JAN 7, 1915 – World War I: Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm approves strategic bombing of Britain, but forbids bombing London, fearing his relatives in the royal family might be killed
1325 – Alfonso IV becomes King of Portugal.
1558 – Calais, the last English possession on mainland France, was recaptured by the French.
1579 – England signs an offensive & defensive alliance with the Netherlands
1598 – Boris Godunov seizes the Russian throne on death of Feodore I
1601 – Robert, Earl of Essex leads revolt in London against Queen Elizabeth
1610 – Galileo Galilei sighted four of Jupiter’s moons. He named them Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
1611 – Trial of Hungarian aristocrat Elizabeth Báthory for killing and torturing hundreds of young women, later sentenced to house arrest for the rest of her life
1714 – Typewriter patented by Englishman Henry Mill (built years later)
1782 – The Bank of North America opened in Philadelphia. It was the first commercial bank in the United States.
1785 – French aeronaut/balloonist Jean-Pierre Blanchard successfully made the first air-crossing of the English Channel from the English coast to France.
1789 – Americans voted for the electors that would choose George Washington to be the first U.S. president.
1790 – French Revolution: A major riot breaks out in Versailles as people demand lower bread prices
1807 – A British Order in Council January 7 prohibits neutral nation ships from trading with France and her allies, but while the Royal Navy blockades Napoleon’s ports, the French are agriculturally self-sufficient and suffer less than do the British
1822 – Liberia colonized by Americans
1890 – Nellie Bly boards the S.S. Oceanic at Yokohama January 7 and sails for San Francisco after having crossed the Atlantic, Europe, and Asia in her well-publicized attempt to girdle the earth in less than 80 days
1892 – Mine explosion kills 100 in Krebs, Oklahoma; blacks trying to help rescue white survivors, driven away with guns
1894 – W.K. Dickson received a patent for motion picture film.
1896 – The “Fannie Farmer Cookbook” was published.
1904 – The distress signal “CQD” was established. Two years later “SOS” became the radio distress signal because it was quicker to send by wireless radio.
1911 – First airplane bombing experiments with explosives, San Francisco
1913 – William M. Burton patents a process to “crack” petroleum
1915 – World War I: Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm approves strategic bombing of Britain, but forbids bombing London, fearing his relatives in the royal family might be killed
1927 – In Hinckley IL, the Harlem Globetrotters played their first game.
1929 – The debut of “Buck Rogers 2429 A.D.” occurred in newspapers around the U.S. The title of the comic strip was later changed to “Buck Rogers in the 25th Century.”
1930 – Marguerite Perey discovers francium (Fr), the last naturally occurring element to be found
1932 – Chancellor Heinrich Brüning declared that Germany cannot, and will not, resume reparations payments.
1934 – “Flash Gordon” comic strip (by Alex Raymond) debuts
1935 – French Foreign Minister Pierre Laval and Italian Prime Minister Benito Mussolini signed the Italo-French agreements.
1941 – The NBC Blue radio network presented “The Squeaky Door” for the first time. The show was later known as “Inner Sanctum.”
1942 – The World War II siege of Bataan began.
1945 – World War II: British General Bernard Montgomery holds a press conference in which he claims credit for victory in the Battle of the Bulge.
1946 – Cambodia becomes autonomous state inside French Union
1948 – US President Harry Truman raises taxes for the Marshall Plan to assist in rebuilding Europe after WWII
1949 – The announcement of the first photograph of genes was shown at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.
1953 – U.S. President Harry Truman announced the development of the hydrogen bomb.
1954 – The Duoscopic TV receiver was unveiled this day. The TV set allowed the watching of two different shows at the same time.
1957 – Algerian militant and National Liberation Front member Djamila Bouhired sets off a bomb in an Algiers cafe killing 11 civilians, precipitating the Battle of Algiers
1959 – American gangster Meyer Lansky flees Cuba for the Bahamas due to the Cuban Revolution and rise of Fidel Castro
1962 – Assassination attempt fails on Indonesian President Sukarno
1964 – Bahamas achieves internal self-government & cabinet responsibility
1969 – US Congress doubles presidential salary
1970 – Farmers sue Max Yasgur for $35,000 in damages caused by “Woodstock”
1973 – Mark Essex’s mass shooting comes to an end after he is shot by police more than 200 times on the roof of New Orlean’s Holiday Inn hotel. He killed nine people, including five policeman.
1975 – OPEC agreed to raise crude oil prices by 10%, which began a time of world economic inflation.
1979 – Vietnamese forces captured the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, overthrowing the Khmer Rouge government.
1980 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter signed legislation that authorized $1.5 billion in loans for the bail out of Chrysler Corp.
1983 – Reagan ends US arms embargo against Guatemala
1989 – Crown Prince Akihito became the emperor of Japan following the death of his father, Emperor Hirohito.
1990 – The Leaning Tower of Pisa was closed to the public. The accelerated rate of “leaning” raised fears for the safety of its visitors.
1991 – Saddam Hussein prepares his troops for what he says will be a long violent war against the US
1997 – Newt Gingrich narrowly re-elected speaker of the US House of Representatives
1998 – Former White House intern Monica Lewinsky signed an affidavit denying that she had an affair with U.S. President Clinton.
1999 – U.S. President Clinton went on trial before the Senate. It was only the second time in U.S. history that an impeached president had gone to trial. Clinton was later acquitted of perjury and obstruction of justice charges.
2000 – An exhausted 14-year-old Tibetan Buddhist leader reaches India after trekking across the snowy Himalayas, a defection that embarrassed Chinese leaders who used him as a symbol of their rule over Tibet.
2002 – Microsoft Corp. chairman Bill Gates introduced a new device code named Mira. The device was tablet-like and was a cross between a handheld computer and a TV remote control.
2009 – Russia shut off all gas supplies to Europe through Ukraine. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin publicly endorsed the move and urged greater international involvement in the energy dispute.
2010 – Muslim gunmen in Egypt kill nine people after opening fire on a crowd of Coptic Christians
2015 – Terrorist attack on the offices of satirical newspaper “Charlie Hebdo” in Paris kills 12 (including Jean Cabut and Stéphane Charbonnier), injures 11
2019 – Attempted coup in Gabon fails after rebel soldiers overtake national radio station in Libreville
2021 – US Congress completes the ceremonial certification of Joe Biden’s presidential victory late in the night after an earlier unprecedented breach of the Capitol by Trump supporters
2022 – Three men convicted of murdering black jogger Ahmaud Arbery in Feb 2020, sentenced to life in prison in a Georgia court
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
