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- 0069 Year of the four emperors: Following Galba, Otho and Vitellius, Vespasian becomes the fourth Emperor of Rome within a year.
- 1620 Plymouth Colony: William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims land on what is now known as Plymouth Rock in Plymouth, Massachusetts.
- 1803 The Middlesex Canal opens to connect the Merrimack River with Boston Harbor
- 1844 The Rochdale Pioneers commence business at their cooperative in Rochdale, England, starting the Cooperative movement.
- 1861 Congress authorizes the Medal of Honor, the Nation's highest award, for Naval personnel.
- 1861 Medal of Honor: Public Resolution 82, containing a provision for a Navy Medal of Valor, is signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln.
- 1865 Kappa Alpha Order is founded under the name of Phi Kappa Chi at Washington College (now Washington and Lee University) in Lexington, Virginia.
- 1872 Challenger expedition: HMS Challenger, commanded by Captain George Nares, sails from Portsmouth.
- 1883 The first Permanent Force cavalry and infantry regiments of the Canadian Army are formed: The Royal Canadian Dragoons and The Royal Canadian Regiment.
- 1891 18 students play first basketball game (Springfield College)
- 1898 Scientists Pierre & Marie Curie discovers radium
- 1909 University of Copenhagen rejects Cook's claim that he was first to North Pole
- 1912 The movie Das Mirakel premiered in Germany.
- 1913 Arthur Wynne's "word-cross", the first crossword puzzle, is published in the New York World.
- 1913 The first crossword puzzle (with 32 clues) printed in New York World
- 1914 First feature-length silent film comedy, "Tillie's Punctured Romance" released. (Marie Dressler, Mabel Normand and Charles Chaplin)
- 1915 25.83 cm (10.17") of rainfall, Glenora, Oregon (state record)
- 1917 Meiji Dairies, a Japanese dairy company, is founded.
- 1921 Supreme Court rules labor injunctions and picketing unconstitutional
- 1923 Nepal changes from British protectorate to independent nation
- 1929 First group hospital insurance plan effected, Dallas TX
- 1932 SS Gateshead, sunk in a storm off Seaham Harbour, Durham after a collision with the Norwegian vessel Miranda. Most of the crew including the Captain, Matthew W. Hall lost their lives.
- 1933 Dried human blood serum first prepared, University of Pennsylvania
- 1933 Newfoundland reverts to being a crown colony
- 1937 Snow White the first feature-length color and sound cartoon premiers
- 1937 The film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is premiered at the Carthay Circle Theater in Los Angeles.
- 1941 HMS AUDACITY, sunk east of Azores by 3 torpedoes from German U-751.
- 1943 USS Grayling (SS-208) sinks fourth Japanese ship since 18 December.
- 1951 First helicopter landing aboard a hospital ship, USS Consolation.
- 1958 French presidential election, 1958: Charles de Gaulle is elected President of France as his Union des Dmocrates pour la Rpublique party gain 78.5% of the vote.
- 1962 Rondane National Park is established as Norway's first national park.
- 1967 Louis Washkansky, the first man to undergo a heart transplant, dies in Cape Town, South Africa, after living for 18 days.
- 1968 Launch of Apollo 8 with Captain James A. Lovell, Jr. as Command Module Pilot. During the mission Lovell was one of the first two people to see the far side of the moon. The mission lasted 6 days and 3 hours, and included 10 moon orbits. Recovery was by HS-4 helicopters from USS Yorktown (CVS-10).
- 1968 Visitor posting - Marcus James Ward born in Pasadena, TX - USA [email protected]
- 1970 Elvis Presley meets with President Richard Nixon to discuss the war on drugs.
- 1970 The F-14 Tomcat flies for the first time.
- 1971 The United Nations Security Council chooses Kurt Waldheim to succeed U Thant as Secretary-General.
- 1971 UN Security Council chooses Kurt Waldheim as 4th secretary general
- 1972 Soviet Union signs a separate peace with East Germany
- 1973 Israel, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, US & USSR meet in Geneva
- 1973 The Geneva Conference on the Arab-Israeli conflict opens.
- 1974 Number one hit on UK music charts - Mud - Lonely This Christmas
- 1975 First New York Jet to gain 1,000 yards rushing (John Riggins)
- 1976 UN General Assembly passes a resolution declaring 1979-Year of Child
- 1978 Police in Des Plaines IL, arrested John W Gacy Jr for murder
- 1979 Gary Unger plays in record 914th consecutive NHL game
- 1979 Lancaster House Agreement: An independence agreement for Rhodesia is signed in London by Lord Carrington, Sir Ian Gilmour, Robert Mugabe, Joshua Nkomo, Bishop Abel Muzorewa and Dr. S.C. Mundawarara.
- 1983 Loretta Swit weds Dennis Holahan
- 1984 USSR launches Vega 2 for fly-by of Halley's Come
- 1985 ARCO Anchorage runs aground near Port Angeles, WA
- 1987 3 white New York teens convicted of manslaughter in death of a black man
- 1987 Soyuz TM-4 carries 3 cosmonauts to space station Mir
- 1987 The passenger ferry Doa Paz sinks after colliding with the oil tanker Vector 1 in the Tablas Strait in the Philippines, killing 1,565.
- 1988 A bomb explodes on board Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland, killing 270.
- 1988 Drexel agrees guilt to security felonies, pays a $650 million fine
- 1988 Pan Am "Flight 103" explodes over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270
- 1989 Romania's dictator Nicolae Ceausescu's final speech (executed 12/25)
- 1989 US invades Panama and ousts General Noriega
- 1991 95 share in Madrid Spain $1.3 billion lottery (#47996)
- 1991 Charilaos Florakis is elected honorary president of the Communist Party of Greece.
- 1991 El Sayid Nosair acquitted of killing Meir Kahane
- 1992 A Dutch DC-10, flight Martinair MP 495, crashes at Faro Airport (Portugal), killing 56 people.
- 1994 A homemade bomb explodes on the # 4 train on Fulton Street in New York City.
- 1995 The city of Bethlehem passes from Israeli to Palestinian control.
- 1995 Visitor posting - Whitney Alyssa was born - USA
- 1997 Visitor posting - amanda winton famous super model was born - USA
- 1999 The Spanish Civil Guard intercepts a van loaded with 950 kg of explosives that ETA intended to use to blow up Torre Picasso in Madrid.
- 2007 The Schengen Agreement area increases to include 9 European Union member states; Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia on land and sea borders.
- 2008 Jewish Holiday - Chanukah - Work permitted. December 21-29, 2008
- 2009 A police officer in Washington, D.C, draws a gun during a snowball fight.
- 2009 At least 10 people are killed in a rain of mortar shells during the first meeting of MPs in Mogadishu since August 2009.
- 2009 At least 29 people freeze to death in Poland.
- 2009 At least 30 people have been killed in violence in the Nigerian state of Nasarawa.
- 2009 Burma's Supreme Court agrees to review the extension of the house arrest on National League for Democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
- 2009 Eurostar is suspended indefinitely due to the heavy snowfall affecting continental Europe.
- 2009 Madagascar's President Andry Rajoelina abandons the power sharing agreement after appointing a new military Prime Minister, Colonel Vital Albert Camille.
- 2009 Mexico City's Legislative Assembly legalizes same-sex marriage and LGBT adoption.
- 2009 Mister Bolivia wins Mister International 2009 at the end of the two-week event in Taiwan.
- 2009 North Korea establishes a "peacetime firing zone" on the Northern Limit Line maritime border with South Korea, threatening to fire shells in South Korean territorial waters.
- 2009 Polish police arrest five men and recover the stolen Arbeit macht frei sign that hung over the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz where millions were murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust
- 2009 Remains of the first dwelling in Nazareth that can be dated back to the time of Jesus have been found by Israeli archaeologists.
- 2009 Severe Tropical Cyclone Laurence becomes a category 5 and strikes the Australian coast with winds of 285 km/h (177 mph).
- 2009 The Sudan People's Liberation Movement, the ruling party in Southern Sudan, criticises a new security law passed by the central government, saying it could undermine the 2010 elections.
- 2009 The United Nations Security Council lifts an arms embargo on Liberia imposed during the reign of Charles Taylor in 2003.
- 2009 The funeral of Grand Ayatollah Hosein-Ali Montazeri takes place in the Iranian city of Qom, as anti-government protests and clashes take place.
- 2009 The leaders of the three main UK political parties agree to stage the country's first ever live televised election debates ahead of the 2010 General Election.
- 2009 Two firefighters are hurt fighting a fire as St. James's Gate Brewery is engulfed by flames which send clouds of smoke across Dublin.
- 2009 Unknown gunmen in Lebanon open fire on a bus carrying Syrian workers, killing one person.
- 2010 The only full lunar eclipse of 2010. The eclipse begins on Tuesday morning, Dec. 21st, 2010 at 1:33 am EST
- 2012 Forecast as the end of this age by the Mayas, who had remarkably accurate lunar and solar calendars, and fairly advanced mathematics.
- 2012 Hold off buying Christmas presents til after Dec 21, 2012
- 2012 Nostradamus predicted Armageddon for Dec 21, 2012
- 2012 The Mayan civilization predicted that on December 21, 2012 something will happen to the world we know. Something will happen that will change our civilization, value systems and the way we know human civilization forever.
- 2012 Visitor posting - People proclaim the end of the world
- 2012 Visitor posting - the world is not going to end! - USA
- 2012 Visitor posting - the poles will shift - two spots that are now on the equator will be the new poles
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