EVENTS
- 1684 – Isaac Newton’s paper on the theory of gravity is read to the Royal Society by Edmund Halley.
- 1817 – Mississippi is admitted as the 20th U.S. state
- 1864 – Major General William T. Sherman’s Union Army troops reach Savannah, Georgia.
- 1868 – The first traffic lights are installed outside the Houses of Parliament in London.
- 1896 – Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel died at San Remo, Italy. His will stipulated that income from his $9 million estate be used for awards recognizing persons who have made valuable contributions to humanity. Nobel recipients are chosen by a committee of the Norwegian parliament. Prizes for Peace, Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature and Economics are presented annually in a ceremony in Stockholm, Sweden, on the anniversary of his death. Each prize is valued at about $1 million.
- 1898 – The Treaty of Paris was signed between American and Spanish representatives following Spain’s defeat in the Spanish-American War. Under the treaty, the U.S. gained the Philippine Islands, the islands of Guam and Puerto Rico, and an agreement by Spain to withdraw from Cuba. The treaty passed by a single vote in the U.S. Senate on February 6, 1899, and was signed by President William McKinley four days later.
- 1901 – The first Nobel Prizes were awarded.
- 1941 – During World War II, British Battleships Repulse and Prince of Wales were sunk by Japanese warplanes in the South China Sea, killing nearly 800 crewmen.
- 1948 – The General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
- 1950 – Dr. Ralph Bunche became the first African-American man awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, for his efforts in mediation between Israel and nearby Arab states the previous year.
- 1971 – Jim Hart throws a football for a record 98 yards, the longest recorded throw.
- 1989 – The first non-Communist government since 1948 assumed power in Czechoslovakia.
- 2001 – Release of the first film in the ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy. The award winning movie called ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring’ was directed by Peter Jackson and was based on J. R. R. Tolkien’s ‘The Lord of the Rings’.
- 2007 – Argentina swears in first female elected President. Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner became the first elected female President of Argentina.
BIRTHDAYS
- 1787 – Educator Thomas Gallaudet (1787-1851) was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He co-founded the American School for the Deaf in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1817.
- 1815 – Ada Lovelace (English mathematician)
- 1830 – Emily Dickinson (Poet)
- 1851 – American librarian Melvil Dewey (1851-1931) was born in Adams Center, New York. He invented the Dewey decimal book classification system, advocated spelling reform, and urged use of the metric system.
- 1878 – C. Rajagopalachari (Indian lawyer, politician, 1st Governor General of India)
- 1908 – Olivier Messiaen (French composer, ornithologist)
- 1952 – Susan Dey (Actress – Partridge Family)
- 1956 – Rod Blagojevich (American politician, 40th Governor of Illinois)
- 1957 – Michael Clarke Duncan (Actor)
- 1964 – Bobby Flay (TV Chef)
- 1985 – Raven Symone (Actress)
- 1985 – Matt Forte (NFL Football player)
DEATHS
- 1896 – Alfred Nobel (Swedish chemist, engineer, invented dynamite, founded the Nobel Prize)
- 1951 – Algernon Blackwood (English author)
- 1967 – Otis Redding (American singer-songwriter, producer)
- 1999 – Franjo Tuđman (Croatian general, politician, 1st President of Croatia)
- 2006 – Augusto Pinochet (Chilean general, politician, 30th President of Chile)