defenseman
1979 - Rider Strong, American actor
1980 - Arya, Indian actor
1981 - Zacky Vengeance, American musician (Avenged Sevenfold)
1981 - Nikki Benz, Canadian actress
1981 - Hamish Blake, Australian comedian
1981 - Javier Saviola, Argentine footballer
1988 - Murugan Thiruchelvam, chess prodigy

Deaths
384 - Pope Damasus I
1121 - Al-Afdal Shahanshah, Caliph of Egypt (b. 1066)
1226 - Robert de Ros, English politician (b. 1177)
1282 - Llywelyn the Last, King of Gwynedd
1282 - Michael VIII Palaeologus, Byzantine Emperor (b. 1225)
1532 - Pietro Accolti, Italian Catholic cardinal (b. 1455)
1694 - Ranuccio II Farnese, Duke of Parma (b. 1630)
1737 - John Strype, English historian (b. 1643)
1757 - Edmund Curll, English bookseller (b. 1675)
1797 - Richard Brocklesby, British physician (b. 1722)
1840 - Emperor Kokaku of Japan (b. 1771)
1880 - Oliver Fisher Winchester, American businessman and politician (b. 1810)
1909 - Innokenty Annensky, Russian poet (b. 1855)
1918 - Ivan Cankar, Slovenian writer (b. 1876)
1920 - Olive Schreiner, South African writer (b. 1855)
1938 - Christian Lous Lange, Norwegian pacifist and recipient of Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1869)
1941 - John Gillespie Magee, Jr., American poet and aviator (b. 1922)
1941 - Charles Émile Picard, French mathematician (b. 1856)
1945 - Charles Fabry, French physicist (b. 1867)
1950 - Leslie Comrie, New Zealand astronomer (b. 1893)
1957 - Musidora (Jeanne Roques), French actress (b. 1889)
1959 - Jim Bottomley, Baseball player (b. 1900)
1964 - Sam Cooke, American singer (b. 1931)
1964 - Percy Kilbride, American actor (b. 1888)
1978 - Vincent du Vigneaud, American chemist and Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1901)
1983 - Sir Neil Ritchie, British General (b. 1897)
1984 - Oskar Seidlin, Silesian-born scholar (b. 1911)
1989 - Louise Dahl-Wolfe, American photographer (b. 1895)
1991 - Artur Lundkvist, Swedish author and critic (b. 1906)
1994 - Philip Phillips, American archaeologist (b. 1900)
1996 - Willie Rushton, British cartoonist (b. 1937)
1998 - André Lichnerowicz, Polish-French physicist (b. 1915)
1998 - Lynn Strait, American singer (b. 1968)
2000 - Shaista Suhrawardy Ikramullah, Pakistani politician, diplomat and author (b. 1915)
2003 - Ahmadou Kourouma, Côte d'Ivoire writer (b. 1927)
2004 - M.S. Subbulakshmi, Indian singer (b. 1916)
2004 - Arthur Lydiard, New Zealand running coach (b. 1917)

Holidays and observances
Roman festivals - One of the four Agonalia, this day in honour of Sol Indiges; also the Septimontium festival
R.C. Saints - pope Damasus I: optional memorial
Argentina - Tango Day, Buenos Aires
Burkina Faso - Republic Day (1958, Upper Volta became an autonomous republic in the French Community.)
USA - Admission day for Indiana (19th state, 1816)
Wales - Remembrance Day of Llywelyn II

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 9th and 10th weekend?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Sat, 09 Dec 2006 16:59:00 +0000

xdecOffered by:

December 9th

Events
536 - Byzantine General Belisarius enters in Rome while the Ostrogothic garrison peacefully leaves the city, returning the old capital to its empire.
1425 - The Catholic University of Leuven is founded.
1531 - First supposed apparition of the Virgin Mary (Our Lady of Guadalupe) to Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin on Tepeyac Hill
1793 - New York City's first daily newspaper, the American Minerva, is established by Noah Webster.
1824 - Battle of Ayacucho: Peruvian nationalists led by Antonio José de Sucre defeat Spanish colonial forces and secure the independence of Peru.
1835 - The Republic of Texas captures San Antonio.
1851 - The first YMCA in North America is established in Montreal, Quebec.
1856 - The Iranian city of Bushehr surrenders to occupying British forces.
1861 - American Civil War: The Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War is established by the U.S. Congress.
1872 - In Louisiana, P. B. S. Pinchback becomes the first serving African-American governor of a U.S. state.
1875 - Massachusetts Rifle Association "America's Oldest Active Gun Club" is founded.
1888 - Statistician Herman Hollerith installs his self-designed computing device at the United States War Department.
1897 - Activist Marguerite Durand founds the feminist daily newspaper, La Fronde in Paris.
1905 - In France, the law separating church and state is passed.
1917 - In Palestine, Allenby captures Jerusalem.
1931 - The Constituent Cortes approves the constitution which establishes the Second Spanish Republic.
1937 - Second Sino-Japanese War: Battle of Nanjing - Japanese troops under the command of Lt. Gen. Asaka Yasuhiko launch an assault on the Chinese city of Nanjing.
1940 - World War II: Operation Compass - British and Indian troops under the command of Major-General Richard O'Connor attack Italian forces near Sidi Barrani in Egypt.
1941 - World War II: The Republic of China, Cuba, Guatemala, the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, and the Philippine Commonwealth, declare war on Germany and Japan.
1945 - General George S. Patton is injured in an automobile crash in occupied Germany. He dies twelve days later.
1946 - The "Trials of War Criminals before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals" began with the "Doctors' Trial", prosecuting doctors alleged to be involved in human experimentation.
1950 - Harry Gold is sentenced to thirty years in jail for helping Klaus Fuchs pass information about the Manhattan Project to the Soviet Union. His testimony is later instrumental in the prosecution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.
1953 - Red Scare: General Electric announces that all communist employees will be discharged from the company
1958 - Red Scare: The John Birch Society founded in the United States.
1960 - The first episode of ITV soap-opera Coronation Street is aired.
1961 - The trial of Nazi Adolf Eichmann in Israel ends with him being found guilty of 15 criminal charges, including charges of crimes against humanity, crimes against the Jewish people and membership of an outlawed organization.
1961 - Tanganyika becomes independent from Britain.
1965 - Kecksburg UFO incident
1968 - NLS (a system for which hypertext and the computer mouse were developed) is publicly demonstrated for the first time in San Francisco.
1969 - Groundbreaking of Washington, D.C.'s Metrorail system.
1977 - Kermit Washington of the Los Angeles Lakers punches Rudy Tomjanovich of the Houston Rockets. The punch nearly kills Tomjanovich and leads to major rules changes in the National Basketball Association.
1981 - Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner is shot and killed during a routine traffic stop. Mumia Abu-Jamal is later convicted of the murder.
1982 - Activist Norman Mayer threatens to blow up the Washington Monument, before being killed by United States Park Police.
1987 - Israeli-Palestinian conflict: The First Intifada begins in the Gaza Strip and West Bank
1990 - Lech Wałęsa becomes the first directly elected president of Poland.
1992 - The separation of Charles, Prince of Wales and Diana, Princess of Wales is announced
2003 - A blast in the center of Moscow kills six people and wounds at least 11. (See Red Square Bombing)

Births
1447 - Chenghua, Emperor of China (d. 1487)
1508 - Gemma Frisius, Dutch mathematician and cartographer (d. 1555)
1561 - Sir Edwin Sandys, British-born Virginian colonist (d. 1629)
1571 - Metius (Adriaan Adriaanszoon), Dutch mathematician and astronomer (d. 1635)
1579 - Martin de Porres, Peruvian saint (d. 1639)
1594 - Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden (d. 1632)
1608 - John Milton, English poet (d. 1674)
1610 - Baldassare Ferri, Italian castrato (d. 1680)
1652 - Augustus Quirinus Rivinus, German physician (d. 1723)
1667 - William Whiston, English mathematician (d. 1752)
1748 - Claude Louis Berthollet, French chemist (d. 1822)
1806 - Jean-Olivier Chénier, French Canadian physician and Patriote (d. 1838)
1837 - Émile Waldteufel, French composer (d. 1915)
1842 - Peter Kropotkin, Russian anarchist (d. 1921)
1847 - George Grossmith, English actor (d. 1912)
1850 - Emma Abbott, American soprano (d. 1891)
1868 - Fritz Haber, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1934)
1871 - Joe Kelley, American baseball player (d. 1943)
1876 - Berton Churchill, American actor (d. 1940)
1882 - Joaquín Turina, Spanish composer (d. 1949)
1883 - Nikolai Luzin, Russian mathematician (d. 1950)
1886 - Clarence Birdseye, American frozen food manufacturer (d. 1956)
1889 - Hannes Kolehmainen, Finnish Olympic gold medalist (d. 1966)
1891 - Maksim Bahdanovič, Belarusian poet (d. 1917)
1895 - Conchita Supervía, Spanish opera singer (d. 1936)
1897 - Hermione Gingold, British actress (d. 1987)
1898 - Emmett Kelly, American circus clown (d. 1979)
1899 - Jean de Brunhoff, French author (d. 1937)
1901 - Carol Dempster, American actress (d. 1991)
1901 - Ödön von Horváth, Hungarian-born writer (d. 1938)
1901 - Jean Mermoz, French pilot (d. 1936)
1902 - Margaret Hamilton, American actress (d. 1985)
1905 - Dalton Trumbo, American writer (d. 1976)
1906 - Grace Murray Hopper, American computer pioneer (d. 1992)
1909 - Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., American actor (d. 2000)
1911 - Broderick Crawford, American actor (d. 1986)
1912 - Tip O'Neill, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives (d. 1994)
1915 - Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, German-born soprano (d. 2006)
1916 - Kirk Douglas, American actor
1917 - James Rainwater, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1986)
1918 - Jerome Beatty Jr., American author
1919 - William Lipscomb, Nobel Prize laureate
1920 - Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, President of the Italian Republic
1922 - Redd Foxx, American comedian (d. 1991)
1925 - Dina Merrill, American actress
1926 - Henry Way Kendall, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1999)
1926 - Jan Křesadlo, Czech writer (d. 1995)
1927 - Pierre Henry, French composer
1928 - Dick Van Patten, American actor
1929 - John Cassavetes, American actor and director (d. 1989)
1929 - Bob Hawke, 23rd Prime Minister of Australia
1930 - Buck Henry, American actor
1931 - Ladislav Smoljak, Czech actor
1933 - Morton Downey Jr., American talk show host (d. 2001)
1934 - Judi Dench British actress
1934 - Junior Wells, American harmonica player (d. 1998)
1937 - Darwin Joston, American actor (d. 1998)
1938 - Deacon Jones, American football player
1938 - David Houston, American country music singer (d. 1993)
1941 - Beau Bridges, American actor
1941 - Dan Hicks, American musician
1942 - Dick Butkus, American football player
1943 - Pit Martin, National Hockey League player
1946 - Sonia Gandhi, Italian-born Indian politician
1947 - Tom Daschle, American politician
1947 - Jaak Jõerüüt, Soviet-born Estonian politician
1949 - Tom Kite, American golfer
1950 - Joan Armatrading, West Indian-born British singer
1952 - Michael Dorn, American actor
1952 - Liaqat Baloch, Pakistani politician
1953 - John Malkovich, American actor
1953 - Monique Miller, French Canadian actress
1954 - Herman Finkers, Dutch comedian
1957 - Donny Osmond, American singer and actor
1958 - Nick Seymour, Australian bassist (Crowded House)
1960 - Juan Samuel, Major League Baseball Player
1961 - David Anthony Higgins, American actor
1962 - Felicity Huffman, American actress
1963 - Masako, Crown princess of Japan
1964 - Paul Landers, German guitarist (Rammstein)
1966 - Toby Huss, American actor
1967 - Joshua Bell, American violinist
1967 - Gheorghe Popescu, Romanian footballer
1968 - Kurt Angle, American wrestler
1968 - Dave Harold, British snooker player
1968 - Brian Bell, American guitarist (Weezer)
1969 - Jakob Dylan, American singer (The Wallflowers)
1969 - Bixente Lizarazu, French footballer
1971 - Petr Nedved, National Hockey League player
1972 - Tre Cool, German-born American drummer (Green Day)
1972 - Reiko Aylesworth, American actress
1972 - Fabrice Santoro, Tahitian-born French tennis player
1976 - Chris Booker, American baseball player
1977 - Imogen Heap, British singer and songwriter
1978 - Jesse Metcalfe, American actor (Desperate Housewives)
1979 - Olivia Lufkin, Japanese singer
1980 - Ryder Hesjedal, Canadian professional cyclist
1981 - Diya Mirza, Indian actress
1982 - Tamilla Abassova, Russian cyclist
1983 - Dariusz Dudka, Polish footballer
1990 - LaFee, German Singer
1991 - Prince Joachim, Archduke of Austria-Este, Belgian Prince

Deaths
1165 - King Malcolm IV of Scotland
1292 - Sheikh Saadi, Persian sufi poet
1437 - Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 1368)
1544 - Teofilo Folengo, Italian poet (b. 1491)
1565 - Pope Pius IV (b. 1499)
1603 - William Watson, English conspirator (b. 1559)
1625 - Ubbo Emmius, Dutch historian and geographer (b. 1547)
1636 - Fabian Birkowski, Polish writer (b. 1566)
1641 - Anthony van Dyck, Flemish painter (b. 1599)
1669 - Pope Clement IX (b. 1600)
1674 - Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon, English statesman and historian (b. 1609)
1692 - William Mountfort, English actor and dramatist
1706 - King Peter II of Portugal (b. 1648)
1718 - Vincenzo Coronelli, Italian cartographer and encylopaedist (b. 1650)
1793 - Gabrielle de Polastron, comtesse de Polignac, French aristocrat (b. 1749)
1798 - Johann Reinhold Forster, German botanist (b. 1729)
1830 - Heinrich Christian Friedrich Schumacher, Danish surgeon, botanist and professor of anatomy (b. 1757)
1854 - Almeida Garrett, Portuguese writer (b. 1799)
1858 - Robert Baldwin, Canadian politician (b. 1804)
1887 - Mahmadu Lamine, Senegalese marabout and military leader
1894 - Pafnuty Chebyshev, Russian mathematician (b. 1821)
1916 - Natsume Soseki, Japanese novelist (b. 1867)
1930 - Andrew "Rube" Foster, American baseball player and founder of the Negro National League
1937 - Nils Gustaf Dalén, Swedish physicist and Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1869)
1941 - Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Russian writer and philosopher (b. 1865)
1955 - Hermann Weyl, German mathematician (b. 1885)
1964 - Dame Edith Sitwell, British poet and critic (b. 1887)
1965 - Branch Rickey, American baseball commissioner (b. 1884)
1970 - Sir Feroz Khan Noon, Prime Minister of Pakistan
1971 - Ralph Bunche, American diplomat and Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1904)
1971 - Sergey Konenkov, Russian sculptor (b. 1874)
1972 - Louella Parsons, American gossip columnist (b. 1881)
1975 - William A. Wellman, American movie director (b. 1896)
1979 - Fulton J. Sheen, American archbishop and television preacher (Life is Worth Living) (b. 1895)
1981 - Daniel Faulkner, Philadelphia police officer (b. 1955)
1982 - Leon Jaworski, Watergate scandal special prosecutor (b. 1905)
1984 - Nicholas "Razzle" Dingley, British drummer (Hanoi Rocks) (b. 1960)
1990 - Mike Mazurki, Ukrainian-born professional wrestler and actor (b. 1907)
1992 - Vincent Gardenia, American stage, film and television actor (b. 1922)
1993 - Danny Blanchflower, Northern Irish footballer and football manager (b. 1926)
1995 - Toni Cade Bambara, American author (b. 1939)
1996 - Mary Leakey, British archeologist and anthropologist (b. 1913)
1998 - Shaughnessy Cohen, Canadian politician (b. 1948)
1998 - Archie Moore, American boxer and World Light-Heavyweight Champion (b. 1913)
2002 - Stan Rice, American painter, educator, and poet (b. 1942)
2003 - Paul Simon, U.S. Senator from Illinois (b. 1928)
2004 - David Brudnoy, American radio personality (b. 1940)
2004 - Lea De Mae, Czech actress (b. 1976)
2005 - György Sándor, Hungarian pianist (b. 1912)
2005 - Robert Sheckley, American author (b. 1928)

Holidays and observances
Calendar of saints:
Saint Leocadia; Saint Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin : optional memorial
Peter Fourier, founder of the Congregation of Notre Dame
Also see December 9 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics); specifically the conception of Saint Anne
Scandinavia (specifically Sweden): Anna's Day. Recognizes everyone named Anna, and marks the day to start the preparation process of the lutefisk to be consumed on Christmas Eve.
Tanzania - Independence Day (of Tanganyika from Britain, 1961)

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

---------------------------------------------------------------

December 10th

Events
1041 - Empress Zoe of Byzantium elevates her adoptive son to the throne of the Eastern Roman Empire as Michael V.
1508 - The League of Cambrai is formed by Pope Julius II, Louis XII of France, Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor and Ferdinand II of Aragon as an alliance against Venice.
1520 - Martin Luther burns his copy of the papal bull Exsurge Domine outside Wittenberg's Elster Gate.
1684 - Isaac Newton's derivation of Kepler's laws from his theory of gravity, contained in the paper De motu corporum in gyrum, is read to the Royal Society by Edmund Halley.
1817 - Mississippi becomes the 20th U.S. state.
1836 - Emory College (now Emory University) is chartered in Oxford, Georgia.
1861 - American Civil War: Kentucky becomes the 13th state admitted to the Confederacy.
1864 - American Civil War: Sherman's March to the Sea - Major General William T. Sherman's Union Army troops reach Savannah, Georgia.
1868 - The first traffic lights are installed outside the Houses of Parliament in London. Resembling railway signals, they use semaphore arms and are illuminated at night by red and green gas lamps.
1869 - Wyoming grants women the right to vote.
1869 - The first American chapter of Kappa Sigma is founded at the University of Virginia.
1898 - Spanish-American War: The Treaty of Paris is signed, officially ending the conflict.
1899 - The Delta Sigma Phi fraternity is founded at the City College of New York.
1901 - The first Nobel Prizes are awarded.
1904 - The Pi Kappa Phi fraternity is founded at the College of Charleston in Charleston, South Carolina.
1906 - U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt wins the Nobel Peace Prize, becoming the first American to win a Nobel Prize of any kind.
1932 - Thailand adopts a Constitution and becomes a constitutional monarchy.
1936 - Abdication Crisis: Edward VIII signs his Instrument of Abdication.
1941 - World War II: The Royal Navy capital ships HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse are sunk by Imperial Japanese Navy torpedo bombers.
1941 - World War II: Battle of the Philippines - Imperial Japanese forces under the command of General Masaharu Homma land on the Philippine mainland.
1948 - The UN General Assembly adopts the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
1949 - Chinese Civil War: The People's Liberation Army begins its siege of Chengdu, the last Kuomintang-held city in mainland China, forcing President of the Republic of China Chiang Kai-shek and his government to retreat to Taiwan.
1953 - Dr. Albert Schweitzer is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his humanitarian work.
1963 - The United States Air Force's X-20 Dyna-Soar spaceplane program is cancelled by Robert McNamara.
1965 - The Grateful Dead play their first concert, at the Fillmore in San Francisco.
1968 - Japan's biggest heist, the still-unsolved "300 million yen robbery", occurs in Tokyo.
1970 - Agricultural scientist Norman Borlaug, "father of the Green Revolution", is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
1971 - Jim Hart throws a football for a record 98 yards, the longest recorded throw.
1972 - The American League votes to adopt the Designated Hitter position for the following season.
1975 - Activist Andrei Sakharov is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, accepted by his wife, Yelena Bonner.
1978 - Arab-Israeli conflict: Prime Minister of Israel Menachem Begin and President of Egypt Anwar Sadat are jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
1981 - The United Nations General Assembly approves Pakistan proposal for establishing nuclear free-zone in South Asia.
1983 - Democracy is restored in Argentina with the assumption of President Raúl Alfonsín.
1983 - Solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, accepted by his wife, Danuta.
1984 - Apartheid: Cleric and activist Desmond Tutu is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
1986 - The Holocaust: Elie Wiesel is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
1986 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan declares the date Human Rights Day in the United States.
1989 - Tsakhiagiyn Elbegdorj announced the establishment of Mongolia's democratic movement that peacefully changed the second oldest communist country into a democratic society.
1993 - First release of the videogame Doom.
1996 - Rwandan Genocide: Military Advisor to the United Nations Secretary-General and head of the Military Division of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations of the United Nations Maurice Baril recommends that the UN multi-national forces in Zaire stand down.
2002 - The High Court of Australia hands down its judgement in the internet defamation case of Gutnick v Dow Jones.
2004 - A tombstone commemorating the 35th anniversary of the death of Brazilian guerrilla Carlos Marighella is inaugurated in Salvador, Bahia.
2005 - Sosoliso Airlines Flight 1145 crashes in Nigeria.

Births
1394 - King James I of Scotland (d. 1437)
1452 - Johannes Stöffler, German mathematician and astronomer (d. 1531)
1588 - Isaac Beeckman, Dutch scientist and philosopher (d. 1637)
1750 - Tipu Sultan, ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore (d. 1799)
1787 - Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, American educator (d. 1851)
1804 - Carl Gustav Jakob Jacobi, German mathematician (d. 1851)
1805 - Josef Skoda, Bohemian physician (d. 1881)
1815 - Ada Lovelace, British computer programmer (d. 1852)
1821 - Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov, Russian poet (d. 1877)
1822 - César Franck, Belgian composer and organist (d. 1890)
1824 - George MacDonald, British writer and preacher (d. 1905)
1830 - Emily Dickinson, American poet (d. 1886)
1851 - Melvil Dewey, American librarian (d. 1931)
1870 - Pierre Louÿs, French author (d. 1925)
1870 - Adolf Loos, Austrian architect (d. 1933)
1872 - Don Lorenzo Perosi, Italian composer (d. 1956)
1882 - Otto Neurath, Austrian philosopher (d. 1945)
1884 - Zinaida Serebriakova, Russian-born painter (d. 1967)
1886 - Marco Minghetti, Italian statesman (b. 1813)
1891 - Nelly Sachs, German-born writer and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1970)
1903 - Una Merkel, American actress (d. 1986)
1907 - Rumer Godden (Margaret Rumer Godden), British writer (d. 1998)
1907 - Lucien Laurent, French international footballer (d. 2005)
1908 - Olivier Messiaen, French composer and ornithologist (d. 1992)
1909 - Hermes Pan, American choreographer and dancer (d. 1990)
1911 - Chet Huntley, American journalist (d. 1974)
1912 - Philip A. Hart, U.S. Senator (d. 1976)
1913 - Morton Gould, American composer (d. 1996)
1913 - Harry Locke, British character actor (d. 1987)
1914 - Dorothy Lamour, American actress (d. 1996)
1917 - Sultan Yahya Petra, King of Malaysia (d. 1979)
1918 - Anne Gwynne, American actress (d. 2003)
1918 - Anatoli Tarasov, Russian hockey coach (d. 1995)
1919 - Alexander Courage, American composer
1920 - Reginald Rose, American writer (d. 2002)
1920 - Clarice Lispector, Ukrainian-Brazilian writer (d. 1977)
1928 - Dan Blocker, American actor (d. 1972)
1933 - Mako, Japanese-born American actor (b. 2006)
1934 - Howard Martin Temin, American geneticist and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1994)
1941 - Chad Stuart, British folk singer (Chad and Jeremy)
1941 - Tommy Rettig, American actor (d. 1996)
1944 - Steve Renko, American baseball player
1947 - Douglas Kenney, American humorist (d. 1980)
1947 - Rəsul Quliyev, Azerbaijani politician and chairman of the Azerbaijan Democratic Party.
1947 - Rainer Seifert, German field hockey player
1948 - Abu Abbas, founder of the Palestine Liberation Front (d. 2004)
1951 - Ellen Nikolaysen, Norwegian singer
1952 - Clive Anderson, British television host
1952 - Susan Dey, American actress
1957 - Michael Clarke Duncan, American actor
1960 - Kenneth Branagh, Northern Irish actor and director
1965 - J Mascis, American musician
1966 - Mel Rojas, Major League Baseball pitcher
1967 - Harland Williams, Canadian actor
1969 - Rob Blake, Canadian hockey player
1972 - Brian Molko, Belgian-born singer and songwriter (Placebo)
1974 - Meg White, American drummer (The White Stripes)
1975 - Josip Skoko, Australian footballer
1978 - Donna Williams, co-founder of Neopets
1978 - Brandon Novak, skateboarder
1979 - Matt Bentley, American professional wrestler
1980 - Sarah Chang, American violinist
1980 - Ledley King, English footballer
1981 - Taufik Batisah, Singaporean singer
1981 - Fabio Rochemback, Brazilian footballer
1981 - Ryan Pini, Papua New Guinea swimmer and Commonwealth Games Gold medalist
1982 - Tim Deegan, MuchMusic VJ
1983 - Patrick Flueger, American actor
1983 - Zé Kalanga, Angolan footballer
1985 - Raven-Symoné, American actress and singer
1993 - Rachel Trachtenburg, American drummer and singer (Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players)

Deaths
1041 - Michael IV, Byzantine Emperor (b. 1010)
1198 - Averroes, Arab physician and philosopher (b. 1126)
1508 - René II, Duke of Lorraine (b. 1451)
1603 - William Gilbert, English scientist (plague) (b. 1544)
1618 - Giulio Caccini, Italian composer
1626 - Edmund Gunter, English mathematician (b. 1581)
1665 - Tarquinio Merula, Italian composer
1736 - António Manoel de Vilhena, Portuguese ruler of Malta (b. 1663)
1831 - Thomas Seebeck, Baltic German physicist (b. 1770)
1850 - François Sulpice Beudant, French mineralogist and geologist (b. 1787)
1865 - King Léopold I of Belgium (b. 1790)
1896 - Alfred Nobel, Swedish inventor and founder of the Nobel Prize (b. 1833)
1911 - Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker, British botanist (b. 1817)
1917 - Sir Mackenzie Bowell, fifth Prime Minister of Canada (b. 1823)
1920 - Horace Elgin Dodge, American automobile manufacturing pioneer (b. 1868)
1928 - Charles Rennie Mackintosh, British architect, designer, and illustrator (b. 1868)
1936 - Bobby Abel, English test cricketer (b. 1857)
1936 - Luigi Pirandello, Italian writer and Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1867)
1941 - Colin Kelly, American pilot
1945 - Theodor Dannecker, SS officer (b. 1913)
1946 - Walter Johnson, American baseball player (b. 1887)
1946 - Damon Runyon, American writer (b. 1884)
1951 - Algernon Blackwood, British writer (b. 1869)
1953 - Abdullah Yusuf Ali, Indian-born scholar and translator (b. 1872)
1967 - Otis Redding, American soul singer (b. 1941)
1968 - Thomas Merton, American monk and author (b. 1915)
1968 - Karl Barth, Swiss theologian (b. 1886)
1968 - George Forrest, Northern Irish MP (b. 1921)
1969 - Carlos Marighella, Brazilian politician
1978 - Ed Wood, Jr., American filmmaker (b. 1924)
1979 - Ann Dvorak, American film actress (b. 1912)
1982 - Freeman F. Gosden, American actor (b. 1899)
1986 - Susan Cabot, American actress (murdered) (b. 1927)
1987 - Jascha Heifetz, Russian-born violinist (b. 1901)
1990 - Armand Hammer, American industrialist and art collector (b. 1898)
1991 - Greta Kempton, American artist (b. 1901)
1994 - Alexander Wilson, Canadian and Notre Dame athlete (b. 1905)
1994 - Keith Joseph, British politician (b. 1918)
1996 - Faron Young, American singer (b. 1932)
1999 - Franjo Tuđman, President of Croatia (b. 1922)
1999 - Rick Danko, Canadian bassist and singer (The Band) (b. 1942)
2000 - Marie Windsor, American film actress (b. 1919)
2001 - Ashok Kumar, Indian actor (b. 1911)
2005 - Eugene J. McCarthy, United States Senator (b. 1916)
2005 - Richard Pryor, American comedian and actor (b. 1940)

Holidays and observances
Human Rights Day - United Nations

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 8th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Sat, 09 Dec 2006 16:32:00 +0000

Offered by:

Events
1541 - Thomas Culpeper and Francis Dereham are executed for having affairs with Catherine Howard, Queen of England and wife of Henry VIII.
1609 - Biblioteca Ambrosiana opens its reading room, the second public library of Europe.
1854 - Pope Pius IX proclaims the dogma of Immaculate Conception, which holds that the Virgin Mary was born free of original sin.
1864 - The Clifton Suspension Bridge over the River Avon was officially opened.
1869 - Timothy Eaton founds T. Eaton Co. Limited in Toronto, Canada.
1886 - The American Federation of Labor is founded by Samuel Gompers in Columbus, Ohio.
1904 - Konservativ Ungdom (Young Conservatives) in Denmark is founded by Carl F. Herman von Rosen. Still existing today, it is the oldest youth political organisation in Denmark and believed to be one of the oldest remaining in the world.
1907 - King Gustaf V of Sweden accedes to the Swedish throne.
1914 - World War I: Battle of the Falkland Islands - The Kaiserliche Marine under the command of Admiral Graf Maximilian von Spee is engaged by the Royal Navy.
1935 - The Japanese military police launches a violent suppression of the religious sect Oomoto, beginning with a crackdown on the sect's operational bases of Ayabe and Kameoka in Kyoto Prefecture and the arrest of its leader Onisaburo Deguchi.
1940 - The Chicago Bears defeat the Washington Redskins 73-0, in the NFL Championship Game. This is the most lob-sided game in NFL history.
1941 - World War II: Pacific War - After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor the U.S. Congress passes a declaration of war against Japan.
1941 - World War II: Pacific War - the Republic of China officially declares war against Japan, after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
1941 - World War II: Pacific War - The Netherlands issues a proclamation in which it declares war against Japan, after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
1941 - World War II: Pacific War - The Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea in China issues a proclamation which declared war against Japan and Germany on behalf of Korean people, who were under Japanese occupation since 1910.
1941 - World War II: Battle of Hong Kong - The Japanese invade the British Crown Colony of Hong Kong less than 8 hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
1941 - Holocaust: Gas vans are first used as a means of execution, at the Chelmno extermination camp near Łódź in Poland.
1942 - Holocaust: in Ternopil, Ukraine, German SS organise the last deportation of Ternopil Jews to death camp in Belzec, when 1,400 Jews were sent there. The chief of the Gestapo, SS-Sturmbannführer Hermann Müller, bore overall responsibility for the mass murder of the Jews of Ternopil and Berezhany county.
1949 - Chinese Civil War: The capital of the Republic of China is moved from Nanjing to Taipei, Taiwan.
1959 - U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower watches Pakistan vs Australia cricket test match at Karachi.
1966 - The Greek ferry Heraklion sinks in a storm in the Aegean Sea, killing over 200.
1968 - NLS (a system for which hypertext and the computer mouse were developed) is publicly demonstrated for the first time in San Francisco.
1969 - An Olympic Airways DC-6B crashes near Athens during a storm, killing 93 people.
1972 - United Airlines Flight 533 crashes near Chicago Midway Airport, killing 45 people.
1976 - The Eagles release the album Hotel California.
1980 - John Lennon is murdered by Mark David Chapman in New York City.
1981 - No. 21 Mine explosion in Whitwell, Tennessee kills 13.
1987 - The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty is signed.
1987 - The Queen Street Massacre: Frank Vitkovic shoots and kills 8 people at the offices of Australia Post in Melbourne, Australia before being killed himself.
1987 - Alianza Lima air disaster
1991 - The leaders of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine sign an agreement dissolving the Soviet Union and establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States.
1991 - The Romanian Constitution is adopted in a referendum.
1993 - The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is signed into law by US President Bill Clinton.
1994 - U.S. President Bill Clinton signs a bill enacting United States participation in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.
1995 - Jean-Dominique Bauby suffers a stroke.
1998 - Tadjena massacre: 81 people are killed by armed groups in Algeria.
2004 - The Cuzco Declaration is signed in Cuzco, Peru, establishing the South American Community of Nations.
2005 - Ante Gotovina, Croatian army general accused of war crimes, is captured in the Playa de las Américas, Tenerife by the Spanish police.
2006 - Israeli serial rapist Benny Sela is caught by police, two week after his escape from prison.

Births
65 BC - Horace, Roman poet (d. 8 BC)
1542 - Mary Queen of Scots (d. 1587)
1626 - Queen Christina of Sweden (d. 1689)
1678 - Horatio Walpole, 1st Baron Walpole of Wolterton, English diplomat (d. 1757)
1708 - Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1765)
1730 - Jan Ingenhousz, Dutch-born British physiologist and botanist (d. 1799)
1765 - Eli Whitney, American inventor (d. 1825)
1795 - Peter Andreas Hansen, Danish astronomer (d. 1874)
1815 - Adolph Menzel, German painter and graphic artist (d. 1905)
1816 - August Belmont, Sr., Prussian-born American financier (d. 1890)
1832 - Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Norwegian author and Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1910)
1848 - Joel Chandler Harris, American author and folklorist (d. 1908)
1861 - William C. Durant, American automobile pioneer (d. 1947)
1861 - Aristide Maillol, French sculptor (d. 1944)
1862 - Georges Feydeau, French playwright (d. 1921)
1864 - Camille Claudel, French graphic artist and sculptor (d. 1943)
1865 - Jean Sibelius, Finnish composer (d. 1957)
1865 - Jacques Hadamard, French mathematician (d. 1963)
1874 - Ernst Moro, Austrian physician (d. 1951)
1886 - Diego Rivera, Mexican painter (d. 1957)
1890 - Bohuslav Martinů, Czech composer (d. 1959)
1894 - James Thurber, American writer (d. 1961)
1894 - E.C. Segar, American cartoonist (Popeye), (d. 1938)
1909 - Gratien Gélinas, Quebec playwright, actor, director and producer (d. 1999)
1911 - Lee J. Cobb, American actor (d. 1976)
1913 - Delmore Schwartz, American Poet (d. 1966)
1915 - Ernest Lehman, American screenwriter (d. 2005)
1916 - Richard Fleischer, American film director (d. 2006)
1918 - Gérard Souzay, French baritone (d. 2004)
1919 - Peter Tali Coleman, American politician (d. 1997)
1923 - Rudolph Pariser, Chinese-born American chemist
1925 - Sammy Davis Jr., American actor and singer (d. 1990)
1925 - Jimmy Smith, American jazz musician (d. 2005)
1927 - Vladimir Shatalov, Soviet Union-born cosmonaut
1930 - Maximilian Schell, Austrian-born Swiss actor, film director, and author
1933 - Flip Wilson, American comedian (d. 1998)
1935 - Dharmendra, Indian Actor
1936 - David Carradine, American actor
1937 - James MacArthur, American actor
1937 - Arne Næss Jr., Norwegian mountain climber and businessman (d. 2004)
1939 - Sir James Galway, Northern Irish flautist
1939 - Jerry Butler, American soul singer
1939 - Red Berenson, National Hockey League player
1940 - Brant Alyea, Baseball player
1941 - Sir Geoff Hurst, Ex-English footballer
1941 - Ed Brinkman, Baseball player
1941 - Bob Brown, National Football League player
1943 - Jim Morrison, American singer (The Doors) (d. 1971)
1943 - Mary Woronov, American actress
1946 - John Rubinstein, American actor, composer, director
1947 - Gregg Allman, American musician
1947 - Thomas R. Cech, American chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
1949 - Robert Sternberg, Proposed the Triarchic Theory of Intelligence
1950 - Richard A. Baker, American film makeup artist
1950 - Tim Foli, Major League Baseball player
1951 - Jan Eggum, Norwegian singer-songwriter
1951 - Bill Bryson, American author
1953 - Kim Basinger, American actress
1953 - Sam Kinison, American comedian (d. 1992)
1956 - Warren Cuccurullo, American musician
1957 - Phil Collen, British guitarist (Def Leppard)
1961 - Ann Coulter, American author, political commentator, and attorney
1962 - Marty Friedman, American guitarist
1964 - Sandy Burnett, British record producer
1964 - Teri Hatcher, American actress
1965 - Carina Lau, Hong Kong actress
1966 - Sinéad O'Connor, Irish musician
1966 - Michael Cole, American professional wrestling commentator
1967 - Jeff George, American football player
1967 - Kotono Mitsuishi, Japanese seiyu (voice actress)
1968 - Mike Mussina, American baseball player
1969 - Jeff Tremaine, American television & film director
1972 - Marco Abreu, Angolan footballer
1972 - Frank Shamrock, American MMA-Fighter and younger brother of MMA-Fighter Ken Shamrock
1973 - Corey Taylor, American singer (Slipknot, Stone Sour)
1975 - Kevin Harvick, American NASCAR driver
1976 - Dominic Monaghan, German-born British actor
1976 - Naimee Coleman, Irish singer and songwriter
1976 - Reed Johnson, American Baseball Player
1977 - Ryan Newman, American NASCAR driver
1977 - Elsa Benítez, Mexican supermodel
1978 - Ian Somerhalder, American actor
1978 - Vernon Wells, American baseball player
1981 - Jeremy Accardo, American baseball player
1981 - Philip Rivers, American football player
1982 - Michael Essien, Ghanaian international footballer
1982 - James Guffey, American professional wrestler
1983 - Neel Jani, Swiss racing driver
1985 - Dwight Howard, American basketball player
1986 - Amir Khan, British boxer
1993 - AnnaSophia Robb, American child actress

Deaths
899 - Arnulf of Carinthia (b. 850)
1626 - John Davies, English poet (b. 1569)
1632 - Philippe van Lansberge, Flemish astronomer (b. 1561)
1638 - Ivan Gundulic, Croatian poet (b. 1589)
1643 - John Pym, English statesman (b. 1583)
1649 - Noël Chabanel, French Jesuit missionary (b. 1613)
1680 - Henry Pierrepont, 1st Marquess of Dorchester, English politician (b. 1606)
1691 - Richard Baxter, English clergyman (b. 1615)
1695 - Barthélemy d'Herbelot de Molainville, French orientalist (b. 1625)
1709 - Thomas Corneille, French dramatist (b. 1625)
1722 - Liselotte von der Pfalz, Duchess of Orléans (b. 1652)
1744 - Marie-Anne de Mailly-Nesle duchess de Châteauroux, mistress of King Louis XV of France (b. 1717)
1745 - Etienne Fourmont, French orientalist (b. 1683)
1746 - Charles Radclyffe, British politician (b. 1693)
1756 - William Stanhope, 1st Earl of Harrington, British statesman and diplomat
1768 - Jean Denis Attiret, French Jesuit missionary (b. 1702)
1830 - Benjamin Constant, Swiss writer (b. 1767)
1859 - Thomas de Quincey, British author (b. 1785)
1864 - George Boole, British inventor of Boolean algebra (b. 1815)
1885 - William Henry Vanderbilt, member of the Vanderbilt family (b. 1821)
1894 - Pafnuty Chebyshev, Russian mathematician (b. 1821)
1907 - Oscar II of Sweden (b. 1829)
1914 - Maximilian von Spee, German naval officer (b. 1861)
1917 - Mendele Moykher Sforim, Russian writer (b. 1836)
1938 - Friedrich Glauser, German-language Swiss writer (b. 1896)
1952 - Charles Lightoller, British second officer on the Titanic (b. 1874)
1958 - Tris Speaker, American baseball player (b. 1888)
1963 - Field Marshal Sarit Dhanarajata, Prime Minister of Thailand (b. 1908)
1975 - Gary Thain, New Zealand bassist (Uriah Heep) (b. 1948)
1978 - Golda Meir, Russian-born Prime Minister of Israel (b. 1898)
1980 - John Lennon, British musician and activist (b. 1940)
1982 - Bram Behr, Surinamese journalist (b. 1951)
1982 - Marty Robbins, American singer (b. 1925)
1983 - Slim Pickens, American actor (b. 1919)
1984 - Luther Adler, American actor (b. 1903
1984 - Robert Jay Mathews, White Nationalist (b. 1953)
1991 - Buck Clayton, American jazz trumpet player (b. 1911)
1992 - William Shawn, American magazine editor (b. 1917)
1994 - Tom Jobim, Brazilian composer and arranger (b. 1927)
1996 - Howard Rollins, American actor (b. 1950)
1999 - Péter Kuczka, Hungarian writer (b. 1923)
2001 - Don Tennant, American advertising executive (b. 1922)
2003 - Rubén González, Cuban pianist (Buena Vista Social Club)
2004 - Dimebag Darrell (Darrell Abbott), American guitarist (b. 1966)
2005 - Georgiy Zhzhonov Russian actor and author (b. 1915)
2006 - Jeane Kirkpatrick, American diplomat (b. 1926)
2006 - Jose Uribe, Major League Baseball player (b. (1959)

Holidays and observances
Buddhism - The Enlightenment of Gautama Buddha (Bodhi Day)
R.C. Saints - The solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary (Holy Day of Obligation in Ireland, USA)
Bulgaria - Day of the Student (Студентски празник)
Italy - In Milan, the opera season starts.
Austria - Public Holiday.
Malta - Public Holiday.
Romania - Constitution Day
Afflux (50 Aftermath) (Discordianism)
Panama - Mother's Day
Kazakhstan - Day of the Green Pea
Spain - Immaculate Conception - Day of the National Army

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 7th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 02:10:00 +0000

Offered by:

Events
1724 - Thorn Blood tribunal (de:Thorner Blutgericht), execution of protestant who attacked and demolished Jesuit Church by Poland in Toruń(Thorn)
1732 - The Royal Opera House opens at Covent Garden, London.
1776 - Marquis de Lafayette attempts to enter the American military as a major general.
1787 - Delaware becomes the first state to ratify the US Constitution.
1815 - Michel Ney, Marshal of France, is executed by firing squad after having been convicted of treason for his support of Napoleon I.
1917 - World War I: The US declares war on Austria-Hungary.
1941 - World War II: Canada declared war on Finland, Hungary, Romania, and Japan.
1941 - World War II: Attack On Pearl Harbor - The Imperial Japanese Navy attacks the US Pacific Fleet and its defending Army Air Forces and Marine air forces at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
1946 - A fire at the Winecoff Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia kills 119 people.
1949 - Chinese Civil War : The government of Republic of China moves from Nanking to Taipei.
1962 - Prince Rainier III of Monaco revises the principality's constitution, devolving some of his power to advisory and legislative councils.
1965 - Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras simultaneously lift mutual excommunications that had been in place since 1054.
1966 - A fire at an army barracks in Erzurum, Turkey kills 68 people.
1970 - The first ever general election on the basis of direct adult franchise are held in Pakistan for 313 National Assembly seats.
1971 - Pakistan President Yahya Khan announces formation of a Coalition Government at Centre with Nurul Amin as Prime Minister and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto as Vice-Prime Minister.
1972 - Apollo 17, the last Apollo moon mission, is launched. The crew take the photograph known as "The Blue Marble" as they leave the Earth.
1975 - Indonesia invades East Timor.
1982 - In Texas, Charles Brooks, Jr. becomes the first person to be executed by lethal injection in the US.
1983 - Iberia Airlines' Boeing 727 collided with Aviaco DC-9 in intense fog when the two airliners taxied down the runway at Madrid Airport killing 93 people.
1987 - PSA Flight 1771 crashes near Paso Robles, California, killing all 43 on board, after a disgruntled passenger shoots his ex-boss on the flight, then shoots both pilots and himself.
1988 - Spitak Earthquake: In Armenia an earthquake measuring 6.9 on the Richter scale kills nearly 25,000, injures 15,000 and leaves 400,000 homeless.
1988 - Yasser Arafat recognizes the right of Israel to exist.
1989 - In their third and final fight, Sugar Ray Leonard retains the WBC Super Middleweight Championship of the World, defeating Roberto Duran.
1993 - In South Africa, the Transitional Executive Council is established.
1993 - The Long Island Rail Road Massacre: Colin Ferguson murders six people and injures 19 others on the LIRR in Nassau County, New York.
1995 - The Galileo spacecraft arrives at Jupiter, a little more than six years after it was launched by Space Shuttle Atlantis during Mission STS-34.
1995 - 20 people are killed in the Port-au-Prince air disaster
2003 - The Conservative Party of Canada is officially recognized after the merger of the Canadian Alliance and Progressive Conservative Party of Canada.
2004 - Hamid Karzai is inaugurated as President of Afghanistan.
2004 - John Kufuor is re-elected as President of Ghana.
2005 - Rigoberto Alpizar, a passenger on American Airlines Flight 924 who allegedly claimed to have a bomb, is shot and killed by a team of US federal air marshals at Miami International Airport.

Births
521 - Saint Columba, Irish Christian missionary to Scotland (d. 597)
1545 - Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, consort of Mary I of Scotland (d. 1567)
1561 - Kikkawa Hiroie, Japanese politician (d. 1625)
1598 - Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Italian artist (d. 1680)
1637 - Bernardo Pasquini, Italian composer (d. 1710)
1670 - John Aislabie, English director of the South Sea Company (d. 1742)
1764 - Claude Victor-Perrin, duc de Belluno, French marshal (d. 1841)
1784 - Allan Cunningham, British poet (d. 1842)
1801 - Johann Nestroy, Austrian dramatist and actor (d. 1862)
1810 - Theodor Schwann, German physiologist (d. 1882)
1810 - Josef Hyrtl, Austrian anatomist (d. 1894)
1823 - Leopold Kronecker, German mathematician (d. 1891)
1847 - George Grossmith, British actor and writer (d. 1912)
1860 - Joseph Cook, 6th Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1947)
1863 - Pietro Mascagni, Italian composer (d. 1945)
1863 - Richard Sears, American department store founder (d. 1914)
1873 - Willa Cather, American novelist (d. 1947)
1879 - Rudolf Friml, American composer (d. 1972)
1887 - Ernst Toch, Austrian composer (d. 1964)
1888 - Joyce Cary, Irish author (d. 1957)
1888 - Hamilton Fish III, American politician (d. 1991)
1903 - Danilo Blanuša, Croatian mathematician (d. 1987)
1904 - Konstantin Sokolsky, Russian singer (d. 1991)
1905 - Gerard Kuiper, Dutch-born American astronomer (d. 1973)
1907 - Fred Rose, Canadian communist politician (d. 1983)
1910 - Louis Prima, American musician (d. 1978)
1912 - Daniel Jones, British composer (d. 1993)
1915 - Eli Wallach, American actor
1916 - Jean Carignan, French Canadian fiddler (d. 1988)
1920 - Fiorenzo Magni, Italian cylist
1924 - Mário Soares, President of Portugal
1924 - Bent Fabric, Danish pop pianist and composer
1927 - Helen Watts, British contralto
1928 - Noam Chomsky, American linguist and political writer
1930 - Hal Smith, American baseball player
1932 - Ellen Burstyn, American actress
1940 - Gerry Cheevers, National Hockey League goaltender
1942 - Harry Chapin, American singer and songwriter (d. 1981)
1942 - Peter Tomarken, American game show host (d. 2006)
1942 - Alex Johnson, American baseball player
1943 - Bernard C. Parks, Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department
1944 - Daniel Chorzempa, American organist
1944 - Jamiel Chagra, American drug trafficker
1945 - Marion Rung, Finnish singer
1947 - Johnny Bench, American baseball player
1947 - Garry Unger, Canadian ice hockey player
1947 - Tony Thomas, American TV and film producer
1948 - Gary Morris, American singer and actor
1948 - Mads Vinding, Danish bassist
1949 - Tom Waits, American singer, composer, and actor
1954 - Mark Hofmann, American forger and bomber
1954 - Mike Nolan, Irish singer (Bucks Fizz)
1955 - Priscilla Barnes, American actress
1956 - Larry Bird, American basketball player
1957 - Tom Winsor, British lawyer and economic regulator
1958 - Tim Butler, British musician (Psychedelic Furs)
1958 - Rick Rude, American professional wrestler (d. 1996)
1966 - C. Thomas Howell, American actor
1967 - Tino Martinez, American baseball player
1968 - Mark Geyer, Australian rugby league player
1970 - Carmen Campuzano, Mexican actress and fashion model
1971 - Vladimir Akopian, Armenian chess player
1971 - Chasey Lain, American pornographic actress
1972 - Hermann Maier, Austrian skier
1972 - Tammy Lynn Sytch, American professional wrestler
1973 - Damien Rice, Irish musician
1973 - Terrell Owens, American football player
1974 - Nicole Appleton, Canadian-born singer
1975 - Jamie Clapham, British footballer
1976 - Alan Faneca, American football player
1977 - Dominic Howard, British drummer (Muse)
1978 - Shiri Appleby, American actress
1979 - Ayako Fujitani, Japanese actress
1979 - Jennifer Carpenter, American actress
1980 - John Terry, English footballer
1984 - Robert Kubica, the first Polish Formula One racing driver
1984 - Aaron Gray, American basketball player
1986 - Megan Kanka, American rape and murder victim, basis of Megan's Law (d. 1994)
1987 - Aaron Carter, American singer and actor
1988 - Emily Browning, Australian actress
2003 - Princess Catharina-Amalia of the Netherlands

Deaths
43 BC - Cicero, Roman politician and author (b. 106 BC)
283 - Pope Eutychian
1254 - Pope Innocent IV
1279 - King Boleslaus V of Poland (b. 1226)
1295 - Gilbert de Clare, 7th Earl of Hertford, English politician (b. 1243)
1498 - Alexander Hegius von Heek, German humanist
1562 - Adrian Willaert, Flemish composer
1649 - Charles Garnier, French Jesuit missionary (b. 1606)
1672 - Richard Bellingham, English-born Massachusetts colonial magistrate (b. 1592)
1683 - John Oldham, English poet (smallpox) (b. 1653)
1683 - Algernon Sydney, English politician (b. 1623)
1723 - Jan Santini Aichel, Bohemian architect (b. 1677)
1725 - Florent Carton Dancourt, French dramatist and actor (b. 1661)
1775 - Charles Saunders, British admiral
1793 - Joseph Bara, French revolutionary (b. 1780)
1815 - Michel Ney, French marshall (executed) (b. 1769)
1817 - William Bligh, British naval officer (b. 1745)
1874 - Constantin von Tischendorf, German biblical scholar (b. 1815)
1894 - Ferdinand de Lesseps, French diplomat and entrepreneur (Suez Canal) (b. 1805)
1902 - Thomas Nast, German-born American cartoonist (b. 1840)
1906 - Élie Ducommun, Swiss journalist, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1833)
1913 - Luigi Oreglia di Santo Stefano, Italian Catholic churchman and last surviving cardinal of Pius IX (b. 1828)
1941 - Isaac C. Kidd, American rear admiral (b. 1884)
1947 - Nicholas M. Butler, American university president, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1862)
1947 - Tristan Bernard, French playwright and novelist (b. 1866)
1956 - Huntley Gordon, Canadian actor (b. 1887)
1960 - Clara Haskil, Swiss pianist (b. 1895)
1969 - Lefty O'Doul, baseball player (b. 1897)
1969 - Eric Portman, English actor (b. 1903)
1970 - Rube Goldberg, American cartoonist (b. 1883)
1975 - Thornton Wilder, American playwright (b. 1897)
1977 - Peter Carl Goldmark, Hungarian-born American engineer (b. 1906)
1978 - Alexander Wetmore, American ornithologist (b. 1886)
1980 - Darby Crash, American punk-rock lengend (b. 1958)
1983 - Fanny Cano, Mexican actress (b. 1944)
1985 - Robert Graves, British author (b. 1895)
1985 - Potter Stewart, US Supreme Court Justice (b. 1915)
1989 - William Calhoun, Professional wrestler (b. 1934)
1990 - Joan Bennett, American actress (b. 1910)
1990 - Jean Duceppe, Quebec stage, television and film actor (b. 1923)
1990 - Jean Paul Lemieux, Quebec painter (b. 1904)
1993 - Félix Houphouët-Boigny, President of Côte d'Ivoire (b. 1905)
1993 - Wolfgang Paul, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1913)
1994 - J.C. Tremblay, National Hockey League defenseman (b. 1939)
1998 - Martin Rodbell, American scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1925)
2000 - Vladimir Gotovac, Croatian poet and politician (b. 1930)
2001 - Charles McClendon, LSU Tigers head football coach (b. 1923)
2003 - Carl F. H. Henry American theologian and publisher (b. 1913)
2003 - Azie Taylor Morton, Treasurer of the United States (b. 1936)
2003 - Raúl Vale, Venezuelan entertainer (b. 1944)
2004 - Frederick Fennell, American conductor (b. 1914)
2004 - Jerry Scoggins, American singer (b. 1913)
2005 - Bud Carson, American football player and coach (b. 1931)

Holidays and observances
R.C. Saints - Saint Ambrose: Memorial
US - Pearl Harbor Day (observance)
International Civil Aviation Day

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 6th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 22:45:00 +0000

Offered by:

Events
963 - Leo VIII is elected Pope.
1240 - Mongol invasion of Rus: Kiev under Danylo of Halych and Voivode Dmytro falls to the Mongols under Batu Khan.
1534 - The city of Quito in Ecuador is founded by Spanish settlers led by Sebastián de Belalcázar.
1768 - The first edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica is published.
1790 - The U.S. Congress moves from New York City to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
1845 - Alpha Sigma Phi Fraternity is founded at Yale College.
1849 - American abolitionist Harriet Tubman escapes from slavery.
1865 - The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, banning slavery.
1877 - The Washington Post newspaper is first published.
1884 - The Washington Monument in Washington D.C. is completed.
1897 - London becomes the world's first city to host motorised taxicabs.
1907 - A coal mine explosion at Monongah, West Virginia kills 362 workers.
1916 - Bucharest was captured by the Central Powers
1916 - David Lloyd George becomes Prime Minister of United Kingdom.
1917 - Finland gains independence from Bolshevist Russia.
1917 - Halifax Explosion: In Canada, a munitions explosion kills more than 1900 people and destroys part of the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia.
1921 - The Anglo-Irish Treaty is signed in London by British and Irish representatives
1922 - One year to the day after the signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, the Irish Free State comes into existence.
1933 - U.S. federal judge John M. Woolsey rules that the James Joyce novel Ulysses is not obscene.
1947 - The Everglades National Park in Florida is dedicated.
1956 - The water polo Blood In The Water match between Hungary and the former USSR took place during the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne, representative of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution.
1957 - Project Vanguard: A launchpad explosion of Vanguard TV3 thwarts the first United States attempt to launch a satellite into orbit around the Earth.
1965 - Pakistan's Islamic Ideology Advisory Committee recommends that Islamic Studies be made a compulsory subject for Muslim students from primary to graduation level.
1969 - Meredith Hunter is killed by Hell's Angels during The Rolling Stones's concert at the Altamont Speedway in California.
1971 - Pakistan snaps diplomatic ties with India following New Delhi's recognition of Bangladesh.
1973 - The Twenty-fifth Amendment: The United States House of Representatives votes 387 to 35 to confirm Gerald Ford as Vice President of the United States (on November 27, the Senate confirmed him 92 to 3).
1975 - Balcombe Street Siege: An IRA Active Service Unit takes a couple hostage in Balcombe Street, London.
1977 - South Africa grants independence to Bophuthatswana, although it is not recognized by any other country
1978 - Spain approves its latest constitution in a referendum.
1989 - École Polytechnique Massacre: Marc Lépine kills 14 young women in Montreal, Quebec.
1991 - In Croatia, forces of the Yugoslav People's Army bombard Dubrovnik after laying siege there since May.
1992 - Extremist Hindu activists demolish Babri Masjid - a 16th century mosque in Ayodhya, India which had been used as temple since 1949. Hindus believe this structure was built on the site which is the birthplace of Lord Rama.
1997 - A Russian Antonov An-124 transport cargo plane crashes into an apartment complex near Irkutsk, Siberia, killing 67.
2001 - Name of the Canadian province of Newfoundland changed to Newfoundland and Labrador.
2005 - Several villagers shot dead during protests in Dongzhou, China.

Births
846 -Hasan al-Askari, Shia Imam (d. 874)
1285 - King Ferdinand IV of Castile (d. 1312)
1421 - King Henry VI of England (d. 1471)
1478 - Baldassare Castiglione, Italian diplomat and author (d. 1529)
1550 - Orazio Vecchi, Italian composer (baptism) (d. 1605)
1586 - Niccolo Zucchi, Italian astronomer (d. 1670)
1608 - George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle, English soldier (d. 1670)
1637 - Sir Edmund Andros, English governor in North America (d. 1714)
1640 - Claude Fleury, French historian (d. 1723)
1642 - Johann Christoph Bach, German composer (d. 1703)
1721 - James Elphinston, British philologist (d. 1809)
1721 - Guillaume-Chrétien de Lamoignon de Malesherbes, French statesman (d. 1794)
1778 - Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac, French physicist and chemist (d. 1850)
1792 - King William II of the Netherlands (d. 1849)
1805 - Adolf Reubke, German organ builder (d. 1875)
1805 - Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin, French magician (d. 1861)
1823 - Friedrich Max Müller, German orientalist (d. 1900)
1833 - John Singleton Mosby, American Confederate guerrilla leader (d. 1916)
1841 - Frédéric Bazille, French painter (d. 1870)
1849 - August von Mackensen, German field marshal (d. 1945)
1863 - Charles Martin Hall, American chemist (d. 1914)
1872 - William S. Hart, American actor (d. 1946)
1875 - Evelyn Underhill, British poet (d. 1941)
1886 - Joyce Kilmer, American poet (d. 1918)
1890 - Rudolf Schlichter, German artist and writer (d. 1955)
1890 - Yoshio Nishina, Japanese physicist (d. 1951)
1890 - Dion Fortune, British occultist (d. 1946)
1892 - Sir Osbert Sitwell, British author (d. 1969)
1896 - Ira Gershwin, American lyricist (d. 1983)
1898 - Alfred Eisenstaedt, German-born photojournalist (d. 1995)
1898 - Gunnar Myrdal, Swedish economist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economics (d. 1987)
1900 - Agnes Moorehead, American actress (d. 1974)
1903 - Tony Lazzeri, American baseball player (d. 1946)
1905 - James J. Braddock, American boxer (d. 1974)
1908 - Pierre Graber, Swiss Federal Councilor (d. 2003)
1908 - Baby Face Nelson, American bank robber (d. 1934)
1913 - Eleanor Holm, American swimmer (d. 2004)
1916 - Hugo Peretti, American songwriter and record producer (b. 1986)
1917 - Kamal Jumblatt, leader of the Lebanese Druze (d. 1977)
1919 - Paul de Man, Belgian-born literary critic (d. 1983)
1920 - Dave Brubeck, American pianist and composer
1920 - George Porter, British chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2002)
1921 - Otto Graham, American football player (d. 2003)
1921 - Piero Piccioni - Italian musician and composer (d. 2004)
1921 - William " Bill" Moore - Canadian artist, sportsman, veteran
1924 - Wally Cox, American actor (d. 1973)
1928 - Bobby Van, American singer (d. 1980)
1929 - Alain Tanner, Swiss filmmaker
1929 - Nikolaus Harnoncourt, German conductor
1930 - Daniel Lisulo, Prime Minister of Zambia
1933 - Henryk Górecki, Polish composer
1935 - Jean Lapointe, Quebec comedian, singer and senator
1936 - David Ossman, American comedian
1940 - Lawrence Bergman, Quebec politician
1942 - Peter Handke, Austrian writer
1945 - Shekhar Kapur, Indian filmmaker
1945 - Larry Bowa, baseball player and Major League manager
1947 - Lawrence Cannon, Canadian politician
1948 - JoBeth Williams, American actress
1948 - Keke Rosberg, Finnish race car driver
1950 - Joe Hisaishi, Japanese composer
1952 - Rick Charlesworth, Australian Hockey player
1952 - Craig Newmark, Founder of craigslist
1953 - Tom Hulce, American actor
1953 - Gary Ward, baseball player
1955 - Steven Wright, American comedian
1955 - Rick Buckler, British drummer (The Jam)
1956 - Peter Buck, American guitarist (R.E.M.)
1956 - Randy Rhoads, American guitarist (d. 1982)
1958 - Nick Park, British filmmaker and animator
1961 - David Lovering, American drummer (the Pixies)
1962 - Janine Turner, American actress
1967 - Hacken Lee, Hong Kong singer
1970 - Éric Lemieux, Quebec keyboardist (La Chicane)
1971 - Richard Krajicek, Dutch tennis player
1971 - Ryan White, American AIDS activist (d. 1990)
1971 - Nicole Coste, Togo-born ex-girlfriend of Albert II, Prince of Monaco
1972 - Rick Short, Baseball player
1975 - Noel Clarke, English actor and writer
1976 - Colleen Haskell, American television personality
1977 - Kevin Cash, baseball player
1977 - Andrew Flintoff, England cricketer
1977 - Paul McVeigh, Irish footballer
1978 - Darrell Jackson, American Football Player
1979 - Tim Cahill, Australia footballer
1979 - Stephenie LaGrossa, American game show contestant
1980 - Steve Lovell, British footballer
1982 - Sean Ervine, Zimbabwean cricketer
1982 - Ryan Carnes, American actor
1983 - Bryan Habana, South African rugby player
1985 - Dulce Maria, Singer in the Latin Pop group RBD
1986 - Cintia Dicker, Brazilian model
1993 - Elián González, Cuban subject of child custody battle

Deaths
343 - Saint Nicholas
1185 - King Afonso I of Portugal (b. 1109)
1352 - Pope Clement VI (b. 1291)
1562 - Jan van Scorel Dutch painter and architect
1618 - Jacques-Davy Duperron, French cardinal (b. 1556)
1658 - Baltasar Gracián y Morales, Spanish writer (b. 1601)
1672 - King John II Casimir of Poland (b. 1609)
1675 - John Lightfoot, English churchman (b. 1602)
1718 - Nicholas Rowe, English poet and dramatist (b. 1674)
1746 - Lady Grizel Baillie, Scottish songwriter (b. 1665)
1771 - Giovanni Battista Morgagni, Italian anatomist (b. 1682)
1779 - Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin, French painter (b. 1699)
1788 - Jonathan Shipley, British bishop and politician (b. 1714)
1867 - Jean Pierre Flourens, French physician (b. 1794)
1868 - August Schleicher, German linguist (b. 1821)
1879 - Erastus Brigham Bigelow, American industrialist (b. 1814)
1882 - Anthony Trollope, British author (b. 1815)
1882 - Alfred Escher, Swiss politician and railroad entrepreneur (b. 1819)
1889 - Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America (b. 1808)
1892 - Ernst Werner von Siemens, German inventor and industrialist (b. 1816)
1924 - Gene Stratton-Porter, American author, screenwriter and naturalist (b. 1863)
1949 - Leadbelly, American musician (b. 1885)
1951 - Harold Ross, American magazine editor (b. 1892)
1955 - Honus Wagner, baseball player (b. 1874)
1956 - Dr. Bhimji Ramji Ambedkar, Indian Minister of Law and architect of The Constitution of India (b. 1891)
1961 - Frantz Fanon, West Indian psychiatrist and writer (b. 1925)
1972 - Janet Munro, British actress (b. 1934)
1976 - João Goulart, President of Brazil (b. 1918)
1983 - Lucienne Boyer, French singer (b. 1903)
1985 - Burr Tillstrom, American puppeteer (b. 1917)
1985 - Burleigh Grimes, baseball player (b. 1893)
1988 - Roy Orbison, American singer, guitarist, and songwriter (b. 1936)
1989 - Frances Bavier, American actress (b. 1902)
1989 - Sammy Fain, American popular music composer (b. 1902)
1989 - John Payne, American movie actor (b. 1912)
1991 - Sir Richard Stone, British economist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1913)
1992 - Mary Smith or Mimi, Maternal Aunt and Guardian of John Lennon (b. 1914)
1993 - Don Ameche, American actor (b. 1908)
1996 - Pete Rozelle, commissioner of the National Football League (b. 1926)
1997 - Billy Bremner, Scottish footballer (b. 1942)
2000 - Werner Klemperer, German-born actor (b. 1920)
2001 - Sir Peter Blake, New Zealand sailor and environmentalist (b. 1948)
2001 - Charles McClendon, Hall of Fame college football coach (b. 1923)
2002 - Philip Berrigan, American civil rights activist (b. 1923)
2003 - Carlos Manuel Arana Osorio, President of Guatemala (b. 1918)
2003 - Jerry Tuite, American professional wrestler (b. 1966)
2004 - Raymond Goethals, Belgian football coach (b. 1921)
2005 - Charly Gaul, Luxembourg cyclist (b. 1932)
2005 - Devan Nair, 3rd President of Singapore (b. 1923)
2005 - Danny Williams, South African-born singer (b. 1942)

[edit] Holidays and observances
KrampusNacht, a re-interpretation of St. Nicholas Day held in San Francisco
R.C. Saints - optional memorial of Saint Nicholas
Canada - National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women
Finland - Independence Day (from Russia, 1917)
Hungary - Santa Claus leaves a little present in children's shoes.
Spain - Constitution Day
Belgium and the Netherlands celebrate Sinterklaas, a day on which the saint gives out presents, oranges and chocolates (and other sweets) to good kids (and supposedly puts charcoal in the shoes of bad kids).

Other uses
December 6 is a novel by Martin Cruz Smith about an American expatriate living in Japan just prior to Pearl Harbor.

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

What happened today December 5th?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 19:40:00 +0000

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Events

63 BC - Cicero reads the last of his Catiline Orations.
663 - Fourth Council of Toledo.
771 - Charlemagne becomes the sole King of the Franks after the death of his brother Carloman.
1082 - Assassination of Ramon Berenguer II, Count of Barcelona.
1360 - Creation of the French Franc.
1408 - Emir Edigu of Golden Horde reaches Moscow.
1484 - Pope Innocent VIII issues the Summis desiderantes, a papal bull that deputizes Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger as inquisitors to root out alleged witchcraft in Germany and leads to one of the severest witchhunts in European history.
1492 - Christopher Columbus becomes the first European to set foot on the island of Hispaniola.
1496 - King Manuel I of Portugal issues a decrre of expulsion of "heretics" from the country.
1590 - Niccolò Sfondrati becomes Pope Gregory XIV.
1715 - Alexander Dalzeel, a Scottish privateer in French service, is executed in London, England.
1746 - Revolt in Genoa against the Spanish rule.
1757 - Seven Years' War: Battle of Leuthen - Frederick II of Prussia leads Prussian forces to a decisive victory over Austrian forces under Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine.
1766 - In London, James Christie holds his first sale.
1776 - In the Apollo Room of the Raleigh Tavern in Williamsburg, Virginia, students from the College of William and Mary met for the first time founding Phi Beta Kappa, the first scholastic fraternity in the United States.
1815 - Foundation of Maceió in Brazil.
1830 - The premiere of Hector Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique in Paris.
1831 - Former US President John Quincy Adams takes his seat in the House of Representatives.
1848 - California Gold Rush: In a message before the U.S. Congress, US President James K. Polk confirms that large amounts of gold had been discovered in California.
1865 - Chincha Islands War: Peru allies with Chile against Spain.
1892 - Sir John Thompson becomes the fourth Prime Minister of Canada.
1893 - First appearance of an electric car.
1914 - The Italian Parliament proclaims the neutrality of the country.
1926 - Sergei Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin premieres.
1932 - German-born Swiss physicist Albert Einstein is granted an American visa.
1933 - Prohibition ends: Utah becomes the 36th U.S. state to ratify the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution, thus establishing the required 75% of states needed to enact the amendment (this overturned the 18th Amendment which had outlawed alcohol in the United States).
1934 - Abyssinia Crisis: Italian troops attack Wal Wal in Abyssinia, taking four days to capture the city.
1936 - The Soviet Union adopts a new constitution and the Kirghiz Soviet Socialist Republic is established as a full Union Republic of the USSR.
1941 - In Battle of Moscow Zhukov launched a massive Soviet counter-attack against the German army, with the biggest offensive launched against Army Group Centre.
1941 - Great Britain declares war to Finland, Hungary and Romania.
1941 - John Steinbeck's book Sea of Cortez is published.
1944 - Allied troops occupy Ravenna.
1945 - Flight 19 is lost in the Bermuda Triangle.
1952 - The Abbott and Costello Show debuts on American television.
1955 - The American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations merge and form the AFL-CIO.
1955 - Martin Luther King, Jr. leads the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
1957 - Sukarno expels all Dutch people from Indonesia.
1958 - Subscriber Trunk Dialling (STD) is inaugurated in the UK by Queen Elizabeth II when she speaks to the Lord Provost in a call from Bristol to Edinburgh.
1958 - The Preston bypass, the UK's first stretch of motorway opens to traffic for the first time, now part of the M6 and M55 motorways.
1964 - Vietnam War: For his heroism in battle earlier in the year, Captain Roger Donlon is awarded the first Medal of Honor of the war.
1969 - Life Magazine reports the My Lai Massacre .
1970 - Premiere of Dario Fo's Morte accidentale di un anarchico.
1974 - Party Political Broadcast, the final episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus, is broadcast on BBC 2.
1976 - United Nations General Assembly adopts Pakistan resolution on security of non-Nuclear States.
1977 - Egypt breaks diplomatic relations with Syria, Libya, Algeria, Iraq and South Yemen. The move is in retaliation to the Declaration of Tripoli against Egypt.
1978 - The Soviet Union signs a 'friendship treaty' with the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan.
1979 - Sonia Johnson is formally excommunicated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for her outspoken criticism of the church concerning the proposed Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.
1983 - Dissolution of the Military Joint in Argentina.
1989 - TGV Atlantique sets a new railways speed record with 482.4 km/h.
1992 - Kent Conrad of North Dakota resigns his seat in the United States Senate and is sworn into the other seat from North Dakota, becoming the only US Senator ever to have held two seats on the same day.
1993 - The mayor of Wien Helmut Zilk is wounded by a letter bomb.
1995 - Sri Lanka government announces the conquest of Tamil stronghold of Jaffna.
1997 - French far-right politician maintains that Nazis were a "Detail of history" during a press conference in Munich.
2003 - Suicide bombers kill at least 46 people in an attack on a train in southern Russia.
2005 - The Lake Tanganyika earthquake causes significant damage, mostly in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
2005 - The Civil Partnership Act comes into effect in the United Kingdom, and the first civil partnership is registered there.

Births
1377 - Jianwen Emperor of China (d. 1402)
1443 - Pope Julius II (d. 1513)
1495 - Nicolas Cleynaerts, Flemish grammarian (d. 1542)
1537 - Ashikaga Yoshiaki, Japanese shogun (d. 1597)
1539 - Fausto Paolo Sozzini, Italian theologian (d. 1604)
1547 - Ubbo Emmius, Dutch historian and geographer (d. 1625)
1595 - Henry Lawes, English composer (d. 1662)
1661 - Robert Harley, 1st Earl of Oxford and Mortimer, English statesman (d. 1724)
1687 - Francesco Geminiani, Italian violinist and composer (d. 1762)
1782 - Martin Van Buren, 8th President of the United States (d. 1862)
1803 - Fyodor Ivanovich Tyutchev, Russian poet (d. 1873)
1820 - Afanasy Fet, Russian poet (d. 1892)
1822 - Elizabeth Cary Agassiz, American college president (d. 1907)
1829 - Henri-Gustave Joly de Lotbinière, French Canadian politician (d. 1908)
1830 - Christina Rossetti, British poet (d. 1894)
1839 - George Armstrong Custer, American general (d. 1876)
1841 - Marcus Daly, American mining tycoon (d. 1900)
1855 - Clinton Hart Merriam, American ornithologist (d. 1942)
1859 - John Jellicoe, British admiral (d. 1935)
1863 - Paul Painlevé, French mathematician (d. 1933)
1867 - Józef Piłsudski, Polish revolutionary and statesman (d. 1935)
1868 - Arnold Sommerfeld, German physicist (d. 1951)
1869 - Ellis Parker Butler, American author (d. 1937)
1870 - Vítězslav Novák, Czech composer (d. 1949)
1871 - Bill Pickett, American rodeo performer (d. 1932)
1872 - Harry Nelson Pillsbury, American chess player (d. 1906)
1875 - Sir Arthur Currie, Canadian soldier (d. 1933)
1879 - Clyde Cessna, American airplane manufacturer (d. 1954)
1886 - Rose Wilder Lane, American writer and reporter (d. 1968)
1890 - David Bomberg, British painter (d. 1957)
1890 - Fritz Lang, Austrian-born film director (d. 1976)
1892 - Ferdinand Schörner, German field marshal (d. 1973)
1895 - Elbert Frank Cox, American mathematician (d. 1969)
1896 - Carl Ferdinand Cori, Austrian-born biochemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1984)
1879 - Nunnally Johnson, American screenwriter and producer (d. 1977)
1898 - Grace Moore, American soprano (d. 1947}
1898 - Josh Malihabadi, Urdu poet of India and Pakistan (d. 1982)
1901 - Walt Disney, American animated film producer (d. 1966)
1901 - Milton H. Erickson, American psychiatrist (d. 1980)
1901 - Werner Heisenberg, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1976)
1902 - Strom Thurmond, American politician (d. 2003)
1903 - Johannes Heesters, Dutch singer and actor
1903 - Cecil Frank Powell, British physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1969)
1905 - Gus Mancuso, baseball player (d. 1984)
1906 - Otto Preminger, Austrian-born director, producer, and actor (d. 1986)
1907 - Giuseppe Occhialini, Italian physicist (d. 1993)
1910 - Abraham Polonsky, American screenwriter (d. 1999}
1911 - Władysław Szpilman, Polish pianist (d. 2000)
1914 - Hans Hellmut Kirst, German author (d. 1989)
1927 - Bhumibol Adulyadej, King of Thailand
1932 - Sheldon Lee Glashow, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1932 - Little Richard (Richard Wayne Penniman), American singer and pianist
1934 - Joan Didion, American writer
1935 - Calvin Trillin, American writer
1938 - J. J. Cale, American songwriter
1940 - Peter Pohl, Swedish writer
1943 - Eva Joly, Norwegian-born French magistrate
1944 - Jeroen Krabbé, Dutch actor
1945 - Serge Chapleau, Quebec caricaturist
1946 - José Carreras, Spanish tenor
1946 - Andy Kim, Canadian singer and songwriter
1947 - Jim Messina, American musician (Buffalo Springfield - Loggins and Messina)
1947 - Jim Plunkett, American football player
1947 - Bruce Golding, Jamaican Politian, Head of JLP
1949 - Ray Comfort, New Zealand evangelist
1950 - Camarón de la Isla, Spanish flamenco singer (d. 1992)
1950 - Osvaldo Golijov, Argentine-born composer
1951 - Anne-Mie van Kerckhoven, Belgian artist
1951 - Morgan Brittany, American actress
1953 - Larry Zbyszko, American professional wrestler
1956 - Brian Backer, American actor
1956 - Krystian Zimerman, Polish pianist
1957 - Art Monk, American football player
1958 - Dean Erickson, American actor
1960 - Jack Russell, American glam rock singer (Great White)
1962 - José Cura, Argentine tenor
1963 - Eddie 'the Eagle' Edwards, British skier
1965 - Johnny Rzeznik American singer (Goo Goo Dolls)
1966 - Patricia Kaas, French singer
1967 - Gary Allan, American singer
1968 - Margaret Cho, American comedian and actress
1968 - Lisa Marie, American model and actress
1969 - Lewis Gordon Pugh, British swimmer, polar explorer and motivational speaker
1969 - Morgan J. Freeman, American film director
1970 - Kevin Haller, National Hockey League defenseman
1972 - Angela Shelton, American actress & writer
1972 - Mike Mahoney, baseball player
1972 - Cliff Floyd, Major League Baseball player
1973 - Shalom Harlow, Model
1973 - Luboš Motl, Czech physicist
1975 - Ronnie O'Sullivan, British snooker player
1976 - Amy Acker, American actress
1977 - Ryan Newman, American NASCAR driver
1979 - Matteo Ferrari, Italy footballer
1979 - Niklas Hagman, Finnish hockey player
1982 - Eddy Curry, American basketball player
1982 - Trai Essex, American football player
1984 - Chris Solinsky, American distance runner
1985 - Josh Smith, American basketball player
1985 - Frankie Muniz, American actor
1988 - Ross Bagley, American actor

Deaths
749 - Saint John of Damascus, theologian
1082 - Ramon Berenguer II, Count of Barcelona
1355 - John III, Duke of Brabant (b. 1300)
1560 - King Francis II of France (b. 1544)
1624 - Gaspard Bauhin, Swiss botanist (b. 1560)
1654 - Jean François Sarrazin, French writer
1663 - Severo Bonini, Italian composer (b. 1582)
1749 - Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et de la Vérendrye, New French explorer and trader (b. 1685)
1758 - Johann Friedrich Fasch, German composer (b. 1688)
1770 - James Stirling, Scottish mathematician (b. 1692)
1784 - Phillis Wheatley, British poet (b. 1753)
1791 - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Austrian composer (b. 1756)
1819 - Friedrich Leopold Graf zu Stolberg, German poet (b. 1750)
1870 - Alexandre Dumas père, French writer (b. 1802)
1887 - Eliza Roxcy Snow, American poet (b. 1804)
1891 - Emperor Pedro II of Brazil (b. 1825)
1925 - Władysław Reymont, Polish writer and Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1867)
1926 - Claude Monet, French impressionist painter (b. 1840)
1931 - Vachel Lindsay, American poet (b. 1879)
1940 - Jan Kubelík, Austro-Hungarian-born Czechoslovak violinist (b. 1880)
1950 - Shri Aurobindo, Indian guru (b. 1872)
1951 - Shoeless Joe Jackson, American baseball player (b. 1889)
1951 - Abanindranath Tagore, Indian writer (b. 1871)
1963 - Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, Prime Minister Pakistan (b. 1892)
1963 - Karl Amadeus Hartmann, German composer (b. 1905)
1963 - Sri Deep Narayan Mahaprabhuji, Indian Hindu mystic
1965 - Joseph Erlanger, American physiologist and Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1874)
1966 - Sylvère Maes, Belgian cyclist (b. 1909)
1968 - Fred Clark, American actor (b. 1914)
1984 - Adam Malik, Third Vice President of Indonesia (b. 1917)
1986 - Sir Edward Youde, Governor of Hong Kong (b. 1924)
1989 - Sir John Pritchard, British conductor (b. 1921)
1991 - Richard Speck, American mass murderer (b. 1941)
1993 - Doug Hopkins, American guitarist and songwriter (Gin Blossoms) (b. 1961)
2001 - Franco Rasetti, Italian physicist (b. 1901)
2002 - Roone Arledge, American sports broadcasting pioneer (b. 1931)
2002 - Ne Win, Burmese leader (b. 1911)
2005 - Frits Philips, Dutch industrialist and businessman from multinational Philips Electronics (b. 1905)
2005 - Kevin "Big Kev" Mc Quay, Australian businessman (b. 1949)

Holidays and observances
International Volunteer Day
Roman festivals - Faunalia celebrated in honor of Faunus (according to Horace, Odes 3.18)
R.C. Saints - formerly: Saint Sabas
Austria - Krampus
Belgium, Czech Republic, the Netherlands and the UK - Saint Nicholas Eve (whom Dutch speakers call Sinterklaas, which became in other languages Santa Claus)
Thailand - The King's Birthday, National Day, Father's Day
Day of the Ninja

External links
BBC: On This Day
The New York Times: On This Day
On This Day in Canada

France: Le Monde - Culture et présidentielle : qui propose quoi ?

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 00:18:00 +0000

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Pour l'heure, ils n'ont encore rien dit. Dans leurs discours, les futurs candidats ont évoqué la nation, le travail, l'éducation, l'environnement, la sécurité, le chômage… Très peu la culture. Deux mesures sur les quatre-vingt-douze avancées dans les "engagements" à l'UMP. Une proposition et une affirmation chez Ségolène Royal. Bref, peu de chose.

Plus que du désintérêt, ce silence dénote un trouble. L'élaboration des programmes culturels en vue de l'élection présidentielle de 2007 ne va pas de soi : les partis politiques s'interrogent et s'entourent d'experts, comme jamais ils ne semblaient l'avoir fait jusque-là. Les candidats ne peuvent plus se contenter d'aligner quelques propositions consensuelles. Comme si, entre 2002 et 2007, des certitudes avaient été emportées et la parole libérée. La crise des intermittents du spectacle, la secousse provoquée par la loi sur le droit d'auteur sur Internet sont passées par là. Des questions taboues ont émergé : y a-t-il trop de spectacles? Trop d'artistes? Des débats ont coupé les partis en deux : comment concilier rémunération des auteurs, liberté des internautes et poids des industries culturelles? Ah, Internet! Un nouvel outil, une problématique à définir et – qui sait? – un électorat à prendre. Ségolène Royal et Nicolas Sarkozy l'ont compris. A sa manière, chacun a saisi la balle au bond. Des députés UMP ayant voté l'amendement légalisant le téléchargement, le ministre de l'intérieur a dû lancer une opération de charme vers le monde de la musique et du cinéma, recevant notamment les chanteurs Julien Clerc, Enrico Macias ou Calogero, les producteurs Pascal Nègre et Marin Karmitz, ou le patron de la Fnac, Denis Olivennes.
Dans ce monde plutôt acquis à la gauche, il est parvenu à susciter "le respect", voire "l'amitié", concède M.Olivennes. Le vote de la loi durcissant le dispositif contre le téléchargement (DADVSI) a été reçu par l'industrie culturelle et une partie des artistes comme une victoire. Pour consoler les internautes, l'UMP propose la "mise en ligne gratuite du patrimoine culturel français tombé dans le domaine public ou financé par fonds publics".
La présidente de la région Poitou-Charentes a emprunté le chemin inverse. "Quand j'ai fait le tour des responsables politiques en début d'année, tous m'ont reçu. C'est la seule qui a reconnu qu'elle ne connaissait pas le sujet, la seule qui ait vraiment écouté", témoigne Aziz Ridouan, 17ans, président de l'Association des audionautes, devenu son conseiller en nouvelles technologies. Un forum ouvert sur le site Désirs d'avenir, fort de 600 contributions, a permis à la candidate socialiste de trancher.
Estimant qu'il fallait "tirer parti de la numérisation et du peer to peer pour faciliter l'accès des publics aux œuvres et accroître la diversité culturelle", elle s'est prononcée pour une "diversité des sources de financement", dont la fameuse "licence globale", forfait qui légalise le téléchargement. Elle réclame aujourd'hui l'abrogation de la DADVSI. Difficile à avaler pour un PS qui s'était opposé à la licence globale. Dans l'entourage de la candidate, Jack Lang ou l'adjoint au maire de Paris chargé de la culture, Christophe Girard (PS), ne désespèrent pas de "la faire changer d'avis".
Les Verts, eux, hésitent. "Nous étions a priori favorables à la licence globale, mais la question est beaucoup plus complexe", avoue Hervé Pérard, adjoint au maire d'Evry qui anime la commission culture des Verts. Cet embarras fait ricaner le Front national. "Je ne sais pas si l'abrogation de la loi DADVSI sera proposée par la gauche, mais elle figurera à notre programme", grince Philippe Herlin, animateur du projet culturel du FN et directeur de cabinet de Marine Le Pen, qui a créé un site de téléchargement de musique classique à 1euro.
Si Internet offre un terrain presque vierge aux candidats, le reste du paysage culturel ressemble à un maquis. Comment s'y orienter, montrer à l'électeur un chemin identifiable? Pis : faire croire que l'on va – enfin – s'occuper de chantiers négligés, comme l'éducation artistique? Seuls les amis de Ségolène Royal avancent l'idée d'une demi-journée réservée aux arts à l'école, de la maternelle à l'université. Mais "elle ne l'a pas complètement validée", précisent-ils. Pour afficher sa différence, mieux vaut commencer par un symbole : rebaptiser le ministère. Lors de la convention culture de l'UMP, en janvier, Nicolas Sarkozy parlait de fusionner ministères de la culture et de l'éducation nationale, proposition disparue de l'agenda officiel, par peur d'effrayer les artistes.
"Mais s'il n'y a que quinze ministères, ça ira de soi", assure Françoise de Panafieu, animatrice de la convention culture. Le Parti communiste propose, lui, un "ministère de la culture et de l'éducation populaire", en écho à l'objectif de "démocratie culturelle". Et non pas de "démocratisation", terme trop connoté "à l'industrie culturelle, qui donne l'illusion que les produits culturels sont accessibles à tous", souligne Francis Parny (PCF), vice-président de la région Ile-de-France chargé de la culture. Quant au FN, il milite pour le retour au bon vieux "ministère des affaires culturelles" symbolisant "la rencontre entre l'artiste et le public". "Le rôle de l'Etat doit se limiter à cela. Il faut rationaliser le budget en misant sur le mécénat et les fonds privés", résume M.Herlin.
Le mécénat ne fait plus débat : personne n'entend revenir sur la loi de 2003 prévoyant d'importantes déductions fiscales aux entreprises qui investissent dans l'art. Du PS à l'UMP, on veut même le développer. Mais chacun a ses idées du financement. Offensif, le Parti communiste propose de consacrer 1% du produit intérieur brut (PIB), et non plus du budget de l'Etat, à la culture, "soit 15 milliards d'euros, en additionnant les efforts de l'Etat et ceux des collectivités locales, contre 11,5 milliards aujourd'hui". Prévoyante, l'UDF recommande "une programmation pluriannuelle" des crédits.
Lucide, Ségolène Royal estime qu'il ne suffit plus d'accorder 1% du budget à la culture, mais recommande de piocher dans tous les ministères et de "se battre" pour augmenter le budget de la politique culturelle européenne. Audacieuse, l'UMP souhaite "sanctuariser" le budget de la culture et, à rebours des pratiques qu'elle a régulièrement mises en œuvre depuis 2002, recommande d'en finir avec les crédits amputés en cours d'année.
Cela n'exclut pas les redéploiements internes. Ainsi, l'UMP avance l'idée inattendue d'une "gratuité totale dans les musées nationaux" (coût : de l'ordre de 150 millions d'euros), parmi les 92 priorités rendues publiques le 12novembre. Pourtant, elle n'était pas au programme de sa convention culture de janvier. Réticents, les élus de l'UMP se sont laissé convaincre par Emmanuelle Mignon, agitatrice d'idées du parti.
Elle dit s'être inspirée du modèle britannique et de l'exemple de Paris, où le maire socialiste Bertrand Delanoë a rendu l'accès des musées de la ville gratuit. Largement tenu à l'écart, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, ministre de la culture, ne cache pas son scepticisme.

Car comment financer une telle mesure? L'UMP a formulé une proposition choc : l'obligation de résultat en matière de mécénat. Une philosophie empruntée à l'entreprise, qui fait écho au désir du FN de "lier les subventions des institutions culturelles à la fréquentation et aux recettes propres qu'elles génèrent".
Cette musique au timbre populiste se retrouve d'ailleurs, mezzo voce, chez tous les candidats. Où il est de bon ton de dénoncer l'"élitisme culturel". Le FN propose ainsi des "comités d'usagers" dans les établissements subventionnés; les Verts préfèrent parler de "conseils artistiques" participatifs.
Quant à Ségolène Royal, elle invite les professionnels, qui "méconnaissent largement les cultures jeunes et urbaines", à considérer le "consumérisme culturel" comme "un champ à investir". En 2007, il est certain que la culture n'échappera pas au refrain ambiant du "peuple contre les élites"… Clarisse Fabre et Nathaniel Herzberg

It happened today November 29th 2006 - photo slide show

noreply@blogger.com (BLOGTHEWORLD) — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 04:28:00 +0000