Title: January 8 Content: ==Events== === Up to 1900 === * 307 - Jin Huidi, Chinese Emperor of the Jin Dynasty, is poisoned, and succeeded by his son, Jin Huaidi. * 871 – Battle of Ashdown – Ethelred of Wessex defeats Danish invasion army. * 1198 – Innocent III becomes Pope. * 1297 - François Grimaldi, disguised as a monk, leads his men to capture the Rock of Monaco; from then on, his family rules the Principality of Monaco. * 1499 - King Louis XII of France marries Anne of Brittany. * 1697 - Thomas Aikenhead of Edinburgh becomes the last person in Scotland, and in the present-day United Kingdom, to be executed for blasphemy. * 1734 – Premiere of George Frideric Handel's Ariodante at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. * 1746 – Bonnie Prince Charlie occupies Stirling. * 1781 - An earthquake hits Tabriz, Persia, killing over 50,000 people. * 1790 - In New York City, George Washington makes the US' first State of the Union Address. * 1806 – Cape Colony becomes a British colony. * 1815 – War of 1812: In the Battle of New Orleans, Andrew Jackson leads American forces in victory over the British. * 1835 - US national debt is at zero, for the only time in US history. * 1838 – Alfred Vail demonstrates a telegraph using dots and dashes (this is the forerunner of Morse code). * 1856 – Borax is discovered (John Veatch). * 1863 - American Civil War: Second Battle of Springfield. * 1867 – African American men granted the right to vote in the District of Columbia. * 1877 – In Montana, Crazy Horse and his warriors fight their last battle with the United States Cavalry. * 1889 – Herman Hollerith receives a patent for his electric tabulating machine. * 1893 - Captain Thomas Robertson discovers Dundee Island in the Weddell Sea off Antarctica. * 1894 – A fire at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago causes a good deal of damage. * 1900 – United States President William McKinley places Alaska under military rule. === 1901 1950 === * 1906 – A landslide in Haverstraw, New York kills 20 due to the excavation of clay along the Hudson River. * 1908 – A train collision occurs in the Park Avenue Tunnel in New York City killing 17, injuring 38 and leading to increased demand for electric trains. * 1912 - The African National Congress is founded. * 1916 – World War I: Allied forces withdraw from Gallipoli. * 1918 – President Woodrow Wilson announces his "Fourteen Points" for the aftermath of World War I. * 1926 – Abdul-Aziz ibn Saud becomes the King of Hejaz and renames it Saudi Arabia. * 1935 – A.C. Hardy patents the spectrophotometer. * 1942 - World War II: To stop Japanese advances in the Pacific Ocean, the Allies create the commando ABDACOM. === 1951 2000 === * 1953 – René Mayer becomes Prime Minister of France. * 1958 – 14 year old Bobby Fischer wins the United States Chess Championship. * 1959 – Michel Debré becomes Prime Minister of France, while Charles de Gaulle becomes the first President of France's Fifth Republic. * 1961 - In a referendum, a majority of French voters supports Charles de Gaulle's policies on Algeria, which would lead towards the country's independence from France. * 1963 – Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is exhibited in the United States for the first time (National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC). * 1964 – President Lyndon B. Johnson declares a "War on Poverty" in the United States. * 1971 - Bowing to international pressure, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto releases Bengali leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. * 1973 – Watergate scandal: The trial begins for seven men accused of placing bugs in United States Democratic Party headquarters at the Watergate Hotel. * 1973 - The Soviet Luna 21 space mission is launched. * 1975 – Ella Grasso becomes Governor of Connecticut, becoming the first woman to serve as a Governor in the United States who did not succeed her husband. * 1977 - Three bombs explode in Moscow, within 37 minutes, killing 7 people. These attacks are suspected to have been carried out by an Armenian Separatist group. * 1982 – AT&T; agrees to divest itself of twenty-two subdivisions. * 1989 – Kegworth Air Disaster: British Midland Flight 92 crashes onto the M1 motorway, killing 47 people out of the 127 on board. * 1992 – President of the United States George H. W. Bush becomes ill on a visit in Japan and vomits on the Japanese Prime Minister. * 1994 – Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov on Soyuz TM-18 leaves for Mir. He will stay on the space station till March 22, 1995 for a record 437 days in space. * 1996 – An Antonov 32 cargo jet crashes into the central market in Kinshasa, Zaire killing more than 350 people * 1998 – Ramzi Yousef is sentenced to life in prison for planning the World Trade Center bombing and for planning Project Bojinka. * 1999 – Cosmologists announce that the expansion rate of the universe is increasing. === From 2001 === * 2003 - In Kosciuszko National Park in Australia, following several lightning strikes during the dry season, bush fires break out. * 2003 – US Airways flight 5481 crashes at Charlotte-Douglas International Airport in Charlotte, North Carolina killing all 21 people aboard. * 2004 – Queen Elizabeth names the Queen Mary II cruise liner, the largest passenger ship ever built. * 2010 – The Togo national football team is targeted in an attack in Cabinda, Angola, and therefore withdraws from the African Cup of Nations. * 2011 – 2011 Tucson shooting: Six people are killed in a shooting in Tucson, Arizona, and several are injured, including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Jared Lee Loughner is arrested for the shooting. * 2015 - Maithripala Sirisena is elected President of Sri Lanka, defeating Mahinda Rajapaksa, and takes office the next day. ==Births== === Up to 1850 === * 1360 - Ulrich von Jungingen, 26th Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights (d. 1410) * 1529 - John Frederick II, Duke of Saxony (d. 1595) * 1556 - Uesugi Kagekatsu, Japanese samurai and warlord (d. 1623) * 1583 - Simon Episcopius, Dutch theologian (d. 1643) * 1587 – Johannes Fabricius, German astronomer (d. 1616) * 1587 – Jan Pieterszoon Coen, Dutch colonial Governor (d. 1629) * 1601 - Baltasar Gracian, Spanish writer (d. 1658) * 1735 - John Carroll, first Bishop in the United States (d. 1815) * 1788 – Archduke Rudolph of Austria (d. 1831) * 1788 - Pavel Kiselyov, Russian general and politician (d. 1874) * 1805 - John Bigler, 3rd Governor of California (d. 1871) * 1817 – Theophilus Shepstone, South African politician (d. 1893) * 1821 – James Longstreet, American Confederate General (d. 1904) * 1822 - Alfredo Piatti, Italian cellist and composer (d. 1901) * 1823 – Alfred Russel Wallace, British naturalist and biologist (d. 1913) * 1824 - Wilkie Collins, British writer (d. 1889) * 1824 - Francisco Gonzalez Bocanegra, Mexican poet (d. 1861) * 1834 - Larin Paraske, Finnish runic singer (d. 1904) * 1849 – Stepan Makarov, Russian admiral, explorer and writer (d. 1904) === 1851 1900 === * 1859 - Fanny Bullock Workman, American geographer, cartographer, explorer, traveler and mountaineer (d. 1925) * 1862 - Frank Nelson Doubleday, American publisher (d. 1934) * 1864 – Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale (d. 1892) * 1865 - Winnaretta Singer, American patron of French music, arts, sciences and letters (d. 1943) * 1866 - William G. Conley, 18th Governor of West Virginia (d. 1940) * 1867 – Emily Greene Balch, American writer and pacifist (d. 1961) * 1868 – Frank Dyson, English astronomer (d. 1939) * 1870 – Miguel Primo de Rivera, Spanish politician (d. 1930) * 1871 - James Craig, 1st Viscount Craigavon, Irish politician (d. 1940) * 1873 – Elena of Montenegro, Queen of Italy (d. 1956) * 1873 – Iuliu Maniu, Prime Minister of Romania (d. 1953) * 1876 - Arturs Alberings, Prime Minister of Latvia (d. 1934) * 1879 - Charles Bryant, British actor and movie director (d. 1948) * 1883 - Pavel Filonov, Russian painter (d. 1941) * 1883 - Patrick J. Hurley, American soldier, statesman and diplomat (d. 1963) * 1885 – John Curtin, Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1945) * 1886 - Thomas January, American soccer player (d. 1957) * 1888 - Richard Courant, German-American mathematician (d. 1972) * 1891 - Bronislava Nijinska, Russian choreographer (d. 1972) * 1891 – Walther Bothe, German physicist (d. 1957) * 1894 - Maximilian Kolbe, Polish Franciscan friar (d. 1944) * 1896 - Jaromir Weinberger, Czech-American composer (d. 1967) * 1897 - Dennis Wheatley, English writer (d. 1977) * 1899 – Solomon Bandaranaike, Prime Minister of Ceylon, present-day Sri Lanka (d. 1959) * 1900 - François de Menthon, French politician and jurist (d. 1984) === 1901 1950 === * 1902 – Carl Rogers, American psychologist (d. 1987) * 1902 – Georgy Maximilianovich Malenkov, Soviet politician (d. 1988) * 1904 - Tampa Red, American blues musician (d. 1981) * 1905 - Giacinto Scelsi, Italian composer (d. 1988) * 1905 – Carl Gustav Hempel, German philosopher (d. 1997) * 1906 - Serge Poliakoff, Russian-French painter (d. 1969) * 1908 – William Hartnell, English actor (d. 1975) * 1909 - Willy Millowitsch, German actor (d. 1999) * 1910 – Galina Ulanova, Russian |ballerina (d. 1998) * 1912 - José Ferrer, Puerto Rican actor and director (d. 1992) * 1912 - Lawrence Walsh, American-Canadian lawyer and politician (d. 2014) * 1917 - Peter Matthew Hillsman Taylor, American writer (d. 1994) * 1921 - Leonardo Sciascia, Italian writer (d. 1989) * 1922 - Dale D. Myers, American Deputy Administrator of NASA (d. 2015) * 1922 - Jan Nieuwenhuys, Dutch painter (d. 1986) * 1923 – Larry Storch, American actor * 1923 - Bryce DeWitt, American theoretical physicist (d. 2004) * 1924 – Ron Moody, English actor (d. 2015) * 1925 – Helmuth Hubener, German activist (d. 1942) * 1926 - Evelyn Lear, American soprano (d. 2012) * 1926 – Soupy Sales, American comedian (d. 2009) * 1928 - Luther Perkins, American guitarist (d. 1968) * 1929 – Wolfgang Peters, German footballer (d. 2003) * 1929 - Saeed Jaffrey, Indian actor (d. 2015) * 1931 – Bill Graham, German rock music entrepreneur (d. 1991) * 1933 - Ko Un, Korean poet * 1933 - Mariam Fakhr Eddine, Egyptian actress (d. 2014) * 1934 – Jacques Anquetil, French cyclist (d. 1987) * 1934 – Roy Kinnear, English actor (d. 1988) * 1934 - Ronald Greenwald, American rabbi and activist (d. 2016) * 1935 – Elvis Presley, American singer and guitarist (d. 1977) * 1936 - Jyotindra Nath Dixit, Indian diplomat and politician (d. 2005) * 1936 - Robert May, Baron May of Oxford, Australian-English zoologist, ecologist and academic * 1937 – Shirley Bassey, Welsh singer * 1938 - Yevgeny Nesterenko, Russian opera singer * 1938 – Bob Eubanks, American game show host * 1939 - Nanda, Indian actress (d. 2014) * 1941 – Graham Chapman, English comedian (d. 1989) * 1942 – Stephen Hawking, English theoretical physicist and writer (d. 2018) * 1942 – Junichiro Koizumi, former Prime Minister of Japan * 1942 - Vyacheslav Zudov, Soviet-Russian cosmonaut * 1942 - Valya Balkanska, Bulgarian folk singer * 1942 - Robin Ellis, English actor * 1942 - Yvette Mimieux, American actress * 1944 - Terry Brooks, American author * 1946 - Robby Krieger, American musician * 1947 - Ashura Hara, Japanese professional wrestler (d. 2015) * 1947 – David Bowie, English rock music singer, musician and actor (d. 2016) * 1947 - Terry Sylvester, English singer and guitarist * 1947 - Samuel Schmid, Swiss politician * 1948 - Jerzy Kaczmarek, Polish fencer * 1949 - John Podesta, American politician, 20th White House Chief of Staff * 1949 - Kozo Kinomoto, Japanese footballer (d. 2017) === 1951 1975 === * 1951 – Kenny Anthony, former Prime Minister of Saint Lucia * 1951 - John McTiernan, American director and producer * 1951 - Franz Pachl, German chess player * 1958 - Roman Wojcicki, Polish footballer * 1958 - Rey Mysterio, Sr., Mexican wrestler * 1958 - Betsy DeVos, 11th United States Secretary of Education * 1959 - Paul Hester, Australian drummer * 1959 - Duk Koo Kim, South Korean boxer (d. 1982) * 1961 - Calvin Smith, American athlete * 1964 - Ron Sexsmith, Canadian singer- songwriter * 1964 - José-Luis Carranza, Peruvian footballer * 1967 - Willie Anderson, American basketball player * 1967 - Tom Watson, English politician * 1967 – R. Kelly, American R&B; singer * 1968 - James Brokenshire, English politician * 1969 - Ami Dolenz, American actress * 1969 - J. Hunter Johnson, American game designer, author and translator * 1971 – Pascal Zuberbühler, Swiss footballer * 1972 – Giuseppe Favalli, Italian footballer * 1972 - Paul Clement, English football manager * 1973 – Sean Paul, Jamaican reggae singer * 1973 - Henning Solberg, Norwegian rally driver * 1975 - Chris Simmons, English actor === From 1976 === * 1976 – Marcelo Gallardo, Argentine footballer * 1977 - Amber Benson, American actress * 1978 – Marco Fu, Hong Kong snooker player * 1979 – Adrian Mutu, Romanian footballer * 1979 - Windell Middlebrooks, American actor (d. 2015) * 1979 – Stipe Pletikosa, Croatian footballer * 1979 - Sarah Polley, Canadian movie actress, director and screenwriter * 1979 - Tomasz Schafernaker, Polish-English meteorologist * 1979 – Seol Ki-hyeon, South Korean footballer * 1980 – Lee Jung-soo, South Korean footballer * 1981 – Genevieve Cortese, American actress * 1982 - Huang Sui, Chinese badminton player * 1982 – John Utaka, Nigerian footballer * 1983 - Felipe Colombo, Mexican-Argentine singer-songwriter, guitarist and actor * 1983 – Kim Jong-un, North Korean leader * 1986 – David Silva, Spanish footballer * 1986 - Jaclyn Linetsky, Canadian actress (d. 2003) * 1989 – Aaron Cruden, New Zealand rugby player * 1990 - Xu Xin, Chinese ping-pong player * 1991 - Jorge Enriquez, Mexican footballer * 1992 - Koke, Spanish footballer * 1993 - Tang Yi, Chinese swimmer * 1995 - Kyle Edmund, English tennis player * 1997 - Jack Andraka, American inventor * 2000 – Noah Cyrus, American actress * 2011 – Prince Vincent of Denmark * 2011 – Princess Josephine of Denmark ==Deaths== === Up to 1900 === * 307 - Jin Huidi, Emperor of China (b. 259) * 482 - Severinus of Noricum, Italian saint (b. 410) * 1107 – Edgar of Scotland (b. 1074) * 1198 - Pope Celestine III (b. 1106) * 1324 – Marco Polo, Italian trader and explorer (b. 1254) * 1337 - Giotto, Italian painter and architect (b. 1266) * 1598 - John George, Elector of Brandenburg (b. 1525) * 1642 – Galileo Galilei, Italian astronomer (b. 1564) * 1697 – Thomas Aikenhead, Scottish student, executed under Blasphemy law (b. 1676) * 1713 - Arcangelo Corelli, Italian composer (b. 1653) * 1775 - John Baskerville, English printer (b. 1706) * 1794 - Justus Möser, German statesman (b. 1729) * 1815 – Edward Pakenham, British general (b. 1778) * 1818 - Robert Bowie, Governor of Maryland (b. 1750) * 1825 – Eli Whitney, American inventor (b. 1765) * 1878 – Nikolay Nekrasov, Russian poet (b. 1821) * 1880 – Emperor Norton, self-proclaimed Emperor of the United States (b. 1819) * 1896 - William Rainey Marshall, Governor of Minnesota (b. 1825) * 1896 - Paul Verlaine, French poet (b. 1844) === 1901 2000 === * 1918 - Ellis H. Roberts, American politician (b. 1827) * 1919 - Peter Altenberg, Austrian writer (b. 1859) * 1925 - Fernand Sanz, French cyclist (b. 1881) * 1934 - Andrei Bely, Russian poet (b. 1880) * 1941 – Robert Baden-Powell, English founder of Scouting (b. 1857) * 1943 - Richard Hillary, American pilot and author (b. 1919) * 1948 - Richard Tauber, Austrian tenor (b. 1891) * 1948 - Kurt Schwitters, German painter (b. 1887) * 1950 – Joseph Schumpeter, Austrian economist (b. 1883) * 1952 - Antonia Maury, American astronomer (b. 1866) * 1953 - Hugh Binney, British naval commander and Governor of Tasmania (b. 1883) * 1958 - Paul Pilgrim, American runner (b. 1883) * 1964 - Julius Raab, Chancellor of Austria (b. 1891) * 1969 – Albert Hill, British athlete (b. 1889) * 1976 – Zhou Enlai, Premier of the People's Republic of China (b. 1898) * 1983 - Tom McCall, Governor of Oregon (b. 1913) * 1990 - Jaime Gil de Biedma, Spanish poet (b. 1929) * 1991 – Steve Clark, British guitarist (b. 1960) * 1996 - Metin Göktepe, Turkish photographer and journalist (b. 1968) * 1996 – François Mitterrand, President of France (b. 1916) * 1997 – Melvin Calvin, American chemist (b. 1911) * 1998 - Michael Tippett, English composer (b. 1905) === From 2001 === * 2002 – Alexander Prokhorov, Russian physicist (b. 1916) * 2002 – Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy's fast food chain (b. 1932) * 2003 - Ron Goodwin, British composer and conductor (b. 1925) * 2005 – Michel Thomas, Polish-American linguist (b. 1914) * 2006 – Tony Banks, British politician (b. 1943) * 2007 – Yvonne De Carlo, Canadian actress (b. 1922) * 2007 – Iwao Takamoto, American animator (b. 1925) * 2010 – Art Clokey, American animator (b. 1921) * 2011 - Jiri Dienstbier, Czech journalist and politician (b. 1937) * 2011 – John Roll, American judge (b. 1947) * 2012 - Alexis Weissenberg, Bulgarian pianist (b. 1929) * 2013 - Kenojuak Ashevak, Canadian Inuit artist (b. 1927) * 2015 - Kep Enderby, Australian politician and judge (b. 1926) * 2015 - Ray McFall, British nightclub owner (b. 1926) * 2015 - Andraé Crouch, American gospel singer (b. 1942) * 2015 - Hubert Markl, German biologist (b. 1938) * 2015 - Leif Rantala, Finnish linguist (b. 1947) * 2016 - German Moreno, Filipino television host (b. 1933) * 2016 - André Courrèges, French fashion designer (b. 1923) * 2016 - Red Simpson, American singer-songwriter (b. 1934) * 2016 - Otis Clay, American singer (b. 1942) * 2016 - Oscar Fritschi, Swiss politician (b. 1939) * 2016 - Royal Parker, American television personality (b. 1929) * 2016 - Piet Steenkamp, Dutch footballer (b. 1925) * 2017 - James Mancham, 1st President of the Seychelles (b. 1939) * 2017 - Ruth Perry, Liberian politician (b. 1939) * 2017 - Hashemi Rafsanjani, 4th President of Iran (b. 1934) * 2017 - Peter Sarstedt, English singer-songwriter (b. 1941) * 2017 - Buddy Bregman, American arranger, producer and composer (b. 1930) * 2017 - Klaib Al-Fawwaz, Jordanian diplomat and politician (b. 1950) * 2017 - Miriam Goldberg, American newspaper publisher (b. 1916) * 2017 - Roy Innis, American civil rights activist and politician (b. 1934) * 2017 - Abdulkadir Kure, Nigerian politician (b. 1956) * 2017 - Eli Zelkha, Iranian-American entrepreneur (b. 1950) * 2017 - Nigel Spearing, British politician (b. 1930) * 2018 - George Maxwell Richards, President of Trinidad and Tobago (b. 1931) * 2018 - Kato Ottio, Papua New Guinean rugby league player (b. 1994) * 2018 - Denise LaSalle, American singer-songwriter (b. 1939) == Observances == * Commonwealth Day (Northern Mariana Islands) * Celebration of Elvis Presley's Birthday at Graceland, Memphis, Tennessee * Kim Jong-un's Birthday (North Korea) January 08