TODAY HISTORY LESSON: JANUARY 18
532 Nika uprising against Emperor Justinian I in Constantinople fails, 30,000 killed by troops loyal to the Emperor in the Hippodrome
1486 Henry VII marries Elizabeth of York
1591 King Naresuan of Siam kills Crown Prince Minchit Sra of Burma in single combat, date is now observed as Royal Thai Armed Forces day
1644 Perplexed Pilgrims in Boston reported America’s 1st UFO sighting
1733 The first polar bear was exhibited in America, in Boston.
1778 Captain James Cook discovers the Hawaiian Islands, naming them the ‘Sandwich Islands’ after the First Lord of the Admiralty, Lord Sandwich.
1788 First elements of the First Fleet carrying 736 convicts from England to Australia arrives at Botany Bay to set up a penal colony
1803 Thomas Jefferson, in secret communication with Congress, sought authorization for the first official exploration by the U.S. government.
1836 Jim Bowie arrives at the Alamo to assist its Texas defenders.
1862 Confederate Territory of Arizona is formed
1886 Modern hockey is born. The foundation of The Hockey Association in England formalized a modern version of the game that had already been played in ancient times.
1943 Insurgents in the Warsaw Ghetto take up arms against the German oppressors
1943 U.S. commercial bakers stopped selling sliced bread. Only whole loaves were sold during the ban until the end of World War II.
1948 Gandhi breaks a 121-hour fast after halting Muslim-Hindu riots.
1962 The United States begins spraying foliage with herbicides in South Vietnam, in order to reveal the whereabouts of Vietcong guerrillas.
1967 Albert DeSalvo, who claimed to be the “Boston Strangler,” was convicted in Cambridge, MA, of armed robbery, assault and sex offenses. He was sentenced to life in prison. Desalvo was killed in 1973 by a fellow inmate.
1978 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) isolate the cause of Legionnaire’s disease.
1981 Iran accepts US offer of $7.9 billion in frozen assets
1990 In an FBI sting, Washington, DC, Mayor Marion Barry was arrested for drug possession. He was later convicted of a misdemeanor.
1991 Iraq starts firing Scud missiles at Israeli cities.
1991 US acknowledges CIA and US Army paid Noriega $320,000 over his career
1995 A network of caves were discovered near the town of Vallon-Pont-d’Arc in southern France. The caves contained paintings and engravings that were 17,000 to 20,000 years old.
1997 Børge Ousland becomes the first person to cross Antarctica alone and unaided
2002 The Sierra Leone Civil War ends. The conflict had lasted 11 years and left over 50,000 dead.
2012 Wikipedia began a 24-hour “blackout” in protest against proposed anti-piracy legislation (S. 968 and H.R. 3261) known as the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House. Many websites, including Reddit, Google, Facebook, Amazon and others, contended would make it challenging if not impossible for them to operate.
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
