1991 – The White House announced the start of Operation Desert Storm. The operation was designed to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait.
0027 BC – The Roman Empire is established, One of the events marking the beginning of the Imperium Romanum was the Roman Senate’s granting of the honorific Augustus to Octavian on this day.
0550 – Gothic War (535-552): The Ostrogoths, under King Totila, conquer Rome after a long siege, by bribing the Isaurian garrison
0929 – Emir Abd-ar-Rahman III of Cordoba declares himself caliph, thereby establishing the Caliphate of Cordoba.
1120 – The Council of Nablus is held, establishing the earliest surviving written laws of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem.
1412 – The Medici family are made official bankers of the Papacy.
1547 – Ivan the Terrible was crowned Czar of Russia.
1556 – Emperor Karel appoints his son Philip II, king of Spain
1572 – The Duke of Norfolk was tried for treason for complicity in the Ridolfi plot to restore Catholicism in England. He was executed on June 2.
1581 – English Parliament outlaws Roman Catholicism.
1605 – The first edition of El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (Book One of Don Quixote) by Miguel de Cervantes was published in Madrid.
1707 – The Scottish Parliament ratified the Act of Union, paving way for the creation of Great Britain
1749 – Hoax article advertising fictitious theatrical performer “The Bottle Conjuror” drew huge crowds to the Haymarket Theatre, London, whose inevitable non-appearance caused a riot. It’s alleged the Duke of Montagu perpetrated the fiasco to win a bet.
1761 – British took Pondicherry after siege, marking end of French dominion in India
1776 – Continental Congress approves enlistment of free blacks
1809 – French forces defeat Sir John Moore and kill him in the Battle of Corunna January 16 Sir Arthur Wellesley succeeds Moore as commander of British forces in the Peninsular War
1847 – John C. Fremont is appointed Governor of the new California Territory.
1864 – Danish-Prussian War (Second war of Schleswig): King Christian IX of Denmark declares war to the German Confederation in order to occupy Schleswig
1865 – General William Sherman issues Field Order #15 (land for blacks)
1883 – The United States Civil Service Commission was established as the Pendleton Act went into effect.
1900 – The U.S. Senate consented to the Anglo-German treaty of 1899, by which the U.K. renounced rights to the Samoan islands.
1908 – Pinnacles National Monument, California established
1909 – Ernest Shackleton’s expedition finds the magnetic South Pole.
1913 – British House of Commons accepts Home Rule for Ireland (but the Great War gets in the way of it happening)
1919 – The 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibited the sale or transportation of alcoholic beverages, was ratified. It was later repealed by the 21st Amendment.
1920 – 18th Amendment, the “”National Prohibition Act,”” becomes law. Individuals are allowed to produce wine for religious purposes
1925 – Leon Trotsky was dismissed as Chairman of the Revolutionary Council of the USSR.
1930 – USS Lexington provides power to Tacoma, WA, when floods knocked out city power plants
1941 – War Department forms first Army Air Corps squadron for black cadets
1944 – General Dwight D. Eisenhower took command of the Allied invasion force in London.
1945 – Adolf Hitler moves into his underground bunker, the so-called Fuhrerbunker.
1950 – Belgium, Luxembourg & Netherlands recognize Israel
1951 – World’s largest gas pipeline opens (Brownsville TX, to 134th St, New York City NY)
1953 – Egyptian Premier General Naguib disbands all political parties
1956 – President Gamal Abdal Nasser of Egypt vows to reconquer Palestine.
1961 – Mickey Mantle signed a contract that made him the highest paid baseball player in the American League at $75,000 for the 1961 season.
1962 – Suit accuses New York City NY Board of Education uses “racial quotas”
1969 – Czech student Jan Palach commits suicide by self-immolation in Prague, in protest against the Soviets’ crushing of the Prague Spring the year before
1979 – The Shah of Iran and his family fled Iran for Egypt.
1982 – Britain and the Vatican resumed full diplomatic relations after a break of over 400 years.
1984 – President Reagan called for peaceful competition with Moscow. He authorized research and development on space-age weapons capable of destroying incoming nuclear missiles, the program known as Star Wars.
1985 – “Playboy” magazine announced its 30-year tradition of stapling centerfold models in the bellybutton and elsewhere would come to an immediate end.
1986 – Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi said Libya would train, arm and protect Arab guerrillas for Palestinian suicide and terrorist missions, his first explicit endorsement of terrorism
1988 – Jimmy “The Greek” Snyder was fired as a CBS sports commentator one day after telling a TV station in Washington, DC, that, during the era of slavery, black people had been bred to produce stronger offspring.
1989 – Three days of riots begin in Miami after a police officer shoots and kills a black motorcyclist, which also claims the life of the passenger in the ensuing crash
1991 – The White House announced the start of Operation Desert Storm. The operation was designed to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait.
1992 – Officials of the government of El Salvador and rebel leaders signed a pact in Mexico City ending 12 years of civil war. At least 75,000 people were killed during the fighting.
1998 – Three federal judges secretly granted Kenneth Starr authority to probe whether U.S. President Clinton or Vernon Jordan urged Monica Lewinsky to lie about her relationship with Clinton.
2000 – Ricardo Lagos was elected Chile’s first socialist president since Salvador Allende.
2001 – President Laurent Kabila of the Democratic Republic of the Congo was shot to death, reportedly by one of his bodyguards, who in turn was killed by other bodyguards
2002 – U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft announced that John Walker Lindh would be brought to the United States to face trial. He was charged in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, VA, with conspiracy to kill U.S. citizens, providing support to terrorist organizations, and engaging in prohibited transactions with the Taliban of Afghanistan.
2004 – NASA announced plans to cancel further space shuttle missions to repair and upgrade the Hubble Space Telescope, an act that would condemn the Hubble to mechanical failure in the next two years.
2013 – A four day occupation of an Algerian BP facility by Amenas militants begins, killing 48 hostages
2019 – Explosion by a suicide bomber aimed at US-led coalition forces at a market in Manjib, Syria, kills about 18 including four Americans
2020 – Impeachment trial of US President Donald Trump begins in the Senate
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
