- 236 The reign of Pope Anterus as the bishop of Rome ends with his death after only 43 days
- 936 Duke Alberic II of Spoleto appoints his son as Pope Leo VII following the death of Pope John XI
- 1338 Jacob van Artevelde is elected mayor of Ghent
- 1407 Bloody battles between Hoeken and Kabeljauwen in Dordrecht
Trial of Joan of Arc
1431 Joan of Arc is handed over to Bishop Pierre Cauchon
Leonardo da Vinci's Flying Machine
1496 Leonardo da Vinci unsuccessfully tests a flying machine
Luther and Papal Envoy Meet
1519 First meeting in Altenburg, Saxony, between Martin Luther and papal nuncio Karl von Miltitz
Martin Luther Excommunicated
1521 Pope Leo X excommunicates Martin Luther from the Roman Catholic Church for refusing to recant parts of his Ninety-Five Theses, which started the Protestant Reformation
- 1602 Spanish forces in Ireland surrender to the English army at Kinsale
- 1638 Amsterdam's first public theater, the Theatre of Van Campen (Schouwburg), opens on Keizersgracht
- 1638 Dutch Premier Van Joost speaks of "Hostage Rights of Aemstel"
- 1653 The Coonan Cross Oath is taken in the Saint Thomas Christian community in an effort to avoid submission to Portuguese rule in India
- 1749 Benning Wentworth issues the first of the New Hampshire Grants, leading to the establishment of Vermont
- 1750 Tax revolt in Haarlem, Netherlands
- 1752 The Dutch East India Company ship "Geldermalsen" sinks, killing 80 people
Battle of Princeton
1777 General George Washington's Revolutionary Army defeats British forces at the Battle of Princeton, New Jersey
Austin Granted Land
1823 Stephen F. Austin receives a grant of land in Texas from the government of Mexico
- 1825 Scottish factory owner Robert Owen buys 30,000 acres in Indiana as the site for the New Harmony utopian community
- 1831 Oxford Provident Building Association, the first US building and loan association, is founded in Frankford, Pennsylvania
- 1833 British forces seize control of the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic
- 1834 The government of Mexico imprisons Stephen F. Austin in Mexico City
- 1840 First deep-sea sounding by James Clark Ross in the South Atlantic at 2,425 fathoms (14,450 feet)
Dickens Travels to America
1842 Charles Dickens and his wife, Catherine, leave Liverpool, England, for America on board the RMS Britannia
- 1843 Gaetano Donizetti's opera "Don Pasquale" premieres at the Théâtre-Italien in Paris, France
- 1848 Joseph Jenkins Roberts is sworn in as the first President of the independent African Republic of Liberia
- 1852 195 Chinese immigrants arrive in Hawaii aboard the Thetis under Captain John Cass
- 1861 Georgia seizes control of U.S. Fort Pulaski and Fort Jackson in Savannah
- 1861 The US state of Delaware legislature rejects a proposal to join the Confederacy
- 1861 US Civil War: Federal Fort Morgan in Mobile, Alabama, is seized by Confederate forces
Jackson Moves North
1862 US Civil War Romney Campaign: Stonewall Jackson moves north from Winchester, Virginia
- 1868 The Meiji Restoration returns authority to Japan's emperors
Brooklyn Bridge Opens
1870 Construction begins on New York's Brooklyn Bridge; completed May 24, 1883
- 1871 Henry W. Bradley patents oleomargarine in Binghamton, New York
- 1872 The first patent list is issued by the US Patent Office
- 1885 Battle of Núi Bop begins in northern Vietnam during the Sino-French War
- 1888 Marvin C. Stone patents the first wax-coated paper drinking straw in Washington, D.C.
- 1889 Admission convention meets in Ellensburg, Washington, to request statehood
Nietzsche's Breakdown
1889 German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche suffers a mental breakdown after supposedly witnessing a horse flogging
- 1890 First US college-level dairy school opens at the University of Wisconsin
Iolanta
1893 Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's final opera, "Iolanta," is first performed outside of Russia in Hamburg, Germany
- 1896 Emperor Wilhelm congratulates President Kruger on repelling the Jameson Raid
- 1899 The first known use of the word "automobile" appears in an editorial in The New York Times
- 1900 Gerhart Hauptmann's play "Schluck und Jau," premieres in Berlin
- 1902 Due to a poor pitch, Australian batsman Reggie Duff is held back to No. 10 on Test debut against England at MCG and scores 104
- 1910 British miners strike against mandated eight-hour working day
- 1911 A magnitude 7.7 earthquake destroys the city of Almaty in Russian Turkestan
- 1911 The government of India announces that emigration to Natal, Southern Africa, is prohibited with effect from 1 July
Siege of Sidney Street
1911 The Siege of Sidney Street: a firefight breaks out in London's East End between a Latvian gang and the police, who request army backup. The siege is caught on camera by Pathé News, with Winston Churchill observing [1]
- 1911 The United States Postal Savings System is inaugurated
Liberty Bell
1912 Southern Pacific Railroad offers to bring the Liberty Bell to the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco for free
- 1918 US Employment Service opens as a unit of the Department of Labor
Hoover Takes on War Relief
1919 Herbert Hoover is placed in charge of war relief in Europe
- 1919 The Faisal-Weizmann Agreement, a short-lived agreement for the development of a Jewish homeland in Palestine, is signed by the King of Iraq and the President of the World Zionist Organization
- 1920 Arthur Honegger's symphonic poem "Chant de Nigamon" (The Song of Nigamon) premieres at the Cirque d'Hiver in Paris, France
Curse of the Bambino
1920 Boston Red Sox baseball club owner Harry Frazee announces agreement to sell slugger Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees for $125,000 in cash and a $350,000 loan; start of the 84 year "Curse of the Bambino"
Il Duce the Dictator
1925 Benito Mussolini dissolves the Italian Parliament and proclaims himself dictator of Italy, taking the title Il Duce (the Leader)
Bradman's 1st Test Century
1929 Australian cricket icon Don Bradman follows up a first-innings 79 by scoring 112 in the third Test against England in Melbourne; his first of 29 Test centuries
- 1931 Montreal Maroons center Nels Stewart scores the fastest two goals in NHL history with a pair four seconds apart in a 5-3 win over the Boston Bruins at Montreal Arena
- 1933 IJmuiden Federation fishing strike begins; the longest fishing industry strike in history, lasting until July 11
- 1933 Minnie D. Craig becomes the first woman elected as Speaker of the North Dakota House of Representatives, the first woman to hold a Speaker position anywhere in the United States
- 1939 Gene Cox becomes the first girl page to serve in the US House of Representatives
- 1940 WPG-AM in Atlantic City, New Jersey, consolidates with WBIL and WOV as "new" WOV
- 1941 Canada and the US sign a 99-year lease for military bases in Newfoundland
- 1941 Italian forces launch a counteroffensive against the Greeks in Albania
Symphonic Dances
1941 Sergei Rachmaninoff's final composition, "Symphonic Dances," premieres in Philadelphia, with Eugene Ormandy conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra
- 1941 The American National Collegiate Football Rules Committee announces a new rule permitting free substitution of players
- 1943 Canadian Army troops arrive in Algiers, North Africa
- 1943 First missing persons telecast takes place in New York City
- 1943 Max and Doug Bentley assist on brother Reg's only NHL goal in the Chicago Blackhawks' 3-3 tie with the Rangers in NYC; the only time in NHL history a trio of family members scores and assists on a scoring play
Flying Ace Shot Down
1944 World War II: Top US flying ace Major Gregory "Pappy" Boyington is shot down in his F4U Corsair by Japanese Captain Masajiro Kawato flying a Zero and survives as a POW
Okinawa and Iwo Jima
1945 Admiral Chester Nimitz begins planning assaults on Okinawa and Iwo Jima in Japan
- 1945 Allies land on the west coast of Burma and successfully occupy Akyab
- 1945 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill visits France
- 1945 Cato-Meridian School in New York installs germicidal lamps in every room
- 1945 General Nikolaos Plastiras becomes Prime Minister of Greece
- 1945 John Patrick's play "The Hasty Heart" premieres at the Hudson Theatre in New York City
- 1945 Task Force 38 begins a series of airstrikes against targets on Formosa and Luzon
Luciano's Sentence Commuted
1946 As a reward for his wartime cooperation, Governor Thomas E. Dewey commutes Charles "Lucky" Luciano's pandering sentence on condition that he does not resist deportation to Italy
- 1947 The opening session of Congress is first televised; it does not happen again until 1977
- 1949 Dramatic anthology series "Colgate Theatre" premieres on NBC TV
- 1949 The Central Bank of the Philippines is founded (later taken over by BSP)
- 1949 US Representative William L. Dawson becomes the first Black person to head a congressional committee; Committee on Expenditures in the Executive Departments (now known as Committee on Oversight and Reform)
- 1949 West Indian cricket batsman Everton Weekes scores 101 in 3rd Test against India in Calcutta; his world record fifth consecutive Test century
- 1952 "Dragnet," created by and starring Jack Webb, premieres on NBC TV
- 1953 Frances Bolton and her son, Oliver Bolton, are the first mother and son to serve simultaneously in the U.S. Congress, both representing Ohio
- 1956 A major fire caused by a television transmitter damages the top part of the Eiffel Tower
- 1957 First electric watch, the Hamilton Electric 500, is introduced by the Hamilton Watch Company in Lancaster, Pennsylvania
- 1958 Australian cricket fast bowler Lindsay Kline takes a hat-trick (Eddie Fuller, Hugh Tayfield, Neil Adcock) as South Africa is dismissed for 99 in the follow-on 2nd Test at Cape Town
- 1958 The West Indies Federation is formed, comprising former British Caribbean territories, with its capital at Port of Spain
Event of Interest
1959 US President Dwight D. Eisenhower admits Alaska as the 49th US state
Powell Elected to Committee
1961 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. is elected chairman of the U.S. House Education and Labor Committee
- 1961 An explosion at the Nuclear Reactor Testing Station in Idaho Falls kills three operators
- 1961 US President Dwight D. Eisenhower breaks diplomatic relations with Cuba and closes the embassy in Havana
- 1962 Ground is broken for the Houston Astrodome, a multipurpose domed stadium in Houston, Texas
Castro Excommunicated
1962 Pope John XXIII excommunicates Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro
- 1963 WOUB TV channel 20 in Athens, Ohio (PBS) begins broadcasting
- 1966 Floyd B. McKissick is named the National Director of the Congress of Racial Equality
- 1967 WJAN-TV channel 17 in Canton, Ohio (IND) begins broadcasting
- 1969 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. returns to his seat in the US House of Representatives after being re-elected, following his previous expulsion from Congress
- 1969 Authorities in New Jersey seize 30,000 copies of John Lennon and Yoko Ono's album "Two Virgins," declaring it obscene
- 1969 France begins an arms embargo against Israel
- 1970 WHAG-TV channel 25 in Hagerstown, Maryland (NBC) begins broadcasting
- 1972 The Irish Republican Army (IRA) explodes a bomb in Callender Street, Belfast, injuring over 60 people
NY Yankees Sale
1973 A 12-man syndicate led by Michael Burke and George Steinbrenner III buys MLB's New York Yankees from CBS for US$10 million
- 1974 Miguel Piñero's "Short Eyes" premieres in New York City
- 1974 Price of gold hits record $121.25 an ounce in London
- 1974 The Socialist Republic of the Union of Burma adopts its second constitution
- 1976 The US conducts an underground nuclear test at the Nevada Test Site
- 1977 "The Police Tapes" premieres on New York City TV station WNET, based on 1970s NYPD officers who work in the South Bronx
Apple Incorporated
1977 Apple Computer, Inc. is officially incorporated by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak
- 1977 Former Home Secretary Roy Jenkins announces his intention to be Britain's first President of the European Commission
- 1978 Indian cricket spin bowler B. S. Chandrasekhar becomes the first in Test history to register identical figures in both innings (6 for 52) in India's innings win over Australia in the 3rd Test in Melbourne
- 1980 Babrak Karmal defends the Soviet-backed coup in his first public appearance since taking power as President of Afghanistan
- 1980 Price of gold hits record $634 an ounce
Million Dollar World Challenge
1981 American golfer Johnny Miller wins the sport's first $1 million tournament when he beats Seve Ballesteros of Spain in a playoff in the inaugural Million Dollar World Challenge at Sun City, South Africa
- 1981 NBA's Cleveland Cavaliers retire Austin Carr's jersey number 34
- 1983 Dallas running back Tony Dorsett sets NFL record with 99-yard rush in the Cowboys' 31-27 defeat at Minnesota Vikings
Syria Frees US Pilot
1984 Syria frees captured U.S. pilot Robert O. Goodman Jr. after an appeal from activist Reverend Jesse Jackson
- 1985 Future Indian cricket captain Mohammad Azharuddin scores 110 on debut in drawn 3rd Test against England in Kolkata
- 1985 Israel's government confirms they secretly resettled 10,000 Ethiopian Jews
Price's Final Aida Appearance
1985 Leontyne Price makes her final operatic appearance in a televised performance of "Aida" at the Metropolitan Opera in New York
McConnell US Senator
1985 Mitch McConnell becomes the Senator of Kentucky
- 1988 "Roy Orbison and Friends: A Black and White Night" premieres on Cinemax featuring James Burton, Bonnie Raitt, Bruce Springsteen, Elvis Costello, Tom Waits, and k.d. lang
- 1988 Israel orders nine Palestinians to be deported from West Beirut, labeling them "instigators"
Thatcher Longest-Serving PM
1988 Margaret Thatcher becomes the longest-serving British Prime Minister of the century
- 1989 Russian newspaper Izvestia publishes its first commercial advertisement
Noriega Surrenders
1990 Panamanian dictator General Manuel Noriega surrenders to U.S. authorities
- 1991 Eight Iraqi embassy officials are expelled from the UK
- 1991 Israel reopens its consulate in Moscow after 23 years
Gretsky Youngest to 700
1991 Wayne Gretzky becomes the fastest and youngest player in NHL history to score 700 goals (886 games at age 29 years, 342 days) in the LA Kings’ 6-3 win over the NY Islanders at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum
- 1992 Cuban helicopter pilot escapes Cuba by abandoning a group of tourists to pick up his wife and 32 family members in an MI-8 helicopter and flies to Miami to seek asylum [1]
- 1992 English club Wigan pays Widnes a world record rugby league transfer fee of £440,000 for Great Britain international winger Martin Offiah
- 1993 "The Comeback": quarterback Frank Reich leads the Buffalo Bills back from a 32-point deficit to defeat the Houston Oilers 41-38 in overtime in a wild card playoff game, the greatest comeback ever in NFL history
Start II Signed
1993 In Moscow, the START II arms reduction treaty is signed by US President George H. W. Bush and Russian President Boris Yeltsin
Event of Interest
1993 Michael Milken, the "junk bond king," is released from prison after serving 22 months
- 1994 28-foot-tall Chief Wahoo, the trademark of the Cleveland Indians, is taken down from Cleveland Municipal Stadium and later moved to Jacobs Field
- 1994 Baikal Airlines Flight 130 crashes in Irkutsk, Siberia, killing 125 people
- 1994 More than 100 inmates are killed in a Venezuelan prison riot
Black Citizenship Restored
1994 More than 7 million Black South Africans have their citizenship restored, announced on 15 December 1993 by the parliament of President F. W. de Klerk, effective four months before the first non-racial polls on 27 April 1994
- 1994 Steve Young of the San Francisco 49ers becomes the first quarterback to win three consecutive NFL passing titles despite a 37-34 overtime loss to the Philadelphia Eagles; he is also the first to achieve three consecutive passer ratings of 100 or more
- 1996 First successful clamshell flip mobile phone, the Motorola StarTAC, goes on sale; eventually, 60 million units are sold
- 1997 Bryant Gumbel co-hosts his final "Today" show on NBC-TV
- 1997 Texas-El Paso head basketball coach Don Haskins becomes 10th coach in NCAA Division I history to record 700 career wins when the Miners edge SMU, 66-64
- 1997 The People's Republic of China announces it will spend US$27.7 billion to combat erosion and pollution in the Yangtze and Yellow River valleys
- 1997 Zimbabwe cricket fast bowler Eddo Brandes takes ODI hat-trick as home team scores another upset against England, winning by 131 runs and sweeping series, 3-0 in Harare
- 1998 American "Hee Haw" banjo player Grandpa Jones suffers a stroke
- 1998 Los Angeles Clippers Bill Fitch coaches his 2,000th NBA game, a 97-88 win against the Dallas Mavericks at the LA Memorial Sports Arena
- 1999 Israel detains and later expels 14 members of the Denver-based Concerned Christians group
- 1999 NASA's Mars Polar Lander launches; the mission later fails after communication is lost while trying to land on Mars
- 2001 Rapper Vanilla Ice spends a night in jail after allegedly pulling out some of his wife's hair during an argument
- 2002 Israeli military forces seize the Palestinian freighter Karine A in the Red Sea
American Top 40
2004 After hosting the show for over 30 years, Casey Kasem steps down as host of "American Top 40" and is succeeded by Ryan Seacrest
- 2004 Flight 604, a Boeing 737 owned by Egyptian airline Flash Airlines, plunges into the Red Sea, killing all 148 people on board
- 2004 Panthers kicker John Kasay ties the NFL playoff record with five field goals to lead Carolina to a 29-10 win over the Dallas Cowboys in the Wild Card round of the playoffs in Charlotte, North Carolina
The Late Late Show
2005 Scottish comedian Craig Ferguson becomes the host of "The Late Late Show" on CBS and hosts the program through 2014
- 2007 High-profile Miami Dolphins NFL head coach Nick Saban resigns after agreeing to return to college football to take a head coaching job at Alabama
- 2007 National Express experiences its worst-ever coach crash just outside Heathrow Airport, killing three passengers and injuring four
- 2009 Israeli tanks and troops launch a ground invasion to reoccupy Gaza, Palestine
- 2009 The Bitcoin network is launched as the first block of the digital currency is mined by a person or group of people using the name Satoshi Nakamoto
- 2010 Phil Taylor successfully defends his PDC World Darts title with a 7–3 victory over Simon Whitlock of Australia in the final in London; Taylor's 13th PDC and 15th overall world championship
- 2011 Adrian Lewis of England wins his first PDC World Darts Championship with a 7-5 win over Scotsman Gary Anderson at the Alexandra Palace, London
- 2012 Michael van Gerwen named Young Player of the Year at the PDC annual awards ceremony
- 2013 27 Shiite pilgrims are killed and 60 are injured by a suicide bombing in Musayyib, Iraq
- 2014 Cambodian garment workers go on strike demanding a wage increase
- 2015 Over 2,000 people are killed in north-east Nigeria after Boko Haram militants raze the town of Baga
- 2016 Jimmy Butler breaks Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls record for points in an NBA half, scoring 40 of his 42 points in the second half to lead the Bulls in a 115-113 victory over the Toronto Raptors
- 2016 Scotsman Gary Anderson retains his PDC World Darts Championship, beating Adrian Lewis of England, 7-5 at the Alexandra Palace, London
- 2018 First bionic hand with a sense of touch, for use outside a lab unveiled in Rome [1]
- 2018 Landslides and flooding caused by heavy rains in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, kill at least 37
- 2018 Previously unknown ancient Beringian group is unearthed in Alaska, among the earliest known Native American groups, dating to about 11,500 years ago [1]
- 2018 Security experts reveal two security flaws, Meltdown and Spectre, which affect most microprocessors
- 2019 "Surviving R. Kelly" docuseries investigating sexual abuse by R&B singer R. Kelly premieres on Lifetime in the US
- 2019 Archaeologists in Mexico announce the discovery of a pre-Aztec temple dedicated to the god Xipe Tótec in Puebla state, dated 900-1150 AD [1]
- 2019 Chinese Chang'e-4 spacecraft becomes the first ever to touch down on the far side of the Moon
116th Congress
2019 Democrats reclaim power in the House as the 116th US Congress convenes in Washington, D.C., electing Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House of Representatives for the second time
- 2020 US drone strike kills top Iranian security and intelligence commander, Major General Qasem Soleimani, outside Baghdad airport in Iraq
- 2021 Welshman Gerwyn Price wins his first PDC World Darts Championship; beats Gary Anderson of Scotland, 7-3 at the Alexandra Palace in London
- 2022 America records one million new COVID-19 cases for the first time, Omicron accounting for an estimated 95% of these [1]
- 2022 Apple becomes the first US company to be worth $3 trillion in value, after tripling its price in under four years [1]
Holmes Guilty of Fraud
2022 Elizabeth Holmes, founder of blood-testing startup Theranos, is found guilty on four counts of fraud in San Jose, California [1]
- 2022 Rock singer David Lee Roth cancels his pre-retirement residency in Las Vegas due to "unforeseen circumstances related to COVID"
- 2022 Scotsman Peter Wright wins his second PDC World Darts Championship; beats Michael Smith of England, 7-5 at the Alexandra Palace in London
- 2023 England's Michael Smith hits a nine-dart finish on the way to his first PDC world darts title, beating Dutchman Michael van Gerwen, 7-4 at the Alexandra Palace, London
- 2024 In an all-English final, Luke Humphries claims his first PDC World Darts Championship with a 7-4 win over 16-year-old prodigy Luke Littler at the Alexandra Palace, London
- 2024 Jeffrey Epstein's court documents listing his associates are made public from the 2015 defamation trial against Ghislaine Maxwell [1]
- 2024 Lowest January temperature of -43.6 Celsius (-46.5 Fahrenheit) recorded in Sweden for 25 years in Kvikkjokk-Årrenjarka, Swedish Lapland, amid an icy spell across Scandinavia [1]
- 2024 Two explosions kill at least 95 people during a commemorative ceremony marking the assassination of Qasem Soleimani in Kerman, Iran
Youngest Ever Darts Champion
2025 17-year-old English darts prodigy Luke Littler becomes the youngest-ever world champion when he beats three-time title winner Michael van Gerwen 7-3 in the PDC World Championship final in London
- 2026 18-year-old Luke Littler claims back-to-back titles with a commanding 7-1 win over Dutchman Gian van Veen in the World Darts Championship final in London
Avatar Sequel Earns $1B
2026 James Cameron's sci-fi film sequel "Avatar: Fire and Ash" crosses the $1 billion worldwide box office threshold in its third week in theaters, exceeding $300 million in North America
US Attack on Venezuela
2026 US military raids the presidential compound in Caracas and captures Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores; they are transported to New York City to face US federal drug trafficking charges, while Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez assumes interim power [1]
