Today in History

Jan 11 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on January 11:

1928 – The English writer and poet Thomas Hardy, noted for his novels “The Mayor of Casterbridge” and “Tess of the d’Urbervilles”, died.

1935 – The American aviator Amelia Earhart made the first transpacific solo airplane flight by a woman.

1976 – A three-man military junta seized power from President Guillermo Rodriguez Lara in Ecuador.

1987 – Children set world record for Kung Fu exercises.

2003 – The governor of Illinois commuted the sentences of all the state’s 150 inmates on death row, re-igniting the national debate about capital punishment.

2004 – Mark Tuitert sets new world record in speed skating.

2007 – Tower of London appoints first female Yeoman.

2008 – The New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary, who along with Nepal’s Tenzing Norgay Sherpa became the first to conquer the world’s highest peak, Mount Everest, died aged 88.

2008 – World’s first commercial air service from Hobart to Antarctica.

2009 – An Indonesian ferry carrying 250 passengers from Pare-Pare on the west coast of Sulawesi to the city of Samarinda capsized and sank in a storm after being hit by a large wave.

2015 – Hundreds of thousands of French citizens march in unprecedented tribute to victims of Paris attacks.

Jan 10 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on January 10:

1917 – William Frederick Cody, the American army scout, Indian fighter and showman known as Buffalo Bill, died aged 70.

1920 – The League of Nations came into being.

1946 – The first meeting of the United Nations General Assembly began in London.

1971 – The French fashion designer Coco Chanel died aged 87.

1984 – Sir Clive Sinclair launches Sinclair C5 electric vehicle, powered by a washing machine motor.

1996 – Parisians attend a silent tribute to former French President Francois Mitterrand.

2000 – AOL, Time Warner announce merger.

2003 – North Korea withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, accusing the United States of trying to topple its political system.

2011 – Flash floods in Brisbane, Australia.

2013 – Twin explosions kill dozens in Quetta, Pakistan.

2016 – Singer David Bowie dies.

Jan 7 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on January 7:

1610 – Astronomer Galileo announces discovery of Jupiter.

1927 – Harlem Globetrotters basketball team established.

1932 – The French politician Andre Maginot died. As war minister, he began building the French line of fortification against Germany later dubbed the Maginot Line.

1965 – Britain launches its first pay-TV service.

1989 – Emperor Hirohito of Japan died after a 63-year reign.

1990 – Italy’s Leaning Tower of Pisa, officially listed as a danger to the public, was closed to tourists for the first time in its 800-year history for restoration work.

1999 – The U.S. Senate opened the impeachment trial of Bill Clinton, the first of a sitting president in more than 130 years.

2012 – French sailor Loick Peyron and crew win Jules Verne trophy, set new sailing world record for non-stop, round-the-world voyage.

2012 – African National Congress marks centenary.

2015 – Prince Albert II of Monaco and wife Princess Charlene hold twins in official presentation of newborn royals in Monaco.

2015 – Charlie Hebdo offices attacked in Paris.

Jan 6 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on January 6:

1919 – Theodore Roosevelt, 26th U.S. president (1901-1909), died. An expansionist politician, he acquired the Panama Canal Zone in 1903.

1929 – Mother Theresa arrives in Calcutta.

1977 – EMI dump punk band “The Sex Pistols”.

1978 – The United States handed back the Holy Crown of St. Stephen to then-communist Hungary after holding it since World War Two.

1993 – Rudolf Nureyev, Russian ballet dancer, died at 54. One of the greatest dancers of the century, he was granted political asylum in Paris in 1961.

1999 – Former Lesotho prime minister Ntsu Mokhehle died after a long illness aged 80.

2000 – Casio Computer Company unveils the world’s first wrist-type wearable digital camera in Tokyo.

2003 – Jean-Claude Trichet, the head of the Bank of France, went on trial for complicity in an alleged cover-up of losses when Credit Lyonnais came close to collapse.

2005 – South Africa’s Nelson Mandela announced that his son, Makgatho, had died of AIDS, challenging the taboo that keeps many Africans from discussing the epidemic.

2006 – Lou Rawls, the pioneering crossover artist known for signature hits like “You’ll Never Find Another Love Like Mine,” and “Lady Love”, died aged 72.

2017 – Shooting at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.

Jan 5 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on January 5:

1895 – French artillery Captain Alfred Dreyfus, accused of being a traitor, declared unworthy to bear arms.

1922 – Irish explorer Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton died. He made several expeditions to the Antarctic and died on the Falkland Islands.

1933 – Calvin Coolidge, 30th U.S. president, died. He was governor of Massachusetts and became vice-president in 1921.

1941 – Amy Johnson, British aviator, died. The first woman to fly solo from England to Australia in 1930, she died after her plane crashed in the Thames estuary.

1996 – Yahya Ayyash (the “Engineer”), elusive mastermind behind a wave of Islamist suicide bombings against Israel, was killed in Gaza, apparently by a booby-trapped cellular telephone.

1997 – Globe Exide Challenger yacht of British solo round-the-world yachtsman Tony Bullimore capsizes in the Southern Ocean.

2002 – A small plane flown by a 15-year-old student crashed into an office high-rise in Tampa, Florida after taking off from a nearby airport without clearance. The pilot was killed.

2006 – At least 76 people died when a four-storey building collapsed in the Muslim holy city of Mecca during the annual haj pilgrimage.

2007 – Japan’s “Cup Noodle” king Momofuku Ando, whose invention of instant noodles, a snack that has sold billions of servings worldwide since its launch, died. He was 96.

2010 – Base jumper Omar Al Hegelan sets record, free falling from world’s tallest building.

2014 – Historic Tripoli library destroyed by fire.

Jan 4 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on January 4:

1908 – Mulai Hafid was proclaimed Sultan of Morocco at Fez.

1948 – The British colony of Burma was proclaimed an independent republic with U Thakin Nu as prime minister.

1964 – Pope Paul VI began a visit to the Holy Land, which included the first visit by a pope to Jerusalem.

1978 – Said Hammami, the Palestine Liberation Organisation’s representative in Britain, was assassinated in London.

1985 – Coptic Pope Shenouda III returns to Cairo after 40-month banishment to desert monastery.

1995 – Newt Gingrich was elected speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, the first Republican in the post in 40 years.

2004 – Rival Afghan factions attending the Loya Jirga national assembly agreed on a constitution, paving the way for free elections after nearly a quarter of a century of war.

2007 – World’s first bullet train outside Japan launched in Taiwan.

2007 – Nancy Pelosi, a liberal California Democrat, was sworn in as the first woman speaker of the U.S.

2010 – Grand opening of Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

2017 – London’s Natural History Museum bids farewell to Dippy the Dinosaur.

Jan 3 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on January 3:

1924 – The British Egyptologist Howard Carter found the sarcophagus of Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings near Luxor.

1946 – William Joyce, who broadcast Nazi propaganda to Britain during World War Two as “Lord Haw Haw”, was hanged for treason in London.

1959 – Alaska becomes 49th state in U.S.

1961 – One millionth Morris Minor.

1967 – Jack Ruby, who shot Lee Harvey Oswald before he could be tried for the 1963 assassination of President John Kennedy, died in hospital.

1977 – Apple Computer is incorporated.

1979 – Hotelier Conrad Hilton dies.

1990 – General Manuel Antonio Noriega, deposed leader of Panama, surrendered to invading U.S. troops after spending 10 days under siege in the Vatican embassy.

1999 – Australian cricket captain celebrates equalling world record with 156th catch.

1999 – NASA launches Mars Polar Lander.

2016 – Saudi Arabia severs ties with Iran.

People lay down flowers during a memorial ceremony in memory of people who were killed in a stampede incident during a New Year’s celebration on the Bund, in Shanghai
A fire engulfs The Address Hotel in downtown Dubai in the United Arab Emirates
INTERACTIVE
Dec 31 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on December 31:

1946 – U.S. President Harry Truman formally declared an end to all hostilities in World War Two.

1997 – Dow index rises over 20 percent three years in a row for the first time in its 101-year history.

1999 – Russian President Boris Yeltsin stunned the world by announcing his resignation and naming Prime Minister Vladimir Putin as acting president.

1999 – Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso formally took back control of the Panama Canal from the United States.

2001 – The last day for national currencies in 12 European Union member states as the biggest monetary changeover in history takes place at midnight.

2002 – Expelled U.N. inspectors left North Korea after the Communist state set alarm bells ringing by ending independent monitoring of its nuclear programme.

2002 – World’s first passenger Transrapid Maglev high speed train inaugurated in Shanghai.

2004 – Taiwan opened the 508-metre (1,667 ft) Taipei 101, a 101-storey office block that surpassed the twin Petronas towers in Kuala Lumpur as the world’s tallest building.

2009 – Both a blue moon and lunar eclipse occur on New Year’s Eve.

2014 – Dozens killed in stampede during New Year celebrations in Shanghai.

2015 – Fire engulfs The Address Downtown Hotel in Dubai.

Dec 30 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on December 30:

1916 – Grigory Rasputin, the Siberian peasant, mystic, and favourite of Russian Tsar Nicholas II and Tsarina Alexandra, was shot, poisoned and eventually drowned.

1947 – King Michael of Romania resigns.

1968 – Trygve Lie, Norwegian statesman and first secretary-general of the United Nations (1946-52), died.

1993 – Israel and the Vatican recognised each other.

2002 – Mwai Kibaki was sworn in as president of Kenya after sweeping to election victory with his National Rainbow Coalition, ending 24 years of rule by Daniel Arap Moi.

2003 – Former Khmer Rouge president Khieu Samphan, one of Pol Pot’s associates, admitted that mass murders were committed during Khmer Rouge rule in the 1970s.

2004 – A blaze in a Buenos Aires nightclub packed with young revellers celebrating the New Year killed 194 people in Argentina’s worst civil disaster in decades.

2006 – Saddam Hussein was hanged for crimes against humanity, a violent end for a leader who ruled Iraq by fear for three decades before being toppled by a U.S. invasion in 2003.

2006 – Explosion at Madrid’s Barajas airport.

2009 – Suicide bomber kills CIA agents in Khost, Afghanistan.

2013 – Dozens killed in attacks by anti-government forces in Kinshasa, DRC.

Dec 29 (Reuters) – Following are some of the major events to have occurred on December 29:

1911 – Sun Yat Sen became the first president of the Chinese Republic.

1940 – German aircraft dropped thousands of incendiary bombs on London’s city centre, causing the most damaging blaze since the Great Fire of 1666.

1978 – Spain’s new democratic constitution, providing for a constitutional monarchy and parliamentary government, takes effect.

1986 – Harold Macmillan, British prime minister from 1957 to 1963, died.

1992 – President Daniel arap Moi won Kenya’s first multi-party polls in 26 years.

1996 – Guatemala’s government and leftist rebels signed a peace accord ending 36 years of war that cost at least 140,000 lives.

2000 – Diego Turbay, president of the peace commission of Colombia’s Congress, and five other people were killed in an attack in an area controlled by the rebel group FARC.

2000 – Australian cricket team increase world record of successive test wins to 14 with victory over West Indies.

2004 – Jerry Orbach, acclaimed as a quintessential New York actor for his work on Broadway, in films and as the star of television’s “Law & Order,” died. He was 69.

2017 – Boy playing with stove starts deadly fire in Bronx, New York.