On This Day In History January 1 - 31 (Rome, Egypt, influence)

[Da Grouch]

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~871 – The Battle of Ashdown: (Refer to Trudy's post previous to this.)

~1297 - Monaco gained its independence when Franceschino Grimaldi, disguised as a monk, was able to sneak into the Genoese controlled fortress. From there he let in his own soldiers, seized the fortress and established the Grimaldi dynasty.

~1499 – Louis XII of France married Anne of Brittany. (What a bloody soap opera THAT whole affair was!)

~1735 – The premiere of George Frideric Handel's Ariodante took place at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden.

~1746 – Forces under Bonnie Prince Charlie occupied Stirling and laid seige to Stirling Castle.

Stirling Castle in 1693, from John Slezer's Theatrum Scotiae
Engraving by John Slezer (c.1650 – 1717)


~1790 – George Washington delivered the first State of the Union Address in New York City.

~1806 – The British, hoping to keep Napoleon out of the Cape and to control the Far East trade routes, took control of Cape Colony.

~1811 – The 1811 German Coast Uprising: An unsuccessful slave revolt in the Territory of Orleans, led by Charles Deslandes, took place.

~1815 – American forces led by Major General Andrew Jackson defeated the British Army at the Battle of New Orleans, 2 weeks after the United States and United Kingdom had signed the Treaty of Ghent to end the War of 1812. Due to the slow communications of the time neither side new about the treaty. 398 were killed in the battle (385 of them British) and nearly 1250 more wounded.

Early 19th century engraving of The Battle of New Orleans.
Engraving by H.B. Hall, courtesy National Archives and Records Administration


~1835 – US President Andrew Jackson managed to reduce the federal debt to only $33,733.05, the lowest it had been since the first fiscal year of 1791. Jackson was the only president in United States history to have paid off the national debt.

~1856 - Borax (hydrated sodium borate) was discovered by Dr. John Veatch in Tuscan Springs, California. It became a multiuse product that was popularised during the era of TV’s Death Valley Days.

~1863 – In Missouri, Union troops under Brigadier General Egbert Brown successfully defended the town of Springfield, in heavy house to house fighting, against a Confederate force led by Brigadier General John S. Marmaduke at the Second Battle of Springfield.

~1867 – Blacks (men only) were granted the right to vote in Washington, D.C.

~1877 – Chiefs Crazy Horse and Two Moons along with their warriors fought their last battle with the United States Cavalry at Wolf Mountain in the Montana Territory.

Sioux and Cheyenne warriors and white men participate in the Battle of Wolf Mountain in Montana. A howitzer stands near a cliff edge in position to fire upon the Indians.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/71/X-33728.jpg (broken link)
An illustration in Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper from May 5, 1877, p. 156.
Courtesy the Western History Department of the Denver Public Library

~1906 – In New York, a landslide in Haverstraw, caused by the excavation of clay along the Hudson River for brickworks, destroyed a residential area and resulted in the deaths of 21 people.

~1912 – The South African Native National Congress (SANNC), now known as the African National Congress, was founded in Bloemfontein to increase the rights of the black South African population. John Dube, its first president, and poet/author Sol Plaatje are among its founding members. The organization became the ANC in 1923 and formed a military wing, the Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation) in 1961.

~1914 - Born this day: The one and only Gypsy Rose Lee.

~1918 – President Woodrow Wilson delivered his "Fourteen Points" speech to Congress for the aftermath of World War I. The speech was delivered over 10 months before the armistice with the German Empire ended The Great War but the Fourteen Points became the basis for the terms of the German surrender, as negotiated at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919. The Treaty of Versailles, however, had little to do with the Fourteen Points and so was never ratified by the U.S. Senate.

Woodrow Wilson's Speech in Congress: January 8, 1918

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6c/14Points.jpg (broken link)
Photo courtesy Library of Congress


~1935 - Born this day: The King, Elvis Presley.

~1940 – Britain implemented food rationing due to wartime shortages brought on by the Wolf Packs during the Battle of the Atlantic. (Initially only bacon, butter and sugar were rationed.)

~1947 - Born this day: Rock legend David Bowie.

~1956 – Operation Auca: An attempt by 5 Evangelical Christian missionaries from the United States to make contact with the Huaorani people of the rainforest of Ecuador resulted in them being attacked and speared by a group of Huaorani warriors. The news of their deaths was broadcast around the world, and Life magazine covered the event with a photo essay.

~1958 - Bobby Fisher won the United States Chess Championship for the first time. He was only 14 years of age.

~1961 – In France a referendum supported Charles de Gaulle's policies in Algeria. (Sometimes it's hard to bite my tongue about these things...)

~1962 – The Harmelen Train Disaster: In The Netherlands, a rail collision destroyed a total of 9 coaches resulting in the deaths of 93 people. The accident spurred the installation on Dutch railways of the system of automatic train protection known as Automatische Treinbeïnvloeding (ATB) which automatically overrides the driver if a "signal passed at danger" situation occurs.

~1963 – The Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci's early 16th century masterpiece, was exhibited in the United States for the first time at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

~1964 – US President Lyndon B. Johnson declared a War on Poverty in the United States. (And we all know how well THAT fiasco has turned out!)

~1973 – The Soviet spacecraft Luna 21 was launched. Luna 21 carried the second successful Soviet lunar rover, Lunokhod 2, and was launched less than a month after the final Apollo lunar landing.

Lunokhod 2

Image courtesy NASA


~1973 – The Watergate Scandal: The trial of 7 men accused of the illegal entry into the Democratic Party headquarters at Watergate began.

~1979 – The Betelgeuse Incident: The oil tanker Betelgeuse exploded in West Cork, Ireland, at the offshore jetty of the Whiddy Island Oil Terminal, due to the failure of the ship's structure during an operation to discharge its cargo of oil. The explosion and resulting fire claimed the lives of 50 people, only 27 of the bodies were ever recovered. A further fatality occurred during the salvage operation with the loss of a Dutch diver.

~1982 – The break up of AT&T: An antitrust lawsuit against AT&T, United States v. AT&T, led to a settlement under which "Ma Bell" agreed to divest its local exchange service operating companies, in return for a chance to go into the computer business as AT&T Computer Systems.

~1989 – The Kegworth Air Disaster: British Midland Flt. 92, a Boeing 737-400, crashed into the M1 motorway killing 47 of 127. A fire had begun in the port engine but the pilots mistakenly shut down the starboard engine instead.

~1992 - US President George Bush fell suddenly ill at a state dinner in Japan. He became pale, slumped in his chair and promptly vomited into the lap of the Japanese Prime Minister. What must have made this even more enjoyable for the president is the fact that this was recorded on video tape for all the world to see.

~1994 – Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov, aboard Soyuz TM-18, left for Mir. He stayed on the space station until March 22nd, 1995 for a record 437 days in space.

~1996 – An Antonov 32 cargo plane crashed into the central market in Kinshasa, Zaire killing more than 350 people. (Just another way to die in Africa's crime capital...)

~1998 - Mister (Fred) Rogers received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

~2002 – US President George W. Bush signed into law the No Child Left Behind Act. (Quite possibly the worst solution to the problem it was supposed to alleviate.)

~2004 – The RMS Queen Mary 2, the largest ocean liner ever built, was christened by her namesake's granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth II.

RMS Queen Mary 2, in 2006

Photo by Christian Bischof


~2005 – The fast-attack nuclear submarine USS San Francisco (SSN-711) collided with an undersea mountain about 560 kilometers (350 statute miles) south of Guam while operating at flank (maximum) speed and at more than 500 feet of depth. The collision was so serious that the vessel was almost lost; accounts detail a desperate struggle for positive buoyancy to surface after the forward ballast tanks were ruptured. 23 crewmen were injured, and 1 was killed. San Francisco’s forward ballast tanks and sonar dome were severely damaged, but her inner hull was not breached and there was no damage to her nuclear reactor.

USS San Francisco in dry dock at Guam to assess damage. The blue tarp is to conceal classified equipment (January, 2005)
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/08/USS_San_Franciso_drydock_Sm.jpg (broken link)
Photo by Photographer's Mate 2nd Class Mark Allen Leonesio, courtesy US Navy.


~2006 – A magnitude 6.9 earthquake, with its epicenter just off the island of Kythira, struck much of Greece. Damage was caused to many buildings, particularly old ones. The village of Mitata was hit the worst, but there were no casualties. Due to its strength the shaker was felt as far away as Italy, Egypt, and Jordan.

~2009 – The 2009 Costa Rica Earthquake: The epicenter of the magnitude 6.1 quake was in northern Costa Rica, 30 kilometres (19 mi) north-northwest of San José. The earthquake, which was felt all over Costa Rica as well as in southern central Nicaragua, took at least 34 lives, left 64 people missing and injured at least 91 others. Hundreds of people were trapped and two villages were cut off. Most of the victims died when a landslide occurred near the La Paz Waterfall by the Poás Volcano.

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[Da Grouch]

Ooh! Lotsa pictures today!

~475 – Byzantine Emperor Zeno was forced to flee his capital at Constantinople. His mother in law Verina and her brother Basiliscus had conspired together with a general named Illus to overthrow Zeno in favour of Basiliscus. (WHOA!!! And I thought MY mother in law was a boot!)

~1150 РEmperor Xizong of Jin was murdered by Prince Hailing of Jin in a Coup d'̩tat.

~1283 - Wen Tianxiang, Duke of Xinguo, was executed for his resistance to Kublai Khan's invasion of Song. For his refusal to yield to the Yuan Dynasty despite being captured and tortured, he is a popular symbol of patriotism and righteousness in China. He is considered one of three heroes of the Song's last years, alongside Liu Xiufu and Zhang Shijie.

~1349 – The Jewish population of Basel, Switzerland, believed by the residents to be the cause of the ongoing Black Death, was rounded up and burnt alive.

The Burning of the Jews

By Hartmann Schedel (1493) Taken from Liber Chronicarum (The Nuremberg Chronicle)


~1431 – Judges' investigations for the trial of Joan of Arc began in Rouen, France, the seat of the English occupation government.

~1760 – The Battle of Barari Ghat: One of a series of Afghan victories over the Marathas in their war to gain control of the decaying Mughal Empire took place at the Barari Ghat (ferry station) of the Jumna River, some 10 miles north of Delhi. The Maratha chief Dattaji Sindhia, retreating from the Punjab before the Afghan army of Ahmad Shah Durrānī, was surprised by Afghan troops who, concealed by high reeds, had crossed the river. Dattaji was killed and his army scattered. His defeat opened the way to the Afghan occupation of Delhi.

~1768 – This is generally agreed as the date when Philip Astley staged the first modern circus in what is now the Waterloo area of London, behind St John's Church.

~1788 – Connecticut was admitted as the 5th state of the Union.

~1793 – Jean-Pierre Blanchard conducted the first balloon flight in North America, ascending from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and landing in Deptford, New Jersey. One of the flight's witnesses that day was President George Washington, along with the future presidents John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and James Monroe.

~1799 – An income tax was implemented in Britain by the government of Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger (in his budget of December 1798) to pay for weapons and equipment in preparation for the Napoleonic Wars. Pitt's new graduated income tax began at a levy of 2 pence in the pound (0.8333%) on incomes over £60 and increased up to a maximum of 2 shillings (10%) on incomes of over £200. Pitt had hoped that the new income tax would raise £10 million but actual receipts for 1799 totalled just over £6 million.

~1806 – Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson received a state funeral. A funeral procession consisting of 32 admirals, over 100 captains, and an escort of 10,000 troops took the coffin from the Admiralty to St. Paul's Cathedral. After a 4 hour service he was laid to rest within a sarcophagus originally carved for Thomas Cardinal Wolsey.

Nelson's coffin in the crossing of St Paul's during the funeral service,
with captured French and Spanish flags hung in the dome.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fd/NelsonTomb.jpg (broken link)
Artist unknown


~1816 – Sir Humphry Davy tested the Davy Lamp, a safety equiped with a wire sieve for miners, at Hebburn Colliery.

The Davey lamp

Image taken from Bibliothek allgemeinen und praktischen Wissens für
Militäranwärter Band III, 1905


~1822 РThe Portuguese prince Pedro I of Brazil decided to stay in Brazil against the orders of the Portuguese king Jọo VI, starting the Brazilian independence process.

~1839 – The French Academy of Sciences announced the Daguerreotype photography process.

L’Atelier de l'artiste (1837). Believed to be the first photograph ever taken.

Photographer Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre (1787-1851)


~1857 - The Fort Tejon Earthquake: With an estimated magnitude of 7.9, the quake ruptured the San Andreas Fault for a length of 362 kilometers (225 miles) between Parkfield and San Bernardino, California. Displacement along the fault was 9 meters (30 feet). The epicenter of this earthquake is thought to have been located between Parkfield and Cholame. Most of the buildings at Fort Tejon were badly damaged and several people were injured but only 2 people died as a result of the shaker.

~1858 – Anson Jones, the last President of the Republic of Texas, committed suicide. Jones hoped that the new Texas state legislature would send him to the United States Senate. He was not chosen, and as time went on he became increasingly bitter about this slight. Although Jones prospered as a planter and eventually amassed an enormous estate, he was never able to get past the fact that Sam Houston was chosen over him to represent Texas in Washington, D.C.

~1861 – The Star of the West Incident occurred at Charleston, South Carolina. It is generally considered to be the "First Shots of the American Civil War". The Star of the West was fired upon by cadets from The Citadel, who were stationed at the Morris Island battery as the steamship entered Charleston Harbor. This prevented the ship from resupplying Major Robert Anderson's garrison at Fort Sumter. The Star of the West was given a warning shot across the bow and turned about to leave the harbor mouth. She was then fired on from Fort Moultrie and hit twice. The mission was abandoned and the Star headed for her home port of New York Harbor.

Steamship Star of the West, with reinforcements for Major Anderson, approaching Fort Sumter

Illustration from: Frank Leslie's illustrated newspaper, vol. 11, no. 269 (January 19th, 1861),
pp. 136-137. Courtesy Library of Congress


~1861 – Mississippi became the second state to secede from the Union before the actual outbreak of the American Civil War.

~1863 – The 3 day long Battle of Fort Hindman got underway in Arkansas. Union army politican opportunist General John A. McClernand had his numerically and tactically superior forces attack the Confederate Fort Hindman at Arkansas Post instead of Vicksburg as ordered by US President Abraham Lincoln and Major General Ulysses S. Grant. In spite of the subsequent Union victory, Mcclernand's glory seeking cost him his command by an enraged General Grant.

Bombardment and capture of Fort Hindman, Arkansas Post, Arkansas. January 11th 1863

Published by Currier & Ives (between ca. 1863 and 1907), courtesy the Library of Congress


~1878 – Umberto I ascended the throne of of Italy.

~1880 – The Great Gale of 1880: An extremely deep area of low pressure (possibly deeper than 955 mb or 28.20") devastated parts of Oregon and Washington with high winds and heavy snow.

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

~1912 – US Marines invaded Honduras (for the 4th time).

~1916 – The Battle of Gallipoli concluded with an Ottoman Empire victory when the last Allied forces were evacuated from the peninsula.

W Beach (Lancashire Landing) at Cape Helles, Gallipoli, 7 January 1916, just prior to the final evacuation of British forces during the Battle of Gallipoli. The explosion of a Turkish shell in the water, fired from the Asian shore of the Dardanelles, can be seen.

Photo by Lt. Ernest Brooks, Courtesy the Imperial War Museum


~1917 - The Battle of Rafa took place at the outpost of Rafa (known today as Rafah) on the border between the Egyptian Sinai and Turkish occupied Palestine. It was the third and final major battle mounted by the British to drive the Turkish forces from the Sinai. They succeeded with relatively light casualties.

~1918 – the Skirmish at Bear Valley was fought in southern Arizona by no more than 60 combatants. The last battle of the American Indian Wars it resulted in a victory by the US 10th Cavalry over a force of Yaquis Indians. 1 person was killed in the engagement.

~1923 – Juan de la Cierva mades the first autogyro flight at Cuatro Vientos Airfield in Madrid.

The first autogyro to fly successfully in 1923

Photographer unknown, courtesy the Hillel
Aviation Museum


~1929 – In Nashville, Tennessee The Seeing Eye was established with the mission to train dogs to assist the blind.

~1937 - The first issue of Look magazine (400,000 copies) went on sale in the United States.

~1941 – The Avro Lancaster heavy bomber took to skies for the first time, over central England.

Avro Lancaster III from No. 619 Squadon (c.1943)

Photo courtesy the RAF


~1941 – The Greek submarine Triton (S.112) sank the Italian submarine Neghelli in Otranto harbor.

~1945 – In the Philippines, US military forces invaded the island of Luzon.

The first wave of troops approaching the beaches of Luzon on January 9th, 1945

Photo courtesy the US Navy and the National Archives


~1947 – Murder victim Elizabeth "Betty" Short (the Black Dahlia) was last seen alive, in Los Angeles.

~1956 - The Dear Abbey (Abby) column first appeared, in the San Francisco Chronicle.

~1960 - Construction of the Aswan Dam (High Dam) began in Egypt. It was completed in July, 1970. (By most accounts it is now rapidly turning into a major environmental disaster.)

~1964 – Martyrs' Day: Several Panamanian youths atempted to raise the Panamanian flag on the U.S. controlled Panama Canal Zone, leading to fighting between U.S. military and Panamanian civilians.

~1972 - RMS Queen Elizabeth was destroyed by a massive fire in Hong Kong harbor, during her conversion into a floating university. There is well founded suspicion that the fires were deliberately set as several blazes broke out simultaneously throughout the ship.

The wreck of RMS Queen Elizabeth in Hong Kong harbor
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Scan148.jpg (broken link)
Photo by Barry Loigman M.D. taken July, 1972


~1977 - Super Bowl XI: The Oakland Raiders defeated the Minnesota Vikings, 32-14.

~1984 – Clara Peller was featured in the classic "Where's the Beef?" commercial campaign of Wendy's Restaurants for the first time.

~1986 - After losing a patent battle with Polaroid Corporation, Kodak walked away from the instant camera business.

~1989 - The Sega Genesis got its North American debut when it was released in New York City and Los Angeles.

~1997 - Comair (Delta Connection) Flt. 3272, an Embraer EMB 120 Brasilia, crashed while on approach into Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport. All 29 aboard were killed.

~2002 - The United States Department of Justice announced that it was going to pursue a criminal investigation of Enron.

~2005 – Elections were held to replace Yasser Arafat as head of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). He was succeeded by Rawhi Fattouh. (No big scremin' hell of an improvement there...but I suppose it's a step in the right direction.)

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[Da Grouch]

And since it is a rather important one, I'll post it again...and expand upon the original mention somewhat.

January 9th, 1943

Described by many (if not most) followers of aviation as the most beautiful aircraft of the piston age birds, the Lockheed Constellation took to the skies on her maiden flight just outside Burbank, California.

This graceful aircraft with her triple-tailed, dolphin shaped fuselage design is still marvelled at today, 67 years after she was introduced.

The first Constellations were the C-69 military version that saw service mostly as a high speed, long distance troop transport during the Second World War. 22 C-69s were completed before the end of hostilities, and not all of those entered military service. The USAAF cancelled the remainder of the order in 1945.

Universally known as the Connie in her civilian role, as an airliner the sleek long distance flyer gained a worldwide reputation for passenger comfort and reliability. This in spite of the quirkiness inherent in her 4 big Wright R-3350-DA3 Turbo Compound 18 cylinder supercharged radial engines.

The first civil aviation Constellation was delivered to TWA on October 1st, 1945 and the first transatlantic proving flight departed from Washington, DC on December 3rd, 1945, arriving in Paris on December 4th, via Gander and Shannon.

As the first pressurized cabin airliner in widespread use, it was the Constellation that ushered in affordable, comfortable air travel. With the dawn of the jet age, however, the Connie was rendered obsolete and the last one was built in 1958.

The major operators of Constellations, including the later Super Constellations were:

- Aer Lingus
- Air France
- American World Airways
- BOAC
- Eastern Airlines
- Iberia Airlines
- KLM
- Lufthansa
- Pan Am
- Panair do Brasil
- Portugal
- Qantas
- TAP
- Trans-Canada Airlines
- TWA
- VARIG
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A few quick specs (L-1049G Super Constellation):

- Crew: 5 flight crew, varying cabin crew
- Capacity: typically 62-95 passengers (109 in high-density configuration)
- Length: 116 ft 2 in (35.42 m)
- Wingspan: 126 ft 2 in (38.47 m)
- Height: 24 ft 9 in (7.54 m)
- Maximum load capacity: 65,300 lb (29,620 kg)
- Maximum speed: 377 mph (327 knots, 607 km/h)
- Cruising speed: 340 mph (295 knots, 547 km/h) at 22,600 ft (6,890 m)
- Range: 5,400 mi (4,700 nmi, 8,700 km
- Service ceiling: 24,000 ft (7,620 m)

The first Lockheed Constellation on January 9, 1943

Photo from the U.S. Navy Naval Aviation News February 15, 1943


The Lockheed Super Constellation

Photo by Mike Lehmann


Take a short little stroll back to bygone days...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Q9LDAVDy0w
See if the beautiful drone from those awesome radial
engines doesn't bring back some long forgotten memories.

...

[minibrings]

1788 Arrival of first fleet in Sydney Harbour. January 26 is celebrated as Australia Day...

[Da Grouch]

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~49 BC – Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon river. The river was notable as Roman law prohibited the Rubicon from being crossed by any Roman Army legion. It was considered to mark the boundary between the Roman province of Cisalpine Gaul to the north and Italy proper to the south; the law therefore protected the republic from internal military threat. When Caesar crossed the Rubicon with his army, to make his way to Rome, he broke that law and made armed conflict inevitable. According to historian Suetonius, Caesar uttered the famous phrase ālea iacta est ("the die is cast"). From this point on civil war was inevitable.

~1072 – The Norman forces of Robert Guiscard conquered Palermo.

Coin of Robert Guiscard, duke of Sicily



~1475 – Near Vaslui, Moldavia the forces of Stephen III of Moldavia destroyed a much larger army of the Ottoman Empire at the Battle of Vaslui. Of a force consisting of up to 120,000 troops the Ottomans lost upwards of 40,000. This battle has often been described as "the greatest ever secured by the Cross against Islam".

~1645 – Archbishop William Laud was beheaded at the Tower of London for treason, notwithstanding being granted a royal pardon.

~1776 – Common Sense by Thomas Paine, a document denouncing British rule in the Thirteen Colonies, was published (anonymously).

The pamphlet Common Sense

Image courtesy The Lilly Library, Indiana University


~1806 – The Dutch settlers in Cape Town surrendered to the British.

~1810 – Childless after 14 years of marriage, Napoleon divorced his first wife Joséphine so he could remarry in the hopes of having an heir.

~1861 – Florida declared its secession from the Union.

~1863 – The London Underground, the world's oldest underground railway, opened between London Paddington station and Farringdon station.

~1870 – In Ohio, John D. Rockefeller incorporated Standard Oil.

~1901 – The first great Texas oil gusher was struck at Spindletop in Beaumont, Texas.

The Lucas Gusher at Spindletop, January 10th, 1901

Photo courtesy the American Petroleum Institute


~1920 – The League of Nations held its first meeting and ratified the Treaty of Versailles, officially ending The Great War.

~1922 – Arthur Griffith became the President of the Irish Free State.

~1923 – Lithuania seized and annexed Memel during the Klaipėda Revolt.

~1926 – Abdul-Aziz ibn Saud became the King of Hejaz, renaming his possesions as Saudi Arabia, in 1932.

~1927 - The classic science fiction film Metropolis, by Fritz Lang, premiered in Berlin. Set in a futuristic urban dystopia it dwelt upon a common science fiction theme of the day: the social crisis between workers and owners in capitalism.

Original 1927 poster for Metropolis

Image courtesy the German Federal Archives


~1929 – The Adventures of Tintin, a series of comic books created by Belgian artist Hergé that has been sold in over 50 languages and more than 200 million copies to date, first appeared in a children's supplement to the Belgian newspaper Le Vingtième Siècle.

~1941 – The Greek army captured Kleisoura from Italian forces following a fierce battle.

~1946 – The first session of the United Nations General Assembly convened at the Westminster Central Hall in London with representatives from 51 member states. (They didn't get anything meaningful accomplished that day, either...)

~1957 - Harold Macmillan 1st Earl of Stockton took office as the Prime Minister of Great Britain.

~1962 – NASA announced plans to build the C-5 rocket booster. The resulting launch vehicle became better known as the Saturn V moon rocket, which launched every Apollo moon mission.

Early morning view on November 9th, 1967 of Pad A, Launch Complex 39, Kennedy Space Center, showing the (Apollo 4) Saturn V prior to launch later that day. This was the first launch of the Saturn V.

(Composite) photo courtesy NASA


~1971 - Masterpiece Theatre debuted on PBS.

~1972 – Sheikh Mujibur Rahman returned to the newly independent Bangladesh as president (briefly) after spending over 9 months in prison in Pakistan.

~1984 – The United States and the Vatican established full diplomatic relations after 117 years.

~1989 – Cuban troops began to withdraw from Angola. (They should've kept their damned asses out of there to begin with!)

~1990 – The formation of Time Warner was announced from the merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications Inc.

~2000 - The formation of AOL Time Warner was announced from the merger of Time Warner and AOL. (Go figure...)

~2001 – A massive piece of the chalk cliff at Beachy Head fell into the English Channel. After a winter of heavy rain, the water had began to seep into cracks in the chalk which had frozen and caused the cracks to widen. This then made the cliff edge erode and collapse into the sea.

~2005 – A mudslide occurred in La Conchita, California, killing 10 people and injuring many more. It closed Highway 101, the main coastal corridor between San Francisco and Los Angeles, for 10 days. (In typical California fashion everybody who was anybody sued whomever they could looking for money because of this.)

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[Da Grouch]

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~1055 – Theodora was crowned Empress of the Byzantine Empire.

~1158 – Vladislav II became the King of Bohemia.

~1693 – The 1693 (Sicily) Earthquake: At approximately 9 pm local time a powerful earthquake struck parts of southern Italy, notably Sicily and Malta, as Mount Etna erupted. The quake destroyed at least 45 towns and cities, affecting an area of 5600 square kilometres and causing the deaths of over 60,000. Two thirds of the entire population of Catania were killed.

~1779 – Ching-Thang Khomba was crowned King of Manipur for the second time.

~1787 – German astronomer William Herschel discovered Titania and Oberon, 2 of Uranus' numerous moons.

Voyager 2 image of Titania taken on January 24th, 1986

Photo courtesy of NASA


Voyager 2 image of Oberon taken on January 24th, 1986

Photo courtesy of NASA


~1794 – U.S. Marshal Robert Forsythe was killed in Augusta, Georgia while trying to serve court papers. He was the first US marshal to die while carrying out his duties.

~1805 – Michigan Territory was established by an act of the United States Congress, becoming effective June 30th that year.

~1861 – Alabama adopted the ordinances of secession from the Union (by a vote of 61-39).

~1878 – Milk was first delivered in bottles. (Although nobody seems to know just where on God's green Earth this supposed delivery took place or who made it...)

~1879 – In South Africa the Anglo-Zulu War began.

~1908 – In Northern Arizona the Grand Canyon National Monument was created at the urging of US President Theodore Roosevelt.

~1912 – The Lawrence Textile Strike began in Lawrence, Massachusetts when immigrant Polish women weavers at Everett Cotton Mills realized that their employer had reduced their pay by thirty two cents. They stopped their looms and left the mill, shouting "short pay, short pay!".

~1917 – In New Jersey, the Kingsland Munitions Factory Explosion occurred as a result of German sabotage. In 4 hours 500,000 pieces of 76 mm (3") high explosive shells were discharged and the entire plant was destroyed.

~1919 – Transylvania was annexed by Romania.

~1922 – In Ontario at Toronto General Hospital, insulin was used for the first time in a human to treat diabetes. The patient was a 14 year old boy.

~1923 – Occupation of the Ruhr: Troops from France and Belgium occuppied the Ruhr area to force Germany to make its World War I reparation payments.

French soldiers of the occupational force in the Ruhr (1923)

Photo courtesy the German Federal Archive


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

Amelia Earheart and her Lockheed Vega 5b
"Old Bessie" (c. 1935)

Photo courtesy the archives of Purdue University Library


~1940 - Credited by most military historians as the most effective, efficient and influential tank design of the Second World War, the first of the legendary Soviet T-34 medium tanks rolled out of the assembly plant at Kharkiv, in the Ukraine.

The original 1940 model T-34

(PD) Photo courtesy the Mayshev Plant


~1942 – Japanese forces invaded the Netherlands East Indies.

~1942 – Kuala Lumpur fell to invading Japanese forces.

Japanese troops during mop up operations in Kuala Lumpur (January, 1942)

Photo courtesy the Imperial War Museum


~1943 – Both the United States and Britain gave up their territorial rights in China.

~1943 – Newspaper editor and anarchist Carlo Tresca was murdered in New York.

~1957 – The African Convention was founded in Dakar.

~1957 – The bomber who brought down United Airlines Flt. 629 over Longmont, Colorado on November 1st, 1955 was executed in a Colorado gas chamber.

~1962 – A sudden avalanche on Huascaran in Peru caused over 4,000 deaths. (Several sources list this as occurring on January 10th.)

~1964 – United States Surgeon General Dr. Luther L. Terry, published a report saying that smoking was hazardous to health. It was the first such statement ever made by the U.S. government.

~1972 – East Pakistan renamed itself Bangladesh and became a parliamentary democracy under a constitution.

~1986 – In Brisbane the Gateway Bridge was officially opened.

Brisbane's Gateway Bridge in 2003

Photo by Gary Curtis


~1990 – 300,000 took part in a march for Lithuanian independence.

~1998 – The Sidi-Hamed Massacre took place in the town of Sidi-Hamed, 30 km south of Algiers. 103 people were killed and 70 more injured in the GIA attack.

...

[Da Grouch]

.

~475 – 3 days after his acclamation Basiliscus officially became Byzantine Emperor, with a coronation ceremony at the Hebdomon Palace in Constantinople.

~690 - Died this day: Saint Benedict Biscop (b. 1628)

~1528 – The coronation of Gustav I of Sweden took place. (5 out of 11 sources say this occurred on January 21st, Wiki says it happened on both dates...SO YOU DECIDE!!!)

~1539 – The Treaty of Toledo was signed by King Francis I of France and Holy Roman Emperor Charles V which ended the hostilities between the two. (If not the bitter feelings...)

~1592 - It is believed that this is the day when Titus Andronicus was first staged, at the Rose Theatre. (There is no fully documented record of the play's first actual performance.)

~1709 - A 2 month freeze began in France. The Seine River and the coast of the Atlantic froze with the cold, bringing industry to a standstill.

~1773 – The first public Colonial American museum opened in Charleston, South Carolina.

~1777 – Mission Santa Clara de Asís was founded in what is now Santa Clara, California.

Santa Clara de Asis (c. 1910)

Photo by William Amos Haines

~1808 – The Wernerian Natural History Society was founded in Edinburgh. The Society hosted many a notable scientist in its day until its final dissolution in 1858.

~1838 - In order to avoid anti-Mormon persecution, Joseph Smith Jr. and his followers left Ohio for Missouri. (Actually, old Smitty was ducking an arrest warrant for a financial scandal...)

~1848 – The Palermo Rising began in Sicily against the Bourbon kingdom of the Two Sicilies.

~1866 – The Royal Aeronautical Society was formed in London.

~1872 – Yohannes IV was crowned Emperor of Ethiopia in Axum, the first imperial coronation in that city since that of Fasilides in 1632.

~1875 – At the age of 3, Kwang-su became emperor of China.

~1895 – The National Trust was founded in Britain.

~1898 – Itō Hirobumi began his third (and last) term as Prime Minister of Japan.

~1899 – All 13 crew members and 5 apprentices from the ship Forrest Hall were rescued off the coast of southwest England by the Lynmouth Lifeboat during a fierce storm.

~1906 – Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's cabinet, including H. H. Asquith, David Lloyd George, and Winston Churchill amongst others embarked on sweeping social reforms after a Liberal landslide in the British general election.

~1911 – The University of the Philippines College of Law was formally established; three future Philippine presidents were amongst the first enrollees.

~1915 – The Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado was formed by an act of U.S. Congress. The bill was signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson on January 26, 1915.

~1915 – The United States House of Representatives rejected a proposal to give women the right to vote. (I just DARE them to try that today!)

~1918 - Finland’s "Mosaic Confessors" law went into effect, making Finnish Jews full citizens. Under the Act, Jews could for the first time become Finnish nationals and Jews not possessing Finnish nationality were to be treated as foreigners in general.

~1926 - Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll premiered their radio program Sam 'n' Henry on Chicago radio station WGN. The show ran for 586 episodes, the last one airing on December 18, 1927. Afterwards Gosden and Correll reworked the premise on a more ambitious scale to create their long running radio show Amos 'n' Andy.

~1940 - Following her highly successful maiden flight, service testing of the Brewster Buffalo fighter began. The Buffalo was the first monoplane fighter aircraft used by the US Navy, going into service in April, 1939. Her career was short lived, however, as she turned out to be no match at all against the Japanese Mitsubishi A6M-Zero and Nakajima Ki-43 "Oscar". She was derided by USMC wartime pilots as a "flying coffin".

A Brewster F2A-1 Buffalo from aircraft carrier Saratoga (CV-3).
Note "Felix the Cat" insignia of VF-3 squadron, consisting of
Felix happily carrying a bomb with a burning fuse.

Photo courtesy the US Navy


~1940 - The Soviet air force launched a massive bombing raid against 7 cities in Finland.

~1942 – President Franklin Roosevelt re-established the National War Labor Board, under the chairmanship of William Hammatt Davis.

~1945 - The Vistula-Oder Offensive: The Red army began its final offensive against Nazi Germany. In 3 weeks the offensive took Soviet forces from their start lines on the Vistula river in Poland to the banks of the Oder river deep inside Germany, only about seventy km (45 mi) from the capital of Berlin.

The Red Army and the 1st Polish Army on the road to Berlin
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/0b/Na_Berlin.jpg (broken link)
Photographer unknown


~1964 – Rebels in Zanzibar began a (successful) revolt known as the Zanzibar Revolution. They would proclaim a republic that still exists.

~1966 – US President Lyndon B. Johnson stated that the United States should stay in South Vietnam until Communist aggression there was ended. (I'm not in the mood to go into a long drawn out rant this morning, so...)

~1966 - The epitome of campy; Batman the TV series debuted on ABC. (Holy Babe in black, Batman...Catwoman is HOT!!!)

~1967 – Dr. James Bedford became the first person to be cryonically preserved (frozen) with intent of future resuscitation.

~1969 - Led Zeppelin released their eponymous first album. To an entire generation, the image of the burning Hindenburg is synonomous with the rock band and their first album. It was recorded at Olympic Studios in London and released on Atlantic Records.

~1969 – Super Bowl III: The New York Jets defeated the heavily favored Baltimore Colts 16–7. Joe Namath was the hero of the day.

~1970 – Emeka Ojukwu, president of Biafra, fled to the Ivory Coast leaving his chief of staff Philip Effiong to act as the "officer administering the government". Effiong called for a ceasefire and submitted to the FMG, ending the Nigerian Civil War.

~1971 - A television milestone was set as All in the Family debuted on CBS. ("Oh Jeez Edith, you dingbat... just wut da hell wuz zat?")

~1971 – The Harrisburg Seven: The Reverend Philip Berrigan and 6 others were indicted on charges of conspiring to kidnap Henry Kissinger and of plotting to blow up the heating tunnels of federal buildings in Washington, D.C.

~1976 – The UN Security Council voted 11-1 to allow the Palestine Liberation Organization to participate in a Security Council debate, but without voting rights. (See? They'll let any riffraff into their party if there's some publicity to be made by it.)

~1986 – US Congressman Bill Nelson lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center aboard the shuttle Columbia on mission STS-61C, as a Mission Specialist.

~1992 - Hal, The computer HAL 9000, was initially activated on this date...according to the science fiction film classic 2001: A Space Odyssey.

~1995 – Malcolm X's daughter, Qubilah Shabazz, was arrested for conspiring to kill Louis Farrakhan. (Oh but I could bat this one out of the ballpark...)

~2004 – The world's largest ocean liner, RMS Queen Mary 2, set sail on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

~2005 – The NASA space probe and impactor Deep Impact was launched from Cape Canaveral on a Delta 2 rocket.

Comet Tempel 1 67 seconds after it collided with Deep Impact, on July 4th, 2005. This photo was taken by the high resolution camera on the flyby spacecraft. The image reveals ridges, scalloped edges and possibly impact craters formed long ago.

Photo courtesy of NASA


~2006 – The foreign ministers of the United Kingdom, France, and Germany declared that negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program had reached a dead end and recommended that Iran be referred to the United Nations Security Council. (Because we all know how much THEY get accomplished...)

~2006 – A stampede during the Stoning the Devil ritual on the last day at the Hajj in Mina, Saudi Arabia, killed at 346 pilgrims and injured at least 289 more. (I guess the Devil got even...)

~2006 – Turkey released Mehmet Ali Ağca on parole after he served 25 years for shooting Pope John Paul II. (But they locked him up again 8 days later.)

~2006 – The retired French warship (carrier) Clemenceau reached Egypt enroute to be scrapped but was barred access to the Suez Canal.

~2007 – Comet McNaught reached perihelion becoming the brightest comet in more than 40 years; so bright that it was visible worldwide in broad daylight.

Comet McNaught photographed at Canberra from the top of Red Hill on January 21st, 2007

Photo by Golden Wattle

...

[Da Grouch]

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~532 – The Nika Riots took place in Constantinople.

~888 – Odo, the Count of Paris became King of the Franks. (You're welcome to them, Odo!)

The coronation of King Odo
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d6/Coronation_of_King_Odo.jpg (broken link)
Image courtesy the Grand Chroniques de France


~1435 – The papal bull Sicut Dudum was promulgated by Pope Eugene IV. Eugene condemned the enslavement of the peoples of the newly colonized Canary Islands and, under pain of excommunication, ordered all such slaves to be immediately set free.

~1547 – Henry Howard, the Earl of Surrey was sentenced to death for (the unfounded charge of) treason.

~1610 – Galileo Galilei discovered Ganymede, the 7th moon from Jupiter.

Ganymede as photographed by by the Galileo spacecraft
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/2e/Ganymede_g1_true.jpg (broken link)
Photo courtesy of NASA


~1785 – John Walter published the first issue of the Daily Universal Register (renamed The Times 3 years later), just 13 days after founding the paper.

~1830 – The (3rd) Great Fire of New Orleans began. It is believed to have been set by rebel slaves. (Whatever the hell that term means...)

~1840 – The paddlewheel steamship Lexington caught fire and burned 4 miles off Eaton's Neck on the north shore of Long Island. She sank at 03:00 that night with the loss of 139 lives.

"Awful conflagration of the steam boat Lexington in Long Island Sound on Monday eveg., Jany. 13th 1840, by which melancholy occurence; over 100 persons perished."

Lithograph drawn by W.K. Hewitt for Currier and Ives, courtesy the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division


~1842 – Dr. William Brydon, a surgeon in the British Army during the First Anglo-Afghan War, became famous for being the sole survivor of an army ands its contingents numbering 16,500 when he reached the safety of a British garrison at Jalalabad.

Remnants of an Army portraying William Brydon arriving at the gates of Jalalabad
as the only survivor of a 16,500 strong evacuation from Kabul in January, 1842
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6d/Remnants_of_an_army2.jpg (broken link)
Artist: Elizabeth Butler (1846-1933)


~1847 – The Capitulation of Cahuenga ended the fighting of the Mexican-American War in California. It was not a formal treaty between nations but an informal agreement between rival military forces in which the Californios (Hispanics) gave up to a combined force of 600 US dragoons, sailors and troops from the Army of the West.

The memorial, Campo de Cahuenga, scene of the signing of
the Treaty of Cahuenga (Capitulation of Cahuenga)

Photo courtesy the Los Angeles Times photographic archive, UCLA Library
(original publication date February 3rd, 1956)


~1893 – In Bradford, delegates gathered for a conference (to be headed by British MP Keir Hardie) that would prove to be the foundation conference of the Independent Labour Party (ILP).

~1893 – U.S. Marines from the USS Boston landed in Honolulu to prevent Queen Lili'uokalani from abrogating the Bayonet Constitution.

~1898 – Emile Zola's J'accuse exposed the Dreyfus Affair with an open letter published in the newspaper L'Aurore.

~1908 – The Rhoads Opera House Fire: In Boyertown, Pennsylvania fire broke out in the opera house during a church sponsored stage play. The blaze started when a kerosene lamp was knocked over lighting gasoline from a stereoscopic machine. The stage and auditorium were located on the 2nd floor and all auxiliary exits were either unmarked or locked. One fire escape was available but unable to be accessed through a locked window above a 3 foot sill. 171 people perished when the exit was crowded against to escape the fire and entire families were wiped out.

~1915 – The Avazzano Earthquake: In central Italy the town of Avezzano was completely destroyed by possibly the worst recorded earthquake in Italian history. Only Casa dei Palazzi and a wing of Castle Orsini were spared. More than 32,500 people died.

~1916 - Just 1 week after entering service the Nieuport 11 fighter scored its first kills when a French squadron engaged a patrol of German Fokker Eindeckers that were seriously outclassed by the small, lightly loaded sesquiplane. The Nieuport 11 and Nieuport 17 would bring an end to the Fokker Scourge.

A Nieuport 11 C.1 in Belgian service, summer 1916 (that's Bert Hall in the suit)

Photographer unknown


~1934 – The Candidate of Sciences degree was established by a decision of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR. It corresponds to the Doctor of Philosophy degree (Ph.D.) in the USA, the United Kingdom and other countries.

~1935 – A plebiscite in Saarland showed that 90.3% of those voting wished to rejoin Germany. (Even though it was by then under Nazi control.)

~1939 – The Black Friday Bush Fires were the single worst in Australian history as a measure of land affected. Almost 20,000 km² (4,942,000 acres, 2,000,000 ha) of land was burnt. Several towns were entirely destroyed and 71 people died in the inferno. The Royal Commission that resulted from it led to major changes in forest management.

~1942 – Henry Ford patented a plastic automobile that was 30% lighter than a regular car. (Yeah...old Hank got a little feeble minded towards the end there.)

~1942 – The first use of aircraft ejection seat was made. This by Helmut Schenk, a German test pilot in a stricken Heinkel He 280 jet fighter. ("Ach! deese ist goingst to hell unt a haundbasket, yeah? Vell...I'm outta heeya leike SCHNELL!)

~1953 – Marshal Josip Broz Tito was chosen as President of Yugoslavia. He took office the next day.

~1957 - In Alhambra, California the Wham-O Company produced its very first Frisbee. (Ubu celebrates this date as a high water mark in the history of civilization.)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/21/Ubu_logo.jpg (broken link)
("Sit, Ubu, sit...Good dog!)

~1958 – The Moroccan Liberation Army ambushed two companies of the Spanish 13th Legionary battalion who were conducting a reconnaissance missiona at the Battle of Edchera. Ambushed, the Legionaries fought to maintain cohesion, driving off attacks with mortar and small arms fire. Notable fighting was seen by the 1st platoon, which stubbornly denied ground to the Moroccans until grievous casualties forced it to withdraw. Bloody attacks continued until nightfall, when the Moroccan forces, too scattered and depleted of men to continue their assault, fled into the darkness.

~1964 – Karol Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul II, was appointed archbishop of Krakow, Poland.

~1968 – Johnny Cash performed live At Folsom Prison.

~1972 – The democratically elected government of Prime Minister Dr. Kofi Busia and President Edward Akufo-Addo of Ghana were ousted in a bloodless military coup by Col. Ignatius Kutu Acheamphong. (And a more blatant opportunistic political wh-ore than him there never was.)

~1974 – Seraphim was elected Archbishop of Athens and All Greece.

~1982 - Shortly after takeoff Air Florida Flt. 90, a Boeing 737-222, crashed into Washington, DC's 14th Street Bridge and fell into the Potomac River, killing 78 including 4 motorists. The plane had not been properly de-iced. In some of the most dramatic scenes ever caught on TV camera much of North America and the rest of the world watched live as 5 survivors were pulled from the freezing waters of the Potomac by rescue crews and passers-by.

Air Florida Flight 90 wreckage being
removed from the Potomac River on
January 19th, 1982
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/04/Af90.jpg (broken link)

Air Florida B737-222 N62AF in Miami, the plane that crashed on January 13th, 1982
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fd/N62AF_January_1982.jpg (broken link)
Photographers unknown, both photos courtesy the US department of Transport


~1982 - A Washington DC Metro Rail train derailed, killing 3 people.

~1985 – A derailment hurled an Imperial Railway Company of Ethiopia passenger train into a ravine at Awash, Ethiopia, killing at least 428 in the worst railroad disaster in African history.

~1986 – A month-long violent power struggle began in Aden, South Yemen between supporters of Ali Nasir Muhammad and Abdul Fattah Ismail, resulting in thousands of casualties.

~1991 – Lithuanian Independence: Soviet forces stormed the Parliament building in Vilnius along with the Vilnius TV Tower where unarmed civilian Lithuanians confronted the Soviet soldiers. 14 people were killed and seven hundred injured in what has became known as The January Events.

~1992 – The Comfort Women: Japan apologized for the first of many times regarding the forcing of Korean women into sexual slavery/military prostitution during World War II. (There were many other countries where women were forced to become sex slaves as well but despite this, according to the Japanese government, individual comfort women don’t deserve compensation.)

A Chinese girl from one of the Japanese Army's comfort battalions is interviewed by an Allied officer
at a camp in Rangoon on August 8th, 1945

Photo courtesy the Imperial War Museum


~1993 – Space Shuttle Endeavour blasted off when STS-54 launched from the Kennedy Space Center.

~2001 – The January 2001 El Salvador Earthquake: A magnitude 7.9 earthquake devastated El Salvador. More than 220,000 homes were damaged or destroyed and over 150,000 buildings were damaged. Utilities and roads were wiped out by more than 16,000 landslides and 852 were left dead with another 4,723 injured.

Landslide caused by the January 13th, 2001 El Salvador quake

Photo courtesy the US Geological Survey

...

[Da Grouch]

~1129 – The date most often agreed upon as when formal approval of the Order of the Templar was given at the Council of Troyes.

~1301 – Andrew III of Hungary died. With no male heir this ended the Arpad Dynasty in Hungary.

~1639 – The Fundamental Orders, the first written constitution that created a government, was adopted in Connecticut.

~1724 – King Philip V of Spain abdicated the throne to his eldest son, the 17 year old Louis, for reasons that are still the subject of debate more than 285 years later. It is generally believed that Philip, who exhibited many elements of mental instability during his reign, did not wish to reign due to his increasing mental decline and so conscientiously abdicated in favour of his son.

~1761 – The Third Battle of Panipat was fought about 60 miles north of Delhi between the Afghan army under Ahmad Shah Durrani and the Marhatas forces led by Sadashivrao Bhau. The ensuing Afghan victory changed the course history in India. This was one of the largest battles fought in the 18th century with upwards of 175,000 combatants taking part.

~1784 – Ratification Day: The United States Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris with Great Britain. This act officially ended the American Revolution and established the US as a sovereign entity.

Congressional Proclamation of Ratification of the Treaty of Paris

Photo courtesy the Library of Congress


~1814 – The Treaty of Kiel: Frederick VI of Denmark ceded Norway to Sweden in return for Pomerania. The treaty, however, never come into force. Sovereignty over Pomerania passed to Prussia and Norway declared its independence, adopted a constitution, and elected prince Christian Frederik as king.

~1858 РNapoleon III of France and his wife Eug̩nie narrowly escaped an assassination attempt in Paris when 3 bombs were thrown at the imperial carriage.

~1900 - Giacomo Puccini's opera Tosca, based on Victorien Sardou's drama La Tosca, premiered at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome. It is one of the world's most popular operas and has been a sensational hit with audiences ever since its first performance.

The original 1900 poster for
Tosca

Artist: Adolfo Hohenstein (1854-1928)


~1907 – An earthquake and the ensuing fire in Kingston, Jamaica devastated the city, killing more than 800 people.

The devastation in Kingston following the 1907 quake

Photographer unknown


~1938 – Norway claimed Queen Maud Land in Antarctica. (Why? We're not sure, but if it makes the Vikings happy...)

~1943 – Operation Ke: The Japanese operation to evacuate their forces from Guadalcanal during the Guadalcanal campaign, began.

~1943 – US President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prtime Minister Winston Churchill began the Casablanca Conference to discuss strategy and study the next phase of the Second World War.

President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill at the Casablanca Conference in January 1943

Photographer unknown


~1950 – One of the most significant fighters of the jet age, the fast and ultra maneuverable (not to mention lethal) MiG-17 made its maiden flight.

MiG-17 in flight over Illinois' Scott Airforce Base in 2006 (owned by Randy Ball)

Photo by Robert Lawton


~1952 – NBC's long running morning news program The Today Show debuted, with host Dave Garroway.

~1954 - Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio were married at San Francisco City Hall.

Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe
staying at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo
on their honeymoon.

Photographer unknown


~1954 – The Hudson Motor Car Company merged with Nash-Kelvinator Corporation to form the American Motors Corporation.

~1967 – The Human Be-In, took place in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, launching the Summer of Love. Between 20,000 to 30,000 people attended the happening.

~1969 – Near Hawaii, an explosion occurred aboard the USS Enterprise (CVN-65) when a MK-32 Zuni rocket loaded on a parked F-4 Phantom exploded due to ordinance cook off after being overheated by an aircraft start unit mounted to a tow tractor. The explosion set off fires and additional explosions across the flight deck. The fires were brought under control relatively quickly but 27 lives were lost and an additional 314 personnel were injured. The fire destroyed 15 aircraft, and the resulting damage forced Enterprise to put in for repairs, primarily to repair the flight deck's armored plating.

Aircraft burning aboard USS Enterprise during the January, 1969 fire

Photo courtesy US Navy


~1972 – Queen Margrethe II ascended the throne of Denmark, the first Queen of Denmark since 1412 and the first Danish monarch not named Frederick or Christian since 1513.

~1975 – 17 year old heiress Lesley Whittle was kidnapped and later murdered by The Black Panther. (Thankfully the murderous wretch is still rotting in a prison cell where he belongs.)

~1978 - Johnny Rotten quit the Sex Pistols after the final show of their American tour, at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. (These little meaningless bits of flotsam just sort of drift by while I rummage through the journals. Some I post, some I don't...ya know how it goes.)

~1994 - US President Bill Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed the Kremlin Accords which stopped the preprogrammed aiming of nuclear missiles to targets and also provided for the dismantling of the nuclear arsenal in Ukraine.

~1998 – Researchers in Dallas, Texas presented findings about an enzyme that slows aging and cell death (apoptosis).

~1998 – An Afghan cargo plane crashes into a mountain in southwest Pakistan killing more than 50 people. (I can only locate 2 sources that list this event and no further details are available...but what in hell 50 people were doing flying on board a freighter is beyond me.)

~1999 – In Ontario, Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman became the first mayor of a major city in Canada to call in the armed forces to help with emergency medical evacuations and snow removal. This after more than one meter (39 inches) of snow paralyzed the city.

~2004 – The national flag of Georgia, the so called Five Cross Flag, was restored to official use after a hiatus of some 500 years.

The Five Cross Flag



~2005 – NASA's Huygens probe successfully soft landed on Saturn's moon Titan. Even though it hadn't originally been designed as a lander, the probe continued to send data for about 90 minutes after reaching Titan's surface.

Image of Titan's surface taken by the Huygens
probe on January 14th, 2005

Photo courtesy NASA

...

[Da Grouch]

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~69 – Otho seized power in Rome, proclaiming himself Emperor. He would only rule for 3 months before committing suicide, though. (Now I'm no shrink but methinks a bit of Prozac might have been in order here.)

~1559 – Elizabeth I of England was crowned in Westminster Abbey by Owen Oglethorpe, the Bishop of Carlisle, instead of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

~1759 – The British Museum opened at Montagu House in the Bloomsbury district of London.

Montagu House, Bloomsbury, London (later the British Museum) from the north side

Artist James Simon (c. 1715)


~1777 – New Connecticut (present day Vermont) declared its independence.

~1782 – Superintendent of Finance Robert Morris drafted a proposal that he later presented to the Continental Congress recommending the establishment of a national mint and decimal coinage.

~1822 – During the Greek War of Independence, Demetrius Ypsilanti was elected president of the legislative assembly.

~1844 – The University of Notre Dame received its official college charter from the Indiana State General Assembly.

~1865 – Fort Fisher in North Carolina fell to the Union, cutting off the last major seaport of the Confederacy.

Engraving by T. Shussler, after an artwork by J.O. Davidson, published in Battles and Leaders of the Civil War. It depicts ships of the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron bombarding Fort Fisher, North Carolina, prior to the ground assault that captured the fortification.

Image courtesy U.S. Naval Historical Center


~1870 – The political cartoon A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion, by Thomas Nast appeared in Harper's Weekly. For the first time the United States Democratic Party was symbolized with a donkey.

"A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion"
Drawn by Thomas Nast, published in Harper's Weekly, January 15th, 1870


~1892 – James Naismith published the rules of basketball.

The first basketball court: Springfield College
December, 1891. Note the peach basket
attached to the wall.

Photographer unknown


~1919 – Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, two of the most prominent socialists in Germany, were tortured and murdered by the Freikorps, primarily for their (reluctant) support of the Spartacist Uprising in Berlin.

~1919 – The Boston Molasses Disaster: In the North End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts a large molasses storage tank burst sending a wave of molasses rushing through the streets at an estimated 35 mph (56 km/h). 21 were killed and another 150 injured in the incident. The event has since entered local folklore and residents claim that, on hot summer days, the area still smells of molasses. (I've been there on a hot summer day and, to use the proper Boston vernacular, "IT DON'T!")

Aftermath of the Boston Molasses Disaster

Photo believed to be by Leslie Jones


~1936 – The first building to be completely covered in glass, built for the Owens-Illinois Glass Company, was completed in Toledo, Ohio.

~1943 – The Liberation of Voronezh: In southwestern Russia the Soviet counter offensive to wrest control of Voronezh from German forces began. It would end in a Soviet victory 10 days later.

~1943 – The Pentagon, the world's largest office building, was dedicated in Arlington, Virginia.

Northwest exposure of the Pentagon's construction underway on July 1st, 1942.

Photographer unknown, courtesy the US Army Corps of Engineers


~1947 – The brutalized corpse of Elizabeth Short ("The Black Dahlia") was found at Leimert Park in Los Angeles.

~1949 – The Chinese Civil War: Forces of the Chinese Communist Party took Tianjin from Nationalist Government troops following a pitched 29 hour long battle.

~1951 – Ilse Koch, wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, was sentenced to life imprisonment by a court in West Germany. She was known as "The Witch of Buchenwald" ("Die Hexe von Buchenwald") by the inmates because of her sadistic cruelty and lasciviousness toward prisoners.

~1967 – Super Bowl I was played in Los Angeles, California. Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers defeated the Kansas City Chiefs 35-10.

~1969 – Soyuz 5, a Zond, was launched launched by the Soviet Union. It docked with Soyuz 4 (Zond) in orbit, becoming the first ever docking of two manned spacecraft, the first ever transfer of crew from one space vehicle to another and the only time a transfer was accomplished with a space walk. The craft, however, nearly burnt up on re-entry 3 days later.

Soyuz Zond spacecraft

PD image


~1974 – The BTK Killer murdered his first victims by binding, torturing and killing Joseph, Joseph II, Josephine and Julie Otero in their Witchita, Kansas home.

~1974 – Happy Days premiered on ABC. (Ron Howard still had hair back then!)

~1976 – US President Gerald Ford's would be assassin, Sara Jane Moore, was sentenced to life in prison. (Hey, she coulda shared a cell with Squeaky...!)

~1977 – The Kälvesta Air Disaster: A Vickers 838 Viscount crashed into a parkade 5 kilometers (3 miles) short of the runway at the Stockholm-Bromma Airport, killing all 22 people aboard. It is the worst air crash in Sweden's history.

Vickers 838 Viscount, similar to the one that crashed at Stockholm

Photo by MilborneOne, taken at Aberdeen Airport on June 5th, 1980


~1986 – The Living Seas opened at EPCOT Center in Walt Disney World, Florida.

~1991 – The United Nations deadline for the withdrawal of Iraqi forces from occupied Kuwait came and went. This opened the way for the start of Operation Desert Storm.

~1993 – Salvatore Riina, the Mafia boss known as The Beast, was arrested in Sicily after 3 decades as a fugitive.

~1999 – The Racak Massacre: 45 Albanians in the Kosovo village of Racak were killed by Yugoslav security forces. (Now THERE is a tale of hypocrisy and double standards for you!)

~2001 – Wikipedia, a free Wiki content encyclopedia, went online.

~2005 – ESA's SMART-1 lunar orbiter detected the element calcium, in Mare Crisium on the moon.

~2007 – Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, former Iraqi intelligence chief and half brother of Saddam Hussein, along with Awad Hamed al-Bandar, former chief judge of the Revolutionary Court, were executed by hanging in Iraq.

~2009 – Following a bird strike, US Airways Flt. 1549 made an emergency landing into the Hudson River shortly after takeoff from LaGuardia Airport in New York City. All passengers and crew members survived.

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