1516
Born on this date
Bayinnaung. King of Burma, 1550-1581. Bayinnaung succeeded Tabinshwehti as King, and assembled the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia, including included much of modern-day Burma; Chinese Shan states; Lan Na; Lan Xang; Manipur; and Siam. He died after a long illness on October 10, 1581 at the age of 65, and was succeeded by his eldest son Nanda.
130 years ago
1886
Died on this date
Amilcare Ponchielli, 51. Italian composer. Mr. Ponchielli was best known for the opera La Gioconda (1876-1880), which includes The Dance of the Hours. He died of pneumonia.
125 years ago
1891
Died on this date
Léo Delibes, 54. French composer. Mr. Delibes was best known for his ballets Coppélia (1870) and Sylvia (1876) and the operas Le roi l'a dit (1873) and Lakmé (1883).
120 years ago
1896
Basketball
U.S. university (exhibition)
Chicago 15 @ Iowa 12
This experimental game was the first unofficial college game with five players on each side.
110 years ago
1906
Died on this date
Marshall Field, 71. U.S. businessman. Mr. Field founded the Chicago-based Marshall Field & Co. department store in 1881.
Defense
The last British soldiers left Canada, as the United Kingdom turned over control of its naval bases and garrisons to Canada.
80 years ago
1936
Died on this date
Albert Fish, 65. U.S. criminal. Mr. Fish was a serial child rapist and cannibal, known by various aliases and nicknames. He was executed in the electric chair at Sing Sing Prison in Ossining, New York, 10 months after being convicted of the 1928 kidnapping and murder of 10-year-old Grace Budd.
Exploration
American explorer Lincoln Ellsworth and Canadian pilot Herbert Hollick-Kenyon were rescued by the research ship Discovery II, nearly two months after running out of fuel and making a forced landing near the Little America camp that had been established by Admiral Richard Byrd. The pair had made the first flight across Antarctica, 2,300 miles from the Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea, landed on November 23, 1935 when their plane's engine faltered, and waited in the previously constructed shelter at Little America.
75 years ago
1941
Died on this date
Charles Thurston Holland. U.K. physician. Dr. Holland was a pioneer in the use of X-rays in medicine and surgery.
War
The Women’s Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) was formed to enable the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF) to release more men for service overseas.
Diplomacy
Bolivia and Chile signed a non-aggression pact; agreed to study a new commercial and financial accord; and arranged for "intellectual cooperation."
Defense
Former U.S. President Herbert Hoover asked the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee to clearly define the powers granted to the President in the Lend-Lease bill. U.S. Rep. George Pinkham (Republican--Massachusetts) accused President Franklin D. Roosevelt of plotting to get the United States into war, while Rep. Hamilton Fish (Republican--New York described Lend-Lease as "the President's dictatorship bill."
Movies
Will Hays, president of the Motion Pictures Producers and Distributers of America, Inc., denied the charges of U.S. Senator Burton K. Wheeler (Democrat--Montana) that the motion picture industry was inciting the American people toward war.
70 years ago
1946
War
At the Nazi war crimes trial in Nuremberg, American prosecutor Dr. Robert Kempner introduced documents showing that German Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick had ordered the killing of 275,000 insane, disabled, and old people, and had made it possible for Fuehrer Adolf Hitler to obtain German citizenship. The Allied Control Council reported that 19 of the 42 I.G. Farben chemical plants in the U.S. occupation zone in Germany had been set aside for reparations. An Australian commission at Labuan sentenced 28 Japanese war criminals to death. At the hearings of the United States Senate committee on the December 7, 1941 Japanese attack on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, U.S. Navy Admiral Husband Kimmel, head of U.S. naval operations at Pearl Harbor at the time of the invasion, told the committee that he had doubted the Japanese could stage an attack on Pearl Harbor. American intelligence sources reported that Japan had launched 9,000 bomb-carrying silk and paper balloons agains the U.S. in 1944 and 1945, with aout 10% reaching their targets.
Chinese Nationalist and Communist delegates to the Political Consultative Conference agreed on a mutual reduction of military forces within the next six months.
Defense
The U.S.S.R. and U.S. military missions began talks in Seoul on the Korean problem.
The Iranian government requested its United Nations delegation to request the UN's assistance in expediting the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Iran, scheduled for March 2, 1946.
Diplomacy
The U.S. State Department reported that a majority of the 21 American republics had responded negatively to the Uruguayan proposal for collective intervention to protect individual rights in the Western Hemisphere.
Kings Ib'n Saud of Saudi Arabia and Farouk of Egypt insisted that Palestine remain an Arab country.
Politics and government
Former Buddhist priest Hiromichi Kumazawa petitioned Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers in Japan General Douglas MacArthur to confirm his claim that Mr. Kumazawa was the legitimate Emperor of Japan, and that Hirohito was "illegal."
Journalism
Associated Press stopped providing news to the U.S. State Department for dissemination abroad, stating that this practice created "the fear of propaganda." United Press announced that it was contemplating similar action.
Labour
The strike of meat packers and butchers cut U.S. meat ouput by 75%, as the American Federation of Labor Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butchers reduced its wage demand from a 25c hourly increase to 15c.
50 years ago
1966
At the movies
Our Man Flint, directed by Daniel Mann, and starring James Coburn, Lee J. Cobb, Gila Golan, and Edward Mulhare, opened in theatres.
World events
Major General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi seized power in Nigeria, the day after the beginning of a military coup d'état that overthrew the First Nigerian Republic.
Football
NFL
Pro Bowl @ Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum
East 36 West 7
Jim Brown, in the final game of his 9-year Professional Football Hall of Fame career, rushed 21 times for 65 yards as the East routed the West before 60,124 fans.
40 years ago
1976
Hit parade
#1 single in West Germany (Media Control): Lady Bump--Penny McLean (8th week at #1)
#1 single in Switzerland: Dolannes-Melodie--Jean-Claude Borelly (14th week at #1)
#1 single in Sweden (Topplistan): Paloma Blanca--George Baker Selection (10th week at #1)
Personal
This blogger was among those in Mr. Capyk's physical eduction 10 class at Sir John Franklin Territorial High School in Yellowknife who were given a clinic in basketball by Jack Donohue, coach of Canada's national men's team.
30 years ago
1986
Hit parade
Edmonton's Top 10 (CKRA)
1 That's What Friends are For--Dionne and Friends (with Elton John, Gladys Knight & Stevie Wonder)
2 Say You, Say Me--Lionel Richie
3 Party All the Time--Eddie Murphy
4 I Miss You--Klymaxx
5 Talk to Me--Stevie Nicks
6 Everything in My Heart--Corey Hart
7 Alive and Kicking--Simple Minds
8 Tonight She Comes--The Cars
9 Small Town--John Cougar Mellencamp
10 My Hometown--Bruce Springsteen
Died on this date
Herbert W. Armstrong, 93. U.S.
Diplomacy
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev formally presented his proposal to extend the U.S.S.R.’s moratorium on nuclear tests by three months at the opening session of the fourth round of U.S.-Soviet disarmament talks in Geneva. U.S. President Ronald Reagan said he was grateful for the proposal--which called for a worldwide ban on nuclear weapons within 15 years and was tied to a requirement that the United States end development of anti-satellite weapons and its Strategic Defense Initiative anti-missile defense system--and that he would study it with great care.
Economics and finance
The U.S. Federal Reserve Board reported that industrial production had increased 0.7% in December 1985, although its rise for the entire year of 1985 was only 2.1%.
Crime
New York State Supreme Court Justice Stephen Crane dismissed charges of attempted murder and assault against Bernhard Goetz, New York’s "subway vigilante," ruling that the prosecution had distorted the explanation of the justification for self-defense in its statements to grand jurors. Stare law permitted the use of deadly force by someone who "reasonably believed" that he was threatened with unlawful physical violence and could not escape safely. Mr. Goetz had shot and wounded four youths who had accosted him and asked him for money on a New York subway train in December 1984. Justice Crane also cited possible perjured testimony by two of the youths in the dismissal of the charges. He did, however, let stand charges of weapons possession and reckless endangerment.
Technology
The first meeting of the Internet Engineering Task Force took place.
25 years ago
1991
Hit parade
#1 single in Sweden (Topplistan): Sadeness Part I--Enigma
War
Less than 17 hours after the United Nations Security Council’s deadline of midnight January 15 for Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to withdraw his forces from Kuwait, Operation Desert Storm--the attack by UN forces against Iraq--began. At 7 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater announced, "The liberation of Kuwait has begun." Two hours later, U.S. President George Bush said in a televised address that the attacks were targeting military headquarters, including nuclear and chemical installations. He said that Iraq "will not be another Vietnam."
World events
As many as 500,000 people in Vilnius attended a funeral for nine of the people killed three days earlier when Soviet forces attacked the Lithuanian capital.
Economics and finance
The United States Labor Department reported that consumer prices had risen 6.1% in 1990, the highest annual rate since 1981. The increase in December had been 0.3%.
20 years ago
1996
Politics and government
Andreas Papandreou announced his resignation as Prime Minister of Greece, saying that he was too ill to govern. Mr. Papandreou had served as Prime Minister from 1981-1989 and again since 1993, but was plagued by heart and kidney trouble. He was succeeded on January 22 by Kostas Simitas.
10 years ago
2006
Politics and government
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf took office as President of Liberia, becoming Africa's first female elected head of state.
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