January 8
January 8 is the 8th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. There are 357 days remaining (358 in leap years).
Events
- 871 - Battle of Ashdown - Ethelred of Wessex defeats Danish invasion army.
- 1198 - Innocent III becomes Pope.
- 1297 - Monaco gains its independence.
- 1734 - Premiere of George Frideric Handel's Ariodante at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.
- 1746 - Bonnie Prince Charlie occupies Stirling.
- 1790 - George Washington delivers the first State of the Union Address address in New York City.
- 1806 - Cape Colony becomes a British colony.
- 1811 - Unsuccessful slave revolt led by Charles Deslandes in St. Charles and St. James, Louisiana.
- 1815 - War of 1812: In the Battle of New Orleans Andrew Jackson leads American forces in victory over the British.
- 1838 - Alfred Vail demonstrates a telegraph using dots and dashes (this is the forerunner of Morse code).
- 1856 - Borax is discovered (John Veatch).
- 1863 - Battle of Springfield of the American Civil War is fought.
- 1867 - African American men granted the right to vote in the District of Columbia.
- 1877 - Crazy Horse and his warriors fight their last battle with the United States Cavalry (Montana).
- 1889 - Herman Hollerith receives a patent for his electric tabulating machine.
- 1894 - A fire at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago causes a good deal of damage.
- 1900 - United States President William McKinley places Alaska under military rule.
- 1906 - A landslide in Haverstraw, New York kills 20 due to the excavation of clay along the Hudson River.
- 1908 - A train collision occurs in the Park Avenue Tunnel in New York City killing 17, injuring 38 and leading to increased demand for electric trains.
- 1926 - African National Congress founded.
- 1916 - World War I: Allied forces withdraw from Gallipoli.
- 1918 - President Woodrow Wilson announces his "Fourteen Points" for the aftermath of World War I.
- 1926 - Abdul-Aziz ibn Saud becomes the King of Hejaz and renames it Saudi Arabia.
- 1935 - A.C. Hardy patents the spectrophotometer.
- 1953 - René Mayer becomes Prime Minister of France.
- 1958 - 14 year old Bobby Fischer wins the United States Chess Championship.
- 1959 - conquest of Cuba by Fidel Castro is completed with the conquest of Santiago de Cuba.
- 1959 - Michel Debré becomes Prime Minister of France
- 1962 - Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is exhibited in the United States for the first time (National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC).
- 1962 - Harmelen train disaster.
- 1964 - President Lyndon B. Johnson declares a "War on Poverty" in the United States.
- 1966 - Operation Crimp of the Vietnam War.
- 1973 - Watergate scandal: The trial of seven men accused of placing bugs in Democratic Party headquarters at Watergate begins.
- 1975 - Ella Grasso becomes Governor of Connecticut, becoming the first woman to serve as a Governor in the United States who did not succeed her husband.
- 1977 - Soviet space mission Luna 21 is launched.
- 1982 - AT&T agrees to divest itself of twenty-two subdivisions.
- 1986 - Hacker Manifesto written.
- 1987 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average gains 8.30 to close at 2,002.25 -- The Dow's first close above 2,000.
- 1989 - Kegworth Air Disaster
- 1989 - beginning of Japanese Heisei era
- 1992 - President of the United States George H. W. Bush becomes ill on a visit in Japan and vomits on the Japanese Prime Minister.
- 1994 - Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov on Soyuz TM-18 leaves for Mir. He will stay on the space station till March 22, 1995 for a record 437 days in space.
- 1996 - An Antonov 32 cargo jet crashes into the central market in Kinshasa, Zaire killing more than 350
- 1997 - Mister Rogers receives a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
- 1997 - computer processer Pentium MMX introduced by Intel.
- 1998 - Ramzi Yousef is sentenced to life in prison for planning the World Trade Center bombing and for planning Project Bojinka.
- 1999 - Cosmologists announce that the expansion rate of the universe is increasing.
- 2000 - The Music City Miracle a play during the NFL playoffs.
- 2003 - US Airways flight 5481 crashes at Charlotte-Douglas International Airport in Charlotte, North Carolina killing all 21 people aboard.
- 2004 - Queen Elizabeth names the Queen Mary II cruise liner, the largest passenger ship ever built.
Births
- 1556 - Uesugi Kagekatsu, Japanese samurai and warlord (d. 1623)
- 1628 - François Henri de Montmorency-Bouteville, duc de Luxembourg, French general (d. 1695)
- 1632 - Samuel Pufendorf Austrian jurist (d. 1694)
- 1735 - John Carroll, first Roman Catholic Archbishop in the U.S. (d. 1815)
- 1763 - Edmond Charles Genêt, French ambassador to the United States during the French Revolution (d. 1834)
- 1786 - Nicholas Biddle, President of the Second Bank of the United States (d. 1844)
- 1805 - Orson Hyde, American religious leader (d. 1878)
- 1805 - John Bigler, California governor (d. 1871)
- 1821 - James Longstreet, America Confederate general (d. 1904)
- 1821 - W.H.L. Wallace, American Civil War brigadier general(North) {d. 1862)
- 1823 - Alfred Russel Wallace, British naturalist and biologist (d. 1913)
- 1824 - Wilkie Collins, British novelist (d. 1889)
- 1864 - Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence eldest son of King Edward VII
- 1867 - Emily Greene Balch, American writer, pacifist 1946 (d. 1961)
- 1870 - Miguel Primo de Rivera, dictator of Spain (d. 1930)
- 1871 - James Craig, 1st Viscount Craigavon, First Prime Minister of Northern Ireland (d. 1940)
- 1881 - Willy Piper, aviation pioneer (d. 1970)
- 1881 - Henrik Shipstead Minnesota senator (d. 1960)
- 1885 - A. J. Muste, civil rights activist and pacifist (d. 1967)
- 1885 - John Curtin, fourteenth Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1945)
- 1891 - Walther Bothe, German physicist (d. 1957)
- 1902 - Carl Rogers, American psycologist (1883)
- 1904 - Karl Brandt, Nazi war ciminal (d. 1948)
- 1908 - William Hartnell, British actor (d. 1975)
- 1909 - Willy Millowitsch, German actor (d. 1999)
- 1909 - Evelyn Wood, American educator (d. 1995)
- 1910 - Galina Sergeyevna Ulanova, dancer (d. 1988)
- 1912 - José Ferrer, Puerto Rican actor (d. 1992)
- 1923 - Larry Storch, American actor
- 1923 - Joseph Weizenbaum, Computer Scientist and creator of ELIZA
- 1924 - Ron Moody, English actor
- 1925 - Gerald Durrell, British naturalist and writer (d. 1995)
- 1925 - James Saunders, dramatist
- 1926 - Evelyn Lear, American soprano
- 1926 - Soupy Sales, American comedian
- 1926 - Hanae Mori, Japanese fashion designer
- 1926 - Kerwin Mathews, American actor
- 1928 - Sander Vanocur, journalist
- 1931 - Bill Graham, German rock music entrepreneur (d. 1991)
- 1933 - Charles Osgood, American journalist, commentator
- 1934 - Alexandra Ripley, writer (d. 2004)
- 1934 - Roy Kinnear, English actor (1988)
- 1934 - Jacques Anquetil, French cyclist (d. 1987)
- 1935 - Elvis Presley, American singer and guitarist (d. 1977)
- 1935 - Jesse Garon Presley, twin of Elvis Presley (d. 1935)
- 1936 - Lawrence Alma-Tadema, Dutch artist (d. 1912)
- 1937 - Shirley Bassey, Welsh singer
- 1937 - John Hume, Northern Ireland politician
- 1938 - Bob Eubanks, American game show host
- 1941 - Graham Chapman, British comedian (d. 1989)
- 1941 - Boris Vallejo, illustrator
- 1941 - Watanabe Yoshinori, Japanese yakuza
- 1942 - Stephen Hawking, English theoretical physicist and author
- 1942 - Junichiro Koizumi, Japanese politician
- 1942 - Yvette Mimieux, American actress
- 1942 - George Passmore, English artist, half of Gilbert and George
- 1944 - Terry Brooks fantasy writer.
- 1946 - Robby Krieger, American musician ("The Doors")
- 1947 - David Bowie, English rock artist
- 1947 - Samuel Schmid, member of the Swiss Federal Council
- 1947 - Laurie Walters, American actress
- 1949 - Wolfgang Puck, Austrian celebrity chef
- 1953 - Bruce Sutter, American baseball relief pitcher
- 1959 - Paul Hester, Australian drummer
- 1960 - Igor Kurchatov, leader of the Soviet atomic bomb project
- 1961 - Calvin Smith, American athlete
- 1966 - Andrew Wood, musician (d. 1990)
- 1967 - Michelle Forbes, American actress
- 1968 - Franjo Cardinal Seper Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (d. 1981)
- 1969 - R. Kelly, American R&B singer
- 1971 - Jason Giambi, American Major League Baseball player
- 1973 - Sean Paul, Jamaican reggae singer
- 1973 - Mark Knight, aka the madfiddler. Video game composer, sound designer and electric violin player
- 1977 - Amber Benson, American actress on Buffy the Vampire Slayer
- 1978 - Marco Fu, Hong Kong snooker player
- 1985 - Rachael Lampa, Christian singer
Deaths
- 482 - Saint Severinus, monk
- 923 or 926 - Athelm, archbishop of Canterbury
- 1107 - King Edgar of Scotland (b. ca. 1072)
- 1198 - Pope Celestine III (b. ca. 1106)
- 1354 - Charles d'Espagna Constable of France
- 1324 - Marco Polo Italian explorer (b. 1254)
- 1324 - Giotto di Bondone Italian artist (b. 1267)
- 1557 - Albert the Warlike Prince of Bayreuth (b. 1522)
- 1642 - Galileo Galilei, Italian astronomer and physicist (b. 1564)
- 1713 - Arcangelo Corelli, Italian composer (b. 1653)
- 1775 - John Baskerville, English printer, typefounder (b. 1706)
- 1825 - Eli Whitney, American inventor of the cotton gin (b. 1765)
- 1880 - Joshua A. Norton, "Emperor Norton I of the United States of America" (b. 1811)
- 1896 - Paul Verlaine, French poet (b. 1844)
- 1896 - William Raine Marshall Fifthe governor of Minnesota (b. 1825)
- 1916 - Ada Rehan, American actress (b. 1860)
- 1935 - Jesse Garon Presley, twin of Elvis Presley (b. 1935)
- 1941 - Lord Robert Baden-Powell, English soldier, writer, founder of Scouting (b. 1857)
- 1942 - Joseph Franklin Rutherford influential second president of Watch Tower Society (b. 1869)
- 1948 - Kurt Schwitters German painter (b. 1887)
- 1950 - Joseph Schumpeter Austrian economist (b. 1883)
- 1956 - Jim Elliot, American Christian martyr]] and missionary to Ecuador (b. 1928)
- 1958 - Paul Pilgrim, American athlete
- 1963 - Kay Sage, surrealist artist and poet (b. 1898)
- 1969 - Albert Hill, British athlete
- 1970 - Georges Guibourg French performer (b. 1891)
- 1972 - Kenneth Patchen, American poet and painter (b. 1911)
- 1975 - Richard Tucker, American tenor (b. 1913)
- 1976 - Zhou Enlai, Premier of the People's Republic of China (b. 1898)
- 1979 - Sara Carter, American country musician (b. 1898)
- 1980 - John Mauchly, American physicist, computer engineer (b. 1907)
- 1981 - Matthew "Stymie" Beard, American actor (b. 1925)
- 1982 - Reta Shaw, American actress
- 1983 - Tom McCall Oregon governor (b. 1913)
- 1986 - Pierre Fournier, French cellist (b. 1906)
- 1989 - Bruce Chatwin, English novelist (b. 1940)
- 1990 - Terry-Thomas, British actor, comedian (b. 1911)
- 1991 - Steve Clark, Def Leppard guitarist
- 1993 - Eleanor Hibbert, British Author
- 1994 - Pat Buttram, American actor
- 1995 - Carlos Monzon, Argentinian boxer (b. 1942)
- 1996 - François Mitterrand, President of France (b. 1916)
- 1997 - Melvin Calvin, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
- 1998 - Michael Tippett, English composer (b. 1905)
- 2000 - Fritz Thiedemann, German equestrianist (b. 1918)
- 2002 - Dave Thomas, American fast food entrepreneur (b. 1932)
- 2002 - Alexander Prochorow, Russian physicist (b. 1916)
- 2003 - Ron Goodwin, British film music composer and conductor
- 2004 - John A. Gambling, American radio talk-show host (b. 1930)
- 2005 - Campbell McComas, 52, Australian impersonator, raconteur, broadcaster, chameleon
- 2005 - Warren Spears, choreographer and dancer
- 2005 - Michel Thomas, Polish linguist and teacher (b. 1914)
Holidays and observances
External links
January 7 - January 9 - December 8 - February 8 -- listing of all days
See also: January 8, 1072, 1106, 1107, 1198
