On January 27th...

Auschwitz Liberation Day
Holocaust Memorial Day (United Kingdom)
National Chocolate Cake Day

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1443 Albert, Duke of Saxony, was born.

1538 The states of Gelderland accepted Willem van Kleef as Viceroy.

1662 The first American lime kiln began operation in Providence, Rhode Island.

1756 Composer Wolfang Amadeus Mozart was born.

1775 Philosopher Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling was born.

1785 The first state university in the United States was chartered in Athens, Georgia.

1816 British Admiral Samuel Hood died.

1825 The U. S. Congress approved the establishment of Indian Territory in what is now Oklahoma.

1832 Author Lewis Carroll was born.

1850 American labor leader Samuel Gompers was born.

1851 Ornithologist and painter John James Audubon died.

1854 The Canadian Great Western Railway started operating.

1857 American politician Preston Brooks died.

1859 Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany was born.

1870 The first sorority, Kappa Alpha Theta, was established at DePauw University.
1870 Manitoba and the Northwest Territories were incorporated.

1880 Thomas Edison was granted a patent for his incandescent light.

1885 Composer Jerome Kern was born.

1888 The National Geographic Society was formed in Washington, D. C.

1891 A mine explosion at Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania, killed 109 persons.

1894 The University of Chicago beat Chicago YMCA 19-11 in the first ever college basketball game.

1900 The Social Democrat Party of America held its first convention.
1900 Georgia Neese Clark Gray, the first woman Treasurer of the United States, was born.
1900 U. S. Navy Admiral Hyman Rickover was born.

1901 Composer Giuseppe Verdi died.

1902 An explosion at a subway construction site in New York City, New York, killed 5 workers.

1905 Actor Howard McNear was born.

1908 Newspaper owner William Randolph Hearst, Jr., was born.

1909 The Young Left was founded in Norway.

1915 U. S. Marines occupied Haiti.

1918 The film Tarzan of the Apes premiered.

1921 Actress Donna Reed was born.

1922 Journalist Nellie Bly died.

1926 The U. S. Senate voted in favor of the United States joining the World Court.

1927 Radio and television journalist Nancy Dickerson was born.

1930 Singer Bobby Bland was born.

1944 The Siege of Leningrad (Russia) ended.

1945 Soviet troops liberated Auschwitz and Birkenau Concentration Camps in Poland.
1945 Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason was born.

1948 Ballet dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov was born.

1955 John G. Roberts, Chief Justice of the United States was born.

1956 Elvis Presley's "Heartbreak Hotel" was released.

1960 Oswaldo Aranha, Brazilian politician and diplomat, died.

1961 "Sing Along with Mitch" premiered on NBC-TV.

1964 Introducing the Beatles was released in the United States.
1964 Actress Bridget Fonda was born.

1965 Iranian Premier Hassan Ali Mansour died of wounds inflicted by an assassin on January 21.
1965 The first ground station-to-aircraft radio communication via satellite was completed.

1967 A flash fire inside an Apollo spacecraft killed astronauts Virgil I. Grissom, Edward H. White II, and Roger B. Chaffee.
1967 A treaty banning military use of nuclear weapons in space was signed.
1967 The Beatles signed a 9-year worldwide contract with EMI records.
1967 The New Orleans Saints signed their first player, Paige Cothren (kicker).

1972 Singer Mahalia Jackson died.

1973 The United States and North Vietnam signed a cease-fire.
1974 UCLA won its 61st consecutive basketball game to set a new NCAA record.

1976 "Laverne and Shirley" premiered on ABC-TV.

1977 "Roots" premiered on ABC-TV.

1982 Mauno Koivisto was inaugurated as President of Finland.
1982 Robert S. Cordova was inaugurated as President of Honduras.

1983 The world's longest underwater tunnel, connecting Honshu and Hokkaido, Japan (33.5 miles), opened.

1984 Michael Jackson suffered burns while filming a Pepsi commercial.

1991 Nadine Strossen became the first female president of the ACLU.
1991 The New York Giants defeated the Buffalo Bills 20-19 in Super Bowl XXV.

1993 A DC-3 crashed in Kinshasa, Congo, killing 12 persons.
1993 Wrestler André the Giant died.

1994 Actor Claude Akins died.

1996 Colonel Ibrahim Baré Maïnassar overthrew President Mahamane Ousmane of Niger in a military coup.
1996 Ralph Webster Yarborough, former U. S. Senator from Texas, died.

1998 A crane crashed into the Roosevelt Island (New York, New York) Tram, injuring 10 persons.

2004 Talk show host Jack Paar died.

2008 Gordon Hinckley, president of the Mormon Church, died.

2009 Author John Updike died.

2010 Author J. D. Salinger died.

2013 A series of bomb attacks in Kandahar, Afghanistan, killed 20 police officers.
2013 A bus crashed down a ravine in Serta, Portugal, killing 11 persons and injuring 32 others.
2013 A retaining wall collapsed during a football match at the Ugur (Turkey) Sports Facility, killing 7 persons and injuring 3 others.

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This page was last updated on January 27, 2019.