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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 2, 2005 9:39:23 GMT -5
1254 - Manfred, King of Sicily, defeated papal armies at the battle of Foggia and retained his kingdom.
1547 - Hernando Cortes, Spanish conqueror of Mexico, died. He fought and conquered Mexico, and in 1522 became governor and captain-general of "New Spain."
1804 - Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned emperor of France in Paris by Pope Pius VII.
1805 - Napoleon defeated Russia and Austria at the battle of Austerlitz. Known as the "Battle of the Three Emperors," Napoleon's 75,000 men drove the allies across the frozen Lake Menitz. Only 25,000 survived an original allied force of 95,000.
1814 - The Comte de Sade, known as the Marquis de Sade, died. His sexual fetishes and writings about them led to the term "sadism."
1823 - United States President James Monroe introduced his "Monroe Doctrine" under which it was held that the American continents were not to open to future colonization by any European power.
1852 - In France, the Second Empire was proclaimed with Napoleon III as emperor.
1859 - John Brown, American anti-slavery campaigner, was hanged after a raid on the federal arsenal in Virginia.
1887 - Britain's acclaimed author Charles Dickens performed his first United States public reading in New York City.
1901 - King Camp Gillette patented the first safety razor with a double-edged disposable blade.
1907 - The English Professional Football Player's Association was formed.
1926 - In Cleveland, Ohio, the first aluminum street cars were put in service.
1932 - "The Adventures of Charlie Chan" was heard for the first time on the NBC Blue radio network. The Chinese detective saw vast popularity on the movie screen between 1937 and the 1940s.
1940 - A seat on the New York Stock Exchange cost $33,000, the lowest price tag for a seat since 1899 when they sold for the bargain price of $29,500.
1942 - The world's first nuclear chain reaction took place at the University of Chicago when physicists led by Enrico Fermi successfully carried out their research.
1950 - Vic Toweel, of South Africa, set a knockdown record in a title fight in Johannesburg, South Africa. He floored England's Danny O’Sullivan 14 times in 10 rounds before the bantamweight fight was halted. During an interview after the fight, O’Sullivan told reporters, "Adkeivhaep oi er," then, passed out again.
1952 - Denver’s KOA-TV transmitted, to 49 stations on the NBC network, the first telvised human birth as a part of the program, "The March of Medicine".
1952 - Keeping his campaign promise, President-elect Dwight D. Eisenhower arrived in war-torn Korea to help promote a peace settlement.
1954 - Senator Joseph McCarthy was condemned by the United States Senate for misconduct after his ruthless investigations of thousands of suspected Communists.
1957 - Sam Cooke's "You Send Me" reached Number 1 on the pop charts.
1967 - Singer Jimmie Rodgers of "Honeycomb", and "Kisses Sweeter Than Wine" fame, was found near death in a car in Los Angeles, California, suffering a fractured skull. He was the victim of a "mysterious assault".
1971 - The United Arab Emirates was formed, consisting of the former Trucial states Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Ajman, Umm al Qaiwain and Fujairah; Ras al-Khaimah became a member in 1972.
1971 - The unmanned Soviet spacecraft Mars 3 landed on Mars.
1972 - Motown’s Temptations hit #1 on the top 40 charts with "Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone", their fourth #1 hit. Other Temptations' songs hitting the top spot were "My Girl" (1965), "I Can’t Get Next to You" (1969) and "Just My Imagination" (1971).
1972 - A general election in Australia resulted in a Labor victory, the first since 1949; Gough Whitlam became prime minister.
1977 - Broadway Melody of 1936 (1935), starring Jack Benny, Eleanor Powell, and Robert Taylor, opened in West Germany movie houses 42 years after it had been produced in the United States. The pre-WWII film had received an Oscar for dance direction, and had been a nominee that year for Best Picture and Best Writing.
1979 - In Iran, electors voted overwhelmingly in favor of a new constitution giving absolute power to Ayatollah Khomeini.
1980 - Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve was established in Alaska.
1982 - The first permanent artificial heart was implanted in Dr. Barney Clark, a Seattle dentist, by Dr. William De Vries at the University of Utah. Clark survived with the artificial heart for over 3 months. He died on March 23, 1983.
1984 - Dan Marino connected for four touchdown passes to set an NFL record for touchdown passes in a season, 40. The Miami Dolphins lost the game to the Los Angeles Rams, 45-34, marking the Dolphins’ first home loss of the season after six wins. In 1995, Marino surpassed the Minnesota Vikings’ Fran Tarkenton for most pass completions.
1985 - On ABC-TV, the highest-rated "Monday Night Football" telecast was seen as the Miami Dolphins beat the Chicago Bears, 38-24. The Miami win ended the Bears’ 12-game winning streak.
1985 - Rupert Holmes' musical "Mystery of Edwin Drood," premiered at the Imperial Theater in New York City. It was a big hit, and it ran for 608 stage performances before closing.
1989 - On this date, KHJ-TV in Los Angeles, California changed its call letters to KCAL-TV.
1990 - After German reunification, Chancellor Helmut Kohl's coalition of CDU/CSU and FDP won Germany's first free German elections since 1932.
1991 - Joseph Cicippio, a United States hostage in Lebanon, was freed after being held for 1,906 days by the Revolutionary Justice Organization (RJO). He was kidnapped September 12, 1986.
1993 - Pablo Escobar, boss of the Medellin cocaine cartel in Colombia, was killed in a shootout as police tried to arrest him.
1994 - Starring Tommy Lee Jones in the title role of Cobb,, a film about the legendary, although insufferable and mean, baseball player Ty Cobb, opened in United States theaters to mixed reviews. Critics loved Jones's dark, compelling performance, but overall, found the film redundant. The film did moderately at the box office.
1994 - Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, creator of such stage hits as Cats, Sunset Boulevard, Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, and Phantom of the Opera, was admitted to the hospital for ulcer treatment.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 3, 2005 10:14:35 GMT -5
1800 - In the War of the Second Coalition, 60,000 French under Moreau defeated 70,000 Austrians under Archduke John at the Battle of Hohenlinden in upper Bavaria.
1810 - Britain seized the islands of Reunion and Mauritius from French control.
1818 - Illinois became the 21st state of the United States.
1883 - Oberlin College in Ohio started its term as the United States' first coed institution of higher learning. The school’s registration found a total of 44 students enrolled: 29 men and 15 women.
1910 - The neon lamp, developed by French physicist Georges Claude, was displayed for the first time at the Paris Motor Show.
1912 - An armistice was signed by Turkey, Bulgaria, Serbia and Montenegro, ending the first Balkan War.
1919 - French impressionist painter Pierre Auguste Renoir died; his painting of sunlight through leaves and a series of pictures portraying bathers are amongst his best-known works.
1922 - "The Toll of the Sea", the first successful Technicolor motion picture, was shown at New York City's Rialto Theatre.
1924 - Prizefighter Jack Sharkey had his boxing license revoked by the New York State Boxing Commission after Sharkey knocked down referee Eddie Purdy during a match.
1925 - Young American composer, George Gershwin, appeared as soloist at a concert in New York's Carnegie Hall playing his "Concerto in F," the first jazz concerto in history for a piano.
1931 - The Statute of Westminster was passed, under which British dominions gained complete legislative independence.
1944 - Virtual civil war broke out in Athens, Greece, between the government backed by Britain and the National Liberation Front (EAM).
1944 - Frank Sinatra was recording "Old Man River" in Columbia's studios.
1953 - In New York, "Kismet" opened on Broadway for the first of 583 performances.
1955 - Elvis Presley’s first RCA Victor Records release was announced. The first two sides were purchased from Sun Record's Sam Phillips: "Mystery Train" and "I Forgot to Remember to Forget".
1960 - In New York City, "Camelot" opened at the Majestic Theatre, starring Richard Burton and Julie Andrews in the musical written by Lerner and Loewe. Robert Goulet got great reviews for his songs, "If Ever I Would Leave You", "Then You May Take Me to the Fair" and "How to Handle a Woman". "Camelot" ran for 873 performances. In 1967, "Camelot" became a movie, but its run was not quite as successful.
1962 - Edith Spurlock Sampson was sworn in as the first American black woman judge; she was elected associate judge of the Municipal Court in Chicago.
1967 - Dr. Christiaan Barnard carried out the world's first heart transplant operation in Cape Town on Louis Washkansky. Washkansky lived for 18 days.
1968 - For 1969, the rules committee of Major League Baseball announced the pitcher’s mound would be lowered from 15 to 10 inches in order to "get more batting action." They didn’t know that batters would get taller in 1969.
1968 - The O’Kaysions earned a gold record for their single, "Girl Watcher". In the 1990s, the song had a promotional reprise as a theme for Merv Griffin’s "Wheel of Fortune" with the rewritten lyrics, "I’m a Wheel Watcher..."
1971 - The Pakistani air force attacked Indian airfields and Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared a state of emergency.
1973 - The National Hockey League ended the reserve clause in future player contracts, favoring the one-year option system similar to that in National Football League contracts.
1977 - After a record setting 29 consecutive weeks, 31 weeks total nonconsecutively, in the Album Chart's #1 position, "Rumours" by Fleetwood Mac was replaced by the album "Simple Dreams" by Linda Ronstadt.
1983 - In his final season as the DePaul Blue Demons' head basketball coach, Ray Meyer won game #700.
1984 - Miss America 1971, the wife of Kentucky's Governor and heiress of the Kentucky Fried Chicken fortune, Phyllis George signed a multiyear contract with CBS-TV to be coanchor of the "CBS Morning News" begining in January 1985.
1984 - A gas leak at the Union Carbide pesticide plant near Bhopal, India, killed at least 3,000 people and disabled thousands.
1986 - Bobby Knight led the Indiana Hoosiers to beat Notre Dame 67-62. For the second time in his 22-year basketball coaching career, Knight relied heavily on a zone defense.
1989 - Presidents Bush and Gorbachev hailed their first summit as the start of a new era in United States-Soviet relations.
1989 - The leader of East Germany's orthodox Communist Party, Egon Krenz, and the entire party hierarchy voted themselves out of office.
1993 - Angola's government and its rebel foes agreed to a cease-fire in their 18-year war.
1993 - Britain's Princess Diana said she was bowing out of the public spotlight because she wanted privacy and time to herself.
1995 - Former South Korean President Chun Doo Hwan was arrested over charges of military rebellion stemming from a 1979 coup and a later army massacre.
1996 - Former Afghan Communist leader Babrak Karmal, who personified the Kremlin's ill-fated nine-year intervention in Afghanistan, died of liver cancer in Moscow.
1998 - Directed by John Madden, the romantic comedy Shakespeare in Love opened in United States theaters. The film was a runaway hit, and leading actress Gwyneth Paltrow earned an Oscar and a Golden Globe for her performance as Viola. The film also starred Joseph Fiennes as Will Shakespeare, a young, poor playwright with writer's block who meets his ideal woman and is inspired to write his most famous love play, "Romeo and Juliet". Also in the superb cast were Judi Dench (who earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar), Ben Affleck, Geoffrey Rush, and Colin Firth. The film earned a total of seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 4, 2005 7:24:54 GMT -5
963 - Holy Roman Emperor Otto deposed Pope John XII for dishonorable conduct and for plotting an armed conspiracy; Leo VIII succeeded as pope.
1154 - Nicolas Breakspear, the first and only Englishman to be elected pope, was crowned as Adrian IV.
1214 - William the Lion, king of Scotland, died and was succeeded by his son Alexander II.
1334 - John XXII, pope from 1316, died. The second Avignon pope, he improved church administration and upheld papal authority against Emperor Louis IV.
1786 - The National Grange of Husbandry -- the first United States agricultural movement -- was founded.
1791 - Britain's Observer, the oldest Sunday newspaper in the world, was first published.
1812 - The power mower was patented by Peter Gaillard of Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
1816 - James Monroe was elected fifth president of the United States; he was the first president who had been a senator.
1829 - Britain abolished the practice of "suttee" in India -- the widow burning herself to death on her husband's funeral pyre.
1851 - Two days after a coup d'etat in France, Louis Napoleon used troops to put down a rebellion after bloody rioting.
1867 - The National Grange of Husbandry was founded, although the organization of farmers was usually known as just the Grange. The group contributed to agriculture, serving as a center for rural social life in the United States.
1872 - The sailing vessel Mary Celeste was found adrift and abandoned off the Azores. The fate of the 10 people aboard was never determined.
1918 - The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was proclaimed, with Alexander I as prince regent.
1918 - Woodrow Wilson became the first U.S. president to travel outside the United States while in office when he sailed for the Versailles Peace Conference in France.
1927 - Duke Ellington’s big band opened Harlem's famed Cotton Club marking the first appearance of the Duke’s new, larger group. He would play the club until 1932.
1932 - "The Jergens Journal" or "The Walter Winchell Show", later called "Kaiser-Frazer News" was first aired on the NBC Blue network. Winchell kept the gossip show on radio for the next 23 years. At first it was sponsored by Jergens lotion but laterDryad deodorant, Kaiser-Frazer cars and Richard Hudnut shampoo took over.
1933 - "Tobacco Road", a play based on a book by Erskine Caldwell, premiered at New York's Masque Theatre. The play lasted for eight years and 3,182 shows.
1933 - One of America’s great radio shows made it to the big time when "Ma Perkins" moved from WLW Cincinnati, Ohio, to the NBC-Red network. The show was so popular CBS and NBC radio both carried it later on.
1934 - Ethel Merman recorded "I Get a Kick Out of You", from the Cole Porter musical, "Anything Goes" on Brunswick Records. She was accompanied by the Johnny Green Orchestra.
1942 - United States planes bombed the Italian mainland for the first time during World War II.
1943 - Prime Minister Churchill, President Roosevelt and President Inonu of Turkey met at the second Cairo Conference.
1943 - Bolivia declared war on the Axis countries.
1947 - Tennessee Williams' play "A Streetcar Named Desire" premiered in New York.
1955 - As part of an NBC-TV special, mime artist Marcel Marceau made his first television appearance in a rare speaking role. Marceau said the line, "Pretty funny stuff for a mime....".
1962 - James Caan made his acting debut on television in an episode of "The Untouchables" called "A Fist of Five". That show also starred Robert Stack, today’s "Unsolved Mysteries" host.
1965 - The United States launched Gemini VII into space for a link-up with Gemini VI.
1965 - Jacques Brel, composer, lyricist, and singer, made his debut in the United States at a concert at Carnegie Hall in New York City. Brel composed "Jackie", "You’re Not Alone", "If You Go Away".
1969 - Chicago police shot and killed Black Panther Party leader Fred Hampton during a raid on the party's Illinois headquarters.
1970 - Frank Reynolds co-hosted the "ABC Evening News" with Howard K. Smith for the last time tonight. Reynolds commented on the new co-host, Harry Reasoner, saying, "Due to circumstances beyond my control, the unemployment statistics rose yesterday."
1972 - Billy Paul, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania earned a gold record for his hit, "Me and Mrs. Jones".
1972 - Honduran President Ramon Cruz was overthrown in an army coup led by General Oswaldo Lopez Arellano.
1977 - In Malaysia, 100 people were killed when a plane hijacked by the Japanese Red Army crashed near Singapore.
1977 - Jean Bedel Bokassa crowned himself emperor of the Central African Empire.
1980 - Portuguese Prime Minister Francisco Sa Carneiro was killed in an air crash in Lisbon.
1982 - University of Georgia running back Herschel Walker, received the Heisman Trophy as the United States’s best college football player. Walker was the seventh junior to earn the award.
1984 - The discovery of a Bronze Age shipwreck off Turkey's southern coast was announced by the National Geographic Society. The discovery dated from when King Tutankhamen ruled Egypt.
1985 - Dallas, Texas became the United States' largest city to pass a no smoking law for restaurants.
1988 - In a Penthouse magazine article that hit the stores on this date, former PTL television co-host John Wesley Fletcher revealed that he recently told a grand jury that he had been former PTL leader Jim Bakker's male prostitute. In his interview, he claimed that he had sex with Bakker three times. Fletcher discussed homosexual alliances with Bakker, and alleged also that Bakker used charitable contributions to seduce him with lavish dinners at the finest restaurants in Charlotte, North Carolina. Nearly a year later, Bakker was sentenced to 45 years in prison and fined $500,000 for defrauding his followers for his own enrichment.
1990 - President Hossain Mohammad Ershad of Bangladesh resigned after eight years in power.
1991 - Journalist Terry Anderson, the last American and longest-held Western hostage in Lebanon, was freed by his Islamic Jihad (Holy War) captors after being held for 2,454 days. He was kidnapped on March 16, 1985.
1992 - President George Bush ordered about 28,000 United States troops to Somalia to block warring Somali gangs from intercepting food shipments.
1993 - The Angolan government and its UNITA guerrilla foes formally adopted terms for a truce to end a conflict killing an estimated 1,000 people a day.
1993 - The Hubble Space Telescope was secured aboard the shuttle Endeavor in preparation for a series of outside repairs by spacewalking astronauts.
1995 - An advance team of NATO troops landed in Sarajevo to enforce a peace accord ending four years of war in former Yugoslavia.
1995 - A Boeing 737 Cameroon airliner crashed into a swamp as it attempted to land near Douala, killing 72 passengers and crew.
1996 - NASA's first Mars rover was launched from Cape Canaveral; it landed successfully on July 4, 1997.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 5, 2005 6:24:26 GMT -5
1766 - London auctioneers Christie's held their first sale.
1776 - Phi Beta Kappa, the first American scholastic fraternity, was founded.
1792 - The trial of France's King Louis XVI began.
1832 - President Andrew Jackson was re-elected for a second term.
1868 - In New York City the first American bicycle school opened, announcing courses for velocipede riding.
1872 - The American ship Mary Celeste was found abandoned in the Atlantic en route to Genoa.
1876 - The Stillson wrench, the first practical pipe wrench, was patented by D.C. Stillson of Somerville, Massachusetts.
1904 - The Russian fleet was almost totally destroyed by the Japanese at Port Arthur.
1908 - For the first time numbers were used on college football uniforms. The University of Pittsburgh Panthers displayed their new numbers in a game against Washington and Jefferson.
1913 - Britain outlawed the sending of arms to Ireland.
1929 - The American League for Physical Culture organized in New York City. The ALPC is a nudist organization.
1933 - Utah became the last of 36 states to ratify the 21st Amendment to the United States Constitution which repealed the 18th Amendment, prohibiting all alcohol.
1936 - Bing Crosby took over as host of "The Kraft Music Hall". Later host, Jimmy Dorsey then led the Kraft Orchestra.
1945 - The so-called "Lost Squadron," five United States Navy Avenger bombers carrying 14 Navy flyers, took off on a training mission from the Fort Lauderdale Naval Air Station and were never seen again. They were popularly believed to have vanished in the "Bermuda Triangle."
1948 - The first church service done in sign language for the hearing impaired was televised from St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church for the Deaf in Jamaica, Long Island. It aired on WPIX-TV, Channel 11 in New York.
1951 - The first push button-controlled garage opened in Washington, DC, allowing one attendant, without entering a car, to automatically park or return a vehicle in less than a minute.
1952 - "The Abbott and Costello Show" started its 52-episode, syndicated television run. Comedians Bud Abbott and Lou Costello were such a hit that those 52 episodes have been rerun on local and network television for years.
1953 - Mutual Radio gave the final broadcast of "The Green Hornet". The show ended after 15 years on Mutual, NBC and ABC. In 1966, "The Green Hornet" reappeared on television.
1955 - The labor union AFL-CIO (The American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations ) was founded and elected George Meany as president.
1956 - British and French forces withdrew from the Suez Canal in Egypt.
1957 - The Indonesian government ordered the expulsion of all Dutch nationals.
1965 - General Charles De Gaulle failed to obtain a clear majority in French presidential elections, winning 44 percent of the vote.
1977 - Bophuthatswana in South Africa was created as the Tswana tribal homeland, covering some 13,500 square miles.
1977 - Egypt broke off relations with Syria, Libya, Algeria, Iraq and South Yemen, all opponents of its peace moves with Israel.
1979 - Jack Lynch resigned as Prime Minister of Ireland; Charles Haughey succeeded him.
1983 - In Chicago, Illinois, the first video arcade game licensed by the National Football League was unveiled. Bally Manufacturing called it, "NFL Football".
1984 - At age 37, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was the oldest NBA player. He decided to push for one more year by signing with the Los Angeles Lakers for $2 million. Other National Basketball greats who played for 16 seasons include John Havlicek of Boston, Dolph Shayes of Philadelphia, Paul Ilas of Seattle and Elvin Hayes of Houston.
1984 - Film actress Elizabeth Taylor entered a drug rehabilitation center to cure a 25-year dependency on drugs. Part of her therapy included taking out garbage and hosing down the patio. Taylor remained in the Betty Ford Center near Palm Springs for 6 weeks.
1985 - At age 108, Walter Pleate, America’s oldest military veteran, died. He was one of a dozen surviving veterans from 1898's Spanish-American War.
1985 - Britain announced it would withdraw from UNESCO on December 31, claiming it had an anti-Western bias and accusing it of financial extravagance.
1988 - Television evangelist Jim Bakker was indicted on federal fraud and conspiracy charges.
1990 - British author Salman Rushdie, who had been in hiding since Iran ordered his death for blasphemy, appeared public for the first time for nearly two years.
1993 - Venezuelans elected Rafael Caldera president for the second time in 25 years.
1995 - Spanish Foreign Minister Javier Solana was formally appointed secretary-general of NATO, the first Spaniard to lead the Western alliance.
1995 - It was reported that Kim Basinger has settled with Main Line Pictures over its suit against her for backing out of Boxing Helena. She had declared bankruptcy after a court ordered her to pay $8.1 million. Terms of the out-of-court settlement weren't disclosed.
1997 - The sleeper hit "Good Will Hunting" was released in United States theaters. The film made stars of Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, who co-wrote and starred in the film. The duo, close boyhood friends, received a writing Oscar for their screenplay.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 6, 2005 6:18:20 GMT -5
1492 - Christopher Columbus discovered the island of Hispaniola, now divided between Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
1534 - Quito, Ecuador, was founded.
1774 - Johann von Felbiger's Educational Statute came into effect in Austria, starting the world's first state education system.
1790 - The United States Congress moved from New York to Philadelphia.
1792 - During the French Revolution, the Girondists decided to put King Louis XVI on trial.
1811 - The most violent earthquake in United States history occurred near New Madrid, Missouri.
1857 - Sir Colin Campbell's British troops defeated Sepoy mutineers at the Battle of Cawnpore in India.
1865 - The 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution formally abolished slavery.
1873 - America’s first international soccer game was held in New Haven, Connecticut, where Yale defeated Eton from England 2-1.
1876 - The City of Anaheim, California, incorporated for a second time.
1877 - Thomas Edison made the first sound recording.
1901 - President McKinley was shot by an anarchist; he later died on September 14.
1902 - Martha Washington became the first United States woman on an U.S. stamp.
1906 - Britain granted self-government to the Transvaal and Orange River colonies in South Africa.
1907 - One of the worst coal mine disasters in United States history occurred, killing 361 at Mononagh, West Virginia.
1914 - The Polish town of Lodz fell to German troops.
1916 - The German army entered Bucharest.
1917 - An explosion in the harbor at Halifax, Nova Scotia killed 1,600 people.
1917 - Finland declared its independence from Russia.
1921 - W.L. Mackenzie King was elected Canadian Prime Minister.
1921 - An Anglo-Irish treaty created the Irish Free State after years of separatist strife.
1922 - The Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) was officially proclaimed.
1923 - The first presidential address broadcast on radio was sent from Washington, DC, when President Calvin Coolidge addressed a joint session of the United States Congress.
1944 - On Columbia Records, "Red Bank Boogie", Count Basie’s salute to his hometown, Red Bank, New Jersey.
1948 - Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts, considered by many to be the original "Star Search," debuted on CBS, and was on the air for 10 years. The show was wildly popular with American viewers. Godfrey was the only television personality in television history to have two top-rated shows running simultaneously in prime time for longer than 8 seasons. Godfrey's many discoveries included Rosemary Clooney and Pat Boone, but it was reported that, after seeing their auditions, he declined having Buddy Holly and Elvis Presley on his show.
1950 - "America’s Sweetheart", Shirley Temple, became Shirley Temple Black when she married San Francisco, California socialite and business executive Charles Black.
1955 - On this date, the Motion Picture Association of America refused to grant its seal of approval to Otto Preminger's new film, The Man with the Golden Arm, starring Frank Sinatra and Kim Novak. They refused on the grounds that it dealt with drug addiction, a subject forbidden under the M.P.A.A. Production Code. Preminger decided to release the controversial film without the Association's seal of approval, and it was a critical success.
1960 - Eileen Farrell debuted at New York City's Metropolitan Opera House in the title role of Gluck’s "Alcestis".
1961 - Ernest Davis became the first African-American to win the Heismann Memorial Trophy.
1964 - President Antonio Segni of Italy resigned due to ill health.
1965 - Capitol released The Beatles' hit single, We Can Work It Out / Day Tripper, and the album, Rubber Soul, both on this date.
1968 - The Commissioner of Baseball, William Eckert was fired after only three years of his contracted 7-years. He was replaced by Bowie Kuhn.
1969 - Musician Cab Calloway turned actor in NBC's "Hallmark Hall of Fame" presentation of "The Littlest Angel". The big band singer, known for classics like "Minnie the Moocher", would become a movie star in 1980's "The Blues Brothers" with John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd.
1969 - Steam's "Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye" reached the top 40's #1 spot, staying there for two weeks. It was the only major hit for the group.
1969 - The Rolling Stones held a free concert at the Altamont Speedway, near San Francisco. The event was marred when a member of the Hell's Angels motorcycle gang, hired to provide as security, killed a spectator.
1971 - Jack Nicklaus received $30,000 for winning the first Disney World golf tournament. His season's earnings totaled $244,490.
1971 - India recognized the Democratic Republic of Bangladesh, formerly East Pakistan; Pakistan responded by breaking off diplomatic relations.
1973 - Gerald Ford was sworn in as United States vice president, following Spiro Agnew's resignation.
1975 - A $2.3 billion emergency loan to save New York from bankruptcy was authorized.
1978 - A referendum in Spain approved a new constitution, providing for a constitutional monarchy and a parliamentary form of government.
1984 - Martina Navratilova’s 74-match winning streak over more than 11 months ended. Helen Sukova beat the 28-year-old tennis star in the semifinals of the Australian Open.
1984 - Two former Beatles debuted in two separate film releases. Paul McCartney had "Give My Regards to Broad Street" and George Harrison had "A Private Function" finalized for theatre audiences.
1985 - John Cougar Mellencamp promised 24,000 people at a concert in New York City he would refund their $17.50 tickets when a power outage caused a 20-minute interruption during his debut concert.
1986 - Vinny Testaverde, quarterback for the University of Miami, won the Heisman Trophy.
1988 - Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Roy Orbison died of heart attack at age 52. he would be best-remembered for his hits Pretty Woman and Only the Lonely.
1990 - President Saddam Hussein ordered all international hostages held in Iraq and Kuwait to be freed in a major concession to head off the threat of an international attack on the Arab nation.
1992 - Hindu extremists destroyed an historic mosque at Ayodhya, India. The resulting sectarian violence killed over 400.
1992 - In a referendum, Swiss voters rejected their government's plan to join a new 19-nation European free trade zone.
1994 - Orange County, California -- one of the wealthiest counties in the United States -- filed for bankruptcy protection after investment losses of about $2 billion.
1995 - Gilbert Terrero, a 19-year-old baggage handler at New York's Kennedy Airport, was charged with theft and was released on $75,000 bail for lifting $500,000 worth of jewels belonging to HRH "Fergie," Sarah, the Duchess of York. Police arrested him after finding a damaged 12-diamond necklace in his Queens home and a diamond bracelet in a locker at the airport. The jewels disappeared two days earlier from a suitcase belonging to the Duchess's assistant. Terrero's family said he found the jewels laying loose in the airport. The FBI hinted that Terrero, who knew he was checking the Duchess's bags, bragged to fellow employees about stealing the gems.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 7, 2005 6:28:49 GMT -5
43 B.C. - Marcus Tullius died. Known as Cicero, he was a statesman, writer and is remembered as Rome's greatest orator.
1787 - Delaware became the "First State" when it was first to ratify the proposed United States Constitution. As a result of their quick action, it was admitted first into to the Union. Also known as the Diamond State, Delaware is the smallest of the Southern states and is the second smallest of all 50 states. The state bird of Delaware is the blue hen chicken.
1808 - Republican James Madison was elected United States president. Incumbent New Yorker George Clinton won the vice presidency.
1815 - Michel Ney, the most famous of Napoleon's marshals, was executed by firing squad for treason.
1836 - Democrat Martin Van Buren was elected United States president.
1842 - The New York Philharmonic Society gave the first of its public concerts performing Beethoven's works.
1889 - Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera "The Gondoliers" premiered in London.
1916 - Herbert Asquith resigned as British Prime Minister and was replaced by David Lloyd George, the war secretary, with a commitment to wage all-out war on Germany.
1925 - In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, swimmer Johnny Weissmuller set a world record in the 150-yard freestyle with a time of 1 minute, 25 and 2/5 seconds. Johnny went on to star as King of the Jungle, Tarzan, in movies.
1926 - The gas operated, household refrigerator was patented by The Electrolux Servel Corporation.
1935 - Byron Haines, halfback for the University of Washington, scored all the points, for both teams, as the Huskies defeated Southern California, 6-2. He was responsible for California's touchdown when he was pushed over the goal line giving USC a safety.
1941 - Japanese planes attacked the United States Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, destroying many aircraft and ships. Canada declared war on Japan within a few hours of the attact, even before the United States declaration of war.
1948 - NBC gave the first presentation of "Horace Heidt’s Youth Opportunity Program". The talent show earned accordionist Dick Contino, a $5,000 prize as the program’s first national winner.
1948 - The man called the Babe Ruth of cricket, Donald Bradman, retired in Australia.
1952 - On CBS Radio, "My Little Margie", starring Gale Storm and Charles Farrell, made debuted. The television version of the show began on June 16, 1952. "My Little Margie" lasted 3 years on radio. Storm got her own show, titled "The Gale Storm Show" and recorded several hit songs, including "I Hear You Knocking" and "Ivory Tower" between 1955-1957.
1953 - David Ben Gurion, who had been prime minister of Israel since its foundation, resigned.
1955 - Robert Sarnoff was elected NBC's president.
1957 - For the first of 6 weeks, Pat Boone was at the top of the pop charts with "April Love". His other number one hits would include "Ain’t That a Shame", "I Almost Lost My Mind", "Don’t Forbid Me" and "Love Letters in the Sand".
1963 - Instant replay was given its first use during the Army-Navy game. The first network to use the new technique was CBS-TV.
1965 - Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras of the Greek Church formally annulled the excommunication pronounced on the Church of Rome in 1054.
1968 - The great grandson of a person who borrowed a book on diseases from the University of Cincinnati Medical Library 145 years before, was given the largest library fine ever, $22,646.
1970 - Harry Reasoner, who left CBS News weeks before this, joined Howard K. Smith on "The ABC Evening News with Howard K. Smith and Harry Reasoner". The teaming lasted nearly five years.
1970 - At Madison Square Garden, Muhammad Ali scored a fifteenth-round knock-out over Oscar Bonavena for his 31st consecutive triumph.
1971 - Libya announced the nationalization of British Petroleum's assets.
1972 - The United States launched Apollo 17, the last Apollo, on its way to the moon.
1973 - "The Washington Post" writer and co-host of "CBS Morning News", Sally Quinn, left the program after three months, never to returning to television.
1974 - "Kung Fu Fighting", by Carl Douglas, reached #1 on the pop charts, staying there for two weeks.
1974 - Barry Manilow's recording, Mandy, entered Billboard's record charts on this date. It was Manilow's first hit, becoming Number 1 for a week and staying on the charts for 12 weeks. It was later certified gold.
1974 - President Makarios returned to Cyprus to a hero's welcome after 4 1/2 months in exile.
1975 - The Indonesian army swept into East Timor -- Jakarta already owned the western half of the island -- as civil war broke out after the Portuguese colonial rulers of three centuries left.
1979 - Charles Haughey was elected Irish Prime Minister, replacing Jack Lynch.
1982 - Charlie Brooks Jr., a prisoner on death row at Fort Worth prison, Texas, was executed by lethal injection, the first to die by this method in the United States.
1984 - Michael Jackson was in Chicago, Illinois testifying the song, "The Girl is Mine", was exclusively his and that he hadn't swiped the song, "Please Love Me Now" in a copyright infringement case worth five million dollars. Jackson won.
1986 - Basketball coach Pat Riley got his 300th coaching victory when the Los Angeles Lakers downed the Golden State Warriors, 132-100. It only took Pat 416 games to reach the milestone.
1988 - A magnitude 6.9 quake struck Armenia, killing more than 25,000 people.
1989 - Czech President Gustav Husak accepted the resignation of Communist Prime Minister Ladislav Adamec.
1989 - President Corazon Aquino asked the Philippine Congress for extra powers to rule the country after a six-day coup attempt.
1990 - GATT trade talks were suspended when a row over farm subsidies between the European Community and the United States paralyzed a four-year attempt to lift barriers on commerce.
1992 - Nearly 180 people were killed and hundreds injured when riots erupted across India after Hindu militants demolished an ancient mosque.
1993 - The United States government said it had concealed 204 nuclear blasts at its Nevada test site, more than one-fifth of total tests, to keep the old Soviet Union in the dark about the United States arsenal.
1993 - A lone gunman aboard a packed rush-hour commuter train opened fire at passengers just outside New York, killing six and wounding 19.
1995 - A probe from the spacecraft Galileo successfully entered the atmosphere of the planet Jupiter.
1997 - Causing great family pain, actor Anthony Quinn, age 82, married his former secretary Kathy Blevin, age 35, in Florida. Quinn had divorced his second wife, Iolanda, to whom he had been married 31 years, just 4 months earlier.
1997 - Model Jerry Hall, wife of Rolling Stones Mick Jagger, gave birth to the couple's fourth child in New York. The baby boy, Gabriel Luke Beauregard Jagger -the rock star's sixth child in all - tipped the baby scales at 8 pounds, 3 ounces. Now, Jagger, age 54, had a child younger than his grandchildren (he has two adult daughters).
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 8, 2005 8:31:58 GMT -5
1854 - Pope Pius IX promulgated the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
1863 - Briton Tom King became the world's first heavyweight boxing champion when he beat American John Heenan in Kent, England.
1886 - What is now known as the American Federation of Labor (AFL) was founded in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
1907 - Oscar II, King of Sweden from 1872-1907 and Norway from 1872-1905 died and was succeeded by his son Gustav V.
1914 - The Battle of the Falkland Islands between Britain and Germany resulted in a British victory.
1940 - The Chicago Bears shut out the Washington Redskins, 73-0.
1940 - A heavy overnight raid by German bombers on London caused the first serious damage to the House of Commons and Tower of London.
1941 - On Bluebird Records, Ray Eberle and the Modernaires teamed with the Glenn Miller Orchestra to record "Moonlight Cocktail", which by April, 1942, would be a hit.
1941 - Britain and the United States declared war on Japan following the attack on Pearl Harbor the previous day.
1949 - Chinese Nationalists flee the Chinese mainland, moving their capital to Formosa (Taiwan).
1949 - "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes," one of America’s classic Broadway plays, that would later be a major motion picture, debuted for a long run at the Ziegfeld Theatre in New York City. Carol Channing starred in the musical singing songs like her trademark signature, "Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend". Marilyn Monroe is most remembered for starring and singing in the cinema version; and Carol is thought of for adding "Hello, Dolly" to her trademark.
1953 - Los Angeles, California became the third largest city in the United States, edging out Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for the distinction in a special census. Today Los Angeles is the second largest United States' city, and the 16th most populated city in the world.
1953 - At the United Nations, President Eisenhower called on the major powers to contribute from their stockpiles to an international pool for the peaceful development of atomic energy, and proposed that an international atomic energy agency be set up.
1956 - 47 people were killed and over 80 wounded when Hungarian militiamen and soldiers of the Soviet Red Army opened fire on about 4,000 demonstrators in Salgotarjan, a small northern mining town, during the violent suppression of an anti-Communist uprising.
1959 - Smell-o-Vision premiered as part of a movie titled "Behind the Great Wall", at the DeMille Theatre in New York City. A somewhat noxious scent was piped through the ceiling vents during certain portions of the show.
1961 - "Surfin’", the Beach Boys' first record, was released on Candix Records, becoming a local hit in Los Angeles, California, but only making it to #75 nationally in the Untied States. The surfing music craze wouldn't sweep across America for another year. By the time "Surfin’ Safari" hit Top 40, in September 1962, the Beach Boys were riding a wave of popularity.
1962 - International Typographical Union's striking workers closed nine New York City newspapers. The strike lasted 114 days, before it ended on April 1, 1963, affecting a total of 5,700,000 readers. The loss of coverage made people turn on radio and television.
1963 - On Broadway, Florence Henderson and Jose Ferrer co-starred in "The Girl Who Came to Supper". The production lasted for only 112 shows.
1963 - Frank Sinatra, Jr., 19-year-old son of singer Frank Sinatra, was kidnapped on from a hotel in Lake Tahoe, California. Three days later he was released, unharmed, after his father paid a $240,000 ransom. Most of the money was later recovered and the three kidnappers were arrested and given long prison terms.
1965 - On Broadway, Humphrey Bogart’s wife, Lauren Bacall, opened in "Cactus Flower", also starring Barry Nelson. The production ran for 1,234 performances, and was awarded Best Play honors.
1966 - 28 countries, including the United States and Soviet Union, reached agreement for an international ban on nuclear weapons in space.
1974 - The Greek people, voting in a referendum, decided by a massive majority against restoring the monarchy.
1980 - Former Beatle John Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, arrived at New York's Dakota, the apartment house in which they lived, after an early-evening recording session. As they walked through the apartment gates, a lone gunman stopped and fired five bullets into Lennon, killing him almost instantly. The gunman, a crazed fan named Mark David Chapman, did not attempt to escape and was immediately apprehended. Lennon's untimely death set off a week of worldwide mourning, and the murder was considered to be the most shocking in the history of rock music.
1982 - The Federal Communications Commission approved moving WOR-TV, Channel 9 in New York City to Secaucus, New Jersey. The move, and its additional new call letters, WWOR, gave the Garden State its first VHF television station.
1983 - A heavy overnight raid by German bombers on London caused the first serious damage to the House of Commons and Tower of London.
1984 - Basketball coach for the Indiana Hoosiers, Bobby Knight, got career win #400, when Indiana beat Kentucky’s Wildcats, 81-68.
1986 - At the White House, Santa Claus was television’s Ed McMahon. Johnny Carson’s straight man arrived in D.C. for a Christmas party where he and First Lady Nancy Reagan exchanged kisses. According to Ed, "She gave me a kiss, and I gave her a Hershey."
1987 - Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev signed a treaty in Washington to eliminate all their intermediate-range and shorter-range nuclear missiles.
1989 - East Germany opened corruption investigations against former Communist Party chief Erich Honecker and five other disgraced former leaders.
1991 - Kimberly Bergalis, the first person known to have contracted AIDS from a health care worker, her dentist, died in Florida.
1991 - The Soviet Union was dissolved as the republics of Russia, Byelorussia and Ukraine signed an agreement creating the Commonwealth of Independent States.
1993 - Winnie Mandela, estranged wife of Nelson Mandela, made a triumphant return to the top level of the African National Congress when the ANC Women's League elected her as its president.
1993 - United States President Bill Clinton signed the North American Free Trade Agreement.
1994 - President Clinton offered United States troops to help protect any withdrawal of United Nation peacekeepers from Bosnia.
1995 - China enthroned its choice of a new 6-year-old Panchen Lama, attempting to force Tibetans to accept its controversial choice for Tibetan Buddhism's second-ranking monk instead of one named by the god-king, the Dalai Lama, whom the Chinese had driven into exile.
1995 - The Baltic state of Lithuania formally applied for membership of the European Union.
1998 - The first of eight babies born to Nkem Chukwu and Iyke Louis Udobi was delivered in Houston, Texas.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 9, 2005 8:05:57 GMT -5
1165 - Malcolm IV, King of Scotland, died and was succeeded by his younger brother, William I the Lion.
1625 - The Treaty of The Hague was signed, under which England and the Netherlands agreed to subsidize Christian IV of Denmark in his campaign in Germany.
1788 - George Washington sold Magnolia, his race horse, to Colonel Henry Lee.
1792 - The first formal cremation of a human body in America took place near Charleston, South Carolina.
1793 - Noah Webster established The American Minerva, New York's first daily newspaper.
1824 - In the Peruvian War of Independence, 9,300 Spaniards under Laserna were defeated by Peruvian Patriots led by Sucre at the battle of Ayacucho; the victory led to Peru's independence.
1868 - W.E. Gladstone became British prime minister for the first of his four terms.
1884 - Levant Richardson of Chicago, Illinois patented the ball-bearing roller skate.
1905 - "Salome," a one-act opera by Richard Strauss from the story by Oscar Wilde, had its first performance in Dresden, Germany, and was condemned as obscene.
1917 - Turkish troops surrendered Jerusalem to British troops led by Viscount Allenby.
1926 - For his first recording session, held today, Benny Goodman played clarinet with the Ben Pollack Orchestra on, "Downtown Shuffle" for Victor Records. Goodman was 17 years old.
1926 - The United States Golf Association legalized steel-shaft golf clubs.
1934 - Because of ground conditions, the New York Giants football team wore basketball sneakers as they beat the Chicago Bears, 30-13, to win the NFL championship.
1940 - The Longines Watch Company signed for FM radio's first advertising contract with experimental New York City station W2XOR. The ads, promoting Longines time signals, ran for 26 weeks.
1940 - The British Eighth Army launched an offensive in North Africa by attacking Sidi Barrani in Egypt.
1941 - China formally issued a declaration of war against Japan, Germany and Italy.
1943 - Singer and actor Frank Sinatra was classified 4-F by the United States Army when he tried to enlist in Newark, New Jersey, during World War II.
1948 - The United Nations General Assembly approved the Convention on Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
1953 - Frank Sinatra recorded "Young At Heart", a song turned down by Nat ‘King’ Cole and other artists. In March of 1954, tt became a hit in the United States.
1955 - Sugar Ray Robinson became the first ex-boxing champion to return from retirement and win back his title. He was also the first boxer to win the middleweight title three times when, on this date, he knocked out Carl "Bobo" Olson in the second round of their Chicago bout.
1956 - At Sun Records in Memphis, Tennessee, the Million Dollar Session was held when Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis gathered for an unplanned jam session. Six songs were recorded by the artists at this session, but none were released for almost three decades.
1958 - The John Birch Society was founded in the United States, vowing to fight communism.
1960 - Sperry Rand Corporation, of St. Paul, Minnesota, debuted a new computer, the as Univac 1107, which used what was known as thin-film memory.
1961 - Tanganyika became independent within the commonwealth; one year later, it became a republic within the commonwealth.
1962 - Arizona's Petrified Forest National Park was established.
1965 - The television debut of the comic strip "Peanuts" gang, in A Charlie Brown Christmas, was on this date. More than 30 years later, it was still a perrenial favorite.
1965 - Nikolai Podgorny replaced Anastas Mikoyan as Soviet president.
1966 - Barbados became the 122nd member of the United Nations.
1967 - The Cunard liner Queen Mary docked at Long Beach, California, after her final voyage.
1973 - In London, England, Keith Moon, Rod Stewart and Roger Daltry opened the rock opera, "Tommy". The show, featuring was so popular that tickets sold for upwards of $50.
1973 - After Vice President Spiro T. Agnew resigned, House Speaker Gerald Ford became the United States’s first, appointed Vice President. Later, Ford would become the nation’s first, non-elected President when Richard Nixon resigned.
1984 - The Jackson’s Victory Tour ended at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, California, after giving 55 performances in 19 cities. The production was reported to be one of the world’s greatest, and most problematic, rock concerts. The Jackson brothers were given around $50 million during the five-month tour of the Unted States.
1984 - The Chicago Bears' Walter Payton got another first as he ran six plays, as quarterback. While he was intercepted twice, he ran the ball himself on four carries. The Green Bay packers still won, 20-14. After the game Payton said, "It was okay, but I wouldn’t want to do it for a living."
1984 - Eric Dickerson, of the Los Angeles Rams, became the second professional football player to run over 2,000 yards (2,105) in a season. He beat O.J. Simpson’s record of 2,003 when the Rams defeated the Houston Oilers, 27-16.
1985 - Former Argentine president Jorge Videla and his fellow junta member, Admiral Emilio Massera, were sentenced to life imprisonment for their part in the "dirty war" against left-wing guerrillas in which up to 9,000 people disappeared.
1987 - The first riots of the intifada, or Palestinian uprising, erupted on the Gaza Strip.
1989 - Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci, winner of several gold medals as a teenager at the 1976 Olympics, defected to southern Florida. Accompanying her was Constantin Panait, a roofer who was married and the father of four children.
1990 - Lech Walesa, the former leader of the trade union Solidarity, won a landslide victory in the Polish presidential election.
1992 - The separation of the prince and princess of Wales was announced.
1992 - United States Marines stormed into Mogadishu, spearheading an international effort to overcome one of the worst famines this century.
1993 - United States astronauts finished a grueling five-day repair work on the $3 billion Hubble Space Telescope.
1994 - Britain and Sinn Fein, the Irish Republican Army's political wing, held their first formal talks for more than 70 years.
1995 - Poland's Supreme Court confirmed the victory of ex-communist Aleksander Kwasniewski in November's presidential election, rejecting protests from supporters of defeated former Solidarity hero Lech Walesa.
1996 - The United Nations authorized the start of a long-delayed oil-for-food deal with Iraq, enabling Baghdad to make a limited return to the world oil market for the first time since its 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
1997 - Police in South Carolina investigated a complaint by a woman who claimed actor Edward James Olmos forced "her to do things she didn't want to do," in the words of one source quoted in New York Post, in a hotel room there last October. The acclaimed actor, age 50 and married, couldn't comment on the case, but his attorney Richard Harpootlian told the Post that the accuser - described as a 38-year-old housewife - was a stalker-type looking for money who failed a lie-detector test about her encounter with Olmos. "We have one witness who says the woman stalked and followed Mr. Olmos to his hotel, then came back the next morning," Harpootlian said. The sex probe was abandoned by police a few days later when the charges were dropped.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 10, 2005 7:37:55 GMT -5
1508 - Pope Julius II, Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, Louis XII of France and Ferdinand II of Aragon to attack Venice, formed the League of Cambrai.
1520 - Martin Luther publicly burned the papal bull excommunicating him.
1810 - The first interracial, title boxing match was held at Copthall Common in England. American, Tom Molineaux, lost to Tom Cribb on a fluke punch after 40 rounds.
1817 - Mississippi became the 20th of the United States.
1845 - The first pneumatic tires were patented by British civil engineer Robert Thompson.
1868 - The world's first traffic lights, built near London's Parliament Square, began operation.
1869 - The governor of the Wyoming Territory signed the first legislation granting women the right to vote.
1896 - Intercollegiate basketball was first played as Wesleyan University beat Yale, 4-3, in New Haven, Connecticut.
1898 - The Treaty of Paris was signed, ending the Spanish-American War.
1910 - New York's Metropolitan Opera House featured tenor Enrico Caruso and conductor Arturo Toscanini for the world premiere of Puccini’s "The Girl of the Golden West".
1927 - Famous radio announcer George Hay introduced the "WSM Barn Dance" as "The Grand Ole Opry" for the first time. While the show’s title changed, it still remained the home of country music.
1930 - On Victor Records, Duke Ellington and his orchestra recorded "Mood Indigo", which became one of the Duke’s famous standards.
1930 - Adolph Rupp’s Kentucky Wildcats beat Georgetown College, 67-19, in what was Rupp's coaching debut with Kentucky. He wowed the crowd with a fast break style of basketball unheard of at the time. Rupp continued coaching at Kentucky for 44 years, winning 874 games and earning four national titles. The arena where the Wildcats play is named for Rupp.
1931 - Alasara Zamora was chosen as Spain's first constitutionally elected president.
1941 - Japanese planes sank the British battleships "Repulse" and "Prince of Wales" in the South China Sea, killing nearly 800 people.
1949 - Fats Domino had his firs recordings for Imperial Records. The legend from New Orleans, Louisiana recorded one of rock music's earliest records, "The Fat Man". The title became Domino’s nickname, staying with him throughout his career. Fats’ real name is Antoine. "The Fat Man", is thought to be a million-seller, but that can’t be verified.
1950 - Dr. Ralph Bunche, then undersecretary of the United Nations, became the first black person to win a Nobel Peace Prize.
1953 - After a $7,600 investment, Hugh Hefner published the first "Playboy" magazine. Now a collector's item, there was no date printed on the first issue, according to Hef, because he doubted anyone would expect a second issue to be printed. This first issue included: A nude calendar photo of actress Marilyn Monroe.
1953 - At New York's Imperial Theatre, Harry Belafonte debuted on Broadway in "Almanac". Critics called Belafonte’s performance "electrifyingly sincere". The show also starred: Hermione Gingold, Billy DeWolfe, Polly Bergen and Orson Bean.
1955 - NBC-TV's "The Big Surprise", awarded the largest amount of money given away on television to Mrs. Ethel Park Richardson of Los Angeles, California. She received $100,000 in cash.
1963 - Zanzibar, a British protectorate since 1890, became an independent state within the Commonwealth.
1964 - Reverend Martin Luther King was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace, making him the youngest person to have earned the award.
1964 - Singer Sam Cooke was shot to death under mysterious circumstances at a Los Angeles motel. The motel manager who shot him claimed that Cooke had appeared to be an intruder. Cooke reportedly had picked up a young woman and offered her a lift home, but took her instead to a motel. He allegedly forced her to the room and tore off her clothes. When he was in the bathroom, she fled. The manager's wife said that he broke open her door, demanding to know where the girl was. He allegedly assaulted the manager, and so she shot him. A jury later returned a verdict of justifiable homicide. Cooke's first single, You Send Me, sold more than 1.5 million copies.
1966 - The Beach Boys had a one-week stop at the top of "Billboard's" Hot 100 when "Good Vibrations" hit #1. It was the group's third #1 hit; the others were "I Get Around" and "Help Me Rhonda".
1967 - Composer and singer Otis Redding was killed in a plane crash near Madison, Wisconsin, at age 26. Redding and his touring band, including members of The Bar-Keys, were on their way from Cleveland when the plane crashed and wound up at the bottom of Lake Monona, then frozen over. Ironically, Redding was just enjoying the benefits of his first major hit, (Sittin' on) the Dock of the Bay. His body was never recovered.
1977 - Russia launched Soyuz 26 space capsule to link up with the Salyut 6 space station.
1979 - The parliament of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia met for the last time to vote itself out of existence.
1982/B> - 119 countries -- but not Britain or the United States signed the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
1985 - The R.H. Donnelley Corporation announced it would bring full color to its telephone books adding red, blue and green to the traditional Yellow Pages. Soon after, ads printed in the Yellow Pages began popping up with red, blue and green accents, which cost more than traditional black print.
1986 - Exxon announced the sale of its Manhattan, New York landmark, the 53-story Exxon Building. The buyer was a Japanese real estate developer who paid $610 million for the building.
1987 - Russian-born master violinist Jascha Heifetz died at age 86.
1989 - Czechoslovakia's first government without a Communist majority since 1948 assumed power.
1995 - NASA scientists received the first data from the space probe Galileo -- a message beamed over 2.3 billion miles (3.7 billion kilometers).
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 11, 2005 8:00:02 GMT -5
1205 - In England, John Grey, Bishop of Norwich, was elected Archbishop of Canterbury. He was later rejected by Pope Innocent III.
1282 - Michael VIII Palaeologus, Byzantine emperor, died. He became emperor in 1259 and succeeded in restoring the empire to the Greeks after 57 years of Latin occupation when he took Constantinople. He was succeeded by his son Andronicus II.
1282 - Llewelyn, the last native-born Prince of Wales, was killed in a battle with the English.
1769 - Venetian blinds were patented by Londoner Edward Bevan.
1792 - Deposed French King Louis XVI went before the national Convention to face charges of treason. He was convicted and sent to the guillotine the following month.
1816 - Indiana became the 19th state of the United States.
1844 - When Dr. Horace Wells of Hartford, Connecticut had a tooth pulled, he became the first to receive an anesthetic for the dental procedure.
1845 - The Sonderbund was established by the seven Catholic Swiss cantons to oppose anti-Catholic measures by Protestant cantons.
1845 - In India, the Sikhs crossed Sutlej and surprised the British, heralding the start of the Anglo-Sikh War.
1872 - Pinckney Pinchback became America's first black governor when he took office as acting governor of Louisiana.
1882 - The Bijou Theater was lit with 650 lightbulbs on this date for the world's first electrically-illuminated theater production. Gilbert and Sullivan's operetta, Iolanthe, was performed.
1894 - The world's first motor show opened in Paris with nine exhibitors.
1899 - In the second British-Boer war, the British under Methuen attempted to advance and were defeated with the loss of more than 1,000 men by 9,000 Boers under Cronje at the battle of Magersfontein.
1901 - The first transatlantic radio signal was sent by Italian Guglielmo Marconi from Poldhu in Cornwall and was received by Percy Wright Paget in St Johns, Newfoundland.
1909 - The first public showing of movies in color was achieved by running the film through green and red screens. The process produced headaches for the viewers.
1919 - The town of Enterprise, Alabama dedicated the first known monument to an insect, as townfold came out to honor the boll weevil; that destroyed cotton plants. By forcing them to diversify their crops, the farmers ended up tripling their profits, hence the tribute to the bugs.
1930 - The Bank of the United States in New York failed and closed all of its 60 branches. The bank had at least 400,000 depositors.
1936 - Edward VIII's abdication as King of Great Britain became effective; he gave up the throne in order to marry American divorcee Wallis Simpson.
1937 - The Fascist Council in Rome withdrew Italy from the League of Nations.
1939 - Betty Grable and her legs were featured on "LIFE" magazine's cover. Legend has it that she like the picture, but to those off fighting in World War II, it became an international symbol of "back home."
1939 - On the Decca label, Marlene Dietrich recorded "Falling In Love Again".
1941 - Italy and Germany declared war on the United States; the United States Congress in turn declared war on both. Poland declared war on Japan. Cuba, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Dominican Republic and Guatemala all declared war on Germany and Italy.
1944 - On NBC radio "The Chesterfield Supper Club" debuted with Perry Como, Jo Stafford, and many other stars, sharing the spotlight on the 15-minute show that aired five nights a week.
1946 - John D. Rockefeller, Jr. offered a six-block area of land in New York City to be the headquarters of the United Nations. The next day the offer was accepted.
1946 - The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) was created by the U.N. General Assembly to provide relief to children in countries devastated by war.
1951 - Joe DiMaggio announced he was retiring from baseball. Joltin’ Joe only played for the New York Yankees during his 13-year career. His lifetime batting average was .325; and his 56 game streak of batted safely in, still stands. Joe’s brothers, Vince and Dom, also played in the major-league.
1952 - A 70,000 person audiens watched from 31 theatres as Richard Tucker starred in "Carmen"; in the first pay-television production of an opera. Ticket cost between $1.20 to $7.20.
1957 - Rock and roll singer Jerry Lee Lewis secretly married his third wife, 14-year-old Myra Gale Brown, who was also his third cousin, in Hernando, Tennessee.
1961 - United States President John F. Kennedy ordered the first large group of military advisers into South Vietnam.
1967 - The prototype of the Anglo-French supersonic aircraft Concorde was shown for the first time at Toulouse, France.
1969 - The Magic Christian, starring Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr, premiered in England. Ringo and Maureen Starr , plus John Lennon and Yoko Ono, were in attendance.
1973 - West German Chancellor Willy Brandt and Czech Prime Minister Lubomir Strougal formally signed a treaty nullifying the 1938 Munich pact which sanctioned Hitler's seizure of Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland.
1973 - Karen and Richard Carpenter earned a gold record for, "Top of the World".
1973 - The Chicago Cubs traded Ron Santo to their rivals, the Chicago White Sox. Santo became the first major-league baseball player to invoke the rule permitting 10-year veterans of a club to refuse trading when he turned down a trade to the California Angels.
1979 - Television networks CBS and ABC, as well as Congress and the Carter Administration, publicly condemned NBC-TV for yielding to Iranian conditions in its interview of one of the United States hostages the previous day. NBC was accused of being used by the hostages' Iranian captors.
1981 - The Hawaii-based detective television show, Magnum, P.I., starring Tom Selleck, debuted on CBS. Selleck and co-star John Hillerman each earned an Emmy for their performances.
1982 - Toni Basil hite #1 on the pop music charts for the first time, with the single, "Mickey".
1983 - After widespread riots, Bangladesh's Chief Martial Law Administrator, Mohammad Ershad, declared himself president.
1983 - "Noises Off", a London play, opened at New York's Atkinson Theatre. The three-act play was deemed by critics as "an outrageous slapstick comedy of utter chaos."
1985 - The United States' most expensive non-oil acquisition in history took place when General Electric agreed to buy RCA Corporation for $6.3 billion. The joint company would bring in around $39 billion in revenues. The deal included NBC Radio and television as well.
1987 - Oliver Stone's film,Wall Street, was released to United States theaters. Michael Douglas later received the Golden Globe Award and Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of financial cuttthroat Gordon Gekko.
1988 - 62 people died in a Mexico City marketplace when tons of illegal fireworks exploded.
1990 - Albania's ruling Communist Party authorized the establishment of opposition political parties.
1992 - In what was hoped would be an end to civil war in Somalia, warlords Ali Mahdi Mohamed and Mohamed Farah Aideed signed a peace plan.
1993 - After 45 years of talks, a United Nations panel approved the creation of a new Commissioner for Human Rights to respond quickly to major rights crises around the world.
1994 - Russia sent tanks and troops pouring into Chechnya to try to end the rebel territory's three-year unilateral drive for independence.
1996 - Shipping magnate Tung Chee-hwa swept effortlessly to a historic victory in the poll which selected Hong Kong's leader-in-waiting to take over when the British colony reverted to Chinese rule.
1998 - The Artist Formerly Known as Prince and his wife, Mayte Garcia-Nelson, announced they planned to annul their three-year marriage - for now. They "want to proceed without any sort of contract held by social conventions," he said at a news conference in Madrid. On Valentine's Day 1999, the couple plan to reunite in Spain, "leaving aside legal proceedings that do no more than separate people," he said. "Mayte and I are joined for life, and the best way to demonstrate it is to do away with the legal bonds that people demand".
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 12, 2005 10:10:25 GMT -5
1533 - Juan Diego said he saw the Virgin Mary on a hill near Mexico City; Our Lady of Guadalupe became the patron saint of all Latin America by 1910.
1719 - The Aurora Borealis was first recorded.
1787 - Pennsylvania became the second state of the United States.
1792 - Ludwig van Beethoven, at age 22, paid 19 cents for his first music lesson from composer Franz Joseph Haydn in Vienna.
1844 - Dr. Horace Wells, of Hartford, Connecticut, was the first to receive an anesthetic for a dental procedure.
1850 - The novel, "Wide, Wide World" by Elizabeth Wetherell, whose real name was Susan Warner, was published. Many called the book a bestseller which would make it the first bestseller in America. During its first two years of publication, there were 14 editions printed.
1870 - Joseph Hayne Rainey was sworn in as the first black to serve in the United States House of Representatives.
1882 - The Bijou Theatre in Boston, Massachusetts, became the first theater to be lighted by electricity.
1896 - Guglielmo Marconi gave the first public demonstration of wireless communication in London. On the same day in 1901 he made the first transatlantic radio transmission from Cornwall to Newfoundland.
1897 - The comic strip, "The Katzenjammer Kids," debuted in United States newspapers. The comic strip, which in German, part of the title translates roughly to "yowling cats," was the first to use bubbles over the characters' heads for placing dialogue.
1899 - Boston, Massachusetts' George Grant patented the golf tee.
1900 - Charles M. Schwab joined John Pierpont Morgan and Andrew Carnegie to form the United States Steel Corporation; creating one of the richest, most powerful companies in the world.
1911 - King George V of Britain held a coronation durbar in Delhi, where the Indian capital was to be moved from Calcutta.
1913 - The painting "Mona Lisa" was recovered in Florence after having been stolen from the Louvre two years earlier.
1915 - The first all-metal plane flew for the first time. Built by German Hugo Junkers, it was known as the "Tin Donkey."
1917 - Father Edward Flanagan founded Boys Town near Omaha, Nebraska. His charitable efforts to help wayward youths were immortalized years later in the film Boys Town, starring Spencer Tracy and Mickey Rooney.
1936 - Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek declared war on Japan.
1937 - The Federal Communications Commission was upset with NBC radio, chastizing the radio network for a skit starring Mae West. The satirical routine, based on the biblical tale of Adam and Eve, got out of hand. Following the FCC's comments, NBC banned West from its airwaves for 15 years, even the mention of her name on network was a no-no.
1939 - Singer Betty Grable and her famous legs were featured on the cover of Life Magazine.
1948 - When Michigan State was admitted to the Western Conference today; it made the event the Big 10 Conference again.
1951 - Joe DiMaggio announced his retirement from the New York Yankees.
1955 - The United States closed its consulate in Hanoi following the end of the Indochina war and the partition of Vietnam.
1955 - The Ford Foundation announced the largest philanthropic act in the world, giving $500,000,000 to private hospitals, medical schools, and colleges.
1959 - At 22 years and 104 days old, Bruce McLaren became the youngest racecar driver to win a Grand Prix when he took first place at Sebring, Florida.
1961 - Former big band singer Mike Douglas, along with Kay Kyser, started a television variety show from Cleveland, Ohio. The show saw success when KYW-TV moved from Cleveland to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but it went under when the show left Philly for Hollywood.
1963 - The LP, "John Fitzgerald Kennedy - A Memorial Album", became the fastest-selling record ever when 4 million copies of the 99 cent disk sold in six days; between December 7-12. The tribute was recorded on the day Kennedy was killed in Texas, November 22.
1963 - Kenya became an independent state within the Commonwealth with Jomo Kenyatta as prime minister; it became a republic on the same day the following year with Kenyatta as president.
1969 - Greece withdrew from the Council of Europe shortly before it was to have been expelled because of its military regime.
1970 - The Tears of a Clown, reocorded by Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, hit the Number 1 spot on Billboard's record charts, and remained there for 2 weeks.
1976 - Actor Jack Cassidy died while sleeping in Los Angeles in a fire in his apartment. It was suspected that a lit cigarette started the blaze. Cassidy, age 49, the father of 1970s teen idol David Cassidy and former husband of actress and singer Shirley Jones, was burned beyond recognition. He had to be identified through his dental records.
1979 - The port of Tumaco, Colombia, was hit by an earthquake measuring 8.0; 600 died and 80,000 were made homeless.
1980 - At an auction in London, England, oil tycoon Armand Hammer bought a notebook of Leonardo da Vinci's writings for $5.28 million, the highest price ever paid for a manuscript. The notebook was 36 pages long and dated back to 1508.
1983 - Football’s Jim Brown made a repeat appearance in "Sports Illustrated". This time he was not on the cover, but was inside the magazine setting a record span of more than 23 years between spreads.
1984 - Band Aid, a group of 38 top British rock musicians, recorded "Do They Know This is Christmas?" for Ethiopian famine victims. Despite their best intentions, much of the food never got to starving Ethiopians, a lot of it was found rotting on docks, not fit for human to eat.
1985 - 248 United States soldiers and eight crew members died in a charter plane crash in Gander, Newfoundland.
1985 - The most expensive non-oil acquisition in United States history took place this day. General Electric Company agreed to buy RCA Corporation for $6.3 billion.
1986 - James "Bonecrusher" Smith became the first graduate of college to win the boxing world heavyweight crown. "If I only had a bwain...," he said, as he beat Tim Witherspoon's brain so badly, Tim couldn’t count to ten.
1986 - The Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Boston Celtics, 117-110, becoming the first visiting team since December of 1985 to win at the old Boston Garden. It ended a streak of 48 straight wins for the Celtics.
1987 - Tiffany's single, Could've Been, debuted on Billboard's Top 40 charts on this date, eventually peaking in the Number 1 spot for 2 weeks, and remained on the charts for 14 weeks.
1988 - Three paintings by Vincent van Gogh - "Dried Sunflowers," "Weaver's Interior", and a sketched version of his renowned "Potato Eaters" - were stolen from the Kroller-Muller National Museum in Otterlo, The Netherlands. The museum housed one of the world's largest collections of van Gogh's work. No estimated value of the stolen paintings was announced.
1991 - Supermodel Cindy Crawford and film star Richard Gere were married at the Little Church of the West in Las Vegas, Nevada. It was frequently insinuated by the media and some critics that their marriage was one of convenience, in order to deflect rumors that they were both homosexual. Crawford and Gere both denied the innuendoes.
1993 - Eduardo Frei swept to victory in Chile's presidential elections, the first since military rule ended in 1990.
1994 - Brazil's Supreme Court acquitted former President Fernando Collor de Mello of corruption charges that had forced his resignation in 1992.
1997 - Ilich Ramirez Sanchez -- the international terrorist known as "Carlos the Jackal" -- went on trial in Paris on charges of killing two French investigators and a Lebanese national.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 13, 2005 11:21:36 GMT -5
1250 - Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Germany and Sicily, died and was succeeded by Conrad IV.
1545 - The Council of Trent, summoned by Pope Paul III in May 1542, finally met to discuss doctrinal matters, especially the rise of Protestantism.
1577 - Francis Drake began a voyage from Plymouth, England, in the "Golden Hind" that was to take him around the world.
1642 - New Zealand was discovered by the Dutch navigator Abel Tasman. Several of his men were killed in attempting to land when Maoris interpreted an exchange of trumpet fanfares as a prelude to battle.
1809 - In Danville, Kentucky, the first abdominal surgical procedure was performed. The victim/patient was Jane Todd Crawford, whose operation was performed without an anesthetic.
1816 - John Adamson, of Boston, Massachusetts, patented a dry dock.
1862 - In the American Civil War, General Robert E. Lee with 80,000 Confederates repulsed General Burnside with his 150,000 Federals at the Battle of Fredericksburg, Virginia. After hard fighting along the Massaponax River, Burnside lost almost 14,000 troops.
1884 - The first coin-operated weighing machine was patented by Percy Everitt.
1913 - Leonardo da Vinci’s "La Gioconda" ("Mona Lisa"), was returned to Paris's Louvre Museum after a two-year absence due to theft. The stolen painting was valued $5,000,000 at the time of its recovery. In 1962, the value was set at one hundred million dollars.
1928 - The George Gershwin composition, "American in Paris", had its debut peformance by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra under the direction of Walter Damrosch.
1929 - Hoagy Carmichael and Louis Armstrong recorded "Rockin’ Chair" on Columbia records and cylinders.
1936 - Green Bay won the National Football League championship after they beat the Boston Redskins, 21-6. It was Boston's last game, as they became the Washington Redskins in 1937.
1937 - Japanese forces took the Chinese city of Nanking (Nanjing). Over the following six weeks, in one of the worst atrocities of World War II, they killed an estimated 200,000 Chinese in what became known as the "Rape of Nanking."
1939 - In World War II, the battle of the River Plate took place off the coast of South America between the British cruisers Exeter, Ajax and Achilles and the German battleship Graf Spee.
1940 - Glenn Miller and his orchestra recorded the two-sided jump tune, "The Anvil Chorus", for Bluebird Records in New York. The 10-inch, 78 rpm record was six minutes long.
1941 - British forces retreated to Hong Kong island as the invading Japanese army took Kowloon and the New Territories.
1942 - "Allen’s Alley" was presented for the first time on "The Fred Allen Show". This segment of the show became popular and hence was used until 1949. The stops along the way in "Allen’s Alley" were the Brooklyn tenement of Mrs. Nussbaum, the farmhouse of Titus Moody, the shack of Ajax Cassidy and the antebellum mansion of Senator Beauregard Claghorn.
1948 - After an 11 1/2 month strike, the American Federation of Musicians went back to work. During the strike there was also an 11½-month ban on phonograph records.
1949 - The American League said no to a proposal to revive the spitball, outlawed since 1920. Many pitchers still tossed the spitter anyway.
1961 - At age 101, Grandma Moses, Anna Mary Robertson Moses, passed away. The self-taught artist began painting in her sixties; having her first showing in New York City at eighty. Her nostalgic, primitive style mostly centered on rural scenes: "The Old Oaken Bucket", "Christmas at Home", "The Quilting Bee".
1967 - King Constantine of Greece and his family fled the country after a counter-coup failed to topple the military-backed government.
1973 - Detroit, Michigan was the first city to get a franchise in the unsuccessful World Football League.
1974 - Former Beatle George Harrison was invited to lunch by President Gerald R. Ford. At the White House, the two exchanged buttons, Ford giving George a WIN (Whip Inflation Now) pin and Harrison giving the President an OM (Hindu mantra word expressing creation) button.
1975 - The late-night television variety show, Saturday Night Live, did not broadcast live for the first time on this date. NBC was concerned that the host for that evening's show, popular comedian Richard Pryor, would utter some obscene words or phrases. Pryor had promised that he would not use foul language, but as most of his stand-up routine consisted of four-letter words, the possibility existed that he would accidentally, or purposefully, "let loose." The show's executive heads decided that the show would be placed on a 5-second electronic delay. Two expletives spoken by Pryor were determined unsuitable for television and were deleted before they hit the airwaves.
1979 - In Canada, Prime Minister Joe Clark's 7-month-old Progressive Conservative government was defeated in a vote of no confidence in parliament.
1981 - The Polish government imposed martial law and took its strongest step so far to stifle Solidarity's unprecedented challenge against Communist rule.
1982 - An earthquake in Yemen killed 3,000 people and injured 2,000; the earthquake devastated Dhamar province 60 miles (100 km) southeast of Sanaa.
1983 - Civilian Turgut Ozal became prime minister of Turkey after three years of military rule.
1983 - In professional basketball, Detroit and Denver played for 3 hours, 11 minutes. The Pistons won, 186-184, during triple overtime. NBA records for single-game were set for most points by two teams; by one team; assists; and field goals. Kiki Vandeweghe of the Denver Nuggets scored a career-high with 51 points.
1985 - In a first for movies, the murder mystery, "Clue", opened featuring three different endings. Newspaper ads said which ending was playing at which theatre.
1986 - In the school's 62-year history, Duke University won its first NCAA team championship when the Blue Devils’ soccer team beat Akron, 1-0.
1986 - Madonna's recording of Open Your Heart entered Bilboard's Top 40 pop charts on this date, and later peaked at Number 1 for a week. The song stayed on the charts for 14 weeks.
1991 - North and South Korea signed a non-aggression accord aimed at improving their often rocky ties.
1993 - The European Community ratified a treaty creating the world's largest trade bloc, the European Economic Area, to come into effect on January 1 1994.
1995 - Chinese dissident Wei Jingsheng, a 1995 Nobel Peace Prize nominee, was imprisoned for 14 years for subversive acts.
1995 - All 49 passengers and crew were killed when a Romanian charter plane crashed and burst into flames minutes after take-off from Verona airport in northern Italy.
1996 - Ministers and officials from 128 countries adopted a wide-ranging final declaration at the end of the five-day World Trade Organization conference in Singapore.
1998 - Voters in Puerto Rico rejected United States statehood.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 14, 2005 12:15:28 GMT -5
1417 - Sir John Oldcastle, a leader of the Lollards religious sect, was hanged and burned in Britain. Considered to be the model for Shakespeare's character Falstaff.
1798 - David Wilkinson of Rhode Island patented both the nut and bolt machine, and the screw.
1799 - George Washington died. He was the first president of the United States (1789-1797) and showed his leadership in the American Revolution.
1819 - Alabama became the 22nd state of the Union.
1822 - The Congress of Verona, a last meeting of the powers of the Holy Alliance and Britain, ended with Britain preventing a possible intervention in revolutionary Spain.
1861 - Prince Albert, consort and husband of Queen Victoria of England, died of typhoid at Windsor Castle. The grief-stricken queen went into a long period of mourning.
1900 - Max Planck first published his Quantum Theory,that radiant energy comes in small indivisible packets and was not continuous as previously thought.
1902 - The ship, "Silverton", set sail from the Bay Area to lay the first telephone cable between San Francisco, California and Honolulu, Hawaii. The project was finished by January 1, 1903.
1911 - Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and his three companions became the first to reach the South Pole-- 35 days ahead of Capt. Scott.
1918 - Women in Britain voted for the first time in a general election and were allowed to stand as candidates. The first to be elected was Irish nationalist Countess Markievicz of Sinn Fein, who could not take her seat because she was in prison.
1918 - "Gianni Schicchi," a one-act opera by Giacomo Puccini, was first performed at New York's Metropolitan opera.
1918 - Sidonio Pais, the President of Portugal, was fatally wounded as he entered Rossio station in Lisbon only weeks after a previous unsuccessful assassination attempt.
1920 - The first fatalities on a scheduled passenger flight occurred when an aircraft crashed into a house, killing the two-person crew and two passengers at Cricklewood, London.
1927 - Britain signed a treaty recognizing Iraqi independence and offering support for Iraqi admission to the League of Nations.
1928 - On Victor Records, Fanny Brice, America’s original Funny Girl, recorded "If You Want the Rainbow", from the play, "My Man".
1934 - New York Central Railroad introduced the first steam-driven locomotive, nicknamed the "Commodore Vanderbilt". The locomotive weighed 228 tons and had 4,075 horsepower.
1935 - Thomas Masaryk resigned as Czechoslovakia's first president.
1936 - In New York City, the play You Can't Take It With You opened at the Booth Theatre.
1939 - The League of Nations expelled the Soviet Union for aggression against Finland.
1944 - MGM released the movie National Velvet, featuring young Elizabeth Taylor as Velvet Brown, in New York.
1944 - Representatives of major-league baseball met in New York City, to decide to let ball clubs play night games any day except Sundays and holidays, as long as the visiting team agreed. They also agreed to prohibit scheduling football games before the home team’s baseball season ended.
1945 - Josef Kramer and 10 others were executed for crimes they committed at the Nazi concentration camps Belsen and Auschwitz.
1953 - For NBC radio's "Bell Telephone Hour", Fred Allen returned from semi-retirement to narrate Prokofiev’s classic, "Peter and the Wolf".
1953 - 19-year old Sandy Koufax signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers. In his life, Koufax reportedly had played no more than 20 games of baseball. During the next 12 seasons, he posted 167 wins, 87 losses and 2,396 strikeouts, to become a baseball legend.
1959 - Archbishop Makarios became the first president of the Republic of Cyprus.
1962 - The Mariner II space probe began sending back to Earth man's first information from another planet, Venus.
1963 - Singer Dinah Washington died in Detroit, Michigan. She made several songs popular, including What a Diff'rence a Day Makes and Unforgettable, as well as several hits with Brook Benton, including Baby (You've Got What it Takes) and A Rockin' Good Way (To Mess Around and Fall in Love).
1970 - George Harrison, former Beatle, was awarded a gold record for his single, My Sweet Lord.
1970 - While golfing great Lee Trevino won only two tournaments during the year; he still became the top, golf money-winner with his yearly earnings averaging $157,037.
1973 - In the first round of their boxing match set in New York, Jerry Quarry defeated Ernie Shavers in 2 minutes, 21 seconds. Quarry broke his hand in the short fight and failed at a comeback attempt later on.
1975 - Arthur Treacher, the British-born actor known for his many character roles in films as stuffy butlers or aristocrats, died at age 81 in Manhasset, New York. Treacher also founded a chain of fast-food fish and chips restaurants, which bore his name.
1978 - The United Nation General Assembly called for an oil embargo against South Africa.
1981 - Israel annexed the Golan Heights, seized from Syria in the 1967 Six-Day War.
1983 - In New York City, the musical biography of Peggy Lee opened at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre. The show was called, "Peg".
1984 - The movie The Cotton Club opened around the United States. Its soundtrack included nine classic songs by Duke Ellington.
1985 - Wilma Mankiller became the first woman to lead a major American Indian tribe, taking office as the principal chief of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma.
1985 - The United States’ high school football coach with the most wins called it quits. After 43 years, Gordon Wood, 71, of Brownwood High School in Central Texas, retired. Wood had a career record of 405 wins, 88 losses and 12 ties. The football stadium at Brownwood High was rebuilt and named after him.
1986 - The experimental aircraft Voyager took off from California on the first non-stop, non-refueled flight around the world.
1993 - The European Union established diplomatic relations with South Africa, putting the final touch to a new policy of cooperation after years of isolation.
1995 - Leaders from former Yugoslavia signed a Bosnian peace treaty in Paris, formally ending Europe's worst conflict since World War II and opening the way for thousands of NATO troops to move into the shattered country.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 15, 2005 8:36:36 GMT -5
1791 - In Virginia, the Bill of Rights was ratified this day. The Bill of Rights is made up of the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution.
1794 - In the War of Austrian Succession, the Prussians under Leopold I of Anhalt-Dessau heavily defeated the Saxons under Rutowski at the battle of Kesseldorf near Dresden.
1806 - In the Napoleonic Wars, French forces under Napoleon entered Warsaw.
1840 - Napoleon's remains were interred in Les Invalides in Paris, having been brought from St Helena where he died.
1854 - In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the first street cleaning machine was put to use.
1874 - The first reigning king to visit the United States, King David Kalakaua of the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii), was received by President Ulysses Grant.
1890 - "Sitting Bull" (Tatanka Iyotake), Sioux Indian chief, was killed. He died while resisting arrest by Native American police.
1899 - In the second Boer War, the British under Gen. Redvers Buller made a frontal attack in the battle of Colenso aimed at relieving the besieged town of Ladysmith. The action failed and the British lost over 1,100 men.
1939 - The epic film "Gone with the Wind" had its world premiere in Atlanta, introduced by its producer David O. Selznick.
1939 - To make women's stockings, nylon yarn was sold to hosiery mills; marking the first use of commercial yarn for wearing apparel. In May of 1940, the DuPont product allowed a record number of ladies’ hose to go on sale for the first time.
1941 - On Victor Records, Lena Horne recorded the classic torch song that became her signature: "Stormy Weather".
1942 - The first plastic license plate tabs were issued by the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities.
1943 - Fats Waller, aka Thomas Writght, the famed composer, blues singer, piano and pipe organ player died at age 39 from pneumonia. At 6 he started playing piano, recording songs by 16. Early on some of his songs became hits, but unfortunately for him, the sucess came after he sold them outright; like "On the Sunny Side of the Street" and "I Can’t Give You Anything But Love". Waller composed so many shows and hit songs it would take pages to name all of them. Some familiar ones are: "Ain’t Misbehavin’", "I’ve Got a Feeling I’m Fallin’", "Honeysuckle Rose", "I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter" and "It’s a Sin to Tell a Lie".
1944 - World War II raged as news spread of that an airplane was lost somewhere over the English Channel between England and Paris. On the ill-fated aircraft was Major Glenn Miller, who was on his way to conduct his Air Force Band in a Christmas concert.
1949 - After ten years on radio, "Captain Midnight" was heard for the last time.
1954 - An audience of forty million watched television's Disneyland and, on this date, saw the charming, lanky Fess Parker first portray the character of Davy Crockett. The United States' youth were entranced with Crockett (and his coon-skin cap), and there was a sudden and manic obsession for a man who had died almost 120 years earlier.
1961 - In Israel, Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi SS colonel in World War II, was sentenced to death in Jerusalem for organizing the deportation of Jews to concentration camps.
1961 - The United Nations General Assembly voted against a Soviet proposal to admit Communist China as a member.
1962 - The first album to make fun of a United States President became the United States' #1 LP. The album was Vaughn Meader’s "The First Family", which stayed at #1 for three months.
1962 - The Boston Celtics' Bob Cousy set a National Basketball Association record as he scored his 5,926th field goal. His career highlights included the NBA’s 1957 MVP Award, and the record set on March 21, 1953 for 30 free throws in one game when the Celtics played the Syracuse Nationals. Four of the free throws were made in overtime.
1964 - Canada's parliament adopted a new national flag with a red maple leaf on a white background.
1965 - United States spacecraft Gemini 6 and Gemini 7 achieved the first space rendezvous, flying side by side for two orbits.
1966 - The world mourned the loss of animation genius Walt Disney, who died from acute circulatory collapse one month after having lung surgery. Disney would be best-remembered for his animation contributions, such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Bambi, Cinderella, Fantasia, and Pinocchio, for his wild-life documentaries, for his family-oriented motion pictures, such as Mary Poppins, Treasure Island, The Parent Trap, and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and for his revolutionary fantasy-amusement park in California, Disneyland, with Disney World in Florida underway.
1970 - The unmanned Soviet spacecraft Venera 7 landed on Venus.
1974 - Baltimore Colts quarterback, Bert Jones, set an NFL record by when he completed seventeen consecutive passes in a game against the New York Jets.
1978 - United States President Jimmy Carter announced he would establish diplomatic relations with China from January 1, 1979, and break off relations with Taiwan.
1979 - Chris Haney and Scott Abbot invented the game "Trivial Pursuit".
1980 - Dave Winfield signed a ten-year contract with the New York Yankees for a paycheck between $1.3 and $1.5 million, making him the wealthiest player in United States team sport history. It was said the total package for the outfielder was worth over $22 million.
1982 - Paul "Bear" Bryant announced his retirement as head football coach at the University of Alabama after 232 victories and only 46 losses.
1983 - The remaining 80 United States combat soldiers in Grenada withdrew. -- just over seven weeks after the United States-led invasion of the Caribbean island.
1986 - In New York City, violinist Isaac Stern arrived in a horse-drawn carriage to cut the ribbon on the renovated Carnegie Hall.
1986 - Kenny Rogers cut a 17 million dollar deal with the Dole Food Company, to become the highest-paid celebrity pitchman.
1992 - El Salvador's government and leftist guerrilla leaders formally declared the end of a 12-year civil war.
1993 - Delegations from 117 countries approved by consensus a GATT trade treaty aimed at opening up international markets.
1993 - Called "a beautiful film about the holocaust horror", Steven Speilberg's haunting black-and-white film Schindler's List opened in United States theaters. Starring Liam Neeson, Ben Kingsley, Ralph Fiennes, and Caroline Goodall, the film won many awards, including Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director.
1995 - The United Nations Security Council authorized NATO to take over peacekeeping operations in Bosnia in a resolution spelling the end of one of the United Nations' toughest field missions.
1995 - Southeast Asian nations signed a treaty banning the possession, manufacture and acquisition of nuclear weapons and created a nuclear arms-free zone from Burma and Vietnam in the north to Indonesia in the south.
1995 - European Union leaders christened their planned new single currency the "Euro."
1998 - A stagehand filed a $3 million lawsuit against the pop group Backstreet Boys, contending he was injured by a 50-pound cannon that fell on his head. Michael Barrett, 22, was seeking damages from the five-member group for injuries and emotional distress. Barrett, of Alexandria, was working backstage at Nissan Pavilion after a concert July 16. A line suspending the cannon - a stage prop that fires confetti - was untied after the show, "causing it to descend to the stage below at great speed," according to the lawsuit.
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Post by JJC7655... aka JJ on Dec 17, 2005 9:32:52 GMT -5
1538 - King Henry VIII, who had declared himself head of the English church, was excommunicated by Pope Paul III.
1770 - Ludwig van Beethoven was baptized. He became a huge influence in western classical music and wrote nine symphonies, the opera "Fidelio," five piano concerti and many chamber pieces.
1790 - Workers in Mexico City unearthed a 25-ton stone solar calendar. It is believed to have been carved by the Aztecs in 1479.
1791 - In New York City, a traffic regulation established the first one way street.
1830 - Simon Bolivar died. Known as the "Liberator," he freed Colombia in 1819 and was elected its president. He then took Venezuela, Ecuador and Peru from the Spaniards. Upper Peru was renamed Bolivia.
1895 - George L. Brownell of Worcester, Massachusetts patented his paper-twine machine.
1903 - Wilbur and Orville Wright made the first successful controlled flight in a powered aircraft, the Wright Flyer, on the beach at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. They made four flights, the longest lasting almost a minute.
1926 - Benny Goodman played a clarinet solo; his first time playing solo during a group recording session. Goodman was played with the Ben Pollack band on "He’s the Last Word".
1936 - Ventriloquist Edgar Bergen joked with Charlie McCarthy, for the first time on radio when the two debuted on NBC's "The Rudy Vallee Show".
1939 - The German battleship Admiral Graf Spee was scuttled off Montevideo after it was trapped by British warships. Its captain, Hans Langsdorff, later committed suicide.
1940 - United States President Franklin Roosevelt outlined his plan for "lend-leasing" arms and equipment to Britain during World War II.
1944 - The United States approved an end to the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
1953 - After an earlier decision favoring CBS-TV, the minds at the Federal Communications Commission changed opinions and approved RCA’s color television specifications.
1955 - Carl Perkins wrote "Blue Suede Shoes", which he was recording, less than 48 hours later, at the Sun Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The song became one of the first records to have simultaneous popularity on rock, country and rhythm & blues charts.
1957 - The first Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile was tested by the United States.
1959 - On the Beach, the gripping post-nuclear war film starring Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, Fred Astaire, and Tony Perkins, premiered on this date in New York.
1962 - Monaco promulgated a new constitution, vesting legislative power jointly in the Prince and the Conseil National.
1967 - British yachtsman Alec Rose in his ketch "Lively Lady" reached Melbourne after a 5-month, 14,500-mile single-handed voyage from Portsmouth.
1967 - Harold Holt, Australian prime minister, drowned while swimming off Portsea, near Melbourne. His deputy, John McEwen, succeeded him.
1969 - The soprano-voiced, ukelele-playing Tiny Tim married the lovely Miss Vickie on Johnny Carson's The Tonight Show on this date before a huge viewing audience. The NBC-TV program earned the second-highest, all-time audience rating; second only to Neil Armstrong's walking on the the moon. The unlikely couple later divorced in 1977, but not before Miss Vickie gave birth to daughter Tulip.
1969 - Chicago Transit Authority earned a gold record for the group of the same name, who would later become simply "Chicago". The album's release by Columbia Records marked the first time an artist's debut LP was a double record.
1970 - At Royal Albert Hall in London, the Beach Boys played to Princess Margaret.
1971 - The India-Pakistan War over East Pakistan (later Bangladesh) ended when 90,000 Pakistani troops surrendered.
1973 - In Italy, 32 people were killed at Rome Airport when gunmen threw bombs at a Pan Am jet and machine-gunned the terminal building.
1975 - A federal jury sentenced Lynette Alice "Squeaky" Fromme to life in prison for the attempted assassination of President Gerald Ford.
1976 - The Ted Turner owned WTCG-TV, Atlanta, Georgia, changed its call letters to WTBS, and was uplinked via satellite, making it the first commercial television station to cover the entire United States. WTBS began on only four cable systems, available in 24,000 homes.
1977 - Elvis Costello made a rare television appearance on NBC’s "Saturday Night Live" to perform when Sid Vicious and the Sex Pistols failed to show up.
1983 - In Madrid, Spain, 83 people were killed in a fire at a discotheque.
1983 - Six people were killed by an IRA bomb outside Harrods department store in London.
1984 - For the first time in 14 matches, John McEnroe and Peter Fleming lost a doubles tennis match in the Davis Cup competition. Anders Jarryd and Stefan Edberg lead the Swedish team to win the title, marking the worst defeat since 1973 for the United States team.
1986 - A federal jury in Las Vegas ruled on this date that NBC falsely linked entertainer Wayne Newton to organized crime in 1980 and 1981 telecasts. Newton was awarded $19.2 million in defamation damages.
1986 - Davina Thompson made medical history by having the first heart, lung and liver transplant, which took place at Papworth Hospital in Cambridge, England.
1989 - In its premier airing as a half-hour television sitcom on Fox network, The Simpsons' inaugeral episode was "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire".
1989 - Brazil celebrated its first direct election for president in 29 years. Voters chose between Fernando Collor de Mello (who won) and Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
1990 - In Haiti's first free elections, Father Jean-Bertrand Aristide was elected president.
1993 - Ivory Coast's new prime minister, Daniel Kablan Duncan, took office, praising the economic austerity policies of his predecessor Alassane Ouattara.
1994 - Two United States pilots were captured and interrogated by North Korea after their helicopter crash-landed in the Communist state.
1995 - Chancellor Franz Vranitzky's Social Democrats scored a victory in Austria's snap elections, polling 38.3 percent, up from 34.9 percent in 1994.
1996 - The United Nations General Assembly appointed Kofi Annan of Ghana to a five-year term as secretary-general, beginning January 1, 1997.
1996 - Peruvian rebels stormed the Japanese ambassador's home in Lima, threatening to kill almost 490 hostages unless the government freed jailed comrades.
1996 - Sun Yaoting, China's last imperial eunuch, died in Beijing at the age of 93.
1998 - In a tribute to a charity's recycling skills, Prince Charles unveiled a plaque in Wales sporting his crest - fashioned from a broken coffee table. Charles, a keen conservationist, toured a formerly defunct factory that's now the headquarters of Track 2000, a charity that restores donated household appliances, beds and furniture. The charity, which has distributed 4,000 tons of recycled goods to the needy, also oversees training programs in carpentry and electronics for disabled and disadvantaged people.
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