TODAY IN HISTORY: DECEMBER 21

 

December 21

AD 69 – The Roman Senate declares Vespasian emperor of Rome, the last in the Year of the Four Emperors.

1124 – Pope Honorius II is consecrated, having been elected after the controversial dethroning of Pope Celestine II.

1140 – After a siege of several weeks, the city of Weinsberg and its castle surrender to Conrad III of Germany.

1237 – The city of Ryazan is sacked by the Mongol army of Batu Khan.

1361 – The Battle of Linuesa is fought in the context of the Spanish Reconquista between the forces of the Emirate of Granada and the combined army of the Kingdom of Castile and of Jaén resulting in a Castilian victory.

1598 – Battle of Curalaba: The revolting Mapuche, led by cacique Pelentaru, inflict a major defeat on Spanish troops in southern Chile.

1620 – Plymouth Colony: William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims land near what is now known as Plymouth Rock in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

1826 – American settlers in Nacogdoches, Mexican Texas, declare their independence, starting the Fredonian Rebellion.

1832 – Egyptian–Ottoman War: Egyptian forces decisively defeat Ottoman troops at the Battle of Konya.

1844 – The Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers commences business at its cooperative in Rochdale, England, starting the Cooperative movement.

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, England.

1879 – World premiere of Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House at the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen, Denmark.

1883 – The Royal Canadian Dragoons and The Royal Canadian Regiment, the first Permanent Force cavalry and infantry regiments of the Canadian Army, are formed.

1907 – The Chilean Army commits a massacre of at least 2,000 striking saltpeter miners in Iquique, Chile.

1910 – An underground explosion at the Hulton Bank Colliery No. 3 Pit in Over Hulton, Westhoughton, England, kills 344 miners.

1913 – Arthur Wynne's "word-cross", the first crossword puzzle, is published in the New York World.

1919 – American anarchist Emma Goldman is deported to Russia.

1923 – United Kingdom and Nepal formally sign an agreement of friendship, called the Nepal–Britain Treaty of 1923, which superseded the Treaty of Sugauli signed in 1816.

1934 – Lieutenant Kijé, one of Sergei Prokofiev's best-known works, premiered.

1936 – First flight of the Junkers Ju 88 multi-role combat aircraft.

1937 – Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the world's first full-length animated feature, premieres at the Carthay Circle Theatre.

1941 – World War II: A Thai-Japanese Pact of Alliance is signed.

1946 – An 8.1 M_w earthquake and subsequent tsunami in Nankaidō, Japan, kills over 1,300 people and destroys over 38,000 homes.

1963 – "Bloody Christmas" begins in Cyprus, ultimately resulting in the displacement of 25,000–30,000 Turkish Cypriots and destruction of more than 100 villages.

1965 – International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination is adopted.

1967 – Louis Washkansky, the first man to undergo a human-to-human heart transplant, dies in Cape Town, South Africa, having lived for 18 days after the transplant.

1968 – Apollo program: Apollo 8 is launched from the Kennedy Space Center, placing its crew on a lunar trajectory for the first visit to another celestial body by humans.

1970 – First flight of F-14 multi-role combat aircraft.

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 S.C. Mundawarara.

1988 – A bomb explodes on board Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland, killing 270. This is to date the deadliest air disaster to occur on British soil.

1988 – The first flight of Antonov An-225 Mriya, the largest aircraft in the world.

1992 – A Dutch DC-10, flight Martinair MP 495, crashes at Faro Airport, killing 56.

1995 – The city of Bethlehem passes from Israeli to Palestinian control.

1999 – The Spanish Civil Guard intercepts a van loaded with 950 kg of explosives that ETA intended to use to blow up Torre Picasso in Madrid, Spain.

1999 – Cubana de Aviación Flight 1216 overshoots the runway at La Aurora International Airport, killing 18.

2004 – Iraq War: A suicide bomber kills 22 at the forward operating base next to the main U.S. military airfield at Mosul, Iraq, the single deadliest suicide attack on American soldiers.

2020 – A great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn occurs, with the two planets separated in the sky by 0.1 degrees. This is the closest conjunction between the two planets since 1623.

 

TODAY IN HISTORY: DECEMBER 20

 

December 20

AD 69 – Antonius Primus enters Rome to claim the title of Emperor for Nero's former general Vespasian.

1192 – Richard I of England is captured and imprisoned by Leopold V of Austria on his way home to England after the Third Crusade.

1334 – Cardinal Jacques Fournier, a Cistercian monk, is elected Pope Benedict XII.

1803 – The Louisiana Purchase is completed at a ceremony in New Orleans.

1808 – Peninsular War: The Siege of Zaragoza begins.

1832 – HMS Clio under the command of Captain Onslow arrives at Port Egmont under orders to take possession of the Falkland Islands.

1860 – South Carolina becomes the first state to attempt to secede from the United States with the South Carolina Declaration of Secession.

1915 – World War I: The last Australian troops are evacuated from Gallipoli.

1917 – Cheka, the first Soviet secret police force, is founded.

1924 – Adolf Hitler is released from Landsberg Prison.

1941 – World War II: First battle of the American Volunteer Group, better known as the "Flying Tigers", in Kunming, China.

1942 – World War II: Japanese air forces bomb Calcutta, India.

1946 – It's a Wonderful Life premieres at the Globe Theatre in New York to mixed reviews. [1]

1946 – An earthquake in Nankaidō, Japan causes a tsunami which kills at least one thousand people and destroys 36,000 homes.

1948 – Indonesian National Revolution: The Dutch military captures Yogyakarta, the temporary capital of the newly formed Republic of Indonesia.

1951 – The EBR-1 in Arco, Idaho becomes the first nuclear power plant to generate electricity. The electricity powered four light bulbs.

1952 – A United States Air Force C-124 crashes and burns in Moses Lake, Washington, killing 87 of the 115 people on board.

1955 – Cardiff is proclaimed the capital city of Wales, United Kingdom.

1957 – The initial production version of the Boeing 707 makes its first flight.

1967 – A Pennsylvania Railroad Budd Metroliner exceeds 249 kilometres per hour (155 mph) on their New York Division, also present-day Amtrak's Northeast Corridor.

1973 – Assassination of Luis Carrero Blanco: A car bomb planted by ETA in Madrid kills three people, including the Prime Minister of Spain, Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco.

1984 – The Summit Tunnel fire, one of the largest transportation tunnel fires in history, burns after a freight train carrying over one million liters of gasoline derails near the town of Todmorden, England, in the Pennines.

1984 – Disappearance of Jonelle Matthews from Greeley, Colorado. Her remains were discovered on July 23, 2019, located about 24 km (15 mi) southeast of Jonelle's home. The cause of death "was a gunshot wound to the head."

1985 – Pope John Paul II announces the institution of World Youth Day.

1987 – In the worst peacetime sea disaster, the passenger ferry Doña Paz sinks after colliding with the oil tanker MT Vector in the Tablas Strait of the Philippines, killing an estimated 4,000 people (1,749 official).

1989 – The United States invasion of Panama deposes Manuel Noriega.

1991 – A Missouri court sentences the Palestinian militant Zein Isa and his wife Maria to death for the honor killing of their daughter Palestina.

1995 – NATO begins peacekeeping in Bosnia.

1995 – American Airlines Flight 965, a Boeing 757, crashes into a mountain 50 km north of Cali, Colombia, killing 159 of the 163 people on board.

1999 – Macau is handed over to China by Portugal.

2004 – A gang of thieves steal £26.5 million worth of currency from the Donegall Square West headquarters of Northern Bank in Belfast, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom, one of the largest bank robberies in British history.

2007 – Elizabeth II becomes the oldest monarch in the history of the United Kingdom, surpassing Queen Victoria, who lived for 81 years and 243 days.

2007 – The Portrait of Suzanne Bloch (1904), by the Spanish artist Pablo Picasso, and O Lavrador de Café by Brazilian modernist painter Cândido Portinari, are stolen from the São Paulo Museum of Art in Brazil. Both will be recovered a few weeks later.

2019 – The United States Space Force becomes the first new branch of the United States Armed Forces since 1947.

 

TODAY IN HISTORY: DECEMBER 19

 

December 19

1154 – Henry II of England is crowned at Westminster Abbey.

1187 – Pope Clement III is elected.

1490 – Anne, Duchess of Brittany, is married to Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor by proxy.

1562 – The Battle of Dreux takes place during the French Wars of Religion.

1606 – The ships Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery depart England carrying settlers who founded, at Jamestown, Virginia, the first of the thirteen colonies that became the United States.

1675 – The Great Swamp Fight, a pivotal battle in King Philip's War, gives the English settlers a bitterly won victory.

1776 – Thomas Paine publishes one of a series of pamphlets in The Pennsylvania Journal entitled "The American Crisis".

1777 – American Revolutionary War: George Washington's Continental Army goes into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.

1783 – William Pitt the Younger becomes the youngest Prime Minister of the United Kingdom at 24.

1796 – French Revolutionary Wars: Two British frigates under Commodore Horatio Nelson and two Spanish frigates under Commodore Don Jacobo Stuart engage in battle off the coast of Murcia.

1828 – Vice President of the United States John C. Calhoun sparks the Nullification Crisis when he anonymously publishes the South Carolina Exposition and Protest, protesting the Tariff of 1828.

1900 – Hopetoun Blunder: The first Governor-General of Australia John Hope, 7th Earl of Hopetoun, appoints Sir William Lyne premier of the new state of New South Wales, but he is unable to persuade other colonial politicians to join his government and is forced to resign.

1900 – French parliament votes amnesty for all involved in scandalous army treason trial known as Dreyfus affair.

1907 – Two hundred thirty-nine coal miners die in the Darr Mine Disaster in Jacobs Creek, Pennsylvania.

1912 – William Van Schaick, captain of the steamship General Slocum which caught fire and killed over one thousand people, is pardoned by U.S. President William Howard Taft after 3+⁄₂ years in Sing Sing prison.

1920 – King Constantine I is restored as King of the Hellenes after the death of his son Alexander of Greece and a plebiscite.

1924 – The last Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost is sold in London, England.

1924 – German serial killer Fritz Haarmann is sentenced to death for a series of murders.

1927 – Three Indian revolutionaries, Ram Prasad Bismil, Roshan Singh and Ashfaqulla Khan, are executed by the British Raj for participation in the Kakori conspiracy.

1929 – The Indian National Congress promulgates the Purna Swaraj (the Declaration of the Independence of India).

1932 – BBC World Service begins broadcasting as the BBC Empire Service.

1940 – Risto Ryti, the Prime Minister of Finland, is elected President of the Republic of Finland in a presidential election, which is exceptionally held by the 1937 electoral college.

1941 – World War II: Adolf Hitler appoints himself as head of the Oberkommando des Heeres.

1941 – World War II: Limpet mines placed by Italian divers heavily damage HMS Valiant and HMS Queen Elizabeth in Alexandria harbour.

1945 – John Amery, British Fascist, is executed at the age of 33 by the British Government for treason.

1946 – Start of the First Indochina War.

1956 – Irish-born physician John Bodkin Adams is arrested in connection with the suspicious deaths of more than 160 patients. Eventually he is convicted only of minor charges.

1961 – India annexes Daman and Diu, part of Portuguese India.

1967 – Harold Holt, the Prime Minister of Australia, is officially presumed dead.

1972 – Apollo program: The last crewed lunar flight, Apollo 17, carrying Eugene Cernan, Ronald Evans, and Harrison Schmitt, returns to Earth.

1974 – Nelson Rockefeller is sworn in as Vice President of the United States under President Gerald Ford under the provisions of the 25th Amendment to the United States Constitution.

1977 – The M_s  5.8 Bob–Tangol earthquake strikes Kerman Province in Iran, destroying villages and killing 665 people.

1981 – Sixteen lives are lost when the Penlee lifeboat goes to the aid of the stricken coaster Union Star in heavy seas.

1983 – The original FIFA World Cup trophy, the Jules Rimet Trophy, is stolen from the headquarters of the Brazilian Football Confederation in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

1984 – The Sino-British Joint Declaration, stating that 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.

1986 – Mikhail Gorbachev, leader of the Soviet Union, releases Andrei Sakharov and his wife from exile in Gorky.

1991 – Joe Cole, American roadie and author, is killed in an armed robbery

1995 – The United States Government restores federal recognition to the Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi Native American tribe.

1997 – SilkAir Flight 185 crashes into the Musi River, near Palembang in Indonesia, killing 104.

1998 – President Bill Clinton is impeached by the United States House of Representatives, becoming the second president of the United States to be impeached.

2000 – The Leninist Guerrilla Units wing of the Communist Labour Party of Turkey/Leninist attack a Nationalist Movement Party office in Istanbul, Turkey, killing one person and injuring three.

2001 – A record high barometric pressure of 1,085.6 hectopascals (32.06 inHg) is recorded at Tosontsengel, Khövsgöl, Mongolia.

2001 – Argentine economic crisis: December riots: Riots erupt in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

2012 – Park Geun-hye is elected the first female president of South Korea.

2013 – Spacecraft Gaia is launched by European Space Agency.

2016 – Russian ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov is assassinated while at an art exhibition in Ankara. The assassin, Mevlüt Mert Altıntaş, is shot and killed by a Turkish guard.

2016 – A vehicular attack in Berlin, Germany, kills and injures multiple people at a Christmas market.