1941 – Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivers his Four Freedoms Speech in the State of the Union Address: Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want, Freedom from Fear
0871 – England’s King Alfred defeated the Danes at the Battle of Ashdown.
1017 – Cnut the Great crowned King of England in London by Lyfing, Archbishop of Canterbury
1066 – Harold II (Harold Godwinson) crowned King of England after the death of his brother-in-law Edward the Confessor
1099 – Henry V crowned German king
1205 – Philip of Swabia was crowned as King of the Romans.
1227 – Ferrand, Count of Flanders, freed from the Louvre after being held prisoner for 12 years by the French
1453 – Frederick III erected Austria into an Archduchy.
1496 – Moorish fortress Alhambra, near Grenada, surrenders to the Christi
1497 – Jews are expelled from Graz in Styria, Austria
1535 – City of Lima Peru founded by Francisco Pizarro
1540 – King Henry VIII of England was married to Anne of Cleves, his fourth wife.
1639 – Virginia orders half of its tobacco crop destroyed to support plunging prices and to avoid an economic catastrophe, the 1st colony to order the destruction of crops
1649 – The Rump Parliament votes to put Charles I on trial
1661 – The Fifth Monarchists unsuccessfully attempt to seize control of London.
1681 – First recorded boxing match (Duke of Albemarle’s butler vs his butcher)
1773 – Massachusetts slaves petition legislature for freedom
1781 – In the Battle of Jersey on 6 January the British defeated the last attempt by France to invade Jersey militarily.
1832 – New England Anti-Slavery Society organizes (Boston)
1838 – Samuel Morse publicly demonstrated the telegraph for the first time.
1842 – 4,500 British & Indian troops leave Kabul, massacred before India
1853 – American President-Elect Franklin Pierce and family are involved in a train wreck near Andover, Massachusetts.
1861 – New York City NY mayor proposes New York become a free city, trading with N & S
1873 – US Congress begins investigating the Crédit Mobilier scandal, a fraud by the Union Pacific Railroad and Crédit Mobilier of America in the construction of the first transcontinental railroad
1900 – In India, it was reported that millions of people were dying from starvation.
1907 – Maria Montessori opens her first (Montessori) school (Rome) – Montessori’s revolutionary educational approach is practiced at about 30,000 schools today.
1912 – German scientist Alfred Wegener presents his theory of continental drift, His work laid the foundation for the theory of plate tectonics, which explains why continents move.
1925 – Mikhail Frunze replaces Leon Trotsky as People’s Commissioner of Military and Native Affairs (Minister of Defence) as Trotsky and Joseph Stalin battle for power in the aftermath of Vladimir Lenin’s death
1927 – US marines sent to Nicaragua
1929 – King Alexander of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes suspends his country’s constitution (the so-called January 6th Dictatorship, estojanuarska diktatura.)
1930 – The first diesel-engine automobile trip was completed after a run of 792 miles from Indianapolis, IN, to New York City, NY.
1931 – Thomas Edison executed his last patent application.
1936 – Supreme Court of the United States rules the 1933 Agricultural Adjustment Act unconstitutional in the case United States v. Butler et al..
1940 – Mass execution of Poles, committed by Germans in the city of Pozna, Warthegau
1941 – Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivers his Four Freedoms Speech in the State of the Union Address. https://www.fdrlibrary.org/four-freedoms
1942 – The first commercial around-the-world airline flight took place. Pan American Airlines was the company that made history with the feat.
1945 – The Battle of the Bulge ended with 130,000 German and 77,000 Allied casualties.
1950 – Britain recognized the Communist government of China.
1952 – “Peanuts” debuted in Sunday papers across the United States.
1958 – Gibson patents the Flying V Guitar
1963 – “Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom” with Marlin Perkins begins on NBC
1967 – U.S. and South Vietnamese forces launched a major offensive, known as Operation “Deckhouse V”, in the Mekong River delta.
1973 – “Schoolhouse Rock,” premieres on ABC-TV with Multiplication Rock
1975 – A thousand Led Zeppelin fans, waiting overnight inside the lobby of the Boston Garden for tickets to the group’s February 4th gig to go on sale, cause a riot and an estimated $30,000 damage
1977 – The music publisher EMI ends its contract with the notorious punk rock group Sex Pistols after reports of abusive behaviour at Heathrow Airport, London
1978 – The Crown of St. Stephen (also known as the Holy Crown of Hungary) is returned to Hungary from the United States, where it was held after the Second World War
1982 – William G. Bonin was convicted in Los Angeles, CA, of being the “freeway killer” who had murdered 14 young men and boys.
1986 – Impala Platinum fires 20,000 black mine workers in Johannesburg
1987 – After a 29-year lapse, the Ford Thunderbird was presented with the Motor Trend Car of the Year Award. It was the first occurrence of a repeat winner of the award.
1992 – The US Government urges doctors to stop using silicone breast implants, outlining the health effects
1994 – Figure skater Nancy Kerrigan was clubbed on the right leg by an assailant at Cobo Arena in Detroit, MI. Four men were later sentenced to prison for the attack, including Tonya Harding’s ex-husband.
1995 – A chemical fire in an apartment complex in Manila, Philippines, leads to the discovery of plans for Project Bojinka, a mass-terrorist attack
1998 – The spacecraft Lunar Prospect was launched into orbit around the moon. The craft was crashed into the moon, in an effort to find water under the lunar surface, on July 31, 1999.
1999 – The 106th U.S. Congress opened. The first item on the agenda was the impeachment proceedings of U.S. President Bill Clinton. The trial was set to begin January 7, 1999.
2000 – The last Pyrenean ibex is found dead after being crushed by a tree
2004 – In the United Arab Emirates, construction began on the Burj Khalifa skyscraper. Upon completion it was the world’s largest building.
2005 – Mississippi Civil Rights Workers Murders: Edgar Ray Killen is arrested as a suspect for the 1964 murders of three Civil Rights workers.
2009 – Israel begins an assault on the Gaza Strip
2012 – A suicide bomber blows himself up at a police station in Damascus, Syria, killing 26 people and wounding 63
2013 – 10 people are killed by a US drone attack in South Waziristan, Pakistan
2016 – North Korea states that they have successfully conducted their fourth nuclear test, saying it was a hydrogen bomb in a claim disputed by most international experts
2021 – The US Capitol is attacked. A mob of supporters of then US President Donald Trump stormed the United States Capitol in Washington DC. They were attempting to halt the certification of the results of the 2020 presidential election won by Joe Biden. Five people died in the riot, and many more were injured, including over 150 police officers.
2022 – New Orleans, Louisiana city council votes to change name of Robert E. Lee Boulevard to Allen Toussaint Boulevard
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
