1610 – Galileo Galilei discovers the first three moons of Jupiter: Io, Europa & Ganymede
1714 – Typewriter patented by Englishman Henry Mill (built years later)
1941 – Chinese Kuomintang forces under orders from Chiang Kai-shek open fire on the surrounded Communist New Fourth Army at Maolin, Anhui Province, killing or capturing 7,000 troops
1953 – US President Harry Truman announces American development of the hydrogen bomb
1954 – Georgetown-IBM experiment, 1st public demonstration of a machine translation system, is held at IBM’s head office in New York
1959 – US recognizes Fidel Castro’s Cuban government
1968 – Uncrewed U.S. space probe Surveyor 7 was launched and, a few days later, made a soft landing on the Moon.
1980 – American President Jimmy Carter authorizes legislation to bail out the Chrysler Corporation with a 1.5 billion dollar loan
1991 – Saddam Hussein prepares his troops for what he says will be a long violent war against the US
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
2001 – John Kufuor was inaugurated as president of Ghana in that country’s first peaceful transition from one elected government to another.
2003 – By presidential decree, Christmas—this day on the Coptic Orthodox calendar—was celebrated for the first time as a national holiday in Egypt, an almost entirely Muslim country.
2010 – Muslim gunmen in Egypt kill nine people after opening fire on a crowd of Coptic Christians
2014 – Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina wins re-election in Bangladesh general election
2015 – Two gunmen connected to al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, a Yemeni-based militant group, stormed the Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo and killed 12 people in retribution for the satirical magazine’s portrayals of the Prophet Muhammad; the attackers were later killed by police.
2018 – It snows in the Sahara desert – 15 inches reported in Aïn Séfra, Northwest Algeria
2018 – Sydney, Australia has its hottest day for 80 years as Penrith reaches 47.3 degrees
2019 – Amazon overtakes Microsoft to become the world’s most valuable listed company for the first time, worth $797 billion
2020 – 6.4 magnitude earthquake in Puerto Rico, island’s largest in a century, followed by many aftershocks kill 1 person and destroy 800 homes
Film & TV:
2011 – “The King’s Speech”, starring Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, and Helena Bonham Carter, is released in United Kingdom
Music:
1955 – Marian Anderson becomes the 1st African American to perform with the New York Metropolitan Opera
1958 – Gibson issued US patent for the Flying V Guitar
2003 – “In Da Club” single is released by 50 Cent (MTV Video Music Award Best Rap Video and Best New Artist 2003, Billboard Song of the Year 2003)
Sport:
1955 – Marian Anderson becomes the 1st African American to perform with the New York Metropolitan Opera
1972 – Los Angeles Lakers defeat the Atlanta Hawks, 134-90 for their 33rd straight win, the longest winning streak in major professional sports
