http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history
Dec 26, 2004: Tsunami wreaks havoc on Southeast Asia
On the day after Christmas in 2004, a massive undersea earthquake occurs just off the coast of Indonesia at a few minutes before 8 a.m. local time. With a magnitude of 9.3, the quake was the most powerful of the last 40 years and the second largest earthquake in recorded history. It set off a deadly tsunami that, in the final estimate, killed an estimated 230,000 people and wreaked untold devastation on a wide swath of coastline from Somalia on the east African coast to Sumatra in Southeast Asia.
While most earthquakes last for only a few seconds, it is reported that the Sumatra-Andaman earthquake, as it is known to the scientific community, lasted almost ten minutes, triggering other earthquakes as far away as Alaska and causing the entire planet to move at least a few centimeters. The epicenter of the earthquake was 100 miles west of Sumatra, at the western end of the area known as the "Ring of Fire" for its intense seismic activity. That region has been home to more than 80 percent of the world's largest earthquakes. Since 1900, when accurate measurements began to be made, only three or four earthquakes have rivaled the Sumatra-Andaman in power.
It is estimated that the quake caused the sea bed of the Indian Ocean to rise almost 10 feet, causing seven cubic miles of water to be displaced. The resulting tsunami (from the Japanese words for "harbor" and "waves") sent waves of up to 100 feet crashing into the shores of the Indian Ocean, hitting Somalia, Indonesia, Sumatra, Sri Lanka, southern India, and Thailand, and flooding a series of islands, including the Maldives. In deep water, tsunami waves are barely noticeable and mostly harmless, but in the shallow water near coastlines, tsunamis slow down and form large destructive waves.
Despite scientists reporting the quake about 15 minutes after it struck, there was no tsunami warning system in place in the Indian Ocean with which to track possible tsunamis. A warning system in the Pacific Ocean--where most tsunamis occur--has proven successful in minimizing deaths from tsunamis since it was installed in the mid-1950s. However, the warning systems are difficult and expensive to set up and, despite some requests for aid, one had never been built in the Indian Ocean, located in a relatively poor part of the world.
Within 30 minutes, the tsunami had hit Sumatra and, within two hours, it had battered the coasts of Thailand, Sri Lanka, and southern India. Despite the time lag, the vast majority of victims had no idea that the tsunami was on the way. Although initial news reports severely underestimated the death toll, it became clear within days that the tsunami had created a disaster of unprecedented proportions--killing an estimated 230,000 people and leaving more than a million homeless. Thousands--most likely swept out to sea--will never be found. It has been reported that one third of the victims were children, due to both the region's demographics and children's relative inability to protect themselves. The tsunami also killed more women than men, a statistic that is chalked up to the fact that more men may have been working out at sea in deep water, where they were safer. In addition to natives of the region, an estimated 9,000 people from outside the area, mainly Europeans, were killed while on vacation at the region's resorts.
Although there were no official government warnings of the impending disaster, some communities were able to read nature's signs and knew to evacuate. On the Indonesian island of Simeulue, the oral tradition of the native islanders contained references to a tsunami that occurred in 1907 and the incidents that preceded it. They recognized the receding tide that followed the earthquake as a sign of a coming tsunami and retreated to higher ground, surviving the massive waves.
Most, however, were not so lucky. Despite substantial relief efforts, with public and private aid to the affected areas totaling in the billions of dollars, it will take decades or longer for the shattered infrastructures and economies of the affected regions to be rebuilt. As part of their response to the disaster, the United Nations is currently planning the implementation of a tsunami warning system for the Indian Ocean. Scientists believe that other large earthquakes are likely in the area of the sea floor near the epicenter of the Sumatra-Andaman quake.
Dec 26, 1776: Washington wins first major U.S. victory at Trenton
At approximately 8 a.m. on the morning of December 26, 1776, General George Washington's Continental Army reaches the outskirts of Trenton, New Jersey, and descends upon the unsuspecting Hessian force guarding the city. Trenton's 1,400 Hessian defenders were still groggy from the previous evening's Christmas festivities and had underestimated the Patriot threat after months of decisive British victories throughout New York. The troops of the Continental Army quickly overwhelmed the German defenses, and by 9:30 a.m.Trenton was completely surrounded.
Although several hundred Hessians escaped, nearly 1,000 were captured at the cost of only four American lives. However, because most of Washington's army had failed to cross the Delaware the previous day, he was without adequate artillery or men and was forced to withdraw from the town.
Although the victory was minor from a strategic perspective, it bore tremendous significance for the future of the Continental Army. Washington needed a success before his solders' enlistments expired on December 31--without a dramatic upswing in morale, he was likely to lose the soldiers under his command and be unable to recruit new men to replace them. The victories at Trenton and a few days later at Princeton proved to the American public that their army was indeed capable of victory and worthy of support.
The image of ragged farm-boy Patriots defeating drunken foreign mercenaries has become ingrained in the American imagination. Then as now, Washington's crossing and the Battle of Trenton were emblematic of the American Patriots' surprising ability to overcome the tremendous odds they faced in challenging the wealthy and powerful British empire.
Dec 26, 1966: The first Kwanzaa
The first day of the first Kwanzaa is celebrated in Los Angeles under the direction of Maulana Karenga, the chair of Black Studies at California State University at Long Beach. The seven-day holiday, which has strong African roots, was designed by Dr. Karenga as a celebration of African American family, community, and culture.
In 1965, a deadly riot broke out in the predominantly black Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles, leaving 34 people dead, 1,000 injured, and $40 million worth of property destroyed. Karenga, a former black activist, was deeply disturbed by the devastation and searched for a way to overcome the despair he felt had gripped the African American community in the riot's aftermath. He founded Us, a black cultural organization, and looked to Africa in search of practices and concepts that might empower and unite the nation's African American community. Inspired by Africa's harvest celebrations, he decided to develop a nonreligious holiday that would stress the importance of family and community while giving African Americans an opportunity to explore their African identities.
Karenga combined aspects of several different harvest celebrations, such as those of the Ashanti and those of the Zulu, to form the basis of Kwanzaa. The name Kwanzaa is derived from the phrase matunda ya kwanza, which means "first fruits" in Swahili. Each family celebrates Kwanzaa in its own way, but celebrations often include songs and dances, African drums, storytelling, poetry readings, and a large traditional meal. On each of the seven nights, the family gathers and a child lights one of the candles on the kinara, or candleholder, then one of the seven principles is discussed. The principles, called the Nguzo Saba, are values of African culture that contribute to building and reinforcing community among African Americans. These values include unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, economic cooperation, purpose, creativity, and faith. An African feast, called a Karamu, is held on December 31. Today, Kwanzaa is celebrated by millions of people of African descent all across the United States and Canada.
Dec 26, 1861: Possible war between U.S. and Britain is averted
On this day in 1861, Confederate diplomatic envoys James Mason and John Slidell are freed by President Abraham Lincoln's administration, heading off a possible war between the United States and Great Britain.
The two men were aboard the Trent, a British mail steamer, on November 8, 1861, when they were pulled over by the U.S.S. San Jacinto. They were headed to London to lobby for recognition of the Confederacy. The Union ship intercepted the English ship near the Bahamas, arrested the Southerners, and took them back to Boston. The British were outraged when word of the interception reached London in late November. They had not taken sides in the American Civil War and their policy was to accept any paying customer who wished to travel aboard their ships. The British government dispatched a message to the American government demanding the release of Mason and Slidell, along with an apology for the transgression of British rights on the high seas.
The British cabinet sent a message on December 1 insisting that the U.S. respond within a week. The British also began preparing for war, banning exports of war materials to the U.S. and sending 11,000 troops to Canada. Plans were made to attack the American fleet that was blockading the South. The British also planned a blockade of Northern ports.
Lincoln decided not to push the issue. On December 26, he ordered the envoys released and averted a war with England in the process. The incident gave the Confederates hope that there was support for their cause in Britain, but it also demonstrated how hard the Union would work to avoid conflict with Britain.
Dec 26, 1971: U.S. jets strike North Vietnam
In the sharpest escalation of the war since Operation Rolling Thunder ended in November 1968, U.S. fighter-bombers begin striking at North Vietnamese airfields, missile sites, antiaircraft emplacements, and supply facilities.
These raids continued for five days. They were begun in response to intelligence that predicted a North Vietnamese build up of forces and equipment for a new offensive. At a press conference on December 27, U.S. Defense Secretary Melvin Laird said the increase in bombing was in retaliation for the communist failure to honor agreements made prior to the 1968 bombing halt. As evidence, Laird cited the shelling of Saigon the week before, DMZ violations--including an infiltration route being built through the buffer zone, and attacks on unarmed U.S. reconnaissance planes. Pentagon figures showed that U.S. planes--with as many as 250 aircraft participating in some missions--attacked communist targets over 100 times in 1971, a figure comparable to U.S. air activity in the previous 26 months.
The intensified bombing spurred new antiwar protests in American. In New York, 15 antiwar veterans barricaded themselves inside the Statue of Liberty and flew the U.S. flag upside down from its crown. They ended their occupation of the monument on December 28, obeying a federal court order. At the same time in Washington, over 80 antiwar veterans were arrested after clashing with police on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
Dec 26, 1606: King Lear performed at Court
On this day in 1606, William Shakespeare's play King Lear is performed at the court of King James I of England. Lear is one of the later works penned by the playwright.
Shakespeare's father was probably a common tradesman. He became an alderman and bailiff in Stratford-upon-Avon, and Shakespeare was baptized in the town on April 26, 1564. At age 18, Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway, and the couple had a daughter in 1583 and twins in 1585. Sometime later, Shakespeare set off for London to become an actor and by 1592 was well established in London's theatrical world as both a performer and a playwright. His earliest plays, including The Comedy of Errors and The Taming of the Shrew, were written in the early 1590s. Later in the decade, he wrote such tragedies as Romeo and Juliet (1594-1595) and comedies, including The Merchant of Venice (1596-1597). His greatest tragedies were written after 1600, including Hamlet (1600-01), Othello (1604-05), King Lear (1605-06), and Macbeth (1605-1606).
He became a member of the popular theater group the Lord Chamberlain's Men, who later became the King's Men. The group built and operated the famous Globe Theater in 1599. Shakespeare ultimately became a major shareholder in the troupe and earned enough money to buy a large house in Stratford in 1597. He retired to Stratford in 1610, where he wrote his last plays, including The Tempest (1611) and The Winter's Tale (1610-11). Meanwhile, he had written more than 100 sonnets, which were published in 1609. Shakespeare's plays were not published during his lifetime. After his death, two members of his troupe collected copies of his plays and printed what is now called the First Folio (1623).
Dec 26, 1966: Jimi Hendrix writes "Purple Haze"
After a stint in the U.S. Army and a creatively unfulfilling stretch as a session musician and sideman to acts like Little Richard and The Isley Brothers, 21-year-old Jimi Hendrix moved to New York City in 1964 to set about building a solo career. "Discovered" two years later by the British manager/producer Chas Chandler, a former member of the The Animals, Hendrix moved to England in 1966 and teamed up with bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell to form The Jimi Hendrix Experience. The group scored an almost immediate UK hit with "Hey Joe," which was released in mid-December. It was 10 days later, however, on December 26, 1966, that Hendrix wrote "Purple Haze"—the song that would not only give him his breakthrough hit in the United States, but also go on to define an entire musical era.
In fact, Jimi Hendrix had been fooling around with the guitar riffs that became "Purple Haze" for several months, but it was on the afternoon of this day in 1966, while in a backstage dressing room at the Uppercut Club in London, that he wrote the song's famous lyrics. And while critics and fans alike rightly hail Jimi Hendrix for having revolutionized the very sound of rock's most important instrument, his status as arguably the greatest electric guitarist who ever lived sometimes overshadows his talents as a songwriter. "Purple Haze" was a song that instantly grabbed listeners' attention with its famous opening riff—"a ferocious two-note guitar march scarred with fuzz," in the words of Rolling Stone—and didn't let go through a little more than three minutes of tightly constructed instrumental chaos. But its lyrics—"'Scuse me, while I kiss the sky"—sounded just as revolutionary in 1967, and may be just as much a part of the song's appeal today.
Released in the United States as the lead single from The Jimi Hendrix Experience's debut album, Are You Experienced, in June 1967, "Purple Haze" actually had relatively little commercial success as a single. It was Hendrix's legendary, guitar-burning live performance at the Monterey Pop Festival that same month that established him as a star—though not too big a star to act, briefly, as the opening act for The Monkees later that summer.
In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked "Purple Haze" #17 on its list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time."
Here's a more detailed look at events that transpired on this date throughout history:
268 - Pope St Dionysius dies
418 - Pope St Zosimus dies
795 - St Leo III begins his reign as Catholic Pope
1198 - French bishop Odo van Sully condemns Zottenfeest
1481 - Battle at Westbroek: Dutch army beats Utrecht
1492 - 1st Spanish settlement La Navidad (modern Môle-Saint-Nicolas) in New World founded, by Columbus
1568 - Uprising of Morisco's against suppression in Granada
1620 - Pilgrims arrived at Plymouth, MA
1620 - Elizabeth Báthory's crimes are uncovered.
1659 - Long Parliament reforms in Westminster
1748 - France & Austria signs treaty about Southern Netherlands
1773 - Expulsion of tea ships from Philadelphia
1776 - George Washington defeats Hessians at Battle of Trenton in American Revolutionary War
1792 - The final trial of Louis XVI of France begins in Paris.
1793 - Battle of Geisberg: French defeat Austrians.
1799 - George Washington is eulogized by Col Henry Lee as "1st in war, 1st in peace & 1st in hearts of his countrymen"
1805 - France & Austria signs Peace of Pressburg
1805 - Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts established, Philadelphia
1809 - English invasionary troop leaves Vlissingen
First US President George WashingtonFirst US President George Washington 1811 - A theater fire in Richmond, Virginia kills the Governor of Virginia George William Smith and the president of the First National Bank of Virginia Abraham B. Venable.
1813 - Zamose, Modlin, Torgau surrenders to allied armies
1825 - Erie Canal opens
1830 - Gaetano Donizetti's opera "Anna Bolena," premieres in Milan
1831 - Vincenzo Bellini's opera "Norma," premieres in Milan
1848 - 1st gold seekers arrive in Panama en route to SF
1848 - William & Ellen Craft escape from slavery in Georgia
1848 - The Phi Delta Theta fraternity is founded at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.
1854 - Wood-pulp paper 1st exhibited, Buffalo
1860 - Maiden voyage of 1st steamship owned by 1 man (C Vanderbilt)
1860 - Major Robert Anderson, under cover of darkness, concentrated his small force at Ft Sumter
1860 - The first ever inter-club football match takes place between Hallam F.C. and Sheffield F.C. at the Sandygate Road ground in Sheffield, England.
1862 - -Dec 28th) Battle of Dumfries, VA
1862 - 1st US navy hospital ship enters service
1862 - 38 Santee Sioux Indians hanged in Mankato Minnesota, due to their uprising
1865 - James H Mason (Mass) patents 1st US coffee percolator
1870 - The 12.8-km long Fréjus Rail Tunnel through the Alps is completed.
1871 - Gilbert and Sullivan collaborate for the first time, on their lost opera, Thespis. It does modestly well, but the two would not collaborate again for four years.
1872 - 4th largest snowfall in NYC history (18")
1877 - Socialist Labor Party of North America holds 1st natl convention
1878 - 1st US store to install electric lights, Philadelphia
1879 - John Brahms' "Tragic Ouverture," premieres
1883 - The Harbour Grace Affray between Irish Catholics and Protestant Orangemen causes five deaths in Newfoundland.
1890 - King Mwanga of Uganda signs contract with East Africa Company
1892 - Opera "Cristoforo Colombo" is produced (La Scala)
1899 - Mafeking: Bathe-Powells failed assault up fort Game Tree: 24 killed
1902 - Most knock downs in a fight, Oscar Nelson (5) & Christy Williams (42)
1908 - Jack Johnson TKOs Tommy Burns in 14 for heavyweight boxing title, becomes 1st black heavyweight champion
1916 - Joseph Joffre becomes marshal of France
1917 - 1st NHL defensemen to score a goal: Toronto Maple Leaf Harry Cameron
1917 - Fed government took over operation of American RR for duration of WW I
1918 - 1st day of 1st-class cricket in Aust after WW I (Vic v NSW)
Baseball Great Babe RuthBaseball Great Babe Ruth 1919 - Yanks & Red Sox reach agreement on transfer of Babe Ruth
1924 - Judy Garland, 2½, billed as Baby Frances, makes her show business debut
1925 - 1st East West football game at Ewing Park before 25,000 fans
1925 - NHL record 141 shots as NY Americans (73) beat Pitt Pirates (68) 3-1
1925 - Turkey adopts Gregorian calendar
1925 - NY's Jake Forbes makes 67 saves, Pitt's Ray Waters makes 70
1925 - The Communist Party of India is founded.
1926 - Prince-regent Hirohito becomes emperor of Japan
1928 - Johnny Weissmuller announces his retirement from amateur swimming
1928 - World record 10th wicket stand 307 (Kippax / Hooker) NSW v Vic
1931 - George/Ira Gershwin's "Of Thee I Sing," premieres in NYC
1931 - Pulitzer Prize-winning musical play "Of Thee I Sing" opens on Bdwy
1933 - Bradman scores 187* NSW v Victoria, 294 mins, 13 fours
1933 - US forswears armed intervention in Western Hemisphere
1933 - FM radio is patented.
Actress Judy GarlandActress Judy Garland 1934 - Yomiuri Giants, Japan's 1st professional baseball team forms
1935 - Stalin views Dmitri Sjostakovitsj' opera "Lady Macbeth"
1936 - Israel Philarmonic Orch forms
1938 - Bradman scores 225 South Aust v Qld before Christ gets him out
1938 - Tom Goddard takes a cricket hat-trick for England v South Africa
1939 - Earthquake in East Anatolia Turkey
1939 - Mine strikes in Borinage Brussels
1940 - 1st-class debut of Arthur Morris, who scores 148
1940 - JA Fields/J Chodorov's "My Sister Eileen," premieres in NYC
1941 - Winston Churchill becomes 1st British PM to address a joint meeting of Congress, warning that Axis would "stop at nothing"
1943 - British sink German battle cruiser Scharnhorst
1943 - Chicago Bears win NFL championship
1943 - Earl Claus von Stauffenberg vain with bomb to Hitlers headquarter
1944 - Battle of Bastogne-US Gen Patton's 4th Pantzers repulse Germans
1944 - Budapest surrounded by soviet army
Playwright Tennessee WilliamsPlaywright Tennessee Williams 1944 - Tennessee Williams' play "Glass Menagerie," premieres in Chicago
1945 - CFP franc and CFA franc are created.
1946 - "Beggar's Holiday" opens at Broadway Theater NYC for 111 performances
1946 - "Toplitzky of Notre Dame" opens at Century Theater NYC for 60 perfs
1946 - 35th Davis Cup: USA beats Australia in Melbourne (5-0)
1946 - Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas opens (start of an era)
1947 - "Cradle Will Ruck" opens at Mansfield Theater NYC for 34 performances
1947 - British transfer Heard & McDonald Is (Indian Ocean) to Australia
1947 - Heavy snow blankets Northeast, buries NYC under 25.8" of snow in 16 hrs That same day, LA set a record high of 84°F
1948 - Hungarian cardinal Mindszenty arrested
1950 - Gillette & Mutual buy All Star & World Series rights ($6M for 6 yrs)
1954 - "The Shadow," airs for last time on radio
1954 - Cleveland Browns win NFL Championship, beating Detroit 56-10
1955 - Cleveland Browns win NFL Championship, beating Los Angeles Rams 38-14
1955 - RKO is 1st to announce sale of its film library to TV
US General George S. PattonUS General George S. Patton 1957 - Roger Sessions' 3rd Symphony premieres in London
1960 - "Do Re Mi" opens at St James Theater NYC for 400 performances
1960 - Musical "Do re mi" with Phil Silvers premieres in NYC
1960 - Philadelphia Eagles beat Green Bay Packers 17-13 in NFL championship game
1963 - "Double Dublin" opens at Little Theater NYC for 4 performances
1963 - Beatles release "I Want To Hold Your Hand"/"I Saw Her Standing There"
1963 - US furnishes cereal to USSR
1964 - Beatles' "I Feel Fine," single goes #1& amp; stays #1 for 3 weeks
1964 - Buffalo Bills beat San Diego Chargers 20-7 in AFL championship game
1964 - Moors Murderers claim last victim
1965 - "Funny Girl" with Barbra Streisand closes on Broadway
1965 - Buffalo Bills beat San Diego Chargers 23-0 in AFL championship game
1965 - Paul McCartney is interviewed on pirate radio station Radio Caroline
1966 - Maulana Karenga establishes Kwanzaa (1st fruits of harvest) holiday
1966 - Jimi Hendrix writes "Purple Haze" backstage at the Upper Cut Club
1967 - BBC broadcasts "Magical Mystery Tour"
1967 - Dave Brubeck Quartet formally disbands
1968 - Arab terrorists in Athens fire on El Al plane, kills 1
1968 - Jay Allens "Forty Carats," premieres in NYC
1968 - Led Zeppelin's concert debut in Denver as opener for Vanilla Fudge
1968 - Bruin Ted Green sets NHL penalty record of 3 minors, 2 majors & 2 game misconducts in a game against NY Rangers in NY's Madison Square Garden
1973 - "Exorcist," starring Linda Blair & rated X, premieres
1973 - 2 Skylab 3 astronauts walk in space for a record 7 hours
Rock Guitarist Jimi HendrixRock Guitarist Jimi Hendrix 1973 - Soyuz 13 returns to Earth
1974 - Washington Capitals 1st NHL sellout
1975 - 1st supersonic transport service (USSR-Tupolev-144)
1975 - A crowd of 85661 attends the 1st day of the Aust-WI MCG Test Cricket
1976 - "Music Is" closes at St James Theater NYC after 8 performances
1976 - The Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist-Leninist) is founded.
1977 - USSR performs nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
1978 - India's former PM, Indira Gandhi, released from jail
1979 - Soviet Special forces take over presidential palace in Kabul, Afghanistan.
1980 - Aeroflot puts the Ilyushin Il-86 into service.
1981 - One of the great day's Test Cricket at the MCG Aust v WI
1982 - TIME's Man of the Year is a computer
1982 - USSR performs nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
1983 - Test Cricket debut of Gregory Richard John Matthews, v Pakistan MCG
1983 - USSR performs nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
1985 - Test Cricket debut of Steve Waugh, v India at the MCG
1986 - Captured Iraqi Airways Boeing-737 in Saudi Arabia, about 60 killed
1986 - Doug Jarvis, 31, sets NHL record of 916 consecutive games
1986 - TV soap "Search for Tomorrow" ends 35 year run
1987 - "Les Miserables" opens at National Theatre of Iceland, Reykjavik
1988 - "Legs Diamond" opens at Mark Hellinger Theater NYC for 64 performances
1988 - Anti African student rebellion in China PR
1989 - ODI debut for Mark Taylor & Sanath Jayasuriya at cricket MCG
1990 - Garry Kasparov beats Antatoly Karpov to retain chess championship
1990 - Reggie Williams becomes 1st GM of WLAF's NY-NJ Knights
1990 - Senior Professional Baseball Association folds
1991 - Chuck Knolls retires as NFL coach after 23 years
Night club operator Jack RubyNight club operator Jack Ruby 1991 - Jack Ruby's gun sells for $220,000 in auction
1991 - Militant Sikhs kill 55 & wound 70 in India
1991 - NY Islander Derek King ties NJ Devils 5-5 with ½ second left
1992 - NY Jet announcer Marty Glickman retires at 75
1993 - Antonov-26 crashes at Gyumri, Armenia, 36 killed
1993 - Floyd, Nicklaus & Rodriguez wins Wendy's 3-Tour Challenge Golf Tourn
1994 - French commando's terminate Air France hijacking in Marseille
1995 - Muttiah Muralitharan no-balled for throwing (SL v Aust, MCG)
1995 - Paul Adams becomes S Afr's youngest Test Cricket player, 18 yrs 340 ds
1996 - Start of the largest strike in South Korean history.
1996 - The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification goes into force.
1996 - Six-year-old beauty queen JonBenét Ramsey is found beaten and strangled in the basement of her family's home in Boulder, Colorado.
1997 - The Soufriere Hills volcano on the island of Montserrat explodes, creating a small tsunami offshore.
1998 - Iraq announces its intention to fire upon U.S. and British warplanes that patrol the northern and southern no-fly zones.
1998 - Severe gales over Ireland, northern England, and southern Scotland cause widespread disruption and widespread power outages in Northern Ireland and southern Scotland.
1999 - Severe weather in France kills over 100 people and causes extensive damage to property, trees and the French national power grid (see Lothar).
2003 - A magnitude 6.6 earthquake devastates southeast Iranian city of Bam, killing tens of thousands and destroying the citadel of Arg-é Bam.
2004 - A 9.3 magnitude earthquake creates a tsunami causing devastation in Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, the Maldives and many other areas around the rim of the Indian Ocean, killing 230,000 people.
2005 - Boxing Day shooting on a busy shopping street in Toronto.
2006 - The 2006 Hengchun earthquake with 7.1 magnitude hit Taiwan.
2012 - China opens the world’s longest high speed rail route from Beijing to Guangzhou
1620 - The Pilgrim Fathers landed at New Plymouth, MA, to found Plymouth Colony, with John Carver as Governor. 1776 - The British suffered a major defeat in the Battle of Trenton during the American Revolutionary War. 1865 - The coffee percolator was patented by James H. Mason. 1871 - The "Gods Grown Old" was performed for the first time. It ran for 64 shows. 1898 - Marie and Pierre Curie discovered radium. 1908 - Texan boxer "Galveston Jack" Johnson knocked out Tommy Burns in Sydney, Australia, to become the first black boxer to win the world heavyweight title. 1917 - During World War I, the U.S. government took over operation of the nation's railroads. 1921 - The Catholic Irish Free State became a self-governing dominion of Great Britain. 1927 - The East-West Shrine football game featured numbers on both the front and back of players’ jerseys. 1941 - Winston Churchill became the first British prime minister to address a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress. 1943 - The German battlecruiser Scharnhorst was sunk in the North Sea, during the Battle of North Cape. 1944 - Tennessee Williams' play "The Glass Menagerie" was first performed publicly, at the Civic Theatre in Chicago, IL. 1947 - Heavy snow blanketed the Northeast United States, burying New York City under 25.8 inches of snow in 16 hours. The severe weather was blamed for about 80 deaths. 1953 - "Big Sister" was heard for the last time on CBS Radio. The show ran for 17 years. 1954 - "The Shadow" aired on radio for the last time. 1956 - Fidel Castro attempted a secret landing in Cuba to overthrow the Batista regime. All but 11 of his supporters were killed. 1959 - The first charity walk took place, along Icknield Way, in aid of the World Refugee Fund. 1974 - Comedian Jack Benny died at age 80. 1982 - The Man of the Year in "TIME" magazine was a computer. It was the first time a non-human received the honors. 1986 - Doug Jarvis, age 31, set a National Hockey League (NHL) record as he skated in his 916th consecutive game. Jarvis eventually set the individual record for most consecutive games played with 964. 1986 - "Search for Tomorrow" was seen for the last time on CBS-TV. The show had been on the air for 35-years. 1990 - Garry Kasparov beat Anatoly Karpov to retain the chess championship. 1991 - The Soviet Union's parliament formally voted the country out of existence. 1995 - Israel turned dozens of West Bank villages over to the Palestinian Authority. 1996 - Six-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey was found beaten and strangled in the basement of her family's home in Boulder, CO. 1998 - Iraq announced that it would fire on U.S. and British warplanes that patrol the skies over northern and southern Iraq. 1999 - Alfonso Portillo, a populist lawyer, won Guatemala's first peacetime presidential elections in 40 years. 2000 - Michael McDermott, age 42, opened fire at his place of employment killing seven people. McDermott had no criminal history. 2002 - The first cloned human baby was born. The announcement was made the December 27 by Clonaid. 2004 - Under the Indian Ocean, a 9.0 magnitude earthquake sent 500-mph waves across the Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal. The tsunami killed at least 283,000 people in a dozen countries, including Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Sumatra, Thailand and India.
1776 George Washington defeated the Hessians at Trenton. 1865 James H. Nason received a patent for a coffee percolator. 1966 The first Kwanzaa is celebrated. 1972 The 33rd president of the United States, Harry S. Truman, died in Kansas City, Mo. 1985 Zoologist Dian Fossey was found murdered in Rwanda. 1996 JonBenet Ramsey was found murdered in her Boulder, Colo., home. 2004 In the Indian Ocean, a 9.0 magnitude earthquake, the largest in 40 years, triggered a tsunami that ultimately killed more than 280,000.
The following links are to web sites that were used to complete this blog entry:
http://www.historyorb.com/today/events.php
http://on-this-day.com/onthisday/thedays/alldays/dec26.htm
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history
http://www.infoplease.com/dayinhistory
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