On January 22nd...

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1371 Robert II was crowned King of Scotland.

1440 Tsar Ivan III of Russia was born.

1506 The first contingent of 150 Swiss Guards arrived at the Vatican.

1517 Ottoman forces took Cairo, capital of the Mamluk Sultanate.

1528 England and France declared war on Emperor Charles V.

1561 Author Francis Bacon was born.

1673 Postal service between New York, New York, and Boston, Massachusetts, was inaugurated.

1689 Prime William of Orange summoned the Convention Parliament.

1690 Iroquois tribes renewed their allegiance to the British against the French.

1771 Spain ceded the Falkland Islands to Great Britain.

1775 André-Marie Ampère, physicist and mathematician, was born.

1777 Astronomer Jeremiah Dixon died.

1788 Poet Lord Byron was born.

1802 Architect Richard Upjohn was born.

1814 The first Knights Templar grand encampment in the United States was held in New York City, New York.

1824 Ashantis defeated British forces in the Gold Coast.

1849 Dramatist August Strindberg was born.

1857 The National Association of Baseball Players was founded.

1862 The Confederate States of America raised the premium for volunteers from $10 to $20.

1873 The British ship SS Northfleet sank off Dungeness, England, killing about 300 people.

1875 Film director D. W. Griffith was born.

1879 A British garrison of 150 held off an assault by about 4,000 Zulu warriors at Isandhlwana, South Africa.

1881 The ancient Egyptian obelisk "Cleopatra's Needle" was erected in New York City, New York's, Central Park.

1889 Columbia Phonograph was formed in Washington, D. C.

1890 Jurist Fred M. Vinson was born.

1895 The National Association of Manufacturers was organized in Cincinnati, Ohio.

1899 Leaders of six Australian colonies met in Melbourne to discuss confederation.

1901 Queen Victoria of Great Britain died.

1904 Choreographer George Balanchine was born.

1905 Russian troops in St. Petersburg fired on workers seeking to present a petition to the Tsar.

1906 The SS Valencia ran aground on rocks off Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, killing more than 130 people.

1907 Douglas Corrigan, American aviator who "accidentally" made a solo transatlantic flight, was born.

1909 Actress Ann Sothern was born.
1909 U Thant, Secretary-General of the United Nations, was born.

1911 Austrian Chancellor Bruno Kreisky was born.

1918 Ukraine was proclaimed a free republic.

1922 Lehman Caves National Monument was established.
1922 Actor Telly Savalas was born.
1922 Pope Benedict XV died.

1924 E. M. Laird Company changed its name to Swallow Airplane Manufacturing Company.

1928 U. S. Senator Birch Bayh was born.

1930 Ground was broken for the Empire State Building.

1931 Sir Isaac Isaacs was sworn in as the first Australian-born Governor-General of Australia.
1931 Singer Sam Cooke was born.
1931 Ballerina Anna Pavlova died.

1932 The British Anglican and Old-Catholic churches merged.
1932 Actress Piper Laurie was born.

1934 Actor Bill Bixby was born.
1934 Chef Graham Kerr was born.

1936 Chemist Alan J. Heeger was born.
1936 Ong Teng Cheong, 5th President of Singapore, was born.

1937 Author Joseph Wambaugh was born.

1939 Aquatic Park, near Fisherman's Wharf, San Francisco, was dedicated.
1939 The uranium atom was first split, at Columbia University.

1940 Singer Addie Harris was born.
1940 Actor John Hurt was born.

1941 British and Australian troops captured Tobruk from the Italians.

1944 The Allies were stopped on the beach at the Battle of Anzio (Italy).

1946 The U. S. Central Intelligence Agency was established.

1947 The first commercial television station west of the Mississippi River began broadcasting from Hollywood, California.

1949 The cross-country tour of the Freedom Train ended.
1949 Singer Steve Perry was born.

1950 Actor Alan Hale, Sr. was born.

1955 Actor John Wesley Shipp was born.

1956 An interurban train derailed as it rounded a curve in Los Angeles, California, killing 29 persons.

1957 Israel withdrew its forces from the Sinai Peninsula.

1958 The first public television station in Puerto Rico went into operation.

1959 Actress Linda Blair was born.

1960 A landslide struck a school on Mindanao Island, Philippines, burying 40 children alive.

1964 Kenneth Kaunda became the first Premier of Northern Rhodesia.

1965 Musician Steven Adler was born.
1965 Actress Diane Lane was born.

1968 Apollo 5, an unmanned lunar module, was launched toward the Moon.
1968 "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" premiered on NBC-TV.
1968 The NBA announced the awarding of expansion franchises to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Phoenix, Arizona.

1970 The first commercial Boeing 747 flight was made, from New York, New York, to London, England.

1972 "Emergency" premiered on NBC-TV.

1973 George Foreman won the World Heavyweight Boxing Championship from Joe Frazier.
1973 The United States, North and South Vietnam, and the Vietcong signed a boundary accord.
1973 Lyndon Baines Johnson, 34th President of the United States, died.

1984 The Los Angeles Raiders defeated the Washington Redskins 38-9 in Super Bowl XVIII.

1987 Pennsylvania politician R. Budd Dwyer shot and killed himself during a live nationally-televised press conference.

1988 Mike Tyson TKO'd Larry Holmes in 4 rounds to retain the heavyweight boxing title.

1989 The San Francisco 49ers defeated the Cincinnati Bengals 20-16 in Super Bowl XXIII.

1994 Actor Telly Savalas died.

1995 Kennedy family matriarch Rose Kennedy died.

2002 Kmart Corporation filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

2003 Cartoonist Bill Mauldin died.

2006 Evo Morales was inaugurated as the first indigenous President of Bolivia.

2012 College football coach Joe Paterno died.

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This page was last updated on January 22, 2019.