January 7

Events

• 1325 - Alfonso IV becomes King of Portugal.
• 1558 - France takes Calais, the last continental possession of England.
• 1566 - Pius V becomes Pope.
• 1598 - Boris Godunov seizes the throne of Russia.
• 1601 - Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex leads revolt in London against Queen Elizabeth
• 1610 - Galileo Galilei observes the four largest moons of Jupiter for the first time. He named them and in turn the four are called the Galilean moons.
• 1782 - The first American commercial bank opens (Bank of North America).
• 1785 - Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American John Jeffries travel from Dover, England to Calais, France in a gas balloon, becoming the first to cross the English Channel by air.
• 1835 - HMS Beagle anchors off the Chonos Archipelago.
• 1894 - W.K. Dickson receives a patent for motion picture film.
• 1896 - Fannie Farmer publishes her first cookbook.
• 1901 - Alferd Packer is released from prison after serving 18 years for cannibalism.
• 1904 - The distress signal "CQD" is established only to be replaced two years later by "SOS."
• 1911 - Mary Pickford marries Owen Moore.
• 1922 - Dil ireann ratifies the Anglo-Irish Treaty by 64-57 votes.
• 1924 - George Gershwin completes Rhapsody in Blue.
• 1926 - George Burns marries Gracie Allen.
• 1927 - First international telephone call - New York City to London.
• 1927 - The Harlem Globetrotters play their first game.
• 1935 - World War II: Benito Mussolini and French Foreign Minister Pierre Laval sign the Italo-French agreements.
• 1942 - World War II: Siege of the Bataan Peninsula begins.
• 1945 - British General Bernard Montgomery holds a press conference in which he claims credit for victory in the Battle of the Bulge.
• 1953 - President Harry Truman announces that the United States has developed a hydrogen bomb.
• 1954 - The first public demonstration of a machine translation system was held in New York at the head office of IBM.
• 1959 - The United States recognizes the new Cuban government of Fidel Castro
• 1975 - OPEC agrees to raise crude oil prices by 10%.
• 1979 - Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge are overthrown by Vietnamese troops.
• 1980 - President Jimmy Carter authorizes legislation giving $1.5 billion in loans to bail out Chrysler Corporation.
• 1984 - Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
• 1989 - Akihito becomes Emperor of Japan.
• 1990 - The Leaning Tower of Pisa is closed to the public due to safety concerns.
• 1996 - One of the worst blizzards in American history hits eastern states killing more than 100.
• 1997 - A team of programmers at the University of Regensburg, Germany releases Tibia, one of the earliest graphical MMORPGs.
• 1999 - The impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton begins.

Births

• 1502 - Pope Gregory XIII (d. 1585)
• 1528 - Jeanne d'Albret, Queen of Navarre (d. 1572)
• 1539 - Sebastin de Covarrubias Horozco, Spanish lexicographer
• 1612 - Paul de La Pierre, composer
• 1768 - Joseph Bonaparte, King of Naples (d. 1844)
• 1800 - Millard Fillmore, 13th President of the United States, from 1850-1853 (d. 1874)
• 1831 - Heinrich von Stephan, organizer of the German postal union and founder of the Universal postal union (d. 1897)
• 1834 - Johann Philipp Reis, German physicist and inventor (d. 1874)
• 1844 - Bernadette Soubirous, French saint (d. 1879)
• 1871 - Felix douard Justin mile Borel, mathematician, politician, statesmen, member of the French Resistance during World War II (d. 1956)
• 1873 - Adolph Zukor, Hungarian producer (d. 1976)
• 1875 - Thomas Hicks, American marathon runner (d. 1963)
• 1890 - Henny Porten, actress (d. 1960)
• 1891 - Zora Neale Hurston, American author (d. 1960)
• 1896 - Arnold Ridley, British playwright and actor (d. 1984)
• 1898 - Rudolf Fernau, actor (d. 1985)
• 1899 - Francis Poulenc, French composer (d. 1963)
• 1903:
• Warren Hull, actor (d. 1974)
• Alan Napier, English actor (d. 1988)
• 1908 - Red Allen, American jazz musician (d. 1967)
• 1910:
• Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Pakistani poet (d. (1984)
• Orval Faubus, Governor of Arkansas, segregationist (d. 1994)
• 1911 - Butterfly McQueen, American actress (d. 1995)
• 1912:
• Charles Addams, American cartoonist (d. 1988)
• Gnther Wand, conductor
• 1913 - Johnny Mize, baseball player (d. 1993)
• 1915 - Erwin Wickert, narrator
• 1916 - Paul Keres, Estonian chess player (d. 1975)
• 1919 - Elena Ceausescu, wife of Nicolae Ceausescu (1989)
• 1922:
• Vincent Gardenia, actor (d. 1992)
• Jean-Pierre Rampal, French flutist (d. 2000)
• 1923 - Pinkas Braun, actor and film director
• 1925 - Gerald Durrell British naturalist, zookeeper, author and television presenter (d. 1995)
• 1928:
• William Peter Blatty, American screenwriter
• Clyde Snow, forensic anthropologist
• 1929 - Terry Moore, American actress
• 1930 - Douglas Kiker, journalist (d. 1991)
• 1934 - Charlie Jenkins, American runner
• 1935 - Valeri Kubasov, cosmonaut
• 1942:
• Vassily Alexeyev, Russian weightlifter
• Paul Revere, American singer and musician
• 1943 - Sadako Sasaki, Japanese atom bomb victim (d. 1955)
• 1945 - Tony Conigliaro, American baseball player (d. 1990)
• 1946 - Jann Wenner, publisher
• 1948 - Kenny Loggins, American singer
• 1950 - Erin Gray, American actress
• 1956 - David Caruso, American actor
• 1957:
• Nicholson Baker, American novelist
• Katie Couric, American television host
• Julian Solis, Puerto Rican boxer
• 1964 - Nicolas Cage, American actor
• 1966 - Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, publicist (d. 1999)
• 1971:
• Kevin Rahm, American actor
• David Yost, American actor
• 1976:
• Ivan Petrov, Bulgarian poet
• Eric Gagn, Canadian baseball pitcher
• Alfonso Soriano, Dominican baseball player
• 1977 - Dustin Diamond, American actor

Deaths

• 312 - Lucianus of Antioch, theologist/saint
• 1325 - King Dinis of Portugal (b. 1261)
• 1536 - Catherine of Aragon, Queen of England (b. 1485)
• 1864 - Caleb Blood Smith, U.S. Secretary of the Interior (b. 1808)
• 1872 - James Fisk, American entrepreneur (b. 1834)
• 1893 - Jožef Stefan, Slovene physicist, mathematician and poet (b. 1835)
• 1920 - Edmund Barton, first Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1849)
• 1943 - Nikola Tesla, Serbian-born inventor, electrical engineer (b. 1856)
• 1964 - Cyril Davies, blues musician (b. 1932)
• 1972 - John Berryman, American poet (b. 1914)
• 1988 - Trevor Howard, English actor (b. 1913)
• 1989 - Hirohito, Emperor of Japan (b. 1901)
• 1990 - Bronko Nagurski, American football star (b. 1908)
• 1995 - Murray Rothbard, American economist (b. 1926)
• 1996 - Kroly Grsz, Hungarian politician
• 1998 - Vladimir Prelog, Croatian chemist (b.1906)
• 2000 - Don Martin, illustrator
• 2002 - Avery Schreiber, actor (b. 1935)
• 2002 - Jon Lee, drummer from Feeder
• 2005 - Pierre Daninos, French novelist (b. 1913)
• 2005 - Rosemary Kennedy, third child and first daughter of Joseph and Rose Kennedy (b. 1918)
• 2005 - Eileen Desmond, former Minister for Health & Social Welfare (b. 1932)
• 2005 - Ivar Medaas, Norwegian musician

Holidays and observances

• Catholicism - Feast day of St. Raymond of Penafort.
• Christmas Day in the Julian calendar. This is the day on which Christmas is celebrated in most Orthodox churches, e.g. the Coptic Orthodox, Macedonian Orthodox, Serbian Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, Anthiochian Orthodox as well as the Greek Orthodox Church in Athens & Egypt.
• European traditional - Distaff day: women's traditional work begins again after Epiphany.
• Ken Lane was born, King of Cordania

External links

• BBC: On This Day

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