Events

• 284 - Diocletian is proclaimed emperor by his soldiers.
• 473 - The future Zeno I is named associate emperor by Emperor Leo I.
• 1183 - Battle of Mizushima.
• 1292 - (O.S.) John Balliol becomes King of Scotland.
• 1511 - Spain and England ally against France.
• 1558 - Elizabethan era begins: Queen Mary I of England dies and is succeeded by her half-sister Elizabeth I of England.
• 1603 - English explorer, writer and courtier Sir Walter Raleigh goes on trial for treason.
• 1659 - Peace of the Pyrenees is signed between France and Spain.
• 1777 - Articles of Confederation was submitted to the states for ratification.
• 1796 - Napoleonic Wars: Battle of Arcole - French forces defeat the Austrians in Italy.
• 1800 - The United States Capitol building in Washington, DC holds its first session of the U.S. Congress.
• 1812 - Napoleonic Wars: Battle of Krasnoi.
• 1820 - Captain Nathaniel Palmer becomes the first American to see Antarctica (the Palmer Peninsula was later named after him).
• 1827 - The Delta Phi fraternity, America's oldest continuous social fraternity, was founded at Union College in Schenectady, New York.
• 1831 - Ecuador and Venezuela were separated from Greater Colombia.
• 1855 - David Livingstone becomes the first European to see Victoria Falls in what is now present-day Zambia-Zimbabwe.
• 1856 - American Old West: On the Sonoita River in present-day southern Arizona, the United States Army establishes Fort Buchanan in order to help control new land acquired in the Gadsden Purchase.
• 1858 - Modified Julian Day zero.
• 1863 - American Civil War: Siege of Knoxville begins - Confederate forces led by General James Longstreet place Knoxville, Tennessee under siege.
• 1869 - In Egypt, the Suez Canal, linking the Mediterranean Sea with the Red Sea, is inaugurated in an elaborate ceremony.
• 1871 - The National Rifle Association is granted a charter by the state of New York.
• 1876 - Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's patriotic Slavonic March made its premiere in Moscow to a warm reception by the Russian people.
• 1878 - First assassination attempt against Umberto I of Italy.
• 1903 - The Russian Social Democratic Labor Party splits into two groups; the Bolsheviks (Russian for "majority") and Mensheviks (Russian for "minority").
• 1903 - Dahomey (Benin) becomes a French protectorate.
• 1905 - The Eulsa Treaty is signed between Japan and Korea.
• 1911 - The Omega Psi Phi fraternity, the first African-American fraternity at a historically black college or university, is founded at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
• 1919 - King George V of the United Kingdom proclaims Armistice Day (later Remembrance Day). The idea was first suggested by Edward George Honey.
• 1922 - Former Ottoman sultan Mehmed VI goes into exile in Italy.
• 1933 - United States recognizes Soviet Union.
• 1939 - Nine Czech students are executed as a response to anti-Nazi demonstrations prompted by the death of Jan Opletal; in addition, Czech universities are shut down and over a thousand Czech students sent to concentration camps.
• 1939 - The Rome-Rio de Janeiro air connection is created.
• 1950 - Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, was enthroned as Tibet's head of state at the age of fifteen.
• 1953 - The remaining human inhabitants of the Blasket Islands, Kerry, Ireland are evacuated to the mainland.
• 1954 - Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser becomes president of Egypt.
• 1962 - President John F. Kennedy dedicates Dulles International Airport, serving the Washington, D.C. region.
• 1967 - Vietnam War: Acting on optimistic reports he was given on November 13, US President Lyndon B. Johnson tells his nation that, while much remained to be done, "We are inflicting greater losses than we're taking...We are making progress."
• 1968 - Alexandros Panagoulis is condemned to death for attempting to assassinate Greek dictator George Papadopoulos.
• 1969 - Cold War: Negotiators from the Soviet Union and the United States meet in Helsinki to begin SALT I negotiations aimed at limiting the number of strategic weapons on both sides.
• 1970 - Vietnam War: Lieutenant William Calley goes on trial for the My Lai massacre.
• 1970 - Luna program: The Soviet Union lands Lunokhod 1 on Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains) on the Moon. This is the first roving remote-controlled robot to land on another world and was released by the orbiting Luna 17 spacecraft.
• 1970 - Douglas Engelbart receives the patent for the first computer mouse.
• 1973 - Watergate scandal: In Orlando, Florida, US President Richard Nixon tells 400 Associated Press managing editors "I am not a crook".
• 1973 - The Athens Polytechnic Uprising against the military regime ends in a bloodshed in the Greek capital.
• 1974 - Aliança Operário-Camponesa (Worker-Peasant Alliance) founded in Portugal, as a front of PCP(m-l).
• 1978 - Burger Chef murders in USA
• 1983 - The Zapatista Army of National Liberation is founded.
• 1989 - Cold War: Velvet Revolution begins: In Czechoslovakia, a student demonstration in Prague is quelled by riot police. This sparks an uprising aimed at overthrowing the communist government (it succeeds on December 29).
• 1990 - Fugendake, part of the Mount Unzen volcanic complex, Nagasaki prefecture, Japan becomes active again and erupts.
• 1997 - In Luxor, Egypt, 62 people are killed by 6 Islamic militants outside the Temple of Hatshepsut, known as Luxor massacre (The police then kill the assailants).
• 1998 A fireworks factory in Uffculme, Devon, explodes.
• 2000 - A catastrophic landslide in Log pod Mangartom, Slovenia, kills 7, and causes millions of SIT of damage. It is one of the worst catastrophes in Slovenia in the past 100 years.
• 2000 - Alberto Fujimori is removed from office as president of Peru.
• 2003 - Arnold Schwarzenegger is inaugurated as Governor of California.
• 2004 - Kmart Corp. announces it's buying Sears, Roebuck and Co. for $11 billion USD and naming the newly merged company Sears Holdings Corporation.
• 2005 - Italy's choice of national anthem, Il Canto degli Italiani, becomes official in law for the first time, almost 60 years after it was provisionally chosen following the birth of the republic.
• 2006 - Official naming of element 111, Roentgenium (Rg).

Births