TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON: JANUARY 7
1327 King Edward II of England is deposed.
1558 Calais, last English possession in France, retaken by French under Francois, Duke of Guise
1608 Fire destroys Jamestown, Virginia
1610 Galileo Galilei discovers the first three moons of Jupiter: Io, Europa & Ganymede
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 Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American Dr. John Jeffries make the first crossing of the English Channel in a hydrogen balloon.
1822 Liberia colonized by Americans
1865 Cheyenne and Sioux warriors attack Julesburg, Colo., in retaliation for the Sand Creek Massacre.
1896 Fanny Farmer published her first cookbook.
1901 New York stock exchange trading exceeds two million shares for the first time in history.
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.
1913 William M Burton patents a process to “crack” petroleum
1918 The Germans move 75,000 troops from the Eastern Front to the Western Front.
1927 The first transatlantic telephone service is established
1929 “Buck Rogers”, 1st sci-fi comic strip, premieres
1929 “Tarzan”, one of the 1st adventure comic strips, 1st appears
1934 Six thousand pastors in Berlin defy the Nazis insisting that they will not be silenced.
1953 US President Harry Truman announces American 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
1955 Marian Anderson becomes the first African American to sing at the Metropolitan Opera House.
1979 Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge are overthrown when Vietnamese troops seize the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh.
1980 US President Jimmy Carter signs legislation providing $1.5 billion in loans to salvage Chrysler Corporation.
1985 Japan launches its first interplanetary spacecraft, Sakigake, the first deep space probe launched by any nation other than the US or the USSR.
1990 Safety concerns over structural problems force the Leaning Tower of Pisa to be closed to the public.
1998 Former White House intern Monica Lewinsky signed an affidavit denying that she had an affair with U.S. President Clinton.
1999 President Bill Clinton’s impeachment trial begins in the US Senate after the House voted to impeach him for lying about his affair with Monica Lewinsky
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.
REFERENCES: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeoplehistory.com, timeandate.com, factmonster.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
