On January 7th...

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1502 Pope Gregory XIII was born.

1536 Catherine of Aragon, first wife of King Henry VIII of England, died.

1558 Calais, the last English possession in France, was retaken by the French.

1579 England signed an offensive and defensive alliance with the Netherlands.

1587 The "Cittie of Raleigh in Virginia" was incorporated by the British Parliament.

1601 Robert, Earl of Essex led a revolt in London against Queen Elizabeth.

1608 Fire destroyed Jamestown, Virginia.

1618 Francis Bacon became Lord Chancellor of England.

1655 Pope Innocent X died.

1714 Henry Mill patented a typewriter.

1718 Israel Putnam, Revolutionary War general, was born.

1782 The first commercial bank in the United States, the Bank of North America, opened in Philadelphia.

1784 The first seed business in the United States was established in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, by David Landreth.

1785 Jean-Pierre Blanchard and John Jeffries made the first ever balloon crossing of the English Channel.

1789 The first U. S. presidential elections were held.

1800 Millard Fillmore, 13th President of the United States, was born.

1817 The second Bank of the United States opened in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

1822 Liberia was colonized by Americans.

1830 The first railroad station in the United States opened in Baltimore, Maryland.

1862 The Battle of Manassas Junction (Virginia) was fought.

1890 William Purvis was granted a patent for the fountain pen.

1894 A 5-second film of Fred Ott sneezing, shot by Edison Manufacturing, became the first film to be copyrighted.

1896 Fannie Farmer published her first cookbook.

1899 Walter Camp published his first All-American football team in Collier's.

1911 The Dutch Scouts Organization was established in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

1913 William M Burton patented a process to "crack" petroleum.

1914 The first steamboat passed through the Panama Canal.

1919 The Industrial and Commercial Workers' Union of South Africa was founded.

1920 The New York State Assembly refused to seat five elected Socialists.

1927 Transatlantic commercial telephone service began between New York, New York, and London, England.
1927 The Harlem Globetrotters* played their first game.

1928 Author William Peter Blatty was born.

1929 The "Buck Rogers" comic strip debuted.
1929 The "Tarzan" comic strip debuted.

1930 Marguerite Perey discovered the element francium.

1931 Guy Menzies completed the first solo non-stop flight from Australia to New Zealand, in 11 hours 45 minutes.

1934 The "Flash Gordon" comic strip debuted.

1936 Tennis champions Helen Moody and Howard Kinsley volleyed 2,001 times over a period of 1 hour 18 minutes.

1938 Musician Paul Revere was born.

1942 The Siege of Bataan began.

1943 Electrical engineer Nikola Tesla died.

1946 Cambodia became an autonomous state within the French Union.

1948 Kentucky Air National Guard pilot Thomas Mantell crashed while pursuing a UFO.
1948 Singer Kenny Loggins was born.

1950 The mental health wing of Mercy Hospital in Davenport, Iowa, burned, killing 41 persons.

1954 The first demonstration of a machine translation system was held at IBM's corporate office in New York City, New York.

1955 Marian Anderson became the first African-American to sing a major role on the stage of the New York Metropolitan Opera.

1957 Talk show host Katie Couric was born.

1959 A Soviet rocket became the first man-made object to orbit the Sun.

1960 Kou Abhay was named Prime Minister of Laos by King Savang Vathana.

1961 A motor launch caught fire and sank in the Persian Gulf, killing 88 persons.

1963 Learjet Corporation began business in Wichita, Kansas.
1963 The price of a first class U. S. postage stamp was raised from 4 cents to 5 cents.

1964 The Bahamas inaugurated internal self-government.
1964 Actor Nicolas Cage was born.

1967 "Newlywed Game" premiered on ABC-TV.

1968 The price of a first class U. S.postage stamp was raised from 5 cents to 6 cents.
1968 "GE College Bowl" premiered on NBC-TV.

1972 An Iberian Airlines plane crashed into an 800-foot peak on the island of Ibiza, killing 104 persons.
1972 Lewis F. Powell, Jr., and William H. Rehnquist were sworn in as Associate Justices of the U. S. Supreme Court.

1973 The British Darts Organisation was founded in North London, England.

1979 Cambodian Premier Pol Pot was overthrown.

1980 U. S. President Jimmy Carter authorized legislation to bail out the Chrysler Corporation with a $1.5 billion loan.

1982 "Fame" premiered on NBC-TV.

1983 U. S. President Ronald Reagan ended a U. S. arms embargo against Guatemala.

1985 The Japanese space probe Sakigake was launched on a mission to Halley's Comet.

1986 U. S. President Ronald Reagan announced economic sanctions against Libya.

1989 The International Conference on Limitation of Chemical Weapons opened in Paris, France.
1989 Japanese Emperor Hirohito died.

1990 The Tower of Pisa was closed to the public.

1992 AT&T began selling video-telephones, for $1,499 each.

1993 The Fourth Republic of Ghana was inaugurated, with Jerry Rawlings as President.
1993 Jazz musician Dizzy Gillespie died.

1999 The impeachment trial of U. S. President Bill Clinton began in the Senate.

2007 Auto racer Bobby Hamilton died.

2012 A hot air balloon crashed in Caterton, New Zealand, killing 11 persons.

2015 A terrorist attack on the offices of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris, France, killed 12 persons and injured 11.
2015 A car bomb exploded in San'a, Yemen, killing 38 persons and injuring at least 63.

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This page was last updated on January 08, 2019.