AD 41 – Claudius is proclaimed Roman Emperor by the Praetorian Guard after they assassinate the previous emperor, his nephew Caligula.
914 – Start of the First Fatimid invasion of Egypt.
1438 – The Council of Basel suspends Pope Eugene IV.
1458 – Matthias Corvinus is elected King of Hungary.
1536 – King Henry VIII of England suffers an accident while jousting, leading to a brain injury that historians say may have influenced his later erratic behaviour and possible impotence.
1679 – King Charles II of England dissolves the Cavalier Parliament.
1742 – Charles VII Albert becomes Holy Roman Emperor.
1758 – During the Seven Years’ War the leading burghers of Königsberg submit to Elizabeth of Russia, thus forming Russian Prussia (until 1763).
1817 – Crossing of the Andes: Many soldiers of Juan Gregorio de las Heras are captured during the Action of Picheuta.
1835 – Slaves in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil, stage a revolt, which is instrumental in ending slavery there 50 years later.
1848 – California Gold Rush: James W. Marshall finds gold at Sutter’s Mill near Sacramento.
1857 – The University of Calcutta is formally founded as the first fully fledged university in South Asia.
1859 – The United Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia (later named Romania) is formed as a personal union under the rule of Domnitor Alexandru Ioan Cuza.
1900 – Second Boer War: Boers stop a British attempt to break the Siege of Ladysmith in the Battle of Spion Kop.
1908 – The first Boy Scout troop is organized in England by Robert Baden-Powell.
1915 – World War I: British Grand Fleet battle cruisers under Vice-Admiral Sir David Beatty engage Rear-Admiral Franz von Hipper’s battle cruisers in the Battle of Dogger Bank.
1916 – In Brushaber v. Union Pacific Railroad Co., the Supreme Court of the United States declares the federal income tax constitutional.
1918 – The Gregorian calendar is introduced in Russia by decree of the Council of People’s Commissars effective February 14 (New Style).
1933 – The 20th Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, changing the beginning and end of terms for all elected federal offices.
1939 – The deadliest earthquake in Chilean history strikes Chillán, killing approximately 28,000 people.
1942 – World War II: The Allies bombard Bangkok, leading Thailand, then under Japanese control, to declare war against the United States and United Kingdom.
1943 – World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill conclude a conference in Casablanca.
1946 – The United Nations General Assembly passes its first resolution to establish the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission.
1960 – Algerian War: Some units of European volunteers in Algiers stage an insurrection known as the “barricades week”, during which they seize government buildings and clash with local police.
1961 – Goldsboro B-52 crash: A bomber carrying two H-bombs breaks up in mid-air over North Carolina. The uranium core of one weapon remains lost.
1968 – Vietnam War: The 1st Australian Task Force launches Operation Coburg against the North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong during wider fighting around Long Bình and Biên Hòa.
1972 – Japanese Sgt. Shoichi Yokoi is found hiding in a Guam jungle, where he had been since the end of World War II.
1977 – The Atocha massacre occurs in Madrid during the Spanish transition to democracy.
1978 – Soviet satellite Kosmos 954, with a nuclear reactor on board, burns up in Earth’s atmosphere, scattering radioactive debris over Canada’s Northwest Territories. Only 1% is recovered.
1984 – Apple Computer places the Macintosh personal computer on sale in the United States.
1989 – Notorious serial killer Ted Bundy, with over 30 known victims, is executed by the electric chair at the Florida State Prison.
1990 – Japan launches Hiten, the country’s first lunar probe, the first robotic lunar probe since the Soviet Union’s Luna 24 in 1976, and the first lunar probe launched by a country other than Soviet Union or the United States.
2003 – The United States Department of Homeland Security officially begins operation.
2009 – Cyclone Klaus makes landfall near Bordeaux, France, causing 26 deaths as well as extensive disruptions to public transport and power supplies.
2011 – At least 35 are killed and 180 injured in a bombing at Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport.
Births on January 24
AD 76 – Hadrian, Roman emperor (d. 138)
1287 – Richard de Bury, English bishop and politician, Lord Chancellor of Great Britain (d. 1345)
1444 – Galeazzo Maria Sforza, Duke of Milan (d. 1476)
1540 – Edmund Campion, English priest and martyr (d. 1581)
1547 – Joanna of Austria, Grand Duchess of Tuscany, Austrian Archduchess (d. 1578)
1602 – Mildmay Fane, 2nd Earl of Westmorland, English politician (d. 1666)
1619 – Yamazaki Ansai, Japanese philosopher (d. 1682)
1643 – Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset, English poet and politician, Lord Chamberlain of Great Britain (d. 1706)
1664 – John Vanbrugh, English architect and dramatist (d. 1726)
1670 – William Congreve, English playwright and poet (d. 1729)
1672 – Margrave Albert Frederick of Brandenburg-Schwedt, German Lieutenant General (d. 1731)
1674 – Thomas Tanner, English bishop (d. 1735)
1679 – Christian Wolff, German philosopher and academic (d. 1754)
1684 – Charles Alexander, Duke of Württemberg, German noble (d. 1737)
1705 – Farinelli, Italian castrato singer (d. 1782)
1709 – Dom Bédos de Celles, French monk and organist (d. 1779)
1712 – Frederick the Great, Prussian king (d. 1786)
1732 – Pierre Beaumarchais, French playwright and financier (d. 1799)
1739 – Jean Nicolas Houchard, French General of the French Revolution (d. 1793)
1746 – Gustav III of Sweden (d. 1792)
1749 – Charles James Fox, English businessman and politician, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (d. 1806)
1754 – Andrew Ellicott, American soldier and surveyor (d. 1820)
1761 – Louis Klein, French general (d. 1845)
1763 – Louis Alexandre Andrault de Langeron, French-Ukrainian general and politician (d. 1831)
1776 – E. T. A. Hoffmann, German jurist, author, and composer (d. 1822)
1787 – Christian Ludwig Brehm, German pastor and ornithologist (d. 1864)
1804 – Delphine de Girardin, French author (d. 1855)
1814 – Duchess Helene of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, French Crown Princess (d. 1858)
1814 – John Colenso, British mathematician (d. 1883)
1816 – Wilhelm Henzen, German philologist and epigraphist (d. 1887)
1828 – Ferdinand Cohn, German biologist (d. 1898)
1829 – Yechiel Michel Epstein, Rabbi and posek (d. 1908)
1836 – Signe Rink, Greenland-born Danish writer and ethnologist (d. 1909)
1843 – Josip Stadler, Croatian archbishop (d. 1918)
1848 – Vasily Surikov, Russian painter (d. 1916)
1850 – Hermann Ebbinghaus, German psychologist (d. 1909)
1853 – Sigbert Josef Maria Ganser, German psychiatrist (d. 1931)
1856 – Friedrich Grünanger, Transylvanian Hungarian-German architect (d. 1929)
1858 – Constance Naden, English poet and philosopher (d. 1889)
1862 – Edith Wharton, American novelist and short story writer (d. 1937)
1863 – August Adler, Czech and Austrian mathematician (d. 1923)
1864 – Marguerite Durand, French actress, journalist, and activist (d. 1936)
1864 – Gaetano Giardino, Italian soldier and Marshal of Italy (d. 1935)
1866 – Jaan Poska, Estonian lawyer and politician, 1st Estonian Minister of Foreign Affairs (d. 1920)
1870 – Herbert Kilpin, English footballer (d. 1916)
1871 – Jiří Karásek ze Lvovic, Czech poet, writer and literary critic (d. 1951)
1871 – Thomas Jaggar, American volcanologist (d. 1953)
1872 – Yuly Aykhenvald, Russian literary critic (d. 1928)
1872 – Konstantin Bogaevsky, Russian painter (d. 1943)
1872 – Morris Travers, English chemist and academic (d. 1961)
1873 – Dmitry Ushakov, Russian philologist and lexicographer (d. 1942)
1882 – Harold D. Babcock, American astronomer (d. 1968)
1882 – Ödön Bodor, Hungarian athlete (d. 1927)
1886 – Henry King, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 1982)
1887 – Jean-Henri Humbert, French botanist (d. 1967)
1888 – Vicki Baum, Austrian author and screenwriter (d. 1960)
1888 – Ernst Heinkel, German engineer and businessman, founded the Heinkel Aircraft Manufacturing Company (d. 1958)
1889 – Victor Eftimiu, Romanian poet and playwright (d. 1972)
1889 – Charles Hawes, American historian and author (d. 1923)
1889 – Hermann-Bernhard Ramcke, German general of paratroop forces during World War II (d. 1968)
1891 – Walter Model, German field marshal (d. 1945)
1892 – Franz Aigner, Austrian weightlifter (d. 1970)
1895 – Eugen Roth, German poet and songwriter (d. 1976)
1897 – Paul Fejos, Hungarian-born American director (d. 1963)
1899 – Hoyt Vandenberg, U.S. Air Force general (d. 1954)
1900 – René Guillot, French writer (d. 1969)
1901 – Harry Calder, South African cricketer (d. 1995)
1901 – Cassandre, French painter (d. 1968)
1901 – Edward Turner, English engineer (d. 1973)
1905 – J. Howard Marshall, American lawyer and businessman (d. 1995)
1906 – Wilfred Jackson, American animator and composer (d. 1988)
1907 – Ismail Nasiruddin of Terengganu, fourth Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia (d. 1979)
1907 – Maurice Couve de Murville, French soldier and politician, Prime Minister of France (d. 1999)
1907 – Jean Daetwyler, Swiss composer and musician (d. 1994)
1909 – Martin Lings, English author and scholar (d. 2005)
1910 – Doris Haddock, American political activist (d. 2010)
1912 – Frederick Ashworth, American admiral (d. 2005)
1913 – Norman Dello Joio, American organist and composer (d. 2008)
1913 – Ray Stehr, Australian rugby league player and coach (d. 1983)
1915 – Vítězslava Kaprálová, Czech composer and conductor (d. 1940)
1915 – Robert Motherwell, American painter and academic (d. 1991)
1916 – Rafael Caldera, Venezuelan lawyer and politician, 65th President of Venezuela (d. 2009)
1916 – Gene Mako, Hungarian-American tennis player and actor (d. 2013)
1917 – Ernest Borgnine, American actor (d. 2012)
1917 – Wilhelmus Demarteau, Dutch prelate of the Roman Catholic Church (d. 2012)
1918 – Gottfried von Einem, Austrian pianist and composer (d. 1996)
1918 – Oral Roberts, American evangelist, founded Oral Roberts University and Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association (d. 2009)
1919 – Coleman Francis, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 1973)
1919 – Leon Kirchner, American composer and educator (d. 2009)
1920 – Jimmy Forrest, American saxophonist (d. 1980)
1920 – Jerry Maren, American actor (d. 2018)
1922 – Daniel Boulanger, French actor and screenwriter (d. 2014)
1922 – Neil Franklin, English footballer (d. 1996)
1923 – Geneviève Asse, French painter
1925 – Gus Mortson, Canadian ice hockey player and coach (d. 2015)
1925 – Maria Tallchief, American ballerina and actress (d. 2013)
1926 – Ruth Asawa, American sculptor (d. 2013)
1926 – Georges Lautner, French director and screenwriter (d. 2013)
1927 – Sir Patrick Macnaghten, 11th Baronet, Scottish lieutenant (d. 2007)
1927 – Paula Hawkins, American politician (d. 2009)
1928 – Desmond Morris, English zoologist, ethologist, and painter
1928 – Michel Serrault, French actor (d. 2007)
1930 – Terence Bayler, New Zealand actor (d. 2016)
1930 – Mahmoud Farshchian, Iranian-Persian painter and academic
1930 – John Romita Sr., American comic book artist
1931 – Lars Hörmander, Swedish mathematician and academic (d. 2012)
1931 – Ib Nørholm, Danish composer and organist
1932 – Éliane Radigue, French electronic music composer
1933 – Kamran Baghirov, the 12th First Secretary of Azerbaijan Communist Party (d. 2000)
1933 – Asim Ferhatović, Bosnian footballer (d. 1987)
1934 – Leonard Goldberg, American producer (d. 2019)
1934 – Stanisław Grochowiak, Polish poet and dramatist (d. 1976)
1935 – Eric Ashton, English rugby player and coach (d. 2008)
1935 – Shivabalayogi, Indian religious leader (d. 1994)
1936 – Doug Kershaw, American fiddle player and singer
1937 – Trevor Edwards, Welsh footballer
1938 – Julius Hemphill, American saxophonist and composer (d. 1995)
1939 – Renate Garisch-Culmberger, German shot putter
1939 – Ray Stevens, American singer-songwriter and actor
1940 – Vito Acconci, American designer (d. 2017)
1940 – Joachim Gauck, German pastor and politician, 11th President of Germany
1941 – Neil Diamond, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1941 – Aaron Neville, American singer
1941 – Dan Shechtman, Israeli chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
1942 – Ingo Friedrich, German Member of the European Parliament
1942 – Gary Hart, American wrestler and manager (d. 2008)
1943 – Peter Struck, German lawyer and politician, 13th German Federal Minister of Defence (d. 2012)
1943 – Barry Mealand, English footballer, right back (d. 2013)
1943 – Sharon Tate, American model and actress (d. 1969)
1943 – Tony Trimmer, English race car driver
1943 – Manuel Velázquez, Spanish footballer (d. 2016)
1944 – David Gerrold, American science fiction screenwriter and author
1944 – Gian-Franco Kasper, Swiss ski official
1945 – John Garamendi, American football player and politician, 1st United States Deputy Secretary of the Interior
1945 – Subhash Ghai, Indian director, producer and screenwriter
1945 – Eva Janko, Austrian javelin thrower
1946 – Michael Ontkean, Canadian actor
1947 – Giorgio Chinaglia, Italian footballer (d. 2012)
1947 – Michio Kaku, American physicist and academic
1947 – Masashi Ozaki, Japanese baseball player and golfer
1947 – Warren Zevon, American singer-songwriter (d. 2003)
1948 – Elliott Abrams, American diplomat, lawyer and political scientist
1948 – Michael Des Barres, English singer-songwriter and actor
1949 – John Belushi, American actor and screenwriter (d. 1982)
1949 – Bart Gordon, American lawyer
1949 – Nadezhda Ilyina, Russian athlete and mother of Russian tennis player Nadia Petrova (d. 2013)
1949 – Rihoko Yoshida, Japanese voice actress
1950 – Daniel Auteuil, French actor, director, and screenwriter
1951 – Yakov Smirnoff, Ukrainian-American comedian and actor
1953 – Yuri Bashmet, Russian violinist, viola player, and conductor
1953 – Moon Jae-in, 19th President of South Korea
1954 – Jo Gartner, Austrian race car driver (d. 1986)
1955 – Jim Montgomery, American swimmer
1955 – Alan Sokal, American physicist and author
1955 – Lynda Weinman, American businesswoman and author
1956 – Agus Martowardojo, governor of Bank Indonesia
1957 – Mark Eaton, American basketball player and sportscaster
1957 – Ade Edmondson, English comedian and musician
1958 – Kim Eui-kon, Korean wrestler
1958 – Jools Holland, English singer-songwriter and pianist
1958 – Frank Ullrich, German biathlete
1959 – Akira Maeda, Japanese wrestler, mixed martial artist, and actor
1959 – Michel Preud’homme, Belgian footballer and manager
1961 – Jorge Barrios, Uruguayan footballer
1961 – Guido Buchwald, German footballer and manager
1961 – Christa Kinshofer, German ski racer
1961 – Nastassja Kinski, German-American actress and producer
1961 – William Van Dijck, Belgian runner
1963 – Arnold Vanderlyde, Dutch boxer
1964 – Annika Dahlman, Swedish cross country skier
1965 – Robin Dutt, German footballer
1965 – Carlos Saldanha, Brazilian-American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter
1965 – Margaret Urlich, New Zealand singer-songwriter
1965 – Pagonis Vakalopoulos, Greek footballer and manager
1965 – Kim Sung-moon, South Korean wrestler
1966 – Julie Dreyfus, French actress
1966 – Karin Viard, French actress
1967 – Michael Kiske, German singer
1967 – Mark Kozelek, American singer and musician
1967 – Phil LaMarr, American actor, singer, and screenwriter
1967 – John Myung, American bass player and songwriter
1968 – Fernando Escartín, Spanish cyclist
1968 – Antony Garrett Lisi, American theoretical physicist
1968 – Mary Lou Retton, American gymnast
1968 – Tymerlan Huseynov, Ukrainian footballer
1969 – Yoo Ho-jeong, South Korean actress
1969 – Carlos Rômulo Gonçalves e Silva, bishop of Montenegro
1970 – Roberto Bonano, Argentine footballer
1970 – Neil Johnson, Zimbabwean cricketer
1970 – Matthew Lillard, American actor
1971 – José Carlos Fernandez, Bolivian footballer
1972 – Beth Hart, American blues-rock singer and piano player
1974 – Cyril Despres, French rally racer
1974 – Ed Helms, American actor, producer, and screenwriter
1974 – Melissa Tkautz, Australian actress and singer
1974 – Rokia Traoré, Malian singer
1975 – Gianluca Basile, Italian former professional basketball player
1975 – Rónald Gómez, Costa Rican footballer and manager
1975 – Reto Hug, Swiss triathlonist
1975 – Henna Raita, Finnish alpine skier
1976 – Shae-Lynn Bourne, Canadian ice dancer, coach, and choreographer
1976 – Cindy Pieters, Belgian cyclist
1977 – Andrija Gerić, Serbian volleyball player
1977 – Michelle Hunziker, Swiss-Dutch actress, model and singer
1978 – Veerle Baetens, Belgian actress and singer
1978 – Mark Hildreth, Canadian actor and musician
1978 – Kristen Schaal, American actress, voice artist, comedian and writer
1979 – Tatyana Ali, American actress and singer
1979 – Leandro Desábato, Argentinian footballer
1979 – Busy Signal, Jamaican dancehall reggae artist
1979 – Nik Wallenda, American acrobat
1980 – Jofre Mateu, Spanish footballer
1980 – Suzy, Portuguese singer
1981 – Mario Eggimann, Swiss footballer
1981 – Zaur Hashimov, Azerbaijani footballer and manager
1981 – Elena Kolomina, Kazakhstani cross country skier
1982 – Céline Deville, French footballer
1982 – Daveed Diggs, American actor, rapper and singer
1982 – Claudia Heill, Austrian judoka
1982 – Aitor Hernández, Spanish racing cyclist
1983 – Davide Biondini, Italian footballer
1983 – Wyatt Crockett, New Zealand rugby player
1983 – Evgeny Drattsev, Russian swimmer
1983 – Craig Horner, Australian actor and musician
1983 – Shaun Maloney, Scottish footballer
1983 – Scott Speed, American race car driver
1984 – Emerse Faé, French-born Ivorian footballer
1984 – Yotam Halperin, Israeli basketball player
1984 – Jung Jin-sun, South Korean fencer
1984 – Scott Kazmir, American baseball player
1984 – Paulo Sérgio Moreira Gonçalves, Portuguese footballer
1985 – Fabiana Claudino, Brazilian volleyball player
1985 – Trey Gilder, American basketball player
1986 – Cristiano Araújo, Brazilian singer-songwriter (d. 2015)
1986 – Mohammad Bagheri Motamed, Iranian taekwondo practitioner
1986 – Mischa Barton, English-American actress
1986 – Vladislav Ivanov, Russian footballer
1986 – Michael Kightly, English footballer
1986 – Ricky Ullman, Israeli-American actor
1987 – Wayne Hennessey, Welsh footballer
1987 – Luis Suárez, Uruguayan footballer
1987 – Davide Valsecchi, Italian racing driver
1987 – Kia Vaughn, American born Czech basketball player
1987 – Guan Xin, Chinese basketball player
1988 – Selina Jörg, German snowboarder
1989 – Serdar Kesimal, Turkish footballer
1989 – Gong Lijiao, Chinese shot putter
1989 – Ki Sung-yueng, South Korean footballer
1990 – Mao Abe, Japanese singer-songwriter and guitarist
2007 – İsmail Cem İpekçi, Turkish journalist and politician, 45th Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs (b. 1940)
2007 – Guadalupe Larriva, Ecuadorian academic and politician (b. 1956)
2007 – Emiliano Mercado del Toro, Puerto Rican-American soldier (b. 1891)
2010 – Pernell Roberts, American actor (b. 1928)
2011 – Bernd Eichinger, German director and producer (b. 1949)
2014 – Shulamit Aloni, Israeli lawyer and politician, 11th Israeli Minister of Education (b. 1928)
2014 – Rafael Pineda Ponce, Honduran academic and politician (b. 1930)
2015 – Otto Carius, German lieutenant and pharmacist (b. 1922)
2016 – Fredrik Barth, German-Norwegian anthropologist and academic (b. 1928)
2016 – Marvin Minsky, American computer scientist and academic (b. 1927)
2016 – Henry Worsley, English colonel and explorer (b. 1960)
2017 – Butch Trucks, American drummer (b. 1947)
2018 – Mark E. Smith, British singer-songwriter (b. 1957)
2019 – Rosemary Bryant Mariner, American United States Naval Aviator (b. 1953)
Holidays and observances on January 24
Christian feast day:
Babylas of Antioch
Cadoc (Wales)
Exuperantius of Cingoli
Felician of Foligno
Francis de Sales
Pratulin Martyrs (Greek Catholic Church)
January 24 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Earliest day on which Saturday of Souls can fall, while February 27 (or 28 during Leap Year) is the latest; observed 57 days before Easter. (Eastern Orthodox)
Feast of Our Lady of Peace (Roman Catholic Church), and its related observances:
379 – Emperor Gratian elevates Flavius Theodosius at Sirmium to Augustus, and gives him authority over all the eastern provinces of the Roman Empire.
649 – Conquest of Kucha: The forces of Kucha surrender after a forty-day siege led by Tang dynasty general Ashina She’er, establishing Tang control over the northern Tarim Basin in Xinjiang.
1419 – Hundred Years’ War: Rouen surrenders to Henry V of England, completing his reconquest of Normandy.
1511 – The Italian city-fortress of Mirandola surrenders to the French.
1520 – Sten Sture the Younger, the Regent of Sweden, is mortally wounded at the Battle of Bogesund and dies on February 3.
1607 – San Agustin Church in Manila is officially completed; it is the oldest church still standing in the Philippines.
1764 – John Wilkes is expelled from the British House of Commons for seditious libel.
1764 – Bolle Willum Luxdorph records in his diary that a mail bomb, possibly the world’s first, has severely injured the Danish Colonel Poulsen, residing at Børglum Abbey.
1788 – The second group of ships of the First Fleet arrive at Botany Bay.
1795 – The Batavian Republic is proclaimed in the Netherlands, bringing to an end the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands.
1806 – Britain occupies the Dutch Cape Colony after the Battle of Blaauwberg.
1817 – An army of 5,423 soldiers, led by General José de San Martín, crosses the Andes from Argentina to liberate Chile and then Peru.
1829 – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s Faust: The First Part of the Tragedy receives its premiere performance.
1839 – The British East India Company captures Aden.
1853 – Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Il trovatore receives its premiere performance in Rome.
1861 – American Civil War: Georgia joins South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, and Alabama in declaring secession from the United States.
1862 – American Civil War: Battle of Mill Springs: The Confederacy suffers its first significant defeat in the conflict.
1871 – Franco-Prussian War: In the Siege of Paris, Prussia wins the Battle of St. Quentin. Meanwhile, the French attempt to break the siege in the Battle of Buzenval will end unsuccessfully the following day.
1883 – The first electric lighting system employing overhead wires, built by Thomas Edison, begins service at Roselle, New Jersey.
1899 – Anglo-Egyptian Sudan is formed.
1915 – Georges Claude patents the neon discharge tube for use in advertising.
1915 – German strategic bombing during World War I: German zeppelins bomb the towns of Great Yarmouth and King’s Lynn in the United Kingdom killing at least 20 people, in the first major aerial bombardment of a civilian target.
1917 – Silvertown explosion: A blast at a munitions factory in London kills 73 and injures over 400. The resulting fire causes over £2,000,000 worth of damage.
1920 – The United States Senate votes against joining the League of Nations.
1920 – The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is founded.
1937 – Howard Hughes sets a new air record by flying from Los Angeles to New York City in 7 hours, 28 minutes, 25 seconds.
1940 – You Nazty Spy!, the first Hollywood film of any kind to satirize Adolf Hitler and the Nazis premieres, starring The Three Stooges, with Moe Howard as the character “Moe Hailstone” satirizing Hitler.
1941 – World War II: HMS Greyhound and other escorts of convoy AS-12 sink Italian submarine Neghelli with all hands 40 miles (64 km) northeast of Falkonera.
1942 – World War II: The Japanese conquest of Burma begins.
1945 – World War II: Soviet forces liberate the Łódź Ghetto. Of more than 200,000 inhabitants in 1940, less than 900 had survived the Nazi occupation.
1946 – General Douglas MacArthur establishes the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo to try Japanese war criminals.
1953 – Almost 72 percent of all television sets in the United States are tuned into I Love Lucy to watch Lucy give birth.
1960 – Japan and the United States sign the US–Japan Mutual Security Treaty
1969 – Student Jan Palach dies after setting himself on fire three days earlier in Prague’s Wenceslas Square to protest about the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union in 1968. His funeral turns into another major protest.
1974 – China gains control over all the Paracel Islands after a military engagement between the naval forces of China and South Vietnam
1977 – President Gerald Ford pardons Iva Toguri D’Aquino (a.k.a. “Tokyo Rose”).
1978 – The last Volkswagen Beetle made in Germany leaves VW’s plant in Emden. Beetle production in Latin America continues until 2003.
1981 – Iran hostage crisis: United States and Iranian officials sign an agreement to release 52 American hostages after 14 months of captivity.
1983 – Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie is arrested in Bolivia.
1983 – The Apple Lisa, the first commercial personal computer from Apple Inc. to have a graphical user interface and a computer mouse, is announced.
1986 – The first IBM PC computer virus is released into the wild. A boot sector virus dubbed (c)Brain, it was created by the Farooq Alvi Brothers in Lahore, Pakistan, reportedly to deter unauthorized copying of the software they had written.
1991 – Gulf War: Iraq fires a second Scud missile into Israel, causing 15 injuries.
1993 – Czech Republic and Slovakia join the United Nations.
1995 – After being struck by lightning the crew of Bristow Flight 56C are forced to ditch. All 18 aboard are later rescued.
1996 – The barge North Cape oil spill occurs as an engine fire forces the tugboat Scandia ashore on Moonstone Beach in South Kingstown, Rhode Island.
1997 – Yasser Arafat returns to Hebron after more than 30 years and joins celebrations over the handover of the last Israeli-controlled West Bank city.
1999 – British Aerospace agrees to acquire the defence subsidiary of the General Electric Company plc, forming BAE Systems in November 1999.
2007 – Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink is assassinated in front of his newspaper’s Istanbul office by 17-year-old Turkish ultra-nationalist Ogün Samast.
2007 – Four-man Team N2i, using only skis and kites, completes a 1,093-mile (1,759 km) trek to reach the Antarctic pole of inaccessibility for the first time since 1965 and for the first time ever without mechanical assistance.
2012 – The Hong Kong-based file-sharing website Megaupload is shut down by the FBI.
2014 – A bomb attack on an army convoy in the city of Bannu kills at least 26 Pakistani soldiers and injures 38 others.
Births on January 19
399 – Pulcheria, Byzantine empress and saint (d. 453)
1200 – Dōgen Zenji, founder of Sōtō Zen (d. 1253)
1544 – Francis II of France (d. 1560)
1617 – Lucas Faydherbe, Flemish sculptor and architect (d. 1697)
1628 – Charles Stanley, 8th Earl of Derby, English noble (d. 1672)
1676 – John Weldon, English organist and composer (d. 1736)
1721 – Jean-Philippe Baratier, German scholar and author (d. 1740)
1736 – James Watt, Scottish-English chemist and engineer (d. 1819)
1737 – Giuseppe Millico, Italian soprano, composer, and educator (d. 1802)
1739 – Joseph Bonomi the Elder, Italian architect, designed Longford Hall and Barrells Hall (d. 1808)
1752 – James Morris III, American captain (d. 1820)
1757 – Countess Augusta Reuss of Ebersdorf (d. 1831)
1788 – Pavel Kiselyov, Russian general and politician (d. 1874)
1790 – Per Daniel Amadeus Atterbom, Swedish poet and academic (d. 1855)
1798 – Auguste Comte, French economist, sociologist, and philosopher (d. 1857)
1807 – Robert E. Lee, American general and academic (d. 1870)
1808 – Lysander Spooner, American philosopher and author (d. 1887)
1809 – Edgar Allan Poe, American short story writer, poet, and critic (d. 1849)
1810 – Talhaiarn, Welsh poet and architect (d.1869)
1813 – Henry Bessemer, English engineer and businessman (d. 1898)
1832 – Ferdinand Laub, Czech violinist and composer (d. 1875)
1833 – Alfred Clebsch, German mathematician and academic (d. 1872)
1839 – Paul Cézanne, French painter (d. 1906)
1848 – Arturo Graf, Italian poet, of German ancestry (d. 1913).
1848 – John Fitzwilliam Stairs, Canadian businessman and politician (d. 1904)
1848 – Matthew Webb, English swimmer and diver (d. 1883)
1851 – Jacobus Kapteyn, Dutch astronomer and academic (d. 1922)
1852 – Thomas Price, Welsh-Australian politician, 24th Premier of South Australia (d. 1909)
1863 – Werner Sombart, German economist and sociologist (d. 1941)
1866 – Harry Davenport, American stage and film actor (d. 1949)
1871 – Dame Gruev, Bulgarian educator and activist, co-founded the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (d. 1906)
1874 – Hitachiyama Taniemon, Japanese sumo wrestler, the 19th Yokozuna (d. 1922)
1876 – Wakashima Gonshirō, Japanese sumo wrestler, the 21st Yokozuna (d. 1943)
1876 – Dragotin Kette, Slovenian poet and author (d. 1899)
1878 – Herbert Chapman, English footballer and manager (d. 1934)
1879 – Boris Savinkov, Russian soldier and author (d. 1925)
1882 – John Cain Sr., Australian politician, 34th Premier of Victoria (d. 1957)
1883 – Hermann Abendroth, German conductor (d. 1956)
1887 – Alexander Woollcott, American actor, playwright, and critic (d. 1943)
1889 – Sophie Taeuber-Arp, Swiss painter and sculptor (d. 1943)
1892 – Ólafur Thors, Icelandic lawyer and politician, 8th Prime Minister of Iceland (d. 1964)
1893 – Magda Tagliaferro, Brazilian pianist and educator (d. 1986)
1903 – Boris Blacher, German composer and playwright (d. 1975)
1905 – Stanley Hawes, English-Australian director and producer (d. 1991)
1907 – Briggs Cunningham, American race car driver, sailor, and businessman (d. 2003)
1908 – Ish Kabibble, American comedian and cornet player (d. 1994)
1908 – Aleksandr Gennadievich Kurosh, Russian mathematician and theorist (d. 1971)
1911 – Choor Singh, Indian-Singaporean lawyer and judge (d. 2009)
1912 – Leonid Kantorovich, Russian mathematician and economist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1986)
1913 – Rex Ingamells, Australian author and poet (d. 1955)
1913 – Rudolf Wanderone, American professional pocket billiards player (d. 1996)
1918 – John H. Johnson, American publisher, founded the Johnson Publishing Company (d. 2005)
1920 – Bernard Dunstan, English painter and educator (d. 2017)
1920 – Javier Pérez de Cuéllar, Peruvian politician and diplomat, 135th Prime Minister of Peru (d. 2020)
1921 – Patricia Highsmith, American novelist and short story writer (d. 1995)
1922 – Arthur Morris, Australian cricketer and journalist (d. 2015)
1922 – Miguel Muñoz, Spanish footballer and manager (d. 1990)
1923 – Jean Stapleton, American actress and singer (d. 2013)
1924 – Nicholas Colasanto, American actor and director (d. 1985)
1924 – Jean-François Revel, French philosopher (d. 2006)
1925 – Nina Bawden, English author (d. 2012)
1926 – Hans Massaquoi, German-American journalist and author (d. 2013)
1926 – Fritz Weaver, American actor (d. 2016)
1930 – Tippi Hedren, American model, actress, and animal rights-welfare activist
1930 – John Waite, South African cricketer (d. 2011)
1931 – Robert MacNeil, Canadian-American journalist and author
1932 – Russ Hamilton, English singer-songwriter (d. 2008)
1932 – Richard Lester, American-English director, producer, and screenwriter
1932 – Harry Lonsdale, American chemist, businessman, and politician (d. 2014)
1933 – George Coyne, American priest, astronomer, and theologian
1935 – Johnny O’Keefe, Australian singer-songwriter (d. 1978)
1936 – Ziaur Rahman, Bangladeshi general and politician, 7th President of Bangladesh (d. 1981)
1936 – Willie “Big Eyes” Smith, American singer, harmonica player, and drummer (d. 2011)
1936 – Fred J. Lincoln, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 2013)
1937 – John Lions, Australian computer scientist and academic (d. 1998)
1939 – Phil Everly, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2014)
1940 – Paolo Borsellino, Italian lawyer and judge (d. 1992)
1940 – Mike Reid, English comedian, actor, and author (d. 2007)
1941 – Colin Gunton, English theologian and academic (d. 2003)
1941 – Pat Patterson, Canadian wrestler, trainer, and referee
1942 – Michael Crawford, English actor and singer
1942 – Paul-Eerik Rummo, Estonian poet and politician
1943 – Larry Clark, American director, producer, and screenwriter
1943 – Janis Joplin, American singer-songwriter (d. 1970)
1943 – Princess Margriet of the Netherlands
1944 – Shelley Fabares, American actress and singer
1944 – Thom Mayne, American architect and academic, designed the San Francisco Federal Building and Phare Tower
1944 – Dan Reeves, American football player and coach
1945 – Trevor Williams, English singer-songwriter and bass player
1946 – Julian Barnes, English novelist, short story writer, essayist, and critic
1946 – Dolly Parton, American singer-songwriter and actress
1947 – Frank Aarebrot, Norwegian political scientist and academic (d. 2017)
1947 – Paula Deen, American chef and author
1947 – Rod Evans, English singer-songwriter
1948 – Nancy Lynch, American computer scientist and academic
1948 – Frank McKenna, Canadian politician and diplomat, 27th Premier of New Brunswick
1948 – Mal Reilly, English rugby league player and coach
1949 – Arend Langenberg, Dutch voice actor and radio host (d. 2012)
1949 – Robert Palmer, English singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2003)
1950 – Sébastien Dhavernas, Canadian actor
1951 – Martha Davis, American singer
1952 – Dewey Bunnell, British-American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1952 – Nadiuska, German television actress
1952 – Bruce Jay Nelson, American computer scientist (d. 1999)
1953 – Desi Arnaz, Jr., American actor and singer
1953 – Richard Legendre, Canadian tennis player and politician
1953 – Wayne Schimmelbusch, Australian footballer and coach
1954 – Katey Sagal, American actress and singer
1954 – Cindy Sherman, American photographer and director
1954 – Esther Shkalim, Israeli poet and Mizrahi feminist
1955 – Paul Rodriguez, Mexican-American comedian and actor
1956 – Carman, American singer-songwriter, actor, and television host
1956 – Susan Solomon, American atmospheric chemist
1957 – Ottis Anderson, American football player and sportscaster
1957 – Roger Ashton-Griffiths, English actor, screenwriter and film director
1957 – Kenneth McClintock, Puerto Rican public servant and politician, 22nd Secretary of State of Puerto Rico
1958 – Thomas Kinkade, American painter (d. 2012)
1959 – Danese Cooper, American computer scientist and programmer
1959 – Jeff Pilson, American bass player, songwriter, and actor
1961 – William Ragsdale, American actor
1961 – Wayne Hemingway, English fashion designer, co-founded Red or Dead
1962 – Hans Daams, Dutch cyclist
1962 – Chris Sabo, American baseball player and coach
1962 – Jeff Van Gundy, American basketball player and coach
1963 – Michael Adams, American basketball player and coach
1963 – Martin Bashir, English journalist
1963 – John Bercow, English politician, Speaker of the House of Commons
1964 – Janine Antoni, Bahamian sculptor and photographer
1964 – Ricardo Arjona, Guatemalan singer-songwriter and basketball player
1966 – Sylvain Côté, Canadian ice hockey player
1966 – Stefan Edberg, Swedish tennis player and coach
1966 – Lena Philipsson, Swedish singer-songwriter
1968 – David Bartlett, Australian politician, 43rd Premier of Tasmania
1968 – Whitfield Crane, American singer-songwriter
1969 – Edwidge Danticat, Haitian-American novelist and short story writer
1969 – Luc Longley, Australian basketball player and coach
1969 – Predrag Mijatović, Montenegrin footballer and manager
1969 – Junior Seau, American football player (d. 2012)
1969 – Steve Staunton, Irish footballer and manager
1970 – Steffen Freund, German footballer defensive midfielder and manager
1970 – Kathleen Smet, Belgian triathlete
1970 – Udo Suzuki, Japanese comedian and singer
1971 – Phil Nevin, American baseball player
1971 – Shawn Wayans, American actor, producer, and screenwriter
1971 – John Wozniak, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1972 – Ron Killings, American wrestler and rapper
1972 – Troy Wilson, Australian footballer and race car driver
1972 – Sergei Zjukin, Estonian chess player and coach
1972 – Yoon Hae-young, South Korean actress
1973 – Antero Manninen, Finnish cellist
1973 – Yevgeny Sadovyi, Russian swimmer and coach
1974 – Dainius Adomaitis, Lithuanian basketball player and coach
1974 – Frank Caliendo, American comedian, actor, and screenwriter
1974 – Ian Laperrière, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
1974 – Jaime Moreno, Bolivian footballer and manager
1975 – Natalie Cook, Australian volleyball player
1975 – Zdeňka Málková, Czech tennis player
1976 – Natale Gonnella, Italian footballer
1976 – Tarso Marques, Brazilian race car driver
1977 – Benjamin Ayres, Canadian actor, director, and photographer
1979 – Svetlana Khorkina, Russian gymnast and sportscaster
1979 – Josu Sarriegi, Spanish footballer
1979 – Wiley, English rapper and producer
1980 – Jenson Button, English race car driver
1980 – Pasha Kovalev, Russian-American dancer and choreographer
1980 – Luke Macfarlane, Canadian-American actor and singer
1980 – Arvydas Macijauskas, Lithuanian basketball player
1980 – Michael Vandort, Sri Lankan cricketer
1981 – Paolo Bugia, Filipino basketball player
1981 – Asier del Horno, Spanish footballer
1981 – Lucho González, Argentinian footballer
1982 – Pete Buttigieg, American politician
1982 – Mike Komisarek, American ice hockey player
1982 – Jodie Sweetin, American actress and singer
1982 – Shane Tronc, Australian rugby league player
1982 – Kim Yoo-suk, South Korean pole vaulter
1982 – Robin tom Rink, German singer-songwriter
1983 – Hikaru Utada, American-Japanese singer-songwriter and producer
1984 – Fabio Catacchini, Italian footballer
1984 – Karun Chandhok, Indian race car driver
1984 – Jimmy Kébé, Malian footballer
1984 – Thomas Vanek, Austrian ice hockey player
1985 – Jake Allen, American football player
1985 – Pascal Behrenbruch, German decathlete
1985 – Benny Feilhaber, American soccer player
1985 – Esteban Guerrieri, Argentinian race car driver
1985 – Rika Ishikawa, Japanese singer and actress
1985 – Elliott Ward, English footballer
1985 – Aleksandr Yevgenyevich Nikulin, Russian footballer
2006 – Geoff Rabone, New Zealand cricketer and pilot (b. 1921)
2007 – Hrant Dink, Turkish-Armenian journalist and activist (b. 1954)
2007 – Denny Doherty, Canadian singer-songwriter (b. 1940)
2007 – Murat Nasyrov, Russian singer-songwriter (b. 1969)
2008 – Suzanne Pleshette, American actress (b. 1937)
2008 – John Stewart, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1939)
2008 – Don Wittman, Canadian sportscaster (b. 1936)
2010 – Bill McLaren, Scottish rugby player and sportscaster (b. 1923)
2012 – Peter Åslin, Swedish ice hockey player (b. 1962)
2012 – Sarah Burke, Canadian skier (b. 1982)
2012 – Winston Riley, Jamaican singer-songwriter and producer (b. 1943)
2012 – Rudi van Dantzig, Dutch ballet dancer and choreographer (b. 1933)
2013 – Taihō Kōki, Japanese sumo wrestler, the 48th Yokozuna (b. 1940)
2013 – Stan Musial, American baseball player and manager (b. 1920)
2013 – Frank Pooler, American conductor and composer (b. 1926)
2013 – Earl Weaver, American baseball player and manager (b. 1930)
2013 – Toktamış Ateş, Turkish academician, political commentator, columnist and writer (b. 1944)
2014 – Azaria Alon, Ukrainian-Israeli environmentalist, co-founded the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel (b. 1918)
2014 – Christopher Chataway, English runner, journalist, and politician (b. 1931)
2015 – Justin Capră, Romanian engineer and academic (b. 1933)
2015 – Michel Guimond, Canadian lawyer and politician (b. 1953)
2015 – Ward Swingle, American-French singer-songwriter and conductor (b. 1927)
2016 – Richard Levins, American ecologist and geneticist (b. 1930)
2016 – Ettore Scola, Italian director and screenwriter (b. 1931)
2016 – Sheila Sim, English actress (b. 1922)
2017 – Miguel Ferrer, American actor (b. 1955)
Holidays and observances on January 19
Birthday of Edgar Allan Poe (commemorated by the Poe Toaster at his grave in Baltimore)
Christian feast day:
Bassianus of Lodi
Henry of Uppsala
Marius, Martha, Audifax, and Abachum
Mark of Ephesus (Eastern Orthodox Church)
Pontianus of Spoleto
Wulfstan, Bishop of Worcester
January 19 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Confederate Heroes Day (Texas), and its related observance:
Robert E. Lee Day (Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia and Mississippi)
Feast of Sultán (Sovereignty), first day of the 17th month of the Bahá’í calendar (Bahá’í Faith) (only if Nowruz falls on March 21, otherwise the dates shifts)
Husband’s Day (Iceland)
Kokborok Day (Tripura, India)
Theophany / Epiphany (Eastern and Oriental Orthodoxy), and its related observances:
Timkat, or 20 during Leap Year (Ethiopian Orthodox)
27 BCE – Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus is granted the title Augustus by the Roman Senate, marking the beginning of the Roman Empire.
378 – General Siyaj K’ak’ conquers Tikal, enlarging the domain of King Spearthrower Owl of Teotihuacán.
550 – Gothic War: The Ostrogoths, under King Totila, conquer Rome after a long siege, by bribing the Isaurian garrison.
929 – Emir Abd-ar-Rahman III established the Caliphate of Córdoba.
1120 – The Council of Nablus is held, establishing the earliest surviving written laws of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem.
1362 – Saint Marcellus’s flood kills at least 25,000 people on the shores of the North Sea.
1412 – The Medici family is appointed official banker of the Papacy.
1492 – The first grammar of the Spanish language (Gramática de la lengua castellana) is presented to Queen Isabella I.
1547 – Grand Duke Ivan IV of Muscovy becomes the first Tsar of Russia, replacing the 264-year-old Grand Duchy of Moscow with the Tsardom of Russia.
1556 – Philip II becomes King of Spain.
1572 – Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk is tried for treason for his part in the Ridolfi plot to restore Catholicism in England.
1605 – The first edition of El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (Book One of Don Quixote) by Miguel de Cervantes is published in Madrid, Spain.
1707 – The Scottish Parliament ratifies the Act of Union, paving the way for the creation of Great Britain.
1757 – Forces of the Maratha Empire defeat a 5,000-strong army of the Durrani Empire in the Battle of Narela.
1780 – American Revolutionary War: Battle of Cape St. Vincent.
1786 – Virginia enacts the Statute for Religious Freedom authored by Thomas Jefferson.
1809 – Peninsular War: The British defeat the French at the Battle of La Coruña.
1847 – John C. Frémont is appointed Governor of the new California Territory.
1862 – Hartley Colliery disaster: Two hundred and four men and boys killed in a mining disaster, prompting a change in UK law which henceforth required all collieries to have at least two independent means of escape.
1878 – Russo-Turkish War (1877–78): Battle of Philippopolis: Captain Aleksandr Burago with a squadron of Russian Imperial army dragoons liberates Plovdiv from Ottoman rule.
1883 – The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, establishing the United States Civil Service, is enacted by Congress.
1900 – The United States Senate accepts the Anglo-German treaty of 1899 in which the United Kingdom renounces its claims to the Samoan islands.
1909 – Ernest Shackleton’s expedition finds the magnetic South Pole.
1919 – Nebraska becomes the 36th state to approve the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. With the necessary three-quarters of the states approving the amendment, Prohibition is constitutionally mandated in the United States one year later.
1920 – Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Incorporated was founded on the campus of Howard University.
1920 – The League of Nations holds its first council meeting in Paris, France.
1921 – The Marxist Left in Slovakia and the Transcarpathian Ukraine holds its founding congress in Ľubochňa.
1942 – Crash of TWA Flight 3, killing all 22 aboard, including film star Carole Lombard.
1945 – Adolf Hitler moves into his underground bunker, the so-called Führerbunker.
1964 – Hello, Dolly! opened on Broadway, beginning a run of 2,844 performances.
1969 – Czech student Jan Palach commits suicide by self-immolation in Prague, Czechoslovakia, in protest against the Soviets’ crushing of the Prague Spring the year before.
1969 – Soviet spacecraft Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 perform the first-ever docking of manned spacecraft in orbit, the first-ever transfer of crew from one space vehicle to another, and the only time such a transfer was accomplished with a space walk.
1979 – The last Iranian Shah flees Iran with his family for good and relocates to Egypt.
1991 – Coalition Forces go to war with Iraq, beginning the Gulf War.
1992 – El Salvador officials and rebel leaders sign the Chapultepec Peace Accords in Mexico City, Mexico ending the 12-year Salvadoran Civil War that claimed at least 75,000 lives.
2001 – Congolese President Laurent-Désiré Kabila is assassinated by one of his own bodyguards.
2001 – US President Bill Clinton awards former President Theodore Roosevelt a posthumous Medal of Honor for his service in the Spanish–American War.
2002 – The UN Security Council unanimously establishes an arms embargo and the freezing of assets of Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and the remaining members of the Taliban.
2003 – The Space Shuttle Columbia takes off for mission STS-107 which would be its final one. Columbia disintegrated 16 days later on re-entry.
2006 – Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is sworn in as Liberia’s new president. She becomes Africa’s first female elected head of state.
2016 – Thirty-three out of 126 freed hostages are injured and 23 killed in terrorist attacks in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso on a hotel and a nearby restaurant.
2018 – Myanmar police open fire on a group of ethnic Rakhine protesters, killing seven and wounding twelve.
2020 – The impeachment of Donald John Trump formally moves into its trial phase in the United States Senate.
Births on January 16
972 – Sheng Zong, emperor of the Liao Dynasty (d. 1031)
1093 – Isaac Komnenos, son of Byzantine emperor Alexios I Komnenos (d. 1152)
1245 – Edmund Crouchback, English politician, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports (d. 1296)
1362 – Robert de Vere, duke of Ireland (d. 1392)
1409 – René of Anjou, king of Naples (d. 1480)
1477 – Johannes Schöner, German astronomer and cartographer (d. 1547)
1501 – Anthony Denny, confidant of Henry VIII of England (d. 1559)
1516 – Bayinnaung, king of Burma (d. 1581)
1558 – Jakobea of Baden, Margravine of Baden by birth, Duchess of Jülich-Cleves-Berg by marriage (d. 1597)
1616 – François de Vendôme, duke of Beaufort (d. 1669)
1626 – Lucas Achtschellinck, Belgian painter and educator (d. 1699)
1630 – Guru Har Rai, Sikh Guru (d. 1661)
1634 – Dorothe Engelbretsdatter, Norwegian author and poet (d. 1716)
1675 – Louis de Rouvroy, duc de Saint-Simon, French soldier and diplomat (d. 1755)
1691 – Peter Scheemakers, Belgian sculptor and educator (d. 1781)
1728 – Niccolò Piccinni, Italian composer and educator (d. 1800)
1749 – Vittorio Alfieri, Italian poet and playwright (d. 1803)
1757 – Richard Goodwin Keats, English admiral and politician, 3rd Commodore-Governor of Newfoundland (d. 1834)
1807 – Charles Henry Davis, American admiral (d. 1877)
1815 – Henry Halleck, American lawyer, general, and scholar (d. 1872)
1821 – John C. Breckinridge, American general and politician, 14th Vice President of the United States (d. 1875)
1834 – Robert R. Hitt, American lawyer and politician, 13th United States Assistant Secretary of State (d. 1906)
1836 – Francis II of the Two Sicilies (d. 1894)
1838 – Franz Brentano, German philosopher and psychologist (d. 1917)
1851 – William Hall-Jones, English-New Zealand politician, 16th Prime Minister of New Zealand (d. 1936)
1853 – Johnston Forbes-Robertson, English actor and manager (d. 1937)
1853 – Ian Standish Monteith Hamilton, Greek-English general (d. 1947)
1853 – André Michelin, French businessman, co-founded the Michelin Tyre Company (d. 1931)
1870 – Jüri Jaakson, Estonian businessman and politician, State Elder of Estonia (d. 1942)
1872 – Henri Büsser, French organist, composer, and conductor (d. 1973)
1874 – Robert W. Service, English-Canadian poet and author (d. 1958)
1875 – Leonor Michaelis, German biochemist and physician (d. 1949)
1876 – Claude Buckenham, English cricketer and footballer (d. 1937)
1878 – Harry Carey, American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 1947)
1880 – Samuel Jones, American high jumper (d. 1954)
1882 – Margaret Wilson, American author (d. 1973)
1885 – Zhou Zuoren, Chinese author and translator (d. 1967)
1888 – Osip Brik, Russian avant garde writer and literary critic (d. 1945)
1892 – Homer Burton Adkins, American chemist (d. 1949)
1893 – Daisy Kennedy, Australian-English violinist (d. 1981)
1894 – Irving Mills, American publisher (d. 1985)
1895 – Evripidis Bakirtzis, Greek soldier and politician (d. 1947)
1895 – T. M. Sabaratnam, Sri Lankan lawyer and politician (d. 1966)
1895 – Nat Schachner, American lawyer, chemist, and author (d. 1955)
1897 – Carlos Pellicer, Mexican poet and academic (d. 1977)
1898 – Margaret Booth, American producer and editor (d. 2002)
1898 – Irving Rapper, American film director and producer (d. 1999)
1900 – Kiku Amino, Japanese author and translator (d. 1978)
1900 – Edith Frank, German-Dutch mother of Anne Frank (d. 1945)
1901 – Fulgencio Batista, Cuban colonel and politician, 9th President of Cuba (d. 1973)
1902 – Eric Liddell, Scottish runner, rugby player, and missionary (d. 1945)
1903 – William Grover-Williams, English-French race car driver (d. 1945)
1905 – Ernesto Halffter, Spanish composer and conductor (d. 1989)
1906 – Johannes Brenner, Estonian footballer and pilot (d. 1975)
1906 – Diana Wynyard, English actress (d. 1964)
1907 – Alexander Knox, Canadian-English actor and screenwriter (d. 1995)
1907 – Paul Nitze, American banker and politician, 10th United States Secretary of the Navy (d. 2004)
1908 – Sammy Crooks, English footballer (d. 1981)
1908 – Ethel Merman, American actress and singer (d. 1984)
1908 – Günther Prien, German captain (d. 1941)
1909 – Clement Greenberg, American art critic (d. 1994)
1910 – Dizzy Dean, American baseball player and sportscaster (d. 1974)
1911 – Ivan Barrow, Jamaican cricketer (d. 1979)
1911 – Eduardo Frei Montalva, Chilean lawyer and politician, 28th President of Chile (d. 1982)
1911 – Roger Lapébie, French cyclist (d. 1996)
1914 – Roger Wagner, French-American conductor and educator (d. 1992)
1915 – Leslie H. Martinson, American director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 2016)
1916 – Eddie Burns, Australian rugby league player and coach (d. 2004)
1916 – Philip Lucock, English-Australian minister and politician (d. 1996)
1917 – Carl Karcher, American businessman, founded Carl’s Jr. (d. 2008)
1918 – Nel Benschop, Dutch poet and educator (d. 2005)
1918 – Allan Ekelund, Swedish director, producer, and production manager (d. 2009)
1918 – Clem Jones, Australian surveyor and politician, 8th Lord Mayor of Brisbane (d. 2007)
1918 – Stirling Silliphant, American screenwriter and producer (d. 1996)
1919 – Jerome Horwitz, American chemist and academic (d. 2012)
1920 – Alberto Crespo, Argentinian race car driver (d. 1991)
1920 – Elliott Reid, American actor and screenwriter (d. 2013)
1921 – Francesco Scavullo, American photographer (d. 2004)
1923 – Gene Feist, American director and playwright, co-founded the Roundabout Theatre Company (d. 2014)
1923 – Anthony Hecht, American poet (d. 2004)
1924 – Katy Jurado, Mexican actress (d. 2002)
1925 – Peter Hirsch, German-English metallurgist and academic
1925 – James Robinson Risner, American general and pilot (d. 2013)
1928 – William Kennedy, American novelist and journalist
1928 – Pilar Lorengar, Spanish soprano and actress (d. 1996)
1929 – Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah, Sri Lankan anthropologist and academic (d. 2014)
1930 – Mary Ann McMorrow, American lawyer and judge (d. 2013)
1930 – Norman Podhoretz, American journalist and author
1931 – John Enderby, English physicist and academic
1931 – Robert L. Park, American physicist and academic
1931 – Johannes Rau, German journalist and politician, 8th Federal President of Germany (d. 2006)
1932 – Victor Ciocâltea, Romanian chess player (d. 1983)
1932 – Dian Fossey, American zoologist and anthropologist (d. 1985)
1933 – Susan Sontag, American novelist, essayist, and critic (d. 2004)
1934 – Bob Bogle, American rock guitarist and bass player (d. 2009)
1934 – Marilyn Horne, American soprano and actress
1935 – A. J. Foyt, American race car driver
1935 – Udo Lattek, German footballer, manager, and sportscaster (d. 2015)
1936 – Michael White, Scottish actor and producer (d. 2016)
1937 – Luiz Bueno, Brazilian race car driver (d. 2011)
1937 – Francis George, American cardinal (d. 2015)
1938 – Marina Vaizey, American journalist and critic
1939 – Ralph Gibson, American photographer
1941 – Christine Truman, English tennis player and sportscaster
1942 – René Angélil, Canadian singer and manager (d. 2016)
1942 – Barbara Lynn, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1943 – Gavin Bryars, English bassist and composer
1943 – Ronnie Milsap, American singer and pianist
1944 – Dieter Moebius, Swiss-German keyboard player and producer (d. 2015)
1944 – Jim Stafford, American singer-songwriter and actor
1944 – Jill Tarter, American astronomer and biologist
1944 – Judy Baar Topinka, American journalist and politician (d. 2014)
1945 – Wim Suurbier, Dutch footballer and manager
1946 – Kabir Bedi, Indian actor
1946 – Katia Ricciarelli, Italian soprano and actress
1947 – Elaine Murphy, Baroness Murphy, English academic and politician
1947 – Harvey Proctor, English politician
1947 – Laura Schlessinger, American physiologist, talk show host, and author
1948 – John Carpenter, American director, producer, screenwriter, and composer
1948 – Ants Laaneots, Estonian general
1948 – Cliff Thorburn, Canadian snooker player
1948 – Ruth Reichl, American journalist and critic
1949 – Anne F. Beiler, American businesswoman, founded Auntie Anne’s
1949 – R. F. Foster, Irish historian and academic
1949 – Andrew Refshauge, Australian physician and politician, 13th Deputy Premier of New South Wales
1950 – Debbie Allen, American actress, dancer, and choreographer
1950 – Robert Schimmel, American comedian, actor, and producer (d. 2010)
1952 – Fuad II, King of Egypt
1952 – Piercarlo Ghinzani, Italian race car driver and manager
1952 – L. Blaine Hammond, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut
1952 – Julie Anne Peters, American engineer and author
1953 – Robert Jay Mathews, American militant, founded The Order (d. 1984)
1954 – Wolfgang Schmidt, German discus thrower
1954 – Vasili Zhupikov, Russian footballer and coach (d. 2015)
1955 – Jerry M. Linenger, American captain, physician, and astronaut
1956 – Wayne Daniel, Barbadian cricketer
1956 – Martin Jol, Dutch footballer and manager
1956 – Greedy Smith, Australian singer-songwriter and keyboardist (d. 2019)
1957 – Jurijs Andrejevs, Latvian footballer and manager
1957 – Ricardo Darín, Argentinian actor, director, and screenwriter
1957 – Mark Pawsey, English businessman and politician
1958 – Anatoli Boukreev, Russian mountaineer and explorer (d. 1997)
1958 – Lena Ek, Swedish lawyer and politician, 9th Swedish Minister for the Environment
1958 – Andris Šķēle, Latvian businessman and politician, 4th Prime Minister of Latvia
1959 – Lisa Milroy, Canadian painter and educator
1959 – Sade, Nigerian-English singer-songwriter and producer
1961 – Kenneth Sivertsen, Norwegian guitarist and composer (d. 2006)
1962 – Joel Fitzgibbon, Australian electrician and politician, 51st Australian Minister of Defence
1962 – Maxine Jones, American R&B singer–songwriter and actress
1963 – James May, British journalist/co-host of Top Gear
1964 – Gail Graham, Canadian golfer
1966 – Jack McDowell, American baseball player
1968 – Rebecca Stead, American author
1969 – Neil Back, English rugby player and coach
1969 – Marinus Bester, German footballer
1969 – Stevie Jackson, Scottish guitarist and songwriter
1969 – Roy Jones Jr., American boxer
1970 – Ron Villone, American baseball player and coach
1971 – Sergi Bruguera, Spanish tennis player and coach
1971 – Josh Evans, American film producer, screenwriter and actor
1971 – Jonathan Mangum, American actor
1972 – Ruben Bagger, Danish footballer
1972 – Ang Christou, Australian footballer
1972 – Yuri Alekseevich Drozdov, Russian footballer and manager
1972 – Ezra Hendrickson, Vincentian footballer and manager
1972 – Joe Horn, American football player and coach
1974 – Marlon Anderson, American baseball player and sportscaster
1974 – John Hopoate, Tongan-Australian rugby league player and boxer
1974 – Kate Moss, English model and fashion designer
1976 – Viktor Maslov, Russian race car driver
1976 – Martina Moravcová, Slovak swimmer
1977 – Jeff Foster, American basketball player
1978 – Alfredo Amézaga, Mexican baseball player
1979 – Aaliyah, American singer and actress (d. 2001)
1979 – Brenden Morrow, Canadian ice hockey player
1979 – Jason Ward, Canadian ice hockey player
1980 – Lin-Manuel Miranda, American actor, playwright, and composer
1980 – Albert Pujols, Dominican-American baseball player
1981 – Jamie Lundmark, Canadian ice hockey player
1981 – Paul Rofe, Australian cricketer
1981 – Bobby Zamora, English footballer, striker
1982 – Preston, English singer-songwriter
1982 – Tuncay, Turkish footballer
1983 – Emanuel Pogatetz, Austrian footballer
1983 – Andriy Rusol, Ukrainian footballer
1984 – Stephan Lichtsteiner, Swiss footballer
1984 – Miroslav Radović, Serbian footballer
1985 – Joe Flacco, American football player
1985 – Jayde Herrick, Australian cricketer
1985 – Gintaras Januševičius, Russian-Lithuanian pianist
1985 – Twins Jonathan and Simon Richter, Danish-Gambian footballers
1985 – Sidharth Malhotra, Indian actor
1986 – Johannes Rahn, German footballer
1986 – Mark Trumbo, American baseball player
1986 – Reto Ziegler, Swiss footballer, left back
1987 – Jake Epstein, Canadian actor
1987 – Charlotte Henshaw, English swimmer
1988 – Nicklas Bendtner, Danish footballer
1988 – Jorge Torres Nilo, Mexican footballer
1991 – Matt Duchene, Canadian ice hockey player
1993 – Hannes Anier, Estonian footballer
1993 – Amandine Hesse, French tennis player
1994 – Chris Smith, Australian rugby league player
1354 – Joanna of Châtillon, duchess of Athens (b. c.1285)
1373 – Humphrey de Bohun, 7th Earl of Hereford (b. 1342)
1391 – Muhammed V of Granada, Nasrid emir (b. 1338)
1400 – John Holland, 1st Duke of Exeter, English politician, Lord Great Chamberlain (b. 1352)
1443 – Erasmo of Narni, Italian mercenary (b. 1370)
1545 – George Spalatin, German priest and reformer (b. 1484)
1547 – Johannes Schöner, German astronomer and cartographer (b. 1477)
1554 – Christiern Pedersen, Danish publisher and scholar (b. 1480)
1585 – Edward Clinton, 1st Earl of Lincoln, English admiral and politician (b. 1512)
1595 – Murad III, Ottoman sultan (b. 1546)
1659 – Charles Annibal Fabrot, French lawyer (b. 1580)
1710 – Higashiyama, Japanese emperor (b. 1675)
1711 – Joseph Vaz, Indian-Sri Lankan priest and saint (b. 1651)
1747 – Barthold Heinrich Brockes, German poet and playwright (b. 1680)
1748 – Arnold Drakenborch, Dutch lawyer and scholar (b. 1684)
1750 – Ivan Trubetskoy, Russian field marshal and politician (b. 1667)
1752 – Francis Blomefield, English historian and author (b. 1705)
1794 – Edward Gibbon, English historian and politician (b. 1737)
1809 – John Moore, Scottish general and politician (b. 1761)
1817 – Alexander J. Dallas, Jamaican-American lawyer and politician, 6th United States Secretary of the Treasury (b. 1759)
1834 – Jean Nicolas Pierre Hachette, French mathematician and academic (b. 1769)
1856 – Thaddeus William Harris, American entomologist and botanist (b. 1795)
1864 – Anton Schindler, Austrian secretary and author (b. 1795)
1865 – Edmond François Valentin About, French journalist and author (b. 1828)
1879 – Octave Crémazie, Canadian-French poet and bookseller (b. 1827)
1886 – Amilcare Ponchielli, Italian composer and academic (b. 1834)
1891 – Léo Delibes, French pianist and composer (b. 1836)
1898 – Charles Pelham Villiers, English lawyer and politician (b. 1802)
1901 – Jules Barbier, French poet and playwright (b. 1825)
1901 – Arnold Böcklin, Swiss painter and academic (b. 1827)
1901 – Hiram Rhodes Revels, American soldier, minister, and politician (b. 1822)
1906 – Marshall Field, American businessman and philanthropist, founded Marshall Field’s (b. 1834)
1917 – George Dewey, American admiral (b. 1837)
1919 – Francisco de Paula Rodrigues Alves, Brazilian lawyer and politician, 5th President of Brazil (b. 1848)
1933 – Bekir Sami Kunduh, Turkish politician (b. 1867)
1936 – Albert Fish, American serial killer, rapist and cannibal (b. 1870)
1938 – Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay Indian author and playwright (b. 1876)
1942 – Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn (b. 1850)
1942 – Villem Grünthal-Ridala, Estonian poet and linguist (b. 1885)
1942 – Carole Lombard, American actress and comedian (b. 1908)
1942 – Ernst Scheller, German lawyer and politician, Mayor of Marburg (b. 1899)
1957 – Alexander Cambridge, 1st Earl of Athlone, English general and politician, 16th Governor General of Canada (b. 1874)
1957 – Arturo Toscanini, Italian cellist and conductor (b. 1867)
1959 – Phan Khôi, Vietnamese journalist and author (b. 1887)
1960 – Arthur Darby, English rugby player (b. 1876)
1961 – Max Schöne, German swimmer (b. 1880)
1962 – Frank Hurley, Australian photographer, director, producer, and cinematographer (b. 1885)
1962 – Ivan Meštrović, Croatian sculptor and architect, designed the Monument to the Unknown Hero (b. 1883)
1967 – Robert J. Van de Graaff, American physicist and academic (b. 1901)
1968 – Bob Jones Sr., American evangelist, founded Bob Jones University (b. 1883)
1968 – Panagiotis Poulitsas, Greek archaeologist and judge (b. 1881)
1969 – Vernon Duke, Russian-American composer and songwriter (b. 1903)
1971 – Philippe Thys, Belgian cyclist (b. 1890)
1972 – Teller Ammons, American soldier and politician, 28th Governor of Colorado (b. 1895)
1972 – Ross Bagdasarian, Sr., American singer-songwriter, pianist, producer, and actor, created Alvin and the Chipmunks (b. 1919)
1973 – Edgar Sampson, American musician and composer (b. 1907)
1975 – Israel Abramofsky, Russian-American painter (b. 1888)
1978 – A. V. Kulasingham, Sri Lankan journalist, lawyer, and politician (b. 1890)
1981 – Bernard Lee, English actor (b. 1908)
1983 – Virginia Mauret, American musician and dancer
1986 – Herbert W. Armstrong, American evangelist, author, and publisher (b. 1892)
1987 – Bertram Wainer, Australian physician and activist (b. 1928)
1988 – Andrija Artuković, Croatian politician, war criminal, and Porajmos perpetrator, 1st Minister of Interior of the Independent State of Croatia (b. 1899)
1995 – Eric Mottram, English poet and critic (b. 1924)
1996 – Marcia Davenport, American author and critic (b. 1903)
1996 – Kaye Webb, English journalist and publisher (b. 1914)
1999 – Jim McClelland, Australian lawyer, jurist, and politician, 12th Minister for Industry and Science (b. 1915)
2000 – Robert R. Wilson, American physicist and academic (b. 1914)
2001 – Auberon Waugh, English author and journalist (b. 1939)
2002 – Robert Hanbury Brown, English astronomer and physicist (b. 1916)
2003 – Richard Wainwright, English politician (b. 1918)
2004 – Kalevi Sorsa, Finnish politician 34th Prime Minister of Finland (b. 1930)
2005 – Marjorie Williams, American journalist and author (b. 1958)
2006 – Stanley Biber, American soldier and physician (b. 1923)
2007 – Benny Parsons, American race car driver and sportscaster (b. 1941)
2009 – Joe Erskine, American boxer and runner (b. 1930)
2009 – John Mortimer, English lawyer and author (b. 1923)
2009 – Andrew Wyeth, American painter (b. 1917)
2010 – Glen Bell, American businessman, founded Taco Bell (b. 1923)
2010 – Jyoti Basu, Indian lawyer and politician, 9th Chief Minister of West Bengal (b. 1914)
2010 – Takumi Shibano, Japanese author and translator (b. 1926)
2012 – Joe Bygraves, Jamaican-English boxer (b. 1931)
2012 – Jimmy Castor, American singer-songwriter and saxophonist (b. 1940)
2012 – Sigursteinn Gíslason, Icelandic footballer and manager (b. 1968)
2012 – Lorna Kesterson, American journalist and politician (b. 1925)
2012 – Gustav Leonhardt, Dutch pianist, conductor, and musicologist (b. 1928)
2013 – Wayne D. Anderson, American baseball player and coach (b. 1930)
2013 – André Cassagnes, French technician and toy maker, created the Etch A Sketch (b. 1926)
2013 – Gussie Moran, American tennis player and sportscaster (b. 1923)
2013 – Pauline Phillips, American journalist and radio host, created Dear Abby (b. 1918)
2013 – Glen P. Robinson, American businessman, founded Scientific Atlanta (b. 1923)
2014 – Gary Arlington, American author and illustrator (b. 1938)
2014 – Ruth Duccini, American actress (b. 1918)
2014 – Dave Madden, Canadian-American actor (b. 1931)
2014 – Hiroo Onoda, Japanese lieutenant (b. 1922)
2015 – Miriam Akavia, Polish-Israeli author and translator (b. 1927)
1236 – King Henry III of England marries Eleanor of Provence.
1301 – Andrew III of Hungary dies, ending the Árpád dynasty in Hungary.
1343 – Arnošt of Pardubice becomes the last bishop of Prague and, subsequently, the first Archbishop of Prague.
1539 – Spain annexes Cuba.
1639 – The “Fundamental Orders”, the first written constitution that created a government, is adopted in Connecticut.
1761 – The Third Battle of Panipat is fought in India between the Afghans under Ahmad Shah Durrani and the Marathas.
1784 – American Revolutionary War: Ratification Day, United States – Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris with Great Britain.
1814 – Treaty of Kiel: Frederick VI of Denmark cedes the Kingdom of Norway to Charles XIII of Sweden in return for Pomerania.
1822 – Greek War of Independence: Acrocorinth is captured by Theodoros Kolokotronis and Demetrios Ypsilantis.
1858 – Napoleon III of France escapes an assassination attempt made by Felice Orsini and his accomplices in Paris.
1907 – An earthquake in Kingston, Jamaica kills more than 1,000 people.
1911 – Roald Amundsen’s South Pole expedition makes landfall on the eastern edge of the Ross Ice Shelf.
1939 – Norway claims Queen Maud Land in Antarctica.
1943 – World War II: Japan begins Operation Ke, the successful operation to evacuate its forces from Guadalcanal during the Guadalcanal Campaign.
1943 – World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill begin the Casablanca Conference to discuss strategy and study the next phase of the war.
1950 – The first prototype of the MiG-17 makes its maiden flight.
1952 – NBC’s long-running morning news program Today debuts, with host Dave Garroway.
1953 – Josip Broz Tito is inaugurated as the first President of Yugoslavia.
1954 – The Hudson Motor Car Company merges with Nash-Kelvinator Corporation forming the American Motors Corporation.
1957 – Kripalu Maharaj was named fifth Jagadguru (world teacher) after giving seven days of speeches before 500 Hindu scholars.
1960 – The Reserve Bank of Australia, the country’s central bank and banknote issuing authority, is established.
1967 – Counterculture of the 1960s: The Human Be-In takes place in San Francisco, California’s Golden Gate Park, launching the Summer of Love.
1967 – The New York Times reports that the U.S. Army is conducting secret germ warfare experiments.
1969 – USS Enterprise fire: An accidental explosion aboard the USS Enterprise near Hawaii kills 28 people.
1972 – Queen Margrethe II of Denmark ascends the throne, the first Queen of Denmark since 1412 and the first Danish monarch not named Frederick or Christian since 1513.
1973 – Elvis Presley’s concert Aloha from Hawaii is broadcast live via satellite, and sets the record as the most watched broadcast by an individual entertainer in television history.
1993 – In Poland’s worst peacetime maritime disaster, ferry MS Jan Heweliusz sinks off the coast of Rügen, drowning 55 passengers and crew; nine crew-members are saved.
2000 – A United Nations tribunal sentences five Roman Catholic Bosnian Croats to up to 25 years in prison for the 1993 killing of more than 100 Bosnian Muslims.
2004 – The national flag of the Republic of Georgia, the so-called “five cross flag”, is restored to official use after a hiatus of some 500 years.
2010 – Yemen declares an open war against the terrorist group al-Qaeda.
2011 – Former president of Tunisia, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali flees his country to Saudi Arabia after a series of street demonstrations against his regime and corrupt policies, asking for freedom, rights and democracy, considered as the anniversary of the Tunisian Revolution and the birth of the Arab Spring.
Births onJanuary 14
83 BC – Mark Antony, Roman general and politician (d. 30 BCE)
1131 – Valdemar I of Denmark (d. 1182)
1273 – Joan I of Navarre, queen regnant of Navarre, queen consort of France (d. 1305)
1451 – Franchinus Gaffurius, Italian composer and theorist (d. 1522)
1477 – Hermann of Wied, German archbishop (d. 1552)
1476 – Anne St Leger, Baroness de Ros, English baroness (d. 1526)
1507 – Catherine of Austria, Queen of Portugal (d. 1578)
1507 – Luca Longhi, Italian painter (d. 1580)
1551 – Abu’l-Fazl ibn Mubarak, Grand vizier of emperor Akbar (d. 1602)
1552 – Alberico Gentili, Italian-English academic and jurist (d. 1608)
1615 – John Biddle, English minister and theologian (d. 1662)
1683 – Gottfried Silbermann, German instrument maker (d. 1753)
1684 – Johann Matthias Hase, German mathematician, astronomer, and cartographer (d. 1742)
1684 – Jean-Baptiste van Loo, French painter (d. 1745)
1699 – Jakob Adlung, German organist, historian, and theorist (d. 1762)
1700 – Picander, German poet and playwright (d. 1764)
1702 – Emperor Nakamikado of Japan (d. 1737)
1705 – Jean-Baptiste Charles Bouvet de Lozier, French sailor, explorer, and politician (d. 1786)
1741 – Benedict Arnold, American-British general (d. 1801)
1767 – Maria Theresa of Austria (d. 1827)
1780 – Henry Baldwin, American judge and politician (d. 1844)
1792 – Christian de Meza, Danish general (d. 1865)
1793 – John C. Clark, American lawyer and politician (d. 1852)
1798 – Johan Rudolph Thorbecke, Dutch historian, jurist, and politician, 3rd Prime Minister of the Netherlands (d. 1872)
1800 – Ludwig Ritter von Köchel, Austrian composer, botanist, and publisher (d. 1877)
1806 – Charles Hotham, English-Australian soldier and politician, 1st Governor of Victoria (d. 1855)
1806 – Matthew Fontaine Maury, American astronomer, oceanographer, and historian (d. 1873)
1818 – Zachris Topelius, Finnish author and journalist (d. 1898)
1819 – Dimitrie Bolintineanu, Romanian poet and politician (d. 1872)
1824 – Vladimir Stasov, Russian critic (d. 1906)
1834 – Duncan Gillies, Scottish-Australian politician, 14th Premier of Victoria (d. 1903)
1836 – Henri Fantin-Latour, French painter and lithographer (d. 1904)
1841 – Berthe Morisot, French painter (d. 1895)
1845 – Henry Petty-Fitzmaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne, English politician, 34th Governor-General of India (d. 1927)
1850 – Pierre Loti, French captain and author (d. 1923)
1856 – J. F. Archibald, Australian journalist and publisher, co-founded The Bulletin (d. 1919)
1861 – Mehmed VI, Ottoman sultan (d. 1926)
1862 – Carrie Derick, Canadian botanist and geneticist (d. 1941)
1863 – Manuel de Oliveira Gomes da Costa, Portuguese general and politician, 10th President of Portugal (d. 1929)
1863 – Richard F. Outcault, American author and illustrator (d. 1928)
1869 – Robert Fournier-Sarlovèze, French polo player and politician (d. 1937)
1870 – George Pearce, Australian carpenter and politician (d. 1952)
1875 – Albert Schweitzer, French-Gabonese physician and philosopher, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1965)
1882 – Hendrik Willem van Loon, Dutch-American historian and journalist (d. 1944)
1883 – Nina Ricci, Italian-French fashion designer (d. 1970)
1886 – Hugh Lofting, English author and poet, created Doctor Dolittle (d. 1947)
1887 – Hugo Steinhaus, Polish mathematician and academic (d. 1972)
1892 – Martin Niemöller, German pastor and theologian (d. 1984)
1892 – Hal Roach, American actor, director, and producer (d. 1992)
1892 – George Wilson, English footballer (d. 1961)
1894 – Ecaterina Teodoroiu, Romanian soldier and nurse (d. 1917)
1896 – John Dos Passos, American novelist, poet, and playwright (d. 1970)
1897 – Hasso von Manteuffel, German general and politician (d. 1978)
1899 – Carlos P. Romulo, Filipino soldier and politician, President of the United Nations General Assembly (d. 1985)
1901 – Bebe Daniels, American actress (d. 1971)
1901 – Alfred Tarski, Polish-American mathematician and philosopher (d. 1983)
1904 – Cecil Beaton, English photographer, painter, and costume designer (d. 1980)
1904 – Emily Hahn, American journalist and author (d. 1997)
1904 – Babe Siebert, Canadian ice hockey player and coach (d. 1939)
1905 – Mildred Albert, American fashion commentator, TV and radio personality, and fashion show producer (d. 1991)
1905 – Takeo Fukuda, Japanese politician, 67th Prime Minister of Japan (d. 1995)
1906 – William Bendix, American actor (d. 1964)
1907 – Georges-Émile Lapalme, Canadian lawyer and politician (d. 1985)
1908 – Russ Columbo, American singer, violinist, and actor (d. 1934)
1909 – Brenda Forbes, English-American actress (d. 1996)
1909 – Joseph Losey, American director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 1984)
1911 – Anatoly Rybakov, Russian-American author (d. 1998)
1912 – Tillie Olsen, American short story writer (d. 2007)
1914 – Harold Russell, Canadian-American soldier and actor (d. 2002)
1914 – Selahattin Ülkümen, Turkish diplomat (d. 2003)
1915 – Mark Goodson, American game show producer, created Family Feud and The Price Is Right (d. 1992)
1919 – Giulio Andreotti, Italian journalist and politician, 41st Prime Minister of Italy (d. 2013)
1919 – Andy Rooney, American soldier, journalist, critic, and television personality (d. 2011)
1920 – Bertus de Harder, Dutch footballer and manager (d. 1982)
1921 – Murray Bookchin, American author and philosopher (d. 2006)
1921 – Kenneth Bulmer, American author (d. 2005)
1922 – Diana Wellesley, Duchess of Wellington (d. 2010)
1923 – Gerald Arpino, American dancer and choreographer (d. 2008)
1923 – Fred Beckey, American mountaineer and author (d. 2017)
1924 – Carole Cook, American actress and singer
1925 – Jean-Claude Beton, Algerian-French engineer and businessman, founded Orangina (d. 2013)
1925 – Moscelyne Larkin, American ballerina (d. 2012)
1925 – Yukio Mishima, Japanese author, poet, and playwright (d. 1970)
1926 – Frank Aletter, American actor (d. 2009)
1926 – Warren Mitchell, English actor and screenwriter (d. 2015)
1926 – Tom Tryon, American actor and author (d. 1991)
1927 – Zuzana Růžičková, Czech harpsichord player (d. 2017)
1928 – Lars Forssell, Swedish author, poet, and songwriter (d. 2007)
1928 – Hans Kornberg, German-English biologist and academic (d. 2019)
1928 – Garry Winogrand, American photographer and author (d. 1984)
1930 – Johnny Grande, American pianist and accordion player (d. 2006)
1930 – Kenny Wheeler, Canadian-English trumpet player and composer (d. 2014)
1931 – Frank Costigan, Australian lawyer and politician (d. 2009)
1931 – Martin Holdgate, English biologist and academic
1932 – Don Garlits, American race car driver and engineer
1933 – Stan Brakhage, American director and producer (d. 2003)
1934 – Richard Briers, English actor (d. 2013)
1934 – Alberto Rodriguez Larreta, Argentinian race car driver (d. 1977)
1936 – Clarence Carter, American blues and soul singer-songwriter, musician, and record producer
1937 – J. Bernlef, Dutch author and poet (d. 2012)
1937 – Ken Higgs, English cricketer and coach (d. 2016)
1937 – Leo Kadanoff, American physicist and academic (d. 2015)
1937 – Rao Gopal Rao, Indian actor, producer, and politician (d. 1994)
1937 – Sonny Siebert, American baseball player
1937 – Billie Jo Spears, American country singer (d. 2011)
1938 – Morihiro Hosokawa, Japanese journalist and politician, 79th Prime Minister of Japan
1938 – Jack Jones, American singer and actor
1938 – Allen Toussaint, American singer-songwriter, pianist, and producer (d. 2015)
1939 – Kurt Moylan, Guamanian businessman and politician, 1st Lieutenant Governor of Guam
1940 – Julian Bond, American academic and politician (d. 2015)
1940 – Ron Kostelnik, American football player (d. 1993)
1940 – Siegmund Nimsgern, German opera singer
1940 – Trevor Nunn, English director and composer
1940 – Vasilka Stoeva, Bulgarian discus thrower
1941 – Nicholas Brooks, English historian (d. 2014)
1941 – Faye Dunaway, American actress and producer
1941 – Gibby Gilbert, American golfer
1941 – Milan Kučan, Slovenian politician, 1st President of Slovenia
1942 – Dave Campbell, American baseball player and sportscaster
1942 – Gerben Karstens, Dutch cyclist
1943 – Angelo Bagnasco, Italian cardinal
1943 – Mariss Jansons, Latvian conductor (d. 2019)
1943 – Shannon Lucid, American biochemist and astronaut
1943 – Holland Taylor, American actress and playwright
1944 – Marjoe Gortner, American actor and evangelist
1944 – Graham Marsh, Australian golfer and architect
1944 – Nina Totenberg, American journalist
1945 – Kathleen Chalfant, American actress
1945 – Maina Gielgud, English ballerina and director
1947 – Taylor Branch, American historian and author
1947 – Bev Perdue, American educator and politician, 73rd Governor of North Carolina
1947 – Bill Werbeniuk, Canadian snooker player (d. 2003)
1948 – T Bone Burnett, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
1948 – Muhriz of Negeri Sembilan, Yamtuan Besar of Negeri Sembilan
1948 – Carl Weathers, American football player and actor
1949 – Lawrence Kasdan, American director, producer, and screenwriter
1949 – Mary Robison, American short story writer and novelist
1949 – İlyas Salman, Turkish actor, director, and screenwriter
1949 – Lamar Williams, American bass player (d. 1983)
1950 – Rambhadracharya, Indian religious leader, scholar, and author
1950 – Arthur Byron Cover, American author and screenwriter
1951 – O. Panneerselvam, Indian politician, 7th Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu
1952 – Sydney Biddle Barrows, American businesswoman and author
1952 – Maureen Dowd, American journalist and author
1952 – Konstantinos Iosifidis, Greek footballer and manager
1952 – Călin Popescu-Tăriceanu, Romanian engineer and politician, 60th Prime Minister of Romania
1953 – David Clary, English chemist and academic
1953 – Denzil Douglas, Caribbean educator and politician, 2nd Prime Minister of Saint Kitts and Nevis
1953 – Hans Westerhoff, Dutch biologist and academic
1956 – Étienne Daho, Algerian-French singer-songwriter and producer
1957 – Anchee Min, Chinese-American painter, photographer, and author
1959 – Geoff Tate, German-American singer-songwriter and musician
1961 – Rob Hall, New Zealand mountaineer (d. 1996)
1963 – Steven Soderbergh, American director, producer, and screenwriter
1964 – Beverly Kinch, English long jumper and sprinter
1964 – Shepard Smith, American television journalist
1965 – Marc Delissen, Dutch field hockey player, coach, and lawyer
1965 – Bob Essensa, Canadian ice hockey player and coach
1965 – Slick Rick, English-American rapper and producer
1966 – Rob Flello, English lawyer and politician
1966 – Terry Angus, English footballer, central defender
1966 – Marco Hietala, Finnish singer-songwriter, bass player, and producer
1966 – Rene Simpson, Canadian-American tennis player (d. 2013)
1966 – Dan Schneider, American TV-producer
1967 – Leonardo Ortolani, Italian author and illustrator, created Rat-Man
1967 – Emily Watson, English actress
1968 – LL Cool J, American rapper and actor
1968 – Ruel Fox, English-Montserratian footballer, Midfielder, Manager and Chairman
1969 – Jason Bateman, American actor, director, and producer
1969 – Martin Bicknell, English cricketer
1969 – Dave Grohl, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and drummer
1971 – Lasse Kjus, Norwegian skier
1971 – Bert Konterman, Dutch footballer and manager
1971 – Antonios Nikopolidis, Greek footballer and manager
1972 – Kyle Brady, American football player and sportscaster
1972 – Dion Forster, South African minister, theologian, and author
1972 – James Key, English engineer
1973 – Giancarlo Fisichella, Italian race car driver
1973 – Paul Tisdale, English footballer and manager
1974 – David Flitcroft, English footballer and manager
1975 – Georgina Cates, English actress
1976 – Vincenzo Chianese, Italian footballer
1977 – Narain Karthikeyan, Indian race car driver
1977 – Terry Ryan, Canadian ice hockey player
1978 – Shawn Crawford, American sprinter
1979 – Karen Elson, English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and model
1979 – Evans Soligo, Italian footballer
1980 – Clive Clarke, Irish footballer
1980 – Cory Gibbs, American soccer player
1981 – Abdelmalek Cherrad, Algerian footballer
1981 – Hyleas Fountain, American heptathlete
1981 – Concepción Montaner, Spanish long jumper
1981 – Chiharu Niiyama, Japanese actress and model
1981 – Jadranka Đokić, Croatian actress
1982 – Braith Anasta, Australian rugby league player and sportscaster
1982 – Marc Broussard, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1982 – Chris Heighington, Australian-English rugby league player
1982 – Léo Lima, Brazilian footballer
1982 – Thomas Longosiwa, Kenyan runner
1982 – Víctor Valdés, Spanish footballer
1983 – Cesare Bovo, Italian footballer
1983 – Jason Krejza, Australian cricketer
1984 – Erick Aybar, American baseball player
1984 – Erika Matsuo, Japanese violinist
1984 – Mike Pelfrey, American baseball player
1985 – Joel Rosario, Dominican-American jockey
1985 – Shawn Sawyer, Canadian figure skater
1986 – Yohan Cabaye, French footballer
1986 – Alessio Cossu, Italian footballer
1987 – Atsushi Hashimoto, Japanese actor
1987 – Jess Fishlock, Welsh footballer
1988 – Kacey Barnfield, English actress
1988 – Jack P. Shepherd, English actor
1989 – Frankie Bridge, English singer-songwriter and dancer
1989 – Adam Clayton, English footballer
1989 – Mattia Marchi, Italian footballer
1989 – Liu Xiaodong, Chinese footballer
1990 – Lelisa Desisa, Ethiopian runner
1990 – Grant Gustin, American actor and singer
1990 – Áron Szilágyi, Hungarian fencer
1992 – Robbie Brady, Irish footballer
1992 – Chieh-Yu Hsu, American tennis player
1993 – Daniel Bessa, Brazilian footballer
1994 – Kane Elgey, Australian rugby league player
1994 – Abi Phillips, English singer-songwriter and actress
1994 – Kai, South Korean singer, model, actor and dancer
1995 – Georgios Diamantakos, Greek basketball player
1995 – Alex Johnston, Australian rugby league player
Deaths on January 14
769 – Cui Huan, chancellor of the Tang Dynasty
927 – Wang Yanhan, king of Min (Ten Kingdoms)
937 – Zhang Yanlang, Chinese official
973 – Ekkehard I, Frankish monk and poet
1092 – Vratislaus II of Bohemia
1163 – Ladislaus II of Hungary (b. 1131)
1236 – Saint Sava, Serbian archbishop and saint (b. 1175)
1301 – Andrew III of Hungary (b. 1265)
1331 – Odoric of Pordenone, Italian priest and explorer (b. 1286)
1465 – Thomas Beckington, English statesman and prelate
1476 – John de Mowbray, 4th Duke of Norfolk (b. 1444)
1555 – Jacques Dubois, French anatomist (b. 1478)
1640 – Thomas Coventry, 1st Baron Coventry, English lawyer, judge, and politician, Attorney General for England and Wales (b. 1578)
2013 – Conrad Bain, Canadian-American actor (b. 1923)
2014 – Jon Bing, Norwegian author, scholar, and academic (b. 1944)
2014 – Juan Gelman, Argentinian poet and author (b. 1930)
2014 – Flavio Testi, Italian composer and musicologist (b. 1923)
2015 – Bob Boyd, American basketball player and coach (b. 1930)
2015 – Zhang Wannian, Chinese general (b. 1928)
2016 – Alan Rickman, English actor (b. 1946)
2017 – Zhou Youguang, Chinese sociologist, (b. 1906)
2018 – Spanky Manikan, Filipino veteran actor (b. 1942)
2018 – Cyrille Regis, French Guianan-English footballer (b. 1958)
Holidays and observances on January 14
Christian feast day:
Barba’shmin
Blessed Devasahayam Pillai (Latin Church)
Divina Pastora (Barquisimeto)
Eivind Berggrav (Lutheran)
Felix of Nola
Macrina the Elder
Odoric of Pordenone
January 14 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Defender of the Motherland Day (Uzbekistan)
Feast of the Ass (Medieval Christianity)
Flag Day (Georgia)
National Forest Conservation Day (Thailand)
Old New Year, and its related observance:
Azhyrnykhua (Abkhazia)
Yennayer (Berbers)
Ratification Day (United States)
Revolution and Youth Day (Tunisia)
Sidereal winter solstice celebrations in South and Southeast Asian cultures; marking the transition of the Sun to Capricorn, and the first day of the six months Uttarayana period. (see April 14):
532 – The Nika riots break out, during the racing season at the Hippodrome in Constantinople, as a result of discontent with the rule of the Emperor Justinian I.
1435 – Sicut Dudum, forbidding the enslavement of the Guanche natives in Canary Islands by the Spanish, is promulgated by Pope Eugene IV.
1547 – Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, is sentenced to death for treason, on the grounds of having quartered his arms to make them similar to those of the King, Henry VIII of England.
1793 – Nicolas Jean Hugon de Bassville, representative of Revolutionary France, lynched by a mob in Rome
1797 – French Revolutionary Wars: A naval battle between a French ship of the line and two British frigates off the coast of Brittany ends with the French vessel running aground, resulting in over 900 deaths.
1815 – War of 1812: British troops capture Fort Peter in St. Marys, Georgia, the only battle of the war to take place in the state.
1822 – The design of the Greek flag is adopted by the First National Assembly at Epidaurus.
1833 – United States President Andrew Jackson writes to Vice President Martin Van Buren expressing his opposition to South Carolina’s defiance of federal authority in the Nullification Crisis.
1840 – The steamship Lexington burns and sinks four miles off the coast of Long Island with the loss of 139 lives.
1842 – Dr. William Brydon, an assistant surgeon in the British East India Company Army during the First Anglo-Afghan War, becomes famous for being the sole survivor of an army of 4,500 men and 12,000 camp followers when he reaches the safety of a garrison in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.
1847 – The Treaty of Cahuenga ends the Mexican–American War in California.
1849 – Establishment of the Colony of Vancouver Island.
1849 – Second Anglo-Sikh War – Battle of Chillianwala: British forces retreat from the Sikhs.
1879 – In Mozart Gardens Brooklyn Ada Anderson completed a great feat of pedestrianism – 2700 quarter miles in 2700 quarter hours, earning her $8000.
1888 – The National Geographic Society is founded in Washington, D.C.
1893 – The Independent Labour Party of the United Kingdom holds its first meeting.
1893 – U.S. Marines land in Honolulu, Hawaii from the USS Boston to prevent the queen from abrogating the Bayonet Constitution.
1895 – First Italo-Ethiopian War: the war’s opening battle, the Battle of Coatit, occurs; it is an Italian victory.
1898 – Émile Zola’s J’accuse…! exposes the Dreyfus affair.
1908 – The Rhoads Opera House fire in Boyertown, Pennsylvania kills 171 people.
1910 – The first public radio broadcast takes place; a live performance of the operas Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci are sent out over the airwaves from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York.
1915 – The 6.7 Mw Avezzano earthquake shakes the Province of L’Aquila in Italy with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme), killing between 29,978–32,610.
1920 – The Reichstag Bloodbath of January 13, 1920, the bloodiest demonstration in German history.
1935 – A plebiscite in Saarland shows that 90.3% of those voting wish to join Nazi Germany.
1939 – The Black Friday bushfires burn 20,000 square kilometers of land in Australia, claiming the lives of 71 people.
1942 – Henry Ford patents a plastic automobile, which is 30% lighter than a regular car.
1942 – World War II: First use of an aircraft ejection seat by a German test pilot in a Heinkel He 280 jet fighter.
1950 – British submarine HMS Truculent collides with an oil tanker in the Thames Estuary, killing 64 men.
1950 – Finland forms diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China.
1951 – First Indochina War: The Battle of Vĩnh Yên begins.
1953 – An article appears in Pravda accusing some of the most prestigious and prominent doctors, mostly Jews, in the Soviet Union of taking part in a vast plot to poison members of the top Soviet political and military leadership.
1958 – The Moroccan Army of Liberation ambushes a Spanish patrol in the Battle of Edchera.
1963 – Coup d’état in Togo results in the assassination of president Sylvanus Olympio.
1964 – Anti-Muslim riots break out in Calcutta, resulting in 100 deaths.
1964 – In Manchester, New Hampshire, fourteen-year-old Pamela Mason is murdered. Edward Coolidge is tried and convicted of the crime, but the conviction is set aside by the landmark Fourth Amendment case Coolidge v. New Hampshire (1971).
1966 – Robert C. Weaver becomes the first African American Cabinet member when he is appointed United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.
1968 – Johnny Cash performs live at Folsom State Prison.
1972 – Prime Minister Kofi Abrefa Busia and President Edward Akufo-Addo of Ghana are ousted in a bloodless military coup by Colonel Ignatius Kutu Acheampong.
1978 – United States Food and Drug Administration requires all blood donations to be labeled “paid” or “volunteer” donors.
1982 – Shortly after takeoff, Air Florida Flight 90, a Boeing 737 jet, crashes into Washington, D.C.’s 14th Street Bridge and falls into the Potomac River, killing 78 including four motorists.
1985 – A passenger train plunges into a ravine in Ethiopia, killing 428 in the worst railroad disaster in Africa.
1986 – A month-long violent struggle begins in Aden, South Yemen between supporters of Ali Nasir Muhammad and Abdul Fattah Ismail, resulting in thousands of casualties.
1988 – Lee Teng-hui becomes the first native Taiwanese President of the Republic of China.
1990 – Douglas Wilder becomes the first elected African American governor as he takes office as Governor of Virginia in Richmond, Virginia.
1991 – Soviet Union troops attack Lithuanian independence supporters in Vilnius, killing 14 people and wounding around 1000 others.
1993 – Space Shuttle program: Endeavour heads for space for the third time as STS-54 launches from the Kennedy Space Center.
1993 – The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) is signed.
1998 – Alfredo Ormando sets himself on fire in St. Peter’s Square, protesting against homophobia.
2001 – An earthquake hits El Salvador, killing more than 800.
2012 – The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia sinks off the coast of Italy due to the captain Francesco Schettino’s negligence and irresponsibility. There are 32 confirmed deaths.
2018 – A false emergency alert warning of an impending missile strike in Hawaii caused widespread panic in the state.
2020 – Taal Volcano in the Philippines spews lava fountains while erupting in the crater.
Births on January 13
5 BC – Guangwu of Han, Chinese emperor (d. 57)
101 – Lucius Aelius, Roman adopted son of Hadrian (d. 138)
915 – Al-Hakam II, Umayyad caliph (d. 976)
1334 – Henry II, king of Castile and León (d. 1379)
1338 – Jeong Mong-ju, Korean civil minister, diplomat and scholar (d. 1392)
1400 – Infante John, Constable of Portugal (d. 1442)
1477 – Henry Percy, 5th Earl of Northumberland (d. 1527)
1505 – Joachim II Hector, Elector of Brandenburg (d. 1571)
1562 – Mark Alexander Boyd, Scottish poet and soldier (d. 1601)
1596 – Jan van Goyen, Dutch painter and illustrator (d. 1656)
1610 – Maria Anna of Bavaria, archduchess of Austria (d. 1665)
1616 – Antoinette Bourignon, French-Flemish mystic and author (d. 1680)
1651 – Henry Booth, 1st Earl of Warrington, English soldier and politician, Chancellor of the Exchequer (d. 1694)
1683 – Christoph Graupner, German harpsichord player and composer (d. 1760)
1720 – Richard Hurd, English bishop (d. 1808)
1749 – Maler Müller, German poet, painter, and playwright (d. 1825)
1787 – John Davis, American lawyer and politician, 14th Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1854)
1804 – Paul Gavarni, French illustrator (d. 1866)
1805 – Thomas Dyer, American lawyer and politician, 18th Mayor of Chicago (d. 1862)
1808 – Salmon P. Chase, American jurist and politician, 6th Chief Justice of the United States (d. 1873)
1810 – Ernestine Rose, American suffragist, abolitionist, and freethinker (d. 1892)
1812 – Victor de Laprade, French poet and critic (d. 1883)
1832 – Horatio Alger, Jr., American novelist and journalist (d. 1899)
1845 – Félix Tisserand, French astronomer and academic (d. 1896)
1858 – Oskar Minkowski, Lithuanian-German biologist and academic (d. 1931)
1859 – Kostis Palamas, Greek poet and playwright (d. 1943)
1861 – Max Nonne, German neurologist and academic (d. 1959)
1864 – Wilhelm Wien, German physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1928)
1865 – Princess Marie of Orléans (d. 1908)
1866 – Vasily Kalinnikov, Russian bassoon player and composer (d. 1901)
1866 – George Gurdjieff, Russian-French mystic and philosopher (d. 1949)
1869 – Prince Emanuele Filiberto, Duke of Aosta (d. 1931)
1870 – Ross Granville Harrison, American biologist and anatomist (d. 1959)
1878 – Lionel Groulx, Canadian priest and historian (d. 1967)
1881 – Essington Lewis, Australian engineer and businessman (d. 1961)
1883 – Nathaniel Cartmell, American runner and coach (d. 1967)
1885 – Alfred Fuller, Canadian-American businessman, founded the Fuller Brush Company (d. 1973)
1886 – Art Ross, Canadian-American ice hockey player and coach (d. 1964)
1887 – Sophie Tucker, Russian-born American singer and actress (d. 1966)
1890 – Jüri Uluots, Estonian journalist, lawyer, and politician, 7th Prime Minister of Estonia (d. 1945)
1892 – Ermanno Aebi, Italian-Swiss footballer (d. 1976)
1893 – Charles Arnison, English lieutenant and pilot (d. 1974)
1893 – Roy Cazaly, Australian footballer and coach (d. 1963)
1893 – Clark Ashton Smith, American poet, sculptor, painter, and author (d. 1961)
1893 – Chaim Soutine, Belarusian-French painter (d. 1943)
1900 – Shimizugawa Motokichi, Japanese sumo wrestler (d. 1967)
1900 – Gertrude Mary Cox, American mathematician (d. 1978)
1901 – A. B. Guthrie, Jr., American novelist, screenwriter, historian (d. 1991)
1901 – Mieczysław Żywczyński, Polish priest and historian (d. 1978)
1902 – Karl Menger, Austrian-American mathematician from the Vienna Circle (d. 1985)
1904 – Richard Addinsell, English composer (d. 1977)
1904 – Nathan Milstein, Ukrainian-American violinist and composer (d. 1992)
1904 – Dick Rowley, Irish footballer, centre forward (d. 1984)
1905 – Kay Francis, American actress (d. 1968)
1905 – Jack London, English sprinter and pianist (d. 1966)
1906 – Zhou Youguang, Chinese linguist, sinologist, and academic (d. 2017)
1909 – Helm Glöckler, German race car driver (d. 1993)
1910 – Yannis Tsarouchis, Greek painter and illustrator (d. 1989)
1911 – Joh Bjelke-Petersen, New Zealand-Australian farmer and politician, 31st Premier of Queensland (d. 2005)
1914 – Osa Massen, Danish-American actress (d. 2006)
1914 – Ted Willis, Baron Willis, English author, playwright, and screenwriter (d. 1992)
1919 – Robert Stack, American actor (d. 2003)
1921 – Necati Cumalı, Greek-Turkish author and poet (d. 2001)
1921 – Dachine Rainer, American-English author and poet (d. 2000)
1921 – Arthur Stevens, English footballer, outside right (d. 2007}
1922 – Albert Lamorisse, French director and producer (d. 1970)
1923 – Daniil Shafran, Russian cellist (d. 1997)
1923 – Willem Slijkhuis, Dutch runner (d. 2003)
1924 – Paul Feyerabend, Austrian-Swiss philosopher and academic (d. 1994)
1924 – Roland Petit, French dancer and choreographer (d. 2011)
1925 – Rosemary Murphy, American actress (d. 2014)
1925 – Vanita Smythe, American singer and actress (d. 1994)
1925 – Ron Tauranac, Australian engineer and businessman
1925 – Gwen Verdon, American actress and dancer (d. 2000)
1926 – Michael Bond, English soldier and author, created Paddington Bear (d. 2017)
1926 – Carolyn Gold Heilbrun, American author and academic (d. 2003)
1926 – Melba Liston, American trombonist and composer (d. 1999)
1927 – Brock Adams, American soldier, lawyer, and politician, 5th United States Secretary of Transportation (d. 2004)
1927 – Liz Anderson, American singer-songwriter (d. 2011)
1927 – Sydney Brenner, South African biologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2019)
1929 – Joe Pass, American guitarist and composer (d. 1994)
1930 – Frances Sternhagen, American actress
1931 – Ian Hendry, English actor (d. 1984)
1931 – Charles Nelson Reilly, American actor, comedian, director, game show panelist, and television personality (d. 2007)
1932 – Barry Bishop, American mountaineer, photographer, and scholar (d. 1994)
1933 – Tom Gola, American basketball player, coach, and politician (d. 2014)
1935 – Rip Taylor, American actor and comedian (d. 2019)
1936 – Renato Bruson, Italian opera singer
1937 – Guy Dodson, New Zealand-English biochemist and academic (d. 2012)
1938 – Cabu, French cartoonist (d. 2015)
1938 – Daevid Allen, Australian singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2015)
1938 – Richard Anthony, Egyptian-French singer-songwriter (d. 2015)
1938 – Dave Edwards, American captain and politician (d. 2013)
1938 – Tord Grip, Swedish footballer and manager
1938 – Anna Home, English screenwriter and producer
1939 – Edgardo Cozarinsky, Argentinian author, screenwriter, and director
1939 – Jacek Gmoch, Polish footballer and coach
1939 – Cesare Maniago, Canadian ice hockey player
1940 – Edmund White, American novelist, memoirist, and essayist
1941 – Pasqual Maragall, Spanish academic and politician, 127th President of the Generalitat de Catalunya
1941 – Meinhard Nehmer, German bobsledder
1943 – William Duckworth, American composer and author (d. 2012)
1943 – Richard Moll, American actor
1945 – Gordon McVie, English oncologist and author
1945 – Peter Simpson, English footballer
1946 – Ordal Demokan, Turkish physicist and academic (d. 2004)
1946 – Eero Koivistoinen, Finnish saxophonist, composer, and conductor
1947 – John Lees, English singer-songwriter and guitarist
1947 – Jacek Majchrowski, Polish historian, lawyer, and politician
1947 – Carles Rexach, Spanish footballer and coach
1948 – Gaj Singh, Indian lawyer and politician
1949 – Rakesh Sharma, Indian commander, pilot, and astronaut
1949 – Brandon Tartikoff, American screenwriter and producer (d. 1997)
1950 – Clive Betts, English economist and politician
1950 – Bob Forsch, American baseball player (d. 2011)
1950 – Gholam Hossein Mazloumi, Iranian footballer and manager (d. 2014)
1952 – Stephen Glover, English journalist, co-founded The Independent
1953 – Silvana Gallardo, American actress and producer (d. 2012)
1954 – Richard Blackford, English composer
1954 – Trevor Rabin, South African-American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
1955 – Paul Kelly, Australian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer
1955 – Jay McInerney, American novelist and critic
1955 – Anne Pringle, English diplomat, British Ambassador to Russia
1957 – Claudia Emerson, American poet and academic (d. 2014)
1957 – Mary Glindon, English lawyer and politician
1957 – Mark O’Meara, American golfer
1957 – Lorrie Moore, American short story writer
1958 – Francisco Buyo, Spanish footballer and manager
1958 – Juan Pedro de Miguel, Spanish handball player (d. 2016)
1959 – Winnie Byanyima, Ugandan engineer, politician, and diplomat
1960 – Eric Betzig, American physicist and chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
1960 – Matthew Bourne, English choreographer and director
1961 – Wayne Coyne, American singer-songwriter and musician
1961 – Kelly Hrudey, Canadian ice hockey player and sportscaster
1961 – Julia Louis-Dreyfus, American actress, comedian, and producer
1962 – Trace Adkins, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1962 – Paul Higgins, Canadian ice hockey player
1964 – Penelope Ann Miller, American actress
1966 – Patrick Dempsey, American actor and race car driver
1966 – Leo Visser, Dutch speed skater and pilot
1968 – Mike Whitlow, English footballer and coach
1969 – Stefania Belmondo, Italian skier
1969 – Stephen Hendry, Scottish snooker player and journalist
1970 – Frank Kooiman, Dutch footballer
1970 – Marco Pantani, Italian cyclist (d. 2004)
1970 – Shonda Rhimes, American actress, director, producer, and screenwriter
1972 – Mark Bosnich, Australian footballer and sportscaster
1972 – Nicole Eggert, American actress
1972 – Vitaly Scherbo, Belarusian gymnast
1973 – Nikolai Khabibulin, Russian ice hockey player
1973 – Gigi Galli, Italian race driver
1974 – Sergei Brylin, Russian ice hockey player and coach
1975 – Rune Eriksen, Norwegian guitarist and composer
1975 – Mailis Reps, Estonian academic and politician, 31st Estonian Minister of Education and Research
1975 – Andrew Yang, American entrepreneur, founder of Venture for America, and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate
1976 – Mario Yepes, Colombian footballer
1977 – Orlando Bloom, English actor and producer
1977 – Mi-Hyun Kim, South Korean golfer
1977 – Elliot Mason, English trombonist and keyboard player
1977 – James Posey, American basketball player and coach
1978 – Nate Silver, American journalist and statistician, developed PECOTA
1979 – Katy Brand, English actress and screenwriter
1980 – Krzysztof Czerwiński, Polish organist and conductor
1528 – Gustav I of Sweden is crowned King of Sweden, having already reigned since his election in June 1523.
1554 – Bayinnaung, who would go on to assemble the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia, is crowned King of Burma.
1616 – The city of Belém, Brazil is founded on the Amazon River delta, by Portuguese captain Francisco Caldeira Castelo Branco.
1808 – John Rennie’s scheme to defend St Mary’s Church, Reculver, founded in 669, from coastal erosion is abandoned in favour of demolition, despite the church being an exemplar of Anglo-Saxon architecture and sculpture.
1808 – The organizational meeting leading to the creation of the Wernerian Natural History Society, a former Scottish learned society, is held in Edinburgh.
1848 – The Palermo rising takes place in Sicily against the Bourbon Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.
1866 – The Royal Aeronautical Society is formed in London.
1872 – Yohannes IV is crowned Emperor of Ethiopia in Axum, the first imperial coronation in that city in over 200 years.
1895 – The National Trust is founded in the United Kingdom.
1911 – The University of the Philippines College of Law is formally established; three future Philippine presidents are among the first enrollees.
1915 – The United States House of Representatives rejects a proposal to require states to give women the right to vote.
1916 – Both Oswald Boelcke and Max Immelmann, for achieving eight aerial victories each over Allied aircraft, receive the German Empire’s highest military award, the Pour le Mérite as the first German aviators to earn it.
1918 – The Minnie Pit Disaster coal mining accident occurs in Halmer End, Staffordshire, in which 155 men and boys die.
1921 – Acting to restore confidence in baseball after the Black Sox Scandal, Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis is elected as Major League Baseball’s first commissioner.
1932 – Hattie Caraway becomes the first woman elected to the United States Senate.
1942 – World War II: United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt creates the National War Labor Board.
1945 – World War II: The Red Army begins the Vistula–Oder Offensive.
1962 – Vietnam War: Operation Chopper, the first American combat mission in the war, takes place.
1964 – Rebels in Zanzibar begin a revolt known as the Zanzibar Revolution and proclaim a republic.
1966 – Lyndon B. Johnson states that the United States should stay in South Vietnam until Communist aggression there is ended.
1967 – Dr. James Bedford becomes the first person to be cryonically preserved with intent of future resuscitation.
1969 – The New York Jets of the American Football League defeat the Baltimore Colts of the National Football League to win Super Bowl III in what is considered to be one of the greatest upsets in sports history.
1970 – Biafra capitulates, ending the Nigerian Civil War.
1971 – The Harrisburg Seven: Rev. Philip Berrigan and five other activists are indicted on charges of conspiring to kidnap Henry Kissinger and of plotting to blow up the heating tunnels of federal buildings in Washington, D.C.
1976 – The United Nations Security Council votes 11–1 to allow the Palestine Liberation Organization to participate in a Security Council debate (without voting rights).
1986 – Space Shuttle program: Congressman Bill Nelson lifts off from Kennedy Space Center aboard Columbia on mission STS-61-C as a payload specialist.
1990 – A seven-day pogrom breaks out against the Armenian civilian population of Baku, Azerbaijan, during which Armenians were beaten, tortured, murdered, and expelled from the city.
1991 – Persian Gulf War: An act of the U.S. Congress authorizes the use of American military force to drive Iraq out of Kuwait.
1998 – Nineteen European nations agree to forbid human cloning.
2001 – Downtown Disney opens to the public as part of the Disneyland Resort in Anaheim, California.
2004 – The world’s largest ocean liner, RMS Queen Mary 2, makes its maiden voyage.
2005 – Deep Impact launches from Cape Canaveral on a Delta II rocket.
2006 – A stampede during the Stoning of the Devil ritual on the last day at the Hajj in Mina, Saudi Arabia, kills at least 362 Muslim pilgrims.
2010 – An earthquake in Haiti occurs, killing between 220,000 and 300,000 people and destroying much of the capital Port-au-Prince.
2012 – Violent protests occur in Bucharest, Romania, as two-day-old demonstrations continue against President Traian Băsescu’s economic austerity measures. Clashes are reported in numerous Romanian cities between protesters and law enforcement officers.
2015 – Government raids kill 143 Boko Haram fighters in Kolofata, Cameroon.
2016 – Ten people are killed and 15 wounded in a bombing near the Blue Mosque in Istanbul.
2020 – Taal Volcano in the Philippines erupts, and kills 39 people.
Births on January 12
1483 – Henry III of Nassau-Breda (d. 1538)
1562 – Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy (d. 1630)
1576 – Petrus Scriverius, Dutch historian and scholar (d. 1660)
1577 – Jan Baptist van Helmont, Flemish chemist and physician (d. 1644)
1588 – John Winthrop, English lawyer and politician, 2nd Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony (d. 1649)
1591 – Jusepe de Ribera, Spanish painter (d. 1652)
1597 – François Duquesnoy, Flemish sculptor and educator (d. 1643)
1598 – Jijabai Shahaji Bhosale, venerated mother of Indian king Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj (d. 1674)
1628 – Charles Perrault, French author and academic (d. 1703)
1673 – Rosalba Carriera, Italian painter (d. 1757)
1711 – Gaetano Latilla, Italian composer (d. 1788)
1715 – Jacques Duphly, French organist and composer (d. 1789)
1716 – Antonio de Ulloa, Spanish general and politician, 1st Spanish Governor of Louisiana (d. 1795)
1721 – Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Prussian field marshal (d. 1792)
1723 – Samuel Langdon, American minister, theologian, and academic (d. 1797)
1724 – Frances Brooke, English author and playwright (d. 1789)
1729 – Edmund Burke, Irish philosopher, academic, and politician (d. 1797)
1746 – Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, Swiss philosopher and educator (d. 1827)
1751 – Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies (d. 1825)
1772 – Mikhail Speransky, Russian academic and politician (d. 1839)
1786 – Sir Robert Inglis, 2nd Baronet, English politician (d. 1855)
1792 – Johan August Arfwedson, Swedish chemist and academic (d. 1841)
1797 – Gideon Brecher, Austrian physician and author (d. 1873)
1799 – Priscilla Susan Bury, British botanist (d. 1872)
1822 – Étienne Lenoir, Belgian engineer, designed the internal combustion engine (d. 1900)
1837 – Adolf Jensen, German pianist and composer (d. 1879)
1849 – Jean Béraud, Russian-French painter and academic (d. 1935)
1853 – Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro, Italian mathematician (d. 1925)
1856 – John Singer Sargent, American painter and academic (d. 1925)
1863 – Swami Vivekananda, Indian monk and philosopher (d. 1902)
1869 – Bhagwan Das, Indian philosopher, academic, and politician (d. 1958)
1873 – Spyridon Louis, Greek runner (d. 1940)
1874 – Laura Adams Armer, American author and photographer (d. 1963)
1876 – Fevzi Çakmak, Turkish field marshal and politician, Prime Minister of the Turkish Provisional Government (d. 1950)
1876 – Jack London, American novelist and journalist (d. 1916)
1876 – Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari, Italian composer and educator (d. 1948)
1877 – Frank J. Corr, American lawyer and politician, 45th Mayor of Chicago (d. 1934)
1878 – Ferenc Molnár, Hungarian-American author and playwright (d. 1952)
1879 – Ray Harroun, American race car driver and engineer (d. 1968)
1879 – Anton Uesson, Estonian engineer and politician, 17th Mayor of Tallinn (d. 1942)
1882 – Milton Sills, American actor and screenwriter (d. 1930)
1884 – Texas Guinan, American entertainer and bootlegger (d. 1933)
1971 – John Tovey, 1st Baron Tovey, English admiral (b. 1885)
1973 – Roy Franklin Nichols, American historian and academic (b. 1896)
1974 – Princess Patricia of Connaught (b. 1886)
1976 – Agatha Christie, English crime novelist, short story writer, and playwright (b. 1890)
1977 – Henri-Georges Clouzot, French director and screenwriter (b. 1907)
1983 – Nikolai Podgorny, Ukrainian engineer and politician (b. 1903)
1988 – Connie Mulder, South African politician (b. 1925)
1988 – Piero Taruffi, Italian racing driver and motorcycle racer (b. 1906)
1990 – Laurence J. Peter, Canadian-American author and educator (b. 1919)
1991 – Robert Jackson, Australian public servant and diplomat (b. 1911)
1992 – Kumar Gandharva, a Hindustani classical singer (b. 1924)
1994 – Gustav Naan, Estonian physicist and philosopher (b. 1919)
1996 – Joachim Nitsche, German mathematician and academic (b. 1926)
1997 – Jean-Edern Hallier, French author (b. 1936)
1997 – Charles Brenton Huggins, Canadian-American physician and physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1901)
1998 – Roger Clark, English racing driver (b. 1939)
1999 – Doug Wickenheiser, Canadian-American ice hockey player (b. 1961)
2000 – Marc Davis, American animator and screenwriter (b. 1913)
2000 – Bobby Phills, American basketball player (b. 1969)
2001 – Luiz Bonfá, Brazilian guitarist and composer (b. 1922)
2001 – William Redington Hewlett, American engineer and businessman, co-founded Hewlett-Packard (b. 1913)
2002 – Cyrus Vance, American lawyer and politician, 57th U.S. Secretary of State (b. 1917)
2003 – Dean Amadon, American ornithologist and author (b. 1912)
2003 – Kinji Fukasaku, Japanese actor, director, and screenwriter (b. 1930)
2003 – Leopoldo Galtieri, Argentine general and politician, 44th President of Argentina (b. 1926)
2003 – Maurice Gibb, Manx-Australian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (b. 1949)
2003 – Alan Nunn May, English physicist and spy (b. 1911)
2004 – Olga Ladyzhenskaya, Russian mathematician and academic (b. 1921)
2005 – Amrish Puri, Indian actor (b. 1932)
2006 – Pablita Velarde, Santa Clara Pueblo (Native American) painter (b. 1918)
2007 – Alice Coltrane, American pianist and composer (b. 1937)
2007 – James Killen, Australian soldier, lawyer, and politician, 38th Australian Minister for Defence (b. 1925)
2008 – Max Beck, American intersex advocate (b. 1966)
2009 – Claude Berri, French actor, director, and screenwriter (b. 1934)
2010 – Daniel Bensaïd, French philosopher and author (b. 1946)
2010 – Hasib Sabbagh, Palestinian businessman and philanthropist, co-founded Consolidated Contractors Company (b. 1920)
2012 – Bjørn G. Andersen, Norwegian geologist and academic (b. 1924)
2012 – Glenda Dickerson, American director, choreographer, and educator (b. 1945)
2012 – Bill Janklow, American lawyer and politician, 27th Governor of South Dakota (b. 1939)
2012 – Charles H. Price II, American businessman and diplomat, United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom (b. 1931)
2012 – Jim Stanley, American football player and coach (b. 1935)
2013 – Precious Bryant, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1942)
2013 – Eugene Patterson, American journalist and activist (b. 1923)
2014 – Alexandra Bastedo, English actress (b. 1946)
2014 – Connie Binsfeld, American educator and politician, 58th Lieutenant Governor of Michigan (b. 1924)
2014 – George Dement, American soldier, businessman, and politician (b. 1922)
2015 – Trevor Colbourn, American historian and academic (b. 1927)
2015 – Robert Gover, American journalist and author (b. 1929)
2015 – Carl Long, American baseball player (b. 1935)
2015 – Elena Obraztsova, Russian soprano and actress (b. 1939)
2015 – Inge Vermeulen, Brazilian-Dutch field hockey player (b. 1985)
2017 – William Peter Blatty, American writer and filmmaker (b. 1928)
2017 – Graham Taylor, former Grimsby Town player and former manager of the England football team. (b. 1944)
2018 – Keith Jackson, American sports commentator and journalist (b. 1928)
2020 – Sir Roger Scruton, English philosopher, and writer (b. 1944)
Holidays and observances on January 12
Christian feast day:
Aelred of Rievaulx
Benedict Biscop
Bernard of Corleone
Marguerite Bourgeoys
Tatiana
January 12 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Earliest day on which Lee–Jackson Day can fall while January 18 is the latest, celebrated on the Friday before Martin Luther King Day. (Commonwealth of Virginia)
49 BC – Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon, signalling the start of civil war.
AD 9 – The Western Han dynasty ends when Wang Mang claims that the divine Mandate of Heaven called for the end of the dynasty and the beginning of his own, the Xin dynasty.
AD 69 – Lucius Calpurnius Piso Licinianus is appointed by Galba as deputy Roman Emperor.
236 – Pope Fabian succeeds Anterus to become the twentieth pope of Rome.
1072 – Robert Guiscard conquers Palermo in Sicily for the Normans.
1430 – Philip the Good, the Duke of Burgundy, establishes the Order of the Golden Fleece, the most prestigious, exclusive, and expensive order of chivalry in the world.
1475 – Stephen III of Moldavia defeats the Ottoman Empire at the Battle of Vaslui.
1645 – Archbishop William Laud is beheaded for treason at the Tower of London.
1776 – American Revolution: Thomas Paine publishes his pamphlet Common Sense.
1791 – The Siege of Dunlap’s Station begins near Cincinnati during the Northwest Indian War.
1806 – Two British brigades occupy Cape Town after the Battle of Blaauwberg.
1812 – The first steamboat on the Ohio River or the Mississippi River arrives in New Orleans, 82 days after departing from Pittsburgh.
1861 – American Civil War: Florida becomes the third state to secede from the Union.
1863 – The Metropolitan Railway, the world’s oldest underground railway, opens between Paddington and Farringdon, marking the beginning of the London Underground.
1870 – John D. Rockefeller incorporates Standard Oil.
1901 – The first great Texas oil gusher is discovered at Spindletop in Beaumont, Texas.
1916 – World War I: In the Erzurum Offensive, Russia defeats the Ottoman Empire.
1920 – The Treaty of Versailles takes effect, officially ending World War I.
1920 – League of Nations Covenant enters into force. On January 16 the organization holds its first council meeting, in Paris.
1927 – Fritz Lang’s futuristic film Metropolis is released in Germany.
1941 – World War II: The Greek army captures Kleisoura.
1946 – The first General Assembly of the United Nations opens in London. Fifty-one nations are represented.
1946 – The United States Army Signal Corps successfully conducts Project Diana, bouncing radio waves off the Moon and receiving the reflected signals.
1954 – BOAC Flight 781, a de Havilland DH.106 Comet 1, explodes and falls into the Tyrrhenian Sea killing 35 people.
1962 – Apollo program: NASA announces plans to build the C-5 rocket launch vehicle, which became known as the Saturn V Moon rocket, which launched every Apollo Moon mission.
1966 – Tashkent Declaration, a peace agreement between India and Pakistan signed that resolved the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965.
1972 – Sheikh Mujibur Rahman returns to the newly independent Bangladesh as president after spending over nine months in prison in Pakistan.
1981 – Salvadoran Civil War: The FMLN launches its first major offensive, gaining control of most of Morazán and Chalatenango departments
1984 – Holy See–United States relations: The United States and Holy See (Vatican City) re-establish full diplomatic relations after almost 117 years, overturning the United States Congress’s 1867 ban on public funding for such a diplomatic envoy.
1985 – Sandinista Daniel Ortega becomes president of Nicaragua and vows to continue the transformation to socialism and alliance with the Soviet Union and Cuba; American policy continues to support the Contras in their revolt against the Nicaraguan government.
1990 – Time Warner is formed by the merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications.
2007 – A general strike begins in Guinea in an attempt to get President Lansana Conté to resign.
2012 – A bombing in Khyber Agency, Pakistan, kills at least 30 people and 78 others injured.
2013 – More than 100 people are killed and 270 injured in several bomb blasts in Pakistan.
2015 – A traffic accident between an oil tanker truck and passenger coach en route to Shikarpur from Karachi on the Pakistan National Highway Link Road near Gulshan-e-Hadeed, Karachi, killing at least 62 people.
Births on January 10
626 – Husayn ibn Ali the third Shia Imam (d. 680)
1392 – Johanna van Polanen, Dutch noblewoman (d. 1445)
1480 – Margaret of Austria, Duchess of Savoy (d. 1530)
1538 – Louis of Nassau (d. 1574)
1607 – Isaac Jogues, French priest and missionary (d. 1646)
1644 – Louis François, duc de Boufflers, French general (d. 1711)
1654 – Joshua Barnes, English historian and scholar (d. 1712)
1702 – Johannes Zick, German painter (d. 1762)
1715 – Christian August Crusius, German philosopher and theologian (d. 1775)
1729 – Lazzaro Spallanzani, Italian priest, biologist, and physiologist (d. 1799)
1745 – Isaac Titsingh, Dutch surgeon, scholar, and diplomat (d. 1812)
1750 – Thomas Erskine, 1st Baron Erskine, Scottish-English lawyer and politician, Lord Chancellor of Great Britain (d. 1823)
1760 – Johann Rudolf Zumsteeg, German composer and conductor (d. 1802)
1769 – Michel Ney, French general (d. 1815)
1776 – George Birkbeck, English physician and academic, founded Birkbeck, University of London (d. 1841)
1780 – Martin Lichtenstein, German physician and explorer (d. 1857)
1802 – Carl Ritter von Ghega, Italian-Austrian engineer, designed the Semmering railway (d. 1860)
1810 – Ferdinand Barbedienne, French engineer (d. 1892)
1810 – Jeremiah S. Black, American jurist and politician, 23rd United States Secretary of State (d. 1883)
1810 – William Haines, English-Australian politician, 1st Premier of Victoria (d. 1866)
1812 – Georg Hermann Nicolai, German architect and academic (d. 1881)
1828 – Herman Koeckemann, German bishop and missionary (d. 1892)
1829 – Epameinondas Deligeorgis, Greek lawyer, journalist and politician, Prime Minister of Greece (d. 1879)
1834 – John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton, Italian-English historian and politician (d. 1902)
1836 – Charles Ingalls, American farmer and carpenter (d. 1902)
1840 – Louis-Nazaire Bégin, Canadian cardinal (d. 1925)
1842 – Luigi Pigorini, Italian paleontologist, archaeologist, and ethnographer (d. 1925)
1843 – Frank James, American soldier and criminal (d. 1915)
1848 – Reinhold Sadler, American merchant and politician, 9th Governor of Nevada (d. 1906)
1849 – Robert Crosbie, Canadian theosophist, founded the United Lodge of Theosophists (d. 1919)
1850 – John Wellborn Root, American architect, designed the Rookery Building and Monadnock Building (d. 1891)
1854 – Ramón Corral, Mexican general and politician, 6th Vice President of Mexico (d. 1912)
1858 – Heinrich Zille, German illustrator and photographer (d. 1929)
1859 – Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia, Spanish philosopher and academic (d. 1909)
1860 – Charles G. D. Roberts, Canadian poet and author (d. 1943)
1864 – Grand Duke Peter Nikolaevich of Russia (d. 1931)
1873 – Algernon Maudslay, English sailor (d. 1948)
1873 – Jack O’Neill, Irish-American baseball player (d. 1935)
1873 – George Orton, Canadian runner and hurdler (d. 1958)
1875 – Issai Schur, German mathematician and academic (d. 1941)
1877 – Frederick Gardner Cottrell, American physical chemist, inventor and philanthropist (d. 1948)
1878 – John McLean, American hurdler, football player, and coach (d. 1955)
1880 – Manuel Azaña, Spanish jurist and politician, 7th President of Spain (d. 1940)
1883 – Francis X. Bushman, American actor, director, and screenwriter (d. 1966)
1883 – Aleksey Nikolayevich Tolstoy, Russian journalist, author, and poet (d. 1945)
1887 – Robinson Jeffers, American poet and philosopher (d. 1962)
1890 – Pina Menichelli, Italian actress (d. 1984)
1891 – Heinrich Behmann, German mathematician and academic (d. 1970)
1891 – Ann Shoemaker, American actress (d. 1978)
1892 – Dumas Malone, American historian and author (d. 1986)
1892 – Melchior Wańkowicz, Polish soldier, journalist, and author (d. 1974)
1893 – Albert Jacka, Australian captain, Victoria Cross recipient (d. 1932)
1894 – Pingali Lakshmikantam, Indian poet and author (d. 1972)
1895 – Percy Cerutty, Australian athletics coach (d. 1975)
1896 – Yong Mun Sen, Malaysian watercolour painter (d. 1962)
1898 – Katharine Burr Blodgett, American physicist and engineer (d. 1979)
1900 – Violette Cordery, English racing driver (d. 1983)
1902 – Dobriša Cesarić, Croatian poet and translator (d. 1980)
1903 – Barbara Hepworth, English sculptor (d. 1975)
1903 – Pud Thurlow, Australian cricketer (d. 1975)
1903 – Voldemar Väli, Estonian wrestler (d. 1997)
1904 – Ray Bolger, American actor and dancer (d. 1987)
1905 – Albert Arlen, Australian pianist, composer, actor, and playwright (d. 1993)
1907 – Gordon Kidd Teal, American engineer and inventor (d. 2003)
1908 – Paul Henreid, Italian-American actor and director (d. 1992)
1910 – Jean Martinon, French conductor and composer (d. 1976)
1911 – Binod Bihari Chowdhury, Bangladeshi activist (d. 2013)
1911 – Norman Heatley, English biologist and chemist (d. 2004)
1912 – Maria Mandl, Austrian SS guard (d. 1948)
1913 – Franco Bordoni, Italian racing driver and pilot (d. 1975)
1913 – Gustáv Husák, Slovak politician, 9th President of Czechoslovakia (d. 1991)
1913 – Mehmet Shehu, Albanian soldier and politician, 22nd Prime Minister of Albania (d. 1981)
1914 – Pierre Cogan, French cyclist (d. 2013)
1914 – Yu Kuo-hwa, Chinese politician, 23rd Premier of the Republic of China (d. 2000)
1915 – Dean Dixon, American-Swiss conductor (d. 1976)
1915 – Cynthia Freeman, American author (d. 1988)
1916 – Sune Bergström, Swedish biochemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2004)
1916 – Eldzier Cortor, American painter (d. 2015)
1916 – Don Metz, Canadian ice hockey player (d. 2007)
1917 – Jerry Wexler, American journalist and producer (d. 2008)
1918 – Les Bennett, English footballer and manager (d. 1999)
1918 – Arthur Chung, Guyanese lawyer and politician, 1st President of Guyana (d. 2008)
1918 – Harry Merkel, German racing driver (d. 1995)
1919 – Terukuni Manzō, Japanese sumo wrestler, the 38th Yokozuna (d. 1977)
1919 – Milton Parker, American businessman, co-founded the Carnegie Deli (d. 2009)
1920 – Rosella Hightower, American ballerina (d. 2008)
1920 – Roberto M. Levingston, Argentinian general and politician, 36th President of Argentina (d. 2015)
1920 – Max Patkin, American baseball player and clown (d. 1999)
1921 – Rodger Ward, American aviator, race car driver and sportscaster (d. 2004)
1922 – Billy Liddell, Scottish-English footballer (d. 2001)
1924 – Earl Bakken, American inventor (d. 2018)
1924 – Ludmilla Chiriaeff, Canadian ballerina, choreographer, and director (d. 1996)
1925 – Billie Sol Estes, American financier and businessman (d. 2013)
1926 – Musallam Bseiso, Palestinian journalist and politician (d. 2017)
1927 – Gisele MacKenzie, Canadian-American singer and actress (d. 2003)
1927 – Johnnie Ray, American singer-songwriter and pianist (d. 1990)
1927 – Otto Stich, Swiss lawyer and politician, 140th President of the Swiss Confederation (d. 2012)
1928 – Philip Levine, American poet and academic (d. 2015)
1928 – Peter Mathias, English historian and academic (d. 2016)
1929 – Tony Soper, English ornithologist and author
1930 – Roy E. Disney, American businessman (d. 2009)
1931 – Peter Barnes, English playwright and screenwriter (d. 2004)
1931 – Rosalind Howells, Baroness Howells of St Davids, Grenadian-English academic and politician
1931 – Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat, Malaysian cleric and politician, 12th Menteri Besar of Kelantan (d. 2015)
1931 – John Zizioulas, Greek metropolitan
1934 – Leonid Kravchuk, Ukrainian politician, 1st President of Ukraine
1935 – Ronnie Hawkins, American rockabilly singer-songwriter and guitarist
1935 – Sherrill Milnes, American opera singer and educator
1936 – Stephen E. Ambrose, American historian and author (d. 2002)
1936 – Walter Bodmer, German-English geneticist and academic
1936 – Robert Woodrow Wilson, American physicist and astronomer, Nobel Prize laureate
1937 – Daniel Walker Howe, American historian and academic
1937 – Thomas Penfield Jackson, American soldier, lawyer, and judge (d. 2013)
1938 – Donald Knuth, American computer scientist and mathematician
1938 – Frank Mahovlich, Canadian ice hockey player and politician
1938 – Willie McCovey, American baseball player (d. 2018)
1939 – Jared Carter, American poet and author
1939 – David Horowitz, American activist and author
1939 – William Levy, American-Dutch journalist, author, and poet
1939 – Scott McKenzie, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2012)
1939 – Sal Mineo, American actor (d. 1976)
1940 – K. J. Yesudas, Indian singer and music director
1940 – Godfrey Hewitt, English geneticist and academic (d. 2013)
1941 – Tom Clarke, Scottish politician, Shadow Secretary of State for Scotland
1942 – Graeme Gahan, Australian footballer and coach
1943 – Jim Croce, American singer-songwriter (d. 1973)
1944 – Jeffrey Catherine Jones, American comics and fantasy artist (d. 2011)
1944 – Frank Sinatra, Jr., American singer and actor (d. 2016)
1945 – John Fahey, New Zealand-Australian lawyer and politician, 38th Premier of New South Wales
1945 – Rod Stewart, British singer-songwriter
1945 – Gunther von Hagens, German anatomist, invented plastination
1946 – Aynsley Dunbar, English drummer and songwriter
1947 – George Alec Effinger, American author (d. 2002)
1947 – James Morris, American opera singer
1947 – Peer Steinbrück, German politician, German Minister of Finance
1947 – Tiit Vähi, Estonian engineer and politician, 11th Prime Minister of Estonia
1948 – Donald Fagen, American singer-songwriter and musician
1948 – Bernard Thévenet, French cyclist and sportscaster
1949 – Kemal Derviş, Turkish economist and politician, Turkish Minister of Economy
1949 – George Foreman, American boxer, actor, and businessman
1949 – Linda Lovelace, American porn actress and activist (d. 2002)
1950 – Roy Blunt, American academic and politician
1952 – Scott Thurston, American guitarist and songwriter
1953 – Pat Benatar, American singer-songwriter
1953 – Bobby Rahal, American race car driver
1955 – Michael Schenker, German guitarist, songwriter, and producer
1956 – Shawn Colvin, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1956 – Antonio Muñoz Molina, Spanish author
1958 – Eddie Cheever, American race car driver
1958 – Anatoly Pisarenko, Ukrainian weightlifter and trainer
1959 – Chandra Cheeseborough, American sprinter and coach
1959 – Chris Van Hollen, American lawyer and politician
1959 – Fran Walsh, New Zealand screenwriter and producer
1960 – Gurinder Chadha, Kenyan-English director, producer, and screenwriter
1960 – Brian Cowen, Irish lawyer and politician, 12th Taoiseach of Ireland
1960 – John Mann, English lawyer and politician
1960 – Benoît Pelletier, Canadian lawyer and politician
1961 – Janet Jones, American actress
1961 – Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Italian-American violinist, author, and educator
1962 – Michael Fortier, Canadian lawyer and politician
1962 – Kathryn S. McKinley, American computer scientist and academic
1963 – Malcolm Dunford, New Zealand-Australian footballer
1963 – Kira Ivanova, Russian figure skater (d. 2001)
1964 – Brad Roberts, Canadian singer-songwriter and guitarist
1967 – Maciej Śliwowski, Polish footballer
1969 – Simone Bagel-Trah, German businessperson
1970 – Buff Bagwell, American wrestler and actor
1970 – Alisa Marić, Serbian chess player and politician, Serbian Minister of Youth and Sports
1972 – Mohammed Benzakour, Moroccan-Dutch journalist, poet, and author
1973 – Glenn Robinson, American basketball player
1973 – Félix Trinidad, Puerto Rican-American boxer
1974 – Jemaine Clement, New Zealand comedian, actor, and musician
1974 – Davide Dionigi, Italian footballer and manager
1974 – Steve Marlet, French footballer, forward and coach
1974 – Bob Peeters, Belgian footballer and manager
1974 – Hrithik Roshan, Indian actor
1975 – Jake Delhomme, American football player
1976 – Adam Kennedy, American baseball player
1976 – Ian Poulter, English golfer
1978 – Johan van der Wath, South African cricketer
1979 – Simone Cavalli, Italian footballer
1980 – Sarah Shahi, American actress
1980 – DeShaun Foster, American football player
1981 – James Coppinger, English footballer
1981 – Jared Kushner, American real estate investor and political figure
1982 – Julien Brellier, French footballer
1982 – Tomasz Brzyski, Polish footballer
1984 – Marouane Chamakh, Moroccan footballer
1984 – Trent Cutler, Australian rugby league player
1984 – Ariane Friedrich, German high jumper
1984 – Kalki Koechlin, Indian actress
1986 – Kirsten Flipkens, Belgian tennis player
1986 – Hideaki Ikematsu, Japanese footballer
1986 – Kenneth Vermeer, Dutch footballer
1987 – César Cielo, Brazilian swimmer
1988 – Leonard Patrick Komon, Kenyan runner
1988 – Vladimir Zharkov, Russian ice hockey player
1989 – Emily Meade, American actress
1989 – Kyle Reimers, Australian footballer
1990 – Mirko Bortolotti, Italian racing driver
1990 – Ishiura Masakatsu, Japanese sumo wrestler
1990 – Cody Walker, Australian rugby league player
1990 – John Carlson, American ice hockey player
1991 – Chad Townsend, Australian rugby league player
Deaths on January 10
259 – Polyeuctus, Roman saint
314 – Miltiades, pope of the Catholic Church
681 – Agatho, pope of the Catholic Church
976 – John I Tzimiskes, Byzantine emperor (b. 925)
475 – Byzantine Emperor Zeno is forced to flee his capital at Constantinople, and his general, Basiliscus gains control of the empire.
681 – Twelfth Council of Toledo: King Erwig of the Visigoths initiates a council in which he implements diverse measures against the Jews in Spain.
1127 – Jin–Song Wars: Invading Jurchen soldiers from the Jin dynasty besiege and sack Bianjing (Kaifeng), the capital of the Song dynasty of China, and abduct Emperor Qinzong of Song and others, ending the Northern Song dynasty.
1349 – The Jewish population of Basel, believed by the residents to be the cause of the ongoing Black Death, is rounded up and incinerated.
1431 – The trial of Joan of Arc begins in Rouen.
1760 – Ahmad Shah Durrani defeats the Marathas in the Battle of Barari Ghat.<refFrançois Xavier Wendel (1991). Wendel’s memoirs on the origin, growth and present state of Jat power in Hindustan (1768). Institut français de Pondichéry. p. 61.</ref>
1788 – Connecticut becomes the fifth state to ratify the Constitution.
1792 – Treaty of Jassy between Russian and Ottoman Empire is signed.
1793 – Jean-Pierre Blanchard becomes the first person to fly in a balloon in the United States.
1799 – British Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger introduces an income tax of two shillings to the pound to raise funds for Great Britain’s war effort in the Napoleonic Wars.
1806 – Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson receives a state funeral and is interred in St Paul’s Cathedral.
1816 – Humphry Davy tests his safety lamp for miners at Hebburn Colliery.
1822 – The Portuguese prince Pedro I of Brazil decides to stay in Brazil against the orders of the Portuguese King João VI, beginning the Brazilian independence process.
1839 – The French Academy of Sciences announces the Daguerreotype photography process.
1857 – The 7.9 Mw Fort Tejon earthquake shakes Central and Southern California with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent).
1858 – Anson Jones, the last President of the Republic of Texas, commits suicide.
1861 – American Civil War: “Star of the West” incident occurs near Charleston, South Carolina.
1861 – Mississippi becomes the second state to secede from the Union before the outbreak of the American Civil War.
1878 – Umberto I becomes King of Italy.
1894 – New England Telephone and Telegraph installs the first battery-operated telephone switchboard in Lexington, Massachusetts.
1903 – Hallam Tennyson, 2nd Baron Tennyson, son of the poet Alfred Tennyson, becomes the second Governor-General of Australia.
1909 – Ernest Shackleton, leading the Nimrod Expedition to the South Pole, plants the British flag 97 nautical miles (180 km; 112 mi) from the South Pole, the farthest anyone had ever reached at that time.
1914 – The Phi Beta Sigma fraternity is founded by African-American students at Howard University in Washington D.C., United States.
1916 – World War I: The Battle of Gallipoli concludes with an Ottoman Empire victory when the last Allied forces are evacuated from the peninsula.
1917 – World War I: The Battle of Rafa is fought near the Egyptian border with Palestine.
1918 – Battle of Bear Valley: The last battle of the American Indian Wars.
1921 – Greco-Turkish War: The First Battle of İnönü, the first battle of the war, begins near Eskişehir in Anatolia.
1923 – Juan de la Cierva makes the first autogyro flight.
1923 – Lithuanian residents of the Memel Territory rebel against the League of Nations’ decision to leave the area as a mandated region under French control.
1927 – A fire at the Laurier Palace movie theatre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, kills 78 children.
1941 – World War II: First flight of the Avro Lancaster.
1945 – World War II: The Sixth United States Army begins the invasion of Lingayen Gulf.
1957 – British Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden resigns from office following his failure to retake the Suez Canal from Egyptian sovereignty.
1960 – President of Egypt Gamal Abdel Nasser opens construction on the Aswan Dam by detonating ten tons of dynamite to demolish twenty tons of granite on the east bank of the Nile.
1961 – British authorities announce they have uncovered the Soviet Portland Spy Ring in London.
1964 – Martyrs’ Day: Several Panamanian youths try to raise the Panamanian flag in the U.S.-controlled Panama Canal Zone, leading to fighting between U.S. military and Panamanian civilians.
1965 – The Mirzapur Cadet College formally opens for academic activities in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh).
1991 – Representatives from the United States and Iraq meet at the Geneva Peace Conference to try to find a peaceful resolution to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.
1992 – The Assembly of the Serb People in Bosnia and Herzegovina proclaims the creation of Republika Srpska, a new state within Yugoslavia.
1992 – The first discoveries of extrasolar planets are announced by astronomers Aleksander Wolszczan and Dale Frail. They discovered two planets orbiting the pulsar PSR 1257+12.
1996 – First Chechen War: Chechen separatists launch a raid against the helicopter airfield and later a civilian hospital in the city of Kizlyar in the neighboring Dagestan, which turns into a massive hostage crisis involving thousands of civilians.
2004 – An inflatable boat carrying illegal Albanian emigrants stalls near the Karaburun Peninsula en route to Brindisi, Italy; exposure to the elements kills 28. This is the second deadliest marine disaster in Albanian history.
2005 – Mahmoud Abbas wins the election to succeed Yasser Arafat as President of the Palestinian National Authority, replacing interim president Rawhi Fattouh.
2005 – The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement and the Government of Sudan sign the Comprehensive Peace Agreement to end the Second Sudanese Civil War.
2007 – Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduces the original iPhone at a Macworld keynote in San Francisco.
2011 – Iran Air Flight 277 crashes near Urmia in the northwest of the country, killing 77 people.
2014 – An explosion at a Mitsubishi Materials chemical plant in Yokkaichi, Japan, kills at least five people and injures 17 others.
2015 – The perpetrators of the Charlie Hebdo shooting in Paris two days earlier are both killed after a hostage situation; a second hostage situation, related to the Charlie Hebdo shooting, occurs at a Jewish market in Vincennes.
2015 – A mass poisoning at a funeral in Mozambique involving beer that was contaminated with Burkholderia gladioli leaves 75 dead and over 230 people ill.
Births on January 9
727 – Emperor Daizong of Tang (d. 779)
1418 – Juan Ramón Folch III de Cardona, Aragonese admiral (d. 1485)
1475 – Crinitus, Italian scholar and author (d. 1507)
1554 – Pope Gregory XV (d. 1623)
1571 – Charles Bonaventure de Longueval, Count of Bucquoy, French commander (d. 1621)
1590 – Simon Vouet, French painter (d. 1649)
1606 – William Dugard, English printer (d. 1662)
1624 – Empress Meishō of Japan (d. 1696)
1645 – Sir William Villiers, 3rd Baronet, English noble and politician (d. 1712)
1674 – Reinhard Keiser, German composer (d. 1739)
1685 – Tiberius Hemsterhuis, Dutch philologist and critic (d. 1766)
1728 – Thomas Warton, English poet, historian, and critic (d. 1790)
1735 – John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent, English admiral and politician (d. 1823)
1745 – Caleb Strong, American lawyer and politician, 6th Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1819)
1753 – Luísa Todi, Portuguese soprano and actress (d. 1833)
1773 – Cassandra Austen, English painter and illustrator (d. 1845)
1778 – Hammamizade İsmail Dede Efendi, Turkish Ney player and composer (d. 1846)
1811 – Gilbert Abbott à Beckett, English journalist and author (d. 1856)
1818 – Antoine Samuel Adam-Salomon, French sculptor and photographer (d. 1881)
1819 – James Francis, English-Australian businessman and politician, 9th Premier of Victoria (d. 1884)
1822 – Carol Benesch, Czech-Romanian architect, designed the Peleș Castle (d. 1896)
1823 – Friedrich von Esmarch, German surgeon and academic (d. 1908)
1829 – Thomas William Robertson, English director and playwright (d. 1871)
1829 – Adolf Schlagintweit, German botanist and explorer (d. 1857)
1832 – Félix-Gabriel Marchand, Canadian journalist and politician, 11th Premier of Quebec (d. 1900)
1839 – John Knowles Paine, American composer and academic (d. 1906)
1848 – Princess Frederica of Hanover (d. 1926)
1849 – John Hartley, English tennis player (d. 1935)
1854 – Lady Randolph Churchill, American-born wife of Lord Randolph Churchill, mother of Sir Winston Churchill (d. 1921)
1856 – Anton Aškerc, Slovenian priest and poet (d. 1912)
1859 – Carrie Chapman Catt, American activist, founded the League of Women Voters and International Alliance of Women (d. 1947)
1864 – Vladimir Steklov, Russian mathematician and physicist (d. 1926)
1868 – S. P. L. Sørensen, Danish chemist and academic (d. 1939)
1870 – Joseph Strauss, American engineer, co-designed the Golden Gate Bridge (d. 1938)
1873 – Hayim Nahman Bialik, Ukrainian-Austrian journalist, author, and poet (d. 1934)
1873 – Thomas Curtis, American sprinter and hurdler (d. 1944)
1873 – John Flanagan, Irish-American hammer thrower (d. 1938)
1875 – Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, American sculptor and art collector, founded the Whitney Museum of American Art (d. 1942)
1879 – John B. Watson, American psychologist and academic (d. 1958)
1881 – Lascelles Abercrombie, English poet and critic (d. 1938)
1881 – Giovanni Papini, Italian journalist, author, and poet (d. 1956)
1885 – Charles Bacon, American runner and hurdler (d. 1968)
1886 – Lloyd Loar, American sound engineer and instrument designer (d. 1943)
1889 – Vrindavan Lal Verma, Indian author and playwright (d. 1969)
1890 – Karel Čapek, Czech author and playwright (d. 1938)
1890 – Kurt Tucholsky, German-Swedish journalist and author (d. 1935)
1891 – August Gailit, Estonian journalist and author (d. 1960)
1892 – Eva Bowring, American lawyer and politician (d. 1985)
1893 – Edwin Baker, Canadian soldier and educator, co-founded the Canadian National Institute for the Blind (d. 1968)
1896 – Warwick Braithwaite, New Zealand-English conductor and director (d. 1971)
1897 – Karl Löwith, German philosopher, author, and academic (d. 1973)
1898 – Gracie Fields, English actress and singer (d. 1979)
1899 – Harald Tammer, Estonian journalist and weightlifter (d. 1942)
1900 – Richard Halliburton, American journalist and author (d. 1939)
1901 – Vilma Bánky, Hungarian-American actress (d. 1991)
1901 – Chic Young, American cartoonist (d. 1973)
1902 – Rudolf Bing, American impresario and businessman (d. 1997)
1902 – Josemaría Escrivá, Spanish priest and saint, founded Opus Dei (d. 1975)
1907 – Eldred G. Smith, American patriarch (d. 2013)
1907 – Earl W. Renfroe, African American orthodontist, educator, and activist (d. 2000)
1908 – Simone de Beauvoir, French philosopher and author (d. 1986)
1909 – Anthony Mamo, Maltese lawyer and politician, 1st President of Malta (d. 2008)
1909 – Patrick Peyton, Irish-American priest, television personality, and activist (d. 1992)
1910 – Tom Evenson, English runner (d. 1997)
1912 – Ralph Tubbs, English architect, designed the Dome of Discovery (d. 1996)
1913 – Richard Nixon, American commander, lawyer, and politician, 37th President of the United States (d. 1994)
1914 – Kenny Clarke, American jazz drummer and bandleader (d. 1985)
1915 – Anita Louise, American actress (d. 1970)
1916 – Fernando Lamas, Argentinian-American actor, singer, and director (d. 1982)
1916 – Vic Mizzy, American soldier, pianist, and composer (d. 2009)
1918 – Alma Ziegler, American baseball player and golfer (d. 2005)
1919 – William Morris Meredith, Jr., American poet and academic (d. 2007)
1920 – Clive Dunn, English actor (d. 2012)
1920 – Hakim Said, Pakistani scholar and politician, 20th Governor of Sindh (d. 1998)
1921 – Ágnes Keleti, Hungarian Olympic gymnast
1921 – Lister Sinclair, Indian-Canadian broadcaster and playwright (d. 2006)
1922 – Har Gobind Khorana, Indian-American biochemist and academic, Nobel laureate (d. 2011)
1922 – Ahmed Sékou Touré, Guinean politician, 1st President of Guinea (d. 1984)
1924 – Sergei Parajanov, Georgian-Armenian director and screenwriter (d. 1990)
1925 – Len Quested, English footballer defender and manager (d. 2012)
1925 – Lee Van Cleef, American actor (d. 1989)
1926 – Jean-Pierre Côté, Canadian lawyer and politician, 23rd Lieutenant Governor of Quebec (d. 2002)
1928 – Judith Krantz, American novelist (d. 2019)
1928 – Domenico Modugno, Italian singer-songwriter, actor, and politician (d. 1994)
1929 – Brian Friel, Irish author, playwright, and director (d. 2015)
1929 – Heiner Müller, German poet, playwright, and director (d. 1995)
1931 – Algis Budrys, Lithuanian-American author and critic (d. 2008)
1933 – Robert García, American soldier and politician (d. 2017)
1933 – Roy Dwight, English footballer, outside forward
1933 – Wilbur Smith, Zambian-English journalist and author
1934 – Bart Starr, American football player and coach (d. 2019)
1935 – Bob Denver, American actor (d. 2005)
1935 – Dick Enberg, American sportscaster (d. 2017)
1935 – John Graham, New Zealand rugby player and educator (d. 2017)
1935 – Brian Harradine, Australian politician (d. 2014)
1936 – Anne Rivers Siddons, American author
1936 – Marko Veselica, Croatian academic and politician (d. 2017)
1938 – Claudette Boyer, Canadian educator and politician (d. 2013)
1939 – Susannah York, English actress and activist (d. 2011)
1940 – Barbara Buczek, Polish composer (d. 1993)
1940 – Ruth Dreifuss, Swiss journalist and politician, 86th President of the Swiss Confederation
1941 – Joan Baez, American singer-songwriter, guitarist and activist
1941 – Gilles Vaillancourt, Canadian politician
1942 – John Dunning, American author
1942 – Judy Malloy, American poet and author
1943 – Robert Drewe, Australian author and playwright
1943 – Elmer MacFadyen, Canadian lawyer and politician (d. 2007)
1943 – Scott Walker, American singer-songwriter, bass player, and producer (d. 2019)
1944 – Harun Farocki, German filmmaker (d. 2014)
1944 – Jimmy Page, English guitarist, songwriter, and producer
1944 – Mihalis Violaris, Cypriot singer-songwriter and actor
1945 – Levon Ter-Petrosyan, Syrian-Armenian scholar and politician, 1st President of Armenia
1946 – Mohammad Ishaq Khan, Indian historian and academic (d. 2013)
1946 – Mogens Lykketoft, Danish politician, 45th Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs
1947 – Ronnie Landfield, American painter and educator
1948 – Bill Cowsill, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2006)
1948 – Jan Tomaszewski, Polish footballer, manager, and politician
1950 – Alec Jeffreys, English geneticist and academic
1950 – David Johansen, American musician and actor
1950 – Sandy Martin, American actress
1951 – Crystal Gayle, American singer-songwriter and producer
1952 – Kaushik Basu, Indian economist and academic
1952 – Hugh Bayley, English politician
1952 – Mike Capuano, American lawyer and politician
1953 – Javad Alizadeh, Iranian cartoonist and painter
1954 – Philippa Gregory, Kenyan-English author and academic
1955 – Michiko Kakutani, American journalist and critic
1955 – J.K. Simmons, American actor
1956 – Waltraud Meier, German soprano and actress
1956 – Imelda Staunton, English actress and singer
1958 – Stephen Neale, English philosopher and academic
1959 – Mark Martin, American race car driver and coach
1959 – Rigoberta Menchú, Guatemalan activist and politician, Nobel Prize laureate
1959 – Otis Nixon, American baseball player
1960 – Lisa Walters, Canadian golfer
1961 – Didier Camberabero, French rugby player
1961 – Oliver Goldstick, American screenwriter and producer
1961 – Henry Omaga-Diaz, Filipino journalist
1962 – Ray Houghton, Scottish-born footballer
1963 – Irwin McLean, Northern Irish biologist and academic
1964 – Stan Javier, Dominican baseball player and manager
1965 – Iain Dowie, English-Northern Irish footballer and coach
1965 – Eric Erlandson, American guitarist, songwriter, and producer
1965 – Haddaway, Trinidadian-German singer and musician
1965 – Andrei Nazarov, Estonian decathlete and coach
1965 – Joely Richardson, English actress
1966 – Stephen Metcalfe, English politician
1967 – Matt Bevin, American politician, 62nd governor of Kentucky
1967 – Claudio Caniggia, Argentinian footballer
1967 – Dave Matthews, South African-American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and actor
1967 – Gary Teichmann, South African rugby player
1968 – Jimmy Adams, Jamaican cricketer and coach
1968 – Joey Lauren Adams, American actress
1968 – Mardi Lunn, Australian golfer
1968 – Giorgos Theofanous, Greek-Cypriot composer and producer
1970 – Lara Fabian, Belgian-Italian singer-songwriter and actress
1971 – Angie Martinez, American rapper, actress, and radio host
1971 – Hal Niedzviecki, Canadian author and critic
1971 – Scott Thornton, Canadian ice hockey player
1972 – Jay Powell, American baseball player
1972 – Rawson Stovall, American video game producer and author
1973 – Sean Paul, Jamaican rapper, singer-songwriter, musician, record producer, and actor
1975 – James Beckford, Jamaican long jumper
1976 – Radek Bonk, Czech ice hockey player
1978 – Mathieu Garon, Canadian ice hockey player
1978 – Gennaro Gattuso, Italian footballer and manager
1978 – Chad Johnson, American football player and actor
1978 – AJ McLean, American singer
1980 – Édgar Álvarez, Honduran footballer
1980 – Sergio García, Spanish golfer
1980 – Luke Patten, Australian rugby league player and referee
1980 – Francisco Pavón, Spanish footballer
1980 – Wang Zulan, Hong Kong singer
1981 – Euzebiusz Smolarek, Polish footballer and manager
1982 – Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge
1984 – Drew Brown, American musician and songwriter
1984 – Benjamin Danso, German rugby player
1985 – Juan Francisco Torres, Spanish footballer
1986 – Jéferson Gomes, Brazilian footballer
1986 – Uwe Hünemeier, German footballer
1986 – Amanda Mynhardt, South African netball player
1987 – Sam Bird, English race car driver
1987 – Lucas Leiva, Brazilian footballer
1987 – Paolo Nutini, Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist
1987 – Jami Puustinen, Finnish footballer
1988 – Katherine Copely, American ice dancer
1988 – Marc Crosas, Spanish footballer
1988 – Lee Yeon-hee, South Korean actress
1989 – Michael Beasley, American basketball player
1989 – Nina Dobrev, Bulgarian-Canadian actress
1989 – Michaëlla Krajicek, Dutch tennis player
1989 – Yana Maksimava, Belarusian heptathlete
1989 – Chris Sandow, Australian rugby league player
1989 – Jordan Turner, English rugby league player
1990 – Justin Blackmon, American football player
1991 – Edon Hasani, Albanian football player
1991 – Alvaro Soler, Spanish singer-songwriter
1993 – Katarina Johnson-Thompson, English long jumper and heptathlete
1993 – Marcus Peters, American football player
1993 – Kevin Korjus, Estonian race car driver
1995 – Braden Uele, New Zealand rugby league player
1999 – Shannon Tavarez, American actress (d. 2010)
Deaths on January 9
710 – Adrian of Canterbury, abbot and scholar
1150 – Emperor Xizong of Jin (b. 1119)
1202 – Birger Brosa, Jarl of Sweden
1282 – Abû ‘Uthmân Sa’îd ibn Hakam al Qurashi, Minorcan ruler (b. 1204)
1283 – Wen Tianxiang, Chinese general and scholar (b. 1236)
1367 – Giulia della Rena, Italian saint (b. 1319)
1450 – Adam Moleyns, Bishop of Chichester
1463 – William Neville, 1st Earl of Kent, English soldier (b. 1405)
1499 – John Cicero, Elector of Brandenburg (b. 1455)
1511 – Demetrios Chalkokondyles, Greek scholar and academic (b. 1423)
1514 – Anne of Brittany, queen of Charles VIII of France and Louis XII of France (b. 1477)
1529 – Wang Yangming, Chinese Neo-Confucian scholar (b. 1472)
1534 – Johannes Aventinus, Bavarian historian and philologist (b. 1477)
1543 – Guillaume du Bellay, French general and diplomat (b. 1491)
1561 – Amago Haruhisa, Japanese warlord (b. 1514)
1571 – Nicolas Durand de Villegaignon, French admiral (b. 1510)
1598 – Jasper Heywood, English poet and scholar (b. 1553)
1612 – Leonard Holliday, Lord Mayor of London (b. 1550)
1622 – Alix Le Clerc, French Canoness Regular and foundress (b. 1576)
1757 – Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, French author, poet, and playwright (b. 1657)
1762 – Antonio de Benavides, colonial governor of Florida (b. 1678)
1766 – Thomas Birch, English historian and author (b. 1705)
1799 – Maria Gaetana Agnesi, Italian mathematician and philosopher (b. 1718)
1800 – Jean Étienne Championnet, French general (b. 1762)
1805 – Noble Wimberly Jones, American physician and politician (b. 1723)
1558 – French troops, led by Francis, Duke of Guise, take Calais, the last continental possession of England.
1608 – Fire destroys Jamestown, Virginia.
1610 – Galileo Galilei makes his first observation of the four Galilean moons: Ganymede, Callisto, Io and Europa, although he is not able to distinguish the last two until the following day.
1738 – A peace treaty is signed between Peshwa Bajirao and Jai Singh II following Maratha victory in the Battle of Bhopal.
1782 – The first American commercial bank, the Bank of North America, opens.
1785 – Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American John Jeffries travel from Dover, England, to Calais, France, in a gas balloon.
1835 – HMS Beagle, with Charles Darwin on board, drops anchor off the Chonos Archipelago.
1894 – Thomas Edison makes a kinetoscopic film of someone sneezing. On the same day, his employee, William Kennedy Dickson, receives a patent for motion picture film.
1904 – The distress signal “CQD” is established only to be replaced two years later by “SOS”.
1919 – Montenegrin guerrilla fighters rebel against the planned annexation of Montenegro by Serbia, but fail.
1920 – The New York State Assembly refuses to seat five duly elected Socialist assemblymen.
1922 – Dáil Éireann ratifies the Anglo-Irish Treaty by a 64–57 vote.
1927 – The first transatlantic telephone service is established from New York City to London.
1928 – A disastrous flood of the River Thames kills 14 people and causes extensive damage to much of riverside London.
1931 – Guy Menzies flies the first solo non-stop trans-Tasman flight (from Australia to New Zealand) in 11 hours and 45 minutes, crash-landing on New Zealand’s west coast.
1935 – Benito Mussolini and French Foreign minister Pierre Laval sign the Franco-Italian Agreement.
1940 – Winter War: Battle of Raate Road – The Finnish 9th Division finally defeat the numerically superior Soviet forces on the Raate-Suomussalmi road.
1948 – Kentucky Air National Guard pilot Thomas Mantell crashes while in pursuit of a supposed UFO.
1954 – Georgetown-IBM experiment: The first public demonstration of a machine translation system is held in New York at the head office of IBM.
1955 – Contralto Marian Anderson becomes the first person of color to perform at the Metropolitan Opera in Giuseppe Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera.
1959 – The United States recognizes the new Cuban government of Fidel Castro.
1968 – Surveyor Program: Surveyor 7, the last spacecraft in the Surveyor series, lifts off from launch complex 36A, Cape Canaveral.
1973 – In his second shooting spree of the week, Mark Essex fatally shoots seven people and wounds five others at Howard Johnson’s Hotel in New Orleans, Louisiana, before being shot to death by police officers.
1979 – Third Indochina War: Cambodian–Vietnamese War: Phnom Penh falls to the advancing Vietnamese troops, driving out Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.
1980 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter authorizes legislation giving $1.5 billion in loans to bail out the Chrysler Corporation.
1984 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
1985 – Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency launches Sakigake, Japan’s first interplanetary spacecraft and the first deep space probe to be launched by any country other than the United States or the Soviet Union.
1991 – Roger Lafontant, former leader of the Tonton Macoute in Haiti under François Duvalier, attempts a coup d’état, which ends in his arrest.
1993 – The Fourth Republic of Ghana is inaugurated with Jerry Rawlings as President.
1993 – Bosnian War: The Bosnian Army executes a surprise attack at the village of Kravica in Srebrenica.
1999 – The Senate trial in the impeachment of U.S. President Bill Clinton begins.
2012 – A hot air balloon crashes near Carterton, New Zealand, killing all 11 people on board.
2015 – Two gunmen commit mass murder at the offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris, shooting twelve people execution style, and wounding eleven others.
2015 – A car bomb explodes outside a police college in the Yemeni capital Sana’a with at least 38 people reported dead and more than 63 injured.
2020 – The 6.4Mw 2019–20 Puerto Rico earthquakes kill four and injure nine in southern Puerto Rico.
Births on January 7
889 – Li Bian, emperor of Southern Tang (d. 943)
1355 – Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester, English politician, Lord High Constable of England (d. 1397)
1502 – Pope Gregory XIII (d. 1585)
1634 – Adam Krieger, German organist and composer (d. 1666)
1647 – William Louis, Duke of Württemberg (d. 1677)
1685 – Jonas Alströmer, Swedish agronomist and businessman (d. 1761)
1706 – Johann Heinrich Zedler, German publisher (d. 1751)
1713 – Giovanni Battista Locatelli, Italian director and manager (d. 1785)
1718 – Israel Putnam, American general (d. 1790)
1746 – George Elphinstone, 1st Viscount Keith, Scottish admiral and politician (d. 1823)
1768 – Joseph Bonaparte, Italian king (d. 1844)
1797 – Mariano Paredes, Mexican general and 16th president (1845-1846) (d. 1849)
1800 – Millard Fillmore, American politician, 13th President of the United States (d. 1874)
1814 – Robert Nicoll, Scottish poet (d.1837)
1815 – Elizabeth Louisa Foster Mather, American writer (d.1882)
1827 – Sandford Fleming, Scottish-Canadian engineer, created Universal Standard Time (d. 1915)
1830 – Albert Bierstadt, American painter (d. 1902)
1831 – Heinrich von Stephan, German postman, founded the Universal Postal Union (d. 1897)
1832 – James Munro, Scottish-Australian publisher and politician, 15th Premier of Victoria (d. 1908)
1834 – Johann Philipp Reis, German physicist and academic, invented the Reis telephone (d. 1874)
1837 – Thomas Henry Ismay, English businessman, founded the White Star Line Shipping Company (d. 1899)
1844 – Bernadette Soubirous, French nun and saint (d. 1879)
1858 – Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, Belarusian lexicographer and journalist (d. 1922)
1863 – Anna Murray Vail, American botanist and first librarian of the New York Botanical Garden (d. 1955)
1871 – Émile Borel, French mathematician and politician (d. 1956)
1873 – Charles Péguy, French poet and journalist (d. 1914)
1873 – Adolph Zukor, Hungarian-American film producer, co-founded Paramount Pictures (d. 1976)
1875 – Gustav Flatow, German gymnast (d. 1945)
1876 – William Hurlstone, English pianist and composer (d. 1906)
1877 – William Clarence Matthews, American baseball player, coach, and lawyer (d. 1928)
1889 – Vera de Bosset, Russian-American ballerina (d. 1982)
1891 – Zora Neale Hurston, American novelist, short story writer, and folklorist (d. 1960)
1895 – Hudson Fysh, Australian pilot and businessman, co-founded Qantas Airways Limited (d. 1974)
1899 – Al Bowlly, Mozambican-English singer-songwriter (disputed; d. 1941)
1899 – Francis Poulenc, French pianist and composer (d. 1963)
1900 – John Brownlee, Australian actor and singer (d. 1969)
1906 – Red Allen, American trumpet player (d. 1967)
1910 – Orval Faubus, American soldier and politician, 36th Governor of Arkansas (d. 1994)
1912 – Charles Addams, American cartoonist, created The Addams Family (d. 1988)
1913 – Johnny Mize, American baseball player, coach, and sportscaster (d. 1993)
1916 – W. L. Jeyasingham, Sri Lankan geographer and academic (d. 1989)
1916 – Babe Pratt, Canadian ice hockey player (d. 1988)
1920 – Vincent Gardenia, Italian-American actor (d. 1992)
1921 – Esmeralda Arboleda Cadavid, Colombian politician (d. 1997)
1921 – Chester Kallman, American poet and translator (d. 1975)
1922 – Alvin Dark, American baseball player and manager (d. 2014)
1922 – Jean-Pierre Rampal, French flute player (d. 2000)
1923 – Hugh Kenner, Canadian scholar and critic (d. 2003)
1925 – Gerald Durrell, Indian-English zookeeper, conservationist and author, founded Durrell Wildlife Park (d. 1995)
1926 – Kim Jong-pil, South Korean lieutenant and politician, 11th Prime Minister of South Korea (d. 2018)
1928 – William Peter Blatty, American author and screenwriter (d. 2017)
1929 – Robert Juniper, Australian painter and sculptor (d. 2012)
1929 – Terry Moore, American actress
1931 – Mirja Hietamies, Finnish skier (d. 2013)
1933 – Elliott Kastner, American-English film producer (d. 2010)
1934 – Jean Corbeil, Canadian lawyer and politician, 29th Canadian Minister of Labour (d. 2002)
1934 – Tassos Papadopoulos, Cypriot lawyer and politician, 5th President of Cyprus (d. 2008)
1935 – Li Shengjiao, Chinese diplomat and international jurist (d. 2017)
1935 – Kenny Davern, American clarinet player and saxophonist (d. 2006)
1935 – Valeri Kubasov, Russian engineer and astronaut (d. 2014)
1941 – Iona Brown, English violinist and conductor (d. 2004)
1941 – John E. Walker, English chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
1942 – Vasily Alekseyev, Russian-German weightlifter and coach (d. 2011)
1943 – Sadako Sasaki, Japanese survivor of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, known for one thousand origami cranes (d. 1955)
1944 – Mike McGear, British performing artist and rock photographer
1944 – Kotaro Suzumura, Japanese economist and academic (d. 2020)
1945 – Raila Odinga, Kenyan engineer and politician, 2nd Prime Minister of Kenya
1946 – Jann Wenner, American publisher, co-founded Rolling Stone
1947 – Tony Elliott, English publisher, founded Time Out
1948 – Kenny Loggins, American singer-songwriter
1948 – Ichirou Mizuki, Japanese singer-songwriter
1950 – Juan Gabriel, Mexican singer-songwriter (d. 2016)
1952 – Sammo Hung, Hong Kong actor, director, producer, and martial artist
1953 – Robert Longo, American painter and sculptor
1954 – Alan Butcher, English cricketer and coach
1955 – Mamata Shankar, Indian-Bengali actress
1956 – David Caruso, American actor
1957 – Katie Couric, American television journalist, anchor, and author
1959 – Angela Smith, Baroness Smith of Basildon, English accountant and politician
1959 – Kathy Valentine, American bass player and songwriter
1960 – Loretta Sanchez, American politician
1961 – John Thune, American lawyer and politician
1962 – Aleksandr Dugin, Russian political analyst and strategist known for his fascist views
1962 – Ron Rivera, American football player and coach
1964 – Nicolas Cage, American actor
1965 – Alessandro Lambruschini, Italian runner
1967 – Nick Clegg, English academic and politician, Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
1969 – Marco Simone, Italian footballer and manager
1970 – Andy Burnham, English politician
1971 – Jeremy Renner, American actor
1972 – Donald Brashear, American-Canadian ice hockey player and mixed martial artist
1974 – Alenka Bikar, Slovenian sprinter and politician
1976 – Vic Darchinyan, Armenian-Australian boxer
1976 – Alfonso Soriano, Dominican baseball player
1977 – Sofi Oksanen, Finnish author and playwright
1979 – Aloe Blacc, American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, actor, businessman and philanthropist.
1982 – Francisco Rodríguez, Venezuelan baseball player
1982 – Hannah Stockbauer, German swimmer
1983 – Edwin Encarnación, Dominican baseball player
1985 – Lewis Hamilton, English racing driver
1986 – Wayne Routledge, English footballer winger
1987 – Stefan Babović, Serbian footballer
1987 – Lyndsy Fonseca, American actress
1987 – Davide Astori, Italian footballer (d. 2018)
1990 – Gregor Schlierenzauer, Austrian ski jumper
1991 – Eden Hazard, Belgian footballer
1991 – Caster Semenya, South African sprinter
Deaths on January 7
312 – Lucian of Antioch, Christian martyr, saint, and theologian (b. 240)
838 – Babak Khorramdin, Iranian leader of the Khurramite uprising against the Abbasid Caliphate
856 – Aldric, bishop of Le Mans
1131 – Canute Lavard, Danish prince and saint (b. 1096)
1285 – Charles I of Naples (b. 1226)
1325 – Denis of Portugal (b. 1261)
1355 – Inês de Castro, Castilian noblewoman (b. 1325)
1400 – John Montagu, 3rd Earl of Salisbury, English Earl (b. 1350)
1451 – Amadeus VIII of Savoy a.k.a. Antipope Felix V (b. 1383)
1529 – Peter Vischer the Elder, German sculptor (b. 1455)
1536 – Catherine of Aragon (b. 1485)
1566 – Louis de Blois, Flemish monk and author (b. 1506)
1619 – Nicholas Hilliard, English painter and goldsmith (b. 1547)
1625 – Ruggiero Giovannelli, Italian composer and author (b. 1560)
1655 – Pope Innocent X (b. 1574)
1658 – Theophilus Eaton, American farmer and politician, 1st Governor of the New Haven Colony (b. 1590)
1694 – Charles Gerard, 1st Earl of Macclesfield, English general and politician, Lord Lieutenant of Gloucestershire (b. 1618)
1700 – Raffaello Fabretti, Italian scholar and author (b. 1618)
1715 – François Fénelon, French archbishop, theologian, and poet (b. 1651)
1758 – Allan Ramsay, Scottish poet and playwright (b. 1686)
1767 – Thomas Clap, American minister and academic (b. 1703)
1770 – Carl Gustaf Tessin, Swedish politician and diplomat (b. 1695)
1812 – Joseph Dennie, American journalist and author (b. 1768)
1830 – John Thomas Campbell, Irish-Australian public servant and politician (b. 1770)
1830 – Thomas Lawrence, English painter and educator (b. 1769)
1858 – Mustafa Reşid Pasha, Ottoman politician, Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire (b. 1800)
1864 – Caleb Blood Smith, American journalist and politician, 6th U.S. Secretary of the Interior (b. 1808)
1892 – Tewfik Pasha, Egyptian ruler (b. 1852)
1893 – Josef Stefan, Slovenian physicist and mathematician (b. 1835)
1919 – Henry Ware Eliot, American businessman and philanthropist, co-founded Washington University in St. Louis (b. 1843)
1920 – Edmund Barton, Australian judge and politician, 1st Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1849)
1927 – Nikolaos Kalogeropoulos, Greek politician, 99th Prime Minister of Greece (b. 1851)
1931 – Edward Channing, American historian and author (b. 1856)
1932 – André Maginot, French sergeant and politician (b. 1877)
1936 – Guy d’Hardelot, French pianist and composer (b. 1858)
1941 – Charles Finger, English journalist and author (b. 1869)
1943 – Nikola Tesla, Serbian-American physicist and engineer (b. 1856)
1951 – René Guénon, French-Egyptian philosopher and author (b. 1886)
1960 – Dorothea Douglass Lambert Chambers, English tennis player and coach (b. 1878)
1963 – Arthur Edward Moore, New Zealand-Australian farmer and politician, 23rd Premier of Queensland (b. 1876)
1964 – Reg Parnell, English racing driver and manager (b. 1911)
1967 – David Goodis, American author and screenwriter (b. 1917)
1967 – Carl Schuricht, German-Swiss conductor (b. 1880)
1968 – J. L. B. Smith, South African chemist and academic (b. 1897)
1972 – John Berryman, American poet and scholar (b. 1914)
1981 – Alvar Lidell, English journalist and radio announcer(b. 1908)
1981 – Eric Robinson, Australian businessman and politician, 2nd Australian Minister for Finance (b. 1926)
1984 – Alfred Kastler, German-French physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1902)
1986 – Juan Rulfo, Mexican author, screenwriter, and photographer (b. 1917)
1988 – Zara Cisco Brough, American Nipmuc Indian chief and fashion designer (b.1919)
1988 – Trevor Howard, English actor (b. 1913)
1989 – Hirohito, Japanese emperor (b. 1901)
1990 – Bronko Nagurski, Canadian-American football player and wrestler (b. 1908)
1992 – Richard Hunt, American puppeteer and voice actor (b. 1951)
1995 – Murray Rothbard, American economist, historian, and theorist (b. 1926)
1996 – Károly Grósz, Hungarian politician, 51st Prime Minister of Hungary (b. 1930)
1998 – Owen Bradley, American record producer (b. 1915)
1998 – Vladimir Prelog, Croatian-Swiss chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1906)
2000 – Gary Albright, American wrestler (b. 1963)
2001 – James Carr, American singer (b. 1942)
2002 – Avery Schreiber, American comedian and actor (b. 1935)
2004 – Ingrid Thulin, Swedish actress (b. 1926)
2005 – Pierre Daninos, French author (b. 1913)
2006 – Heinrich Harrer, Austrian mountaineer, geographer, and author (b. 1912)
2007 – Bobby Hamilton, American race car driver and businessman (b. 1957)
2007 – Magnus Magnusson, Icelandic journalist, author, and academic (b. 1929)
2008 – Alwyn Schlebusch, South African academic and politician, Vice State President of South Africa (b. 1917)
2012 – Tony Blankley, British-born American child actor, journalist and pundit (b. 1948)
2014 – Run Run Shaw, Chinese-Hong Kong businessman and philanthropist, founded Shaw Brothers Studio and TVB (b. 1907)
2015 – Mompati Merafhe, Botswana general and politician, Vice-President of Botswana (b. 1936)
2015 – Rod Taylor, Australian-American actor and screenwriter (b. 1930)
2015 – Georges Wolinski, Tunisian-French cartoonist (b. 1934)
2016 – Bill Foster, American basketball player and coach (b. 1929)
2016 – John Johnson, American basketball player (b. 1947)
2016 – Kitty Kallen, American singer (b. 1921)
2016 – Judith Kaye, American lawyer and jurist (b. 1938)
2016 – Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, Indian lawyer and politician, Indian Minister of Home Affairs (b. 1936)
2017 – Mário Soares, Portuguese politician; 16th President of Portugal (b. 1924)
2018 – Jim Anderton, Former New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister (b. 1938)
2018 – France Gall, French singer (b. 1947)
Holidays and observances on January 7
Christian Feast Day:
André Bessette (Canada)
Canute Lavard
Charles of Sezze
Felix and Januarius
Lucian of Antioch
Raymond of Penyafort
Synaxis of John the Forerunner & Baptist (Julian Calendar)
January 7 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Christmas (Eastern Orthodox Churches and Oriental Orthodox Churches using the Julian Calendar, Rastafari)
Christmas in Russia
Christmas in Ukraine
Remembrance Day of the Dead (Armenia)
Distaff Day (medieval Europe)
Earliest day on which Plough Monday can fall, while January 13 is the latest; celebrated on Monday after Epiphany (Europe).
1066 – Following the death of Edward the Confessor on the previous day, the Witan meets to confirm Harold Godwinson as the new King of England; Harold is crowned the same day, sparking a succession crisis that will eventually lead to the Norman conquest of England.
1205 – Philip of Swabia undergoes a second coronation as King of the Romans.
1322 – Stephen Uroš III is crowned King of Serbia, having defeated his half-brother Stefan Konstantin in battle. His son is crowned “young king” in the same ceremony.
1355 – Charles IV of Bohemia is crowned with the Iron Crown of Lombardy as King of Italy in Milan.
1449 – Constantine XI is crowned Byzantine Emperor at Mystras.
1492 – The Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella enter Granada at the conclusion of the Granada War.
1536 – The first European school of higher learning in the Americas, Colegio de Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco, is founded by Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza and Bishop Juan de Zumárraga in Mexico City.
1540 – King Henry VIII of England marries Anne of Cleves.
1579 – The Union of Arras unites the southern Netherlands under the Duke of Parma (Ottavio Farnese), governor in the name of King Philip II of Spain.
1641 – Arauco War: The first Parliament of Quillín is celebrated, putting a temporary hold on hostilities between Mapuches and Spanish in Chile.
1661 – English Restoration: The Fifth Monarchists unsuccessfully attempt to seize control of London, England. The revolt is suppressed after a few days.
1721 – The Committee of Inquiry on the South Sea Bubble publishes its findings, revealing details of fraud among company directors and corrupt politicians.
1781 – In the Battle of Jersey, the British defeat the last attempt by France to invade Jersey in the Channel Islands.
1809 – Combined British, Portuguese and colonial Brazilian forces begin the Invasion of Cayenne during the Napoleonic Wars.
1838 – Alfred Vail and colleagues demonstrate a telegraph system using dots and dashes (this is the forerunner of Morse code).
1839 – The Night of the Big Wind, the most damaging storm in 300 years, sweeps across Ireland, damaging or destroying more than 20% of the houses in Dublin.
1847 – Samuel Colt obtains his first contract for the sale of revolver pistols to the United States government.
1870 – The inauguration of the Musikverein in Vienna, Austria.
1893 – The Washington National Cathedral is chartered by Congress. The charter is signed by President Benjamin Harrison.
1900 – Second Boer War: Having already besieged the fortress at Ladysmith, Boer forces attack it, but are driven back by British defenders.
1907 – Maria Montessori opens her first school and daycare center for working-class children in Rome, Italy.
1912 – New Mexico is admitted to the Union as the 47th U.S. state.
1912 – German geophysicist Alfred Wegener first presents his theory of continental drift.
1929 – King Alexander of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes suspends his country’s constitution (the January 6th Dictatorship).
1929 – Mother Teresa arrives by sea in Calcutta, India, to begin her work among India’s poorest and sick people.
1930 – The first diesel-powered automobile trip is completed, from Indianapolis, Indiana, to New York, New York.
1941 – United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivers his Four Freedoms speech in the State of the Union address.
1946 – The first general election ever in Vietnam is held.
1947 – Pan American Airlines becomes the first commercial airline to offer a round-the-world ticket.
1950 – The United Kingdom recognizes the People’s Republic of China. The Republic of China severs diplomatic relations with the UK in response.
1951 – Korean War: Beginning of the Ganghwa massacre, in the course of which an estimated 200–1,300 South Korean communist sympathizers are slaughtered.
1960 – National Airlines Flight 2511 is destroyed in mid-air by a bomb, while en route from New York City to Miami.
1960 – The Associations Law comes into force in Iraq, allowing registration of political parties
1967 – Vietnam War: United States Marine Corps and ARVN troops launch “Operation Deckhouse Five” in the Mekong River delta.
1974 – In response to the 1973 oil crisis, daylight saving time commences nearly four months early in the United States.
1989 – Satwant Singh and Kehar Singh are sentenced to death for conspiracy in the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi; the two men are executed the same day.
1992 – President of Georgia Zviad Gamsakhurdia flees the country as a result of the military coup.
1993 – Indian Border Security Force units kill 55 Kashmiri civilians in Sopore, Jammu and Kashmir, in revenge after militants ambushed a BSF patrol.
1994 – American figure skater Nancy Kerrigan is attacked and injured by an assailant hired by her rival Tonya Harding’s ex-husband during the U.S. Figure Skating Championships that they were both taking part in.
1995 – A chemical fire in an apartment complex in Manila, Philippines, leads to the discovery of plans for Project Bojinka, a mass-terrorist attack.
2005 – American Civil Rights Movement: Edgar Ray Killen is indicted for the 1964 murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner.
2005 – A train collision in Graniteville, South Carolina, United States, releases about 60 tons of chlorine gas.
2012 – Twenty-six people are killed and 63 wounded when a suicide bomber blows himself up at a police station in Damascus.
2017 – Five people are killed and six others injured in a mass shooting at Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International Airport in Broward County, Florida.
2019 – Forty people are killed in a gold mine collapse in northern Afghanistan.
Births on January 6
1256 – Gertrude the Great, German mystic (d. 1302)
1367 – Richard II of England (d. 1400)
1384 – Edmund Holland, 4th Earl of Kent (d. 1408)
1412 – Joan of Arc, French martyr and saint (d. 1431)
1486 – Martin Agricola, German composer and theorist (d. 1556)
1488 – Helius Eobanus Hessus, German poet (d. 1540)
1493 – Olaus Petri, Swedish clergyman (d. 1552)
1500 – John of Ávila, Spanish mystic and saint (d. 1569)
1525 – Caspar Peucer, German physician and scholar (d. 1602)
1538 – Jane Dormer, Duchess of Feria (d. 1612)
1561 – Thomas Fincke, Danish mathematician and physicist (d. 1656)
1587 – Gaspar de Guzmán, Count-Duke of Olivares (d. 1645)
1595 – Claude Favre de Vaugelas, French educator and courtier (d. 1650)
1617 – Christoffer Gabel, Danish politician (d. 1673)
1632 – Anne Hamilton, 3rd Duchess of Hamilton, Scottish peeress (d. 1716)
1655 – Eleonor Magdalene of Neuburg (d. 1720)
1673 – James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos, English academic and politician, Lord Lieutenant of Radnorshire (d. 1744)
1695 – Giuseppe Sammartini, Italian oboe player and composer (d. 1750)
1702 – José de Nebra, Spanish composer (d. 1768)
1714 – Percivall Pott, English surgeon (d. 1788)
1745 – Jacques-Etienne Montgolfier, French co-inventor of the hot air balloon (d. 1799)
1766 – José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia, Paraguayan lawyer and politician, first dictator of Paraguay (d. 1840)
1785 – Andreas Moustoxydis, Greek historian and philologist (d. 1860)
1793 – James Madison Porter, American lawyer and politician, 18th United States Secretary of War (d. 1862)
1795 – Anselme Payen, French chemist and academic (d. 1871)
1799 – Jedediah Smith, American hunter, explorer, and author (d. 1831)
1803 – Henri Herz, Austrian pianist and composer (d. 1888)
1807 – Joseph Petzval, German-Hungarian mathematician and physicist (d. 1891)
1808 – Joseph Pitty Couthouy, American conchologist and paleontologist (d. 1864)
1811 – Charles Sumner, American lawyer and politician (d. 1874)
1822 – Heinrich Schliemann, German archaeologist and businessman (d. 1890)
1832 – Gustave Doré, French painter and sculptor (d. 1883)
1838 – Max Bruch, German composer and conductor (d. 1920)
1842 – Clarence King, American geologist, mountaineer, and critic (d. 1901)
1856 – Giuseppe Martucci, Italian pianist, composer, and conductor (d. 1909)
1857 – Hugh Mahon, Irish-Australian publisher and politician, 10th Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs (d. 1931)
1857 – William Russell, American lawyer and politician, 37th Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1896)
1859 – Samuel Alexander, Australian-English philosopher and academic (d. 1938)
1861 – Victor Horta, Belgian architect, designed Hôtel van Eetvelde (d. 1947)
1861 – George Lloyd, English-Canadian bishop and theologian (d. 1940)
1870 – Gustav Bauer, German journalist and politician, 11th Chancellor of Germany (d. 1944)
1872 – Alexander Scriabin, Russian pianist and composer (d. 1915)
1874 – Fred Niblo, American actor, director, and producer (d. 1948)
1878 – Adeline Genée, Danish-born British ballerina (d. 1970)
1878 – Carl Sandburg, American poet and historian (d. 1967)
1880 – Tom Mix, American cowboy and actor (d. 1940)
1881 – Ion Minulescu, Romanian author, poet, and critic (d. 1944)
1882 – Fan S. Noli, Albanian-American bishop and politician, 13th Prime Minister of Albania (d. 1965)
1882 – Sam Rayburn, American lawyer and politician, 48th Speaker of the United States House of Representatives (d. 1961)
1883 – Kahlil Gibran, Lebanese-American poet, painter, and philosopher (d. 1931)
1898 – James Fitzmaurice, Irish soldier and pilot (d. 1965)
1899 – Heinrich Nordhoff, German engineer (d. 1968)
1900 – Maria of Yugoslavia, Queen of Yugoslavia from 1922 to 1934 (d. 1961)
1903 – Maurice Abravanel, Greek-American pianist and conductor (d. 1993)
1910 – Wright Morris, American author and photographer (d. 1998)
1910 – Yiannis Papaioannou, Greek composer and educator (d. 1989)
1912 – Jacques Ellul, French philosopher and critic (d. 1994)
1912 – Danny Thomas, American actor, comedian, producer and humanitarian (d. 1991)
1913 – Edward Gierek, Polish lawyer and politician (d. 2001)
1913 – Loretta Young, American actress (d. 2000)
1914 – Godfrey Edward Arnold, Austrian-American physician and academic (d. 1989)
1915 – Don Edwards, American soldier, lawyer, and politician (d. 2015)
1915 – John C. Lilly, American psychoanalyst, physician, and philosopher (d. 2001)
1915 – Alan Watts, English-American philosopher and author (d. 1973)
1916 – Park Mok-wol, influential Korean poet and academic (d. 1978)
1917 – Koo Chen-fu, Taiwanese businessman and diplomat (d. 2005)
1920 – John Maynard Smith, English biologist and geneticist (d. 2004)
1920 – Sun Myung Moon, Korean religious leader; founder of the Unification Church (d. 2012)
1920 – Early Wynn, American baseball player, coach, and sportscaster (d. 1999)
1921 – Marianne Grunberg-Manago, Russian-French biochemist and academic (d. 2013)
1921 – Cary Middlecoff, American golfer and sportscaster (d. 1998)
1923 – Vladimir Kazantsev, Russian runner (d. 2007)
1923 – Norman Kirk, New Zealand engineer and politician, 29th Prime Minister of New Zealand (d. 1974)
1923 – Jacobo Timerman, Argentinian journalist and author (d. 1999)
1924 – Kim Dae-jung, South Korean soldier and politician, 8th President of South Korea, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 2009)
1924 – Earl Scruggs, American banjo player (d. 2012)
1925 – John DeLorean, American engineer and businessman, founded the DeLorean Motor Company (d. 2005)
1926 – Ralph Branca, American baseball player (d. 2016)
1926 – Mickey Hargitay, Hungarian-American actor and bodybuilder (d. 2006)
1927 – Jesse Leonard Steinfeld, American physician and academic, 11th Surgeon General of the United States (d. 2014)
1928 – Capucine, French actress and model (d. 1990)
1931 – E. L. Doctorow, American novelist, playwright, and short story writer (d. 2015)
1931 – Graeme Hole, Australian cricketer (d. 1990)
1931 – Dickie Moore, Canadian ice hockey player and businessman (d. 2015)
1932 – Stuart A. Rice, American chemist and academic
1933 – Oleg Grigoryevich Makarov, Russian engineer and astronaut (d. 2003)
1934 – Sylvia Syms, English actress
1935 – Nino Tempo, American musician, singer, and actor
1936 – Darlene Hard, American tennis player
1936 – Julio María Sanguinetti, Uruguayan journalist, lawyer and politician, 29th President of Uruguay
1937 – Ludvík Daněk, Czech discus thrower (d. 1998)
1937 – Lou Holtz, American football player, coach, and sportscaster
1937 – Doris Troy, American singer-songwriter (d. 2004)
1938 – Adriano Celentano, Italian singer-songwriter, actor, and director
1938 – Adrienne Clarke, Australian botanist and academic
1938 – Larisa Shepitko, Soviet film director, screenwriter, and actress (d. 1979)
1939 – Valeriy Lobanovskyi, Ukrainian footballer and manager (d. 2002)
1939 – Murray Rose, English-Australian swimmer and sportscaster (d. 2012)
1940 – Van McCoy, American singer-songwriter and producer (d. 1979)
1943 – Terry Venables, English footballer and manager
1944 – Bonnie Franklin, American actress and singer (d. 2013)
1944 – Alan Stivell, French singer-songwriter and harp player
1944 – Rolf M. Zinkernagel, Swiss immunologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
1945 – Barry John, Welsh rugby player
1946 – Syd Barrett, English singer-songwriter and guitarist (d. 2006)
1947 – Sandy Denny, English folk-rock singer-songwriter (d 1978)
1948 – Guy Gardner, American colonel and astronaut
1948 – Dayle Hadlee, New Zealand cricketer
1949 – Mike Boit, Kenyan runner and academic (estimated date)
1949 – Carolyn D. Wright, American poet and academic (d. 2016)
1950 – Louis Freeh, American lawyer and jurist, 10th Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
1951 – Don Gullett, American baseball player and coach
1951 – Kim Wilson, American singer-songwriter and harmonica player
1953 – Malcolm Young, Scottish-Australian singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (d. 2017)
1954 – Anthony Minghella, English director and screenwriter (d. 2008)
1955 – Rowan Atkinson, English actor, producer, and screenwriter
1956 – Elizabeth Strout, American novelist and short story writer
1956 – Justin Welby, English archbishop
1956 – Clive Woodward, English rugby player and coach
1957 – Michael Foale, British-American astrophysicist and astronaut
1957 – Nancy Lopez, American golfer and sportscaster
1959 – Kapil Dev, Indian cricketer
1960 – Paul Azinger, American golfer and sportscaster
1960 – Kari Jalonen, Finnish ice hockey player and coach
1960 – Nigella Lawson, English chef and author
1960 – Howie Long, American football player and sports commentator
1961 – Georges Jobé, Belgian motocross racer (d. 2012)
1961 – Peter Whittle, British politician, author, journalist and broadcaster
1963 – Norm Charlton, American baseball player and coach
1963 – Paul Kipkoech, Kenyan runner (d. 1995)
1964 – Jacqueline Moore, American wrestler and manager
1965 – Bjørn Lomborg, Danish author and academic
1966 – Sharon Cuneta, Filipino singer and actress
1966 – Attilio Lombardo, Italian footballer and manager
1967 – A. R. Rahman, Indian composer, singer-songwriter, music producer, musician and philanthropist
1968 – John Singleton, American director, producer, and screenwriter (d. 2019)
1969 – Norman Reedus, American actor and model
1970 – Julie Chen, American television journalist, presenter, and producer
1970 – Radoslav Látal, Czech footballer and manager
1973 – Vasso Karantasiou, Greek beach volleyball player
1976 – Richard Zedník, Slovak ice hockey player
1981 – Asante Samuel, American football player
1982 – Eddie Redmayne, English actor and model
1984 – Kate McKinnon, American actress and comedian
1986 – Paul McShane, Irish footballer
1986 – Petter Northug, Norwegian skier
1989 – Andy Carroll, English footballer
1991 – Will Barton, American basketball player
1994 – Lim Jae-beom, South Korean singer and actor (Got7)
Deaths on January 6
786 – Abo of Tiflis, Iraqi martyr and saint (b. 756)
1088 – Berengar of Tours, French scholar and theologian (b. 999)
1148 – Gilbert de Clare, 1st Earl of Pembroke (b. 1100)
1233 – Matilda of Chester, Countess of Huntingdon, Anglo-Norman noblewoman (b. 1171)
1275 – Raymond of Penyafort, Catalan archbishop and saint (b. 1175)
1350 – Giovanni I di Murta, second doge of the Republic of Genoa
1358 – Gertrude van der Oosten, Beguine mystic
1406 – Roger Walden, English bishop
1448 – Christopher of Bavaria, King of Denmark, Norway and Sweden (b. 1418)
1477 – Jean VIII, Count of Vendôme
1481 – Ahmed Khan bin Küchük, Mongolian ruler
1537 – Alessandro de’ Medici, Duke of Florence (b. 1510)
1537 – Baldassare Peruzzi, Italian architect and painter, designed the Palazzo Massimo alle Colonne (b. 1481)
1616 – Philip Henslowe, English impresario (b. 1550)
1646 – Elias Holl, German architect, designed the Augsburg Town Hall (b. 1573)
1689 – Seth Ward, English bishop, mathematician, and astronomer (b. 1617)
1693 – Mehmed IV, Ottoman sultan (b. 1642)
1711 – Philips van Almonde, Dutch admiral (b. 1646)
1718 – Giovanni Vincenzo Gravina, Italian lawyer and jurist (b. 1664)
1725 – Chikamatsu Monzaemon, Japanese actor and playwright (b. 1653)
1731 – Étienne François Geoffroy, French physician and chemist (b. 1672)
1734 – John Dennis, English playwright and critic (b. 1657)
1813 – Louis Baraguey d’Hilliers, French general (b. 1764)
1829 – Josef Dobrovský, Czech philologist and historian (b. 1753)
1831 – Rodolphe Kreutzer, French violinist, composer, and conductor (b. 1766)
1840 – Frances Burney, English author and playwright (b. 1752)
1852 – Louis Braille, French educator, invented Braille (b. 1809)
1855 – Giacomo Beltrami, Italian jurist, explorer, and author (b. 1779)
1882 – Richard Henry Dana, Jr., American lawyer and politician (b. 1815)
1884 – Gregor Mendel, Czech geneticist and botanist (b. 1822)
1885 – Bharatendu Harishchandra, Indian author, poet, and playwright (b. 1850)
1896 – Thomas W. Knox, American journalist and author (b. 1835)
1902 – Lars Hertervig, Norwegian painter (b. 1830)
1913 – Frederick Hitch, English soldier, Victoria Cross recipient (b. 1856)
1917 – Hendrick Peter Godfried Quack, Dutch economist and historian (b. 1834)
1918 – Georg Cantor, German mathematician and philosopher (b. 1845)
1919 – Theodore Roosevelt, American colonel and politician, 26th President of the United States (b. 1858)
1921 – Devil Anse Hatfield, American guerrilla leader (b. 1839)
1922 – Jakob Rosanes, Ukrainian-German mathematician and chess player (b. 1842)
1928 – Alvin Kraenzlein, American hurdler and long jumper (b. 1876)
1933 – Vladimir de Pachmann, Ukrainian-German pianist (b. 1848)
1934 – Herbert Chapman, English footballer and manager (b. 1878)
1937 – André Bessette, Canadian saint (b. 1845)
1939 – Gustavs Zemgals, Latvian journalist and politician, 2nd President of Latvia (b. 1871)
1941 – Charley O’Leary, American baseball player and coach (b. 1882)
1942 – Emma Calvé, French soprano and actress (b. 1858)
1942 – Henri de Baillet-Latour, Belgian businessman, 3rd President of the International Olympic Committee (b. 1876)
1944 – Jacques Rosenbaum, Estonian-German architect (b. 1878)
1944 – Ida Tarbell, American journalist, reformer, and educator (b. 1857)
1945 – Vladimir Vernadsky, Russian mineralogist and chemist (b. 1863)
1949 – Victor Fleming, American director, producer, and cinematographer (b. 1883)
1966 – Jean Lurçat, French painter (b. 1892)
1972 – Chen Yi, Chinese general and politician, 2nd Foreign Minister of the People’s Republic of China (b. 1901)
1974 – David Alfaro Siqueiros, Mexican painter (b. 1896)
1978 – Burt Munro, New Zealand motorcycle racer (b. 1899)
1981 – A. J. Cronin, Scottish physician and author (b. 1896)
1984 – Ernest Laszlo, Hungarian-American cinematographer (b. 1898)
1990 – Ian Charleson, Scottish-English actor (b. 1949)
1990 – Pavel Cherenkov, Russian physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1904)
1993 – Dizzy Gillespie, American singer-songwriter and trumpet player (b. 1917)
1993 – Rudolf Nureyev, Russian-French dancer and choreographer (b. 1938)
1995 – Joe Slovo, Lithuanian-South African lawyer and politician (b. 1926)
1999 – Michel Petrucciani, French-American pianist (b. 1962)2000 – Don Martin, American cartoonist (b. 1931)
2004 – Pierre Charles, Dominican educator and politician, 5th Prime Minister of Dominica (b. 1954)
2004 – Francesco Scavullo, American photographer (b. 1921)
2005 – Eileen Desmond, Irish civil servant and politician, 12th Irish Minister for Health (b. 1932)
2005 – Lois Hole, Canadian academic and politician, 15th Lieutenant Governor of Alberta (b. 1929)
2005 – Tarquinio Provini, Italian motorcycle racer (b. 1933)
2005 – Louis Robichaud, Canadian lawyer and politician, 25th Premier of New Brunswick (b. 1925)
2006 – Lou Rawls, American singer-songwriter (b. 1933)
2007 – Roberta Wohlstetter, American political scientist, historian, and academic (b. 1912)
2008 – Shmuel Berenbaum, Rabbi of Mir Yeshiva (Brooklyn)
2009 – Ron Asheton, American guitarist, songwriter, and actor (probable; b. 1948)
