December 22......

December 22 is the 356th day of the year (357th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 9 days remaining in the year on this date.

EVENTS

● 401 - St. Innocent I begins his reign as Catholic Pope

● 795 - Leo III succeeds pope Adrianus I

● 1135 - Norman nobles recognize Stefanus van Blois as English king

● 1216 - Pope Honorius III officially approved the Order of Preachers (Dominicans), founded in 1216 by St. Dominic. During the Middle Ages, many leaders of European thought were Dominicans; and a good number followed Portuguese and Spanish explorers to the Americas as missionaries.

● 1216 - Pope Honorius III delegates degree "Religiosam vitam eligentibus"

● 1440 - Execution of Bluebeard the pirate.

● 1465 - Peace of St Truiden: Louis van Bourbon becomes bishop of Luik

● 1536 - English scholar Reginald Pole appointed cardinal

● 1596 - Ferryboat Meuniers crashes in Paris, 150 die

● 1603 - Mehmed III Sultan of the Ottoman Empire dies and is succeeded by his son Ahmed I.

● 1642 - Pope Urbanus VIII publishes degree In eminente

● 1688 - Pro-James II, Earl of Danby occupies York

● 1689 - Heavy earthquake strikes Innsbruck

● 1715 - James Stuart (James III), the "Old Pretender", landed at Petershead after his exile in France.

● 1731 - Dutch people revolt against meat tax.

● 1770 - Birth of Father Demetrius Gallitzin, a Dutch Catholic priest. Arriving in America in 1792, he spent his remaining years as a frontier missionary, building up the Catholic church in parts of PA, MD, VA and WV. Gallitzin became known as the "Apostle to the Alleghenies."

● 1772 - Moravian missionary constructs 1st schoolhouse west of Allegheny

● 1775 - A Continental naval fleet with 7 ships was organized in the rebellious American colonies under the command of Ezek Hopkins.

● 1783 - Washington resigns his military commission as US Army's commander-in-chief

● 1790 - Russian troops occupy Turkish fortress Izmail.

● 1804 - Anglican missionary to Persia Henry Martyn wrote in his journal: 'I look forward to a day of prayer; for my soul hath great need of quickening and restoration, that it may act more in the view of eternity.'

● 1807 - The U.S. Congress passed the Embargo Act, designed to force peace between Britain and France by cutting off all trade with Europe, is passed by the U.S. Congress, at the urging of President Thomas Jefferson.

● 1809 - The Non-Intercourse Act, lifting the Embargo Act except for the United Kingdom and France, passes the U.S. Congress.

● 1810 - British frigate Minotaur sinks killing 480

● 1815 - Jose Maria Morelos dies. Mexican revolutionary priest executed by Spaniards.

● 1830 - State of Georgia makes it unlawful for Cherokee to meet in council, unless it is for the purpose of giving land to whites.

● 1832 - HMS Beagle/Charles Darwin reaches Barnevelts Islands

● 1837 - Mercer University was chartered in Penfield, Georgia under Baptist support. In 1871 the college moved its campus to Macon, Georgia.

● 1849 - Fyodor Dostoevsky led out for execution, then pardoned at the last moment.

● 1851 - The first freight train is operated in Roorkee in India.

● 1862 - Raid on Morgan's: Bardstown to Elizabethtown KY

● 1864 - During the American Civil War, Union Gen. William T. Sherman sent a message to U.S. President Lincoln from Georgia. The message read, "I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah."

● 1864 - Savannah, Georgia falls to General William Tecumseh Sherman, concluding his "March to the Sea".

● 1870 - Jules Janssen flies in a balloon in order to study a solar eclipse

● 1877 - "American Bicycling Journal" first published (Boston MA)

● 1882 - 1st string of Christmas tree lights created by Thomas Edison

● 1885 - Ito Hirobumi, a samurai, became the first Prime Minister of Japan.

● 1885 - Pope Leo XIII proclaims extraordinary jubilee

● 1886 - 1st national accountants' society in US formed (New York NY)

● 1894 - The Dreyfus affair begins, in France, when Alfred Dreyfus is wrongly convicted of treason, on antisemitic grounds. (Dreyfus was eventually vindicated.)

● 1894 - United States Golf Association is formed (New York NY)

● 1894 - Dutch coast hit by hurricane

● 1895 - German physicist Wilhelm Röntgen made the first X-ray, of his wife's hand.

● 1905 - Revolutionary uprising against the Tsar begins in Moscow.

● 1907 - Dame Peggy Ashcroft, the British stage actress , was born.

● 1910 - U.S. Postal savings stamps were issued for the first time. They were discontinued in 1914.

● 1917 - Flanders declares it's independence, under Pieter Tack

● 1919 - Government of Ireland Act of Power (Home Rule for Ireland)

● 1919 - US deports 250 alien radicals, including anarchist Emma Goldman

● 1920 - John Northcutt, militant coal miners' leader, killed.

● 1920 - Opening of 8-th All-Russia congress of Advice in Moscow (on December, 29th). The statement of the GOELRO plan.

● 1921 - The first U.S. commercial radio license assigned to a religious broadcaster was awarded to the National Presbyterian Church of Washington, D.C. Within five years, there were over 60 other licensed religious broadcasters, including KJS-Biola (L.A.), KFUO-Concordia Seminary (St. Louis), and WMBI-Moody Bible Institute (Chicago).

● 1922 - The anarcho-syndicalist International Working Men's Association (IWA) founded, Berlin.

● 1922 - Belgian parliament rejects Dutch University in Ghent

● 1930 - 6 West Europe lands signs Convention of Oslo

● 1934 - 1st flight from Netherlands to Curaçao (Christmas flight 1934)

● 1935 - Yaeko Iwasaki, student of D S Harada Roshi, 1st awakening in Kamakura

● 1936 - 1st common carrier license issued by ICC, Scranton PA

● 1937 - Frank Ade jailed 21 days for war tax resistance, Britain.

● 1937 - Lincoln Tunnel (New York NY) opens to traffic

● 1939 - Gloria Jacobs became the first girl to hold a world pistol record when she shot 299 out of a possible 300 points. She was 17 years old at the time.

● 1939 - 125 die in train wreck at Magdeburg Germany; 99 die in 2nd wreck at Friedrichshafen Germany

● 1939 - Finnish counter offensive at Petsamo

● 1941 - Prime Minister Winston Churchill arrives in Washington DC for a wartime conference with U.S. President Roosevelt.

● 1941 - Japan's invasion leader lands on Luzon, Philippines

● 1941 - Tito establishes 1st Proletarian Brigade in Yugoslavia

● 1942 - Avalanche buries bus full of defense workers at Aliquippa, Pennsylvania. 22 die.

● 1943 - Four month strike by 23 conscientious objectors ends dining hall segregation at Danbury Federal Penitentiary, Connecticut.

● 1943 - WEB Du Bois elected 1st black member, National Institute of Arts & Letters

● 1943 - Sporting goods manufacturers received permission to use synthetic rubber for the core of baseballs.

● 1944 - World War II: German troops demand the surrender of United States troops at Bastogne, Belgium, prompting the famous one word reply by General Anthony McAuliffe: "NUTS!"

● 1944 - World War II: Vietnam People's Army is formed to resist Japanese occupation of Vietnam.

● 1944 - Sub Swordfish departs Pearl Harbor for Japan

● 1945 - Utrecht: Catholic People's party (KVP) established

● 1947 - Italian constituent assembly adopts new constitution

● 1950 - 2 self-propelled trains of Long Island RR collide, killing 77

● 1952 - French government of Pinay, resigns

● 1956 - Manuel Devaldes (aka Ernest-Edmond Lohy) dies. Anarchist, pacifist, and neo-Malthusian.

● 1956 - Last British/French troops leave Egypt

● 1956 - Colo, the first gorilla to be born in captivity, was born at the Columbus, Ohio zoo.

● 1958 - 2nd Dutch Beel government forms

● 1961 - James Davis became the first U.S. soldier to die in Vietnam, while U.S. involvement was still limited to the provision of military advisers.

● 1961 - US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site

● 1962 - Kinderman Place in the Bronx named

● 1962 - 1,000,000th NBA point scored

● 1962 - Harris County voters approve all-weather stadium for Houston Colt .45s

● 1962 - USSR performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya USSR

● 1963 - Cruise ship Lakonia burns 180 miles north of Madeira with the loss of 128 lives.

● 1963 - Official 30-day mourning period for President John F Kennedy ends

● 1964 - First SR-71 (Blackbird) flight. Lockheed SR-71 spy aircraft reaches 3,530 kph (record for a jet)

● 1964 - Comedian Lenny Bruce is convicted of obscenity.

● 1965 - Henry House becomes first U.S. soldier to be courtmartialed for protesting against Vietnam War.

● 1965 - Radio Mil (Dominican Republic) transmitter blown up

● 1965 - Belgian government shuts 6 coal mine

● 1965 - Director David Lean's "Dr Zhivago" premieres

● 1965 - In the United Kingdom, a 70mph speed limit is applied to all rural roads including motorways for the first time. Previously, there had been no speed limit.

● 1968 - All but one of the 83 crew members of the U.S. Navy spy ship Pueblo are released, 11 months after the ship is seized without a struggle by North Korean patrol boats for violating territorial waters in the Sea of Japan.

● 1968 - Julie Nixon weds Dwight David Eisenhower

● 1970 - SS Commander Franz Stangl of Treblinka, sentenced to life imprisonment

● 1971 - UN General Assembly ratifies Kurt Waldheim as Secretary-General

● 1971 - USSR performs underground nuclear test

● 1972 - U.S. again bombs the Bach Mai Hospital in the center of Hanoi, destroying it and allegedly killing 25 doctors, pharmacists, and nurses.

● 1972 - Survivors found 10 weeks after plane crash; The Chilean Air Force finds 14 survivors two months after their plane crashed in the Andes.

● 1972 - 6.25 earthquake strikes Managua Nicaragua, 12,000+ killed

● 1974 - Hopi and Navajo Relocation Act passed by Congress to get those inconvenient Indians at Big Mountain, Arizona, away from lucrative coal deposits. Big Mountain families have been resisting this forced racial relocation ever since.

● 1974 - Grande Comore, Anjouan and Mohéli vote to become the independent nation of Comoros. Mayotte remains under French administration.

● 1974 - Heath's home is bombed; Terrorists bomb the home of the Conservative leader and former Prime Minister Edward Heath.

● 1974 - 2nd cease-fire between IRA & British; lasts until approximately April 1975

● 1976 - Worst oil spill off U.S. coast -- Liberian tanker off Nantucket.

● 1976 - 35 Unification church couples wed in New York NY

● 1976 - The last show of "Let’s Make A Deal" was aired. (Possibly they thought they could never top 35 weddings at once.)

● 1976 - German Democratic Republic banishes singer Nina Hagen

● 1977 - 36 die as grain elevator at Continental Grain Company plant explodes

● 1978 - Thailand adopts constitution

● 1980 - President-elect Reagan appoints Jean Kirkpatrick (UN delegate) & James “Let’s rape the Earth for all its worth” Watt (Interior)

● 1981 - Argentine General Leopoldo Galtieri sworn in as president

● 1981 - Belgium's 5th government of Martens forms

● 1982 - Congress passes first version Boland amendment (411-0) which prohibited covert efforts by the President to overthrow the Nicaraguan government. Therefore, he ordered someone else to do it.

● 1983 - Egyptian President Mubarak meets with PLO leader Yasser Arafat

● 1984 - Bernhard Goetz, riding on New York City subway, shoots and wounds four teen-age boys after one of them demands five dollars. Becomes a pop culture vigilante hero.

● 1985 - STS 51-L vehicle moves to Launch Pad 39B

● 1988 - Chico Mendes, a Brazilian rubber tapper, unionist and environmental activist, is assassinated.

● 1988 - 2 robbers wearing police uniforms rob armored truck of $3 million in New Jersey

● 1988 - Cease-fire announced by Angola, Cuba and South Africa in preparation for Namibian independence.

● 1988 - South Africa signs accord granting independence to South-West Africa

● 1988 - Tug hits oil barge, spreads 231,000 gal on 300 miles of Western Australia & British Columbia coast

● 1989 - Playwright Samuel Beckett died in Paris at age 83.

● 1989 - After a week of bloody demonstrations, Ion Iliescu takes over as president of Romania, ending Nicolae Ceauşescu's Communist 23 years of dictatorial rule. He is executed three days later. Of the numerous "velvet curtain" revolutions of that year, the only one where the protagonists used violence to unseat the government.

● 1989 - Berlin's Brandenburg Gate re-opens after nearly 30 years, effectively ending the division of East and West Germany.

● 1989 - Two tourist coaches collide on the Pacific Highway north of Kempsey NSW (Kempsey bus crash).

● 1989 - Cold wave: -4ºF in Oklahoma City OK, -6ºF in Tulsa OK, -12ºF in Pittsburgh PA, -18ºF in Denver CO, -23ºF in Kansas City MO, -42ºF in Scottsbluff NE, -47ºF in Hardin MT & -60ºF in Black Hills SD

● 1989 - Chad adopts its Constitution

● 1990 - Iraq announces it will never give up Kuwait

● 1990 - Israeli ferry capsizes killing 21 US servicemen

● 1990 - Lech Walesa sworn in as Poland's 1st popularly elected president

● 1991 - The body of Lt. Col. William R. Higgins, an American hostage murdered by his captors, was found along a highway in Lebanon.

● 1992 - Libyan MIG-23UB attacks Boeing 727 at Souk al-Sabt, 158 die

● 1993 - "Operation Toys for Guns" begins in New York City.

● 1993 - Native Title Act restores some land and rights lost by aborigines, Australia.

● 1994 - Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi resigns

● 1996 - A car bomb exploded in Belfast, injuring a known IRA supporter. Police suspected that Protestant loyalists were responsible for the attack. (DUH?)

● 1997 - BSE inquiry to be 'far-reaching'; An independent inquiry into the BSE "disaster" and the devastation it wreaked on British farming is announced.

● 1997 - Merck baldness pill for men approved by FDA

● 1997 - Acteal massacre: Attendees at a prayer meeting of Roman Catholic activists for indigenous causes in the small village of Acteal in the Mexican state of Chiapas are massacred. Paramilitaries associated with the ruling PRI party massacre 45 peasants. Government will use this to expel humanitarian observers and to occupy and suppress the population with over 70,000 troops in the area.

● 1998 - A unit of RJR Nabsico pled guilty to attempting to smuggle cigarettes into Canada.

● 1999 - The Spanish Civil Guard finds near Calatayud (Zaragoza) a van loaded by ETA with 750 kg of explosives.

● 1999 - Tandja Mamadou becomes President of Niger.

● 2000 - Madonna weds her Guy; The American superstar marries British film maker Guy Ritchie at an exclusive ceremony in a Scottish castle hours after their son is christened.

● 2001 - Thirty Afghans, including two women, were sworn in as part of the new interim government in Afghanistan. Hamid Karzai was the head of the post-Taliban government.

● 2001 - Burhanuddin Rabbani, political leader of the Afghan Northern Alliance, hands over power in Afghanistan to the interim government headed by President Hamid Karzai.

● 2001 - Richard C. Reid, a passenger on American Airlines flight 63 from Paris to Miami, tried to ignite explosives in his shoes, but was subdued by flight attendants and fellow passengers.

● 2001 - CC the cat, the first cloned pet, is born.

● 2002 - Rock musician Joe Strummer (The Clash) died at age 50.

● 2003 - Hostages freed by Colombian rebels; Guerrillas in Colombia release the Briton Mark Henderson and four Israelis who were kidnapped in September.

● 2005 - New York transit workers ended their three-day strike without a new contract.

● 2005 - Astronomers announced the discovery of two more rings encircling the planet Uranus.

BIRTHS

● 1178 - Emperor Antoku of Japan (d. 1185)

● 1639 - Jean Racine, French dramatist (d. 1699)

● 1666 - Guru Gobind Singh, Sikh guru (d. 1708)

● 1690 - Meidingnu Pamheiba, King of Manipur (d. 1751)

● 1694 - Hermann Samuel Reimarus, German philosopher and writer (d. 1768)

● 1696 - James Oglethorpe, English general and founder of the state of Georgia (d. 1785)

● 1723 - Karl Friedrich Abel, German composer (d. 1787)

● 1765 - Johann Friedrich Pfaff, German mathematician (d. 1825)

● 1805 - John Obadiah Westwood, British entomologist (d. 1893)

● 1807 - Johann Sebastian Welhaven, Norwegian poet (d. 1873)

● 1819 - Franz Wilhelm Abt, German composer (d. 1870)

● 1819 - Pierre Ossian Bonnet, French mathematician (d. 1892)

● 1823 - Jean Henri Fabre, French entomologist (d. 1915)

● 1823 - Thomas Higginson, American abolitionist (d. 1911)

● 1853 - Teresa Carreño, Venezuelan pianist (d. 1917)

● 1853 - Yevgraf Fyodorov, Russian mathematician (d. 1919)

● 1856 - Frank B. Kellogg, U.S. Secretary of State, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1937)

● 1858 - Giacomo Puccini, Italian composer (d. 1924)

● 1860 - Austin Norman Palmer, American penmanship innovator (d. 1927)

● 1862 - Connie Mack, baseball executive and manager (d. 1956)

● 1869 - Edwin Arlington Robinson, American poet (d. 1935)

● 1869 - Dmitri Egorov, Russian mathematician (d. 1931)

● 1872 - Camille Guérin, French veterinarian and bacteriologist (d. 1961)

● 1874 - Franz Schmidt, Austrian composer (d. 1939)

● 1876 - Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Italian-born French novelist, poet, and dramatist; founded Futurist artistic movement (d. 1944)

● 1883 - Edgard Varèse French-born composer (d. 1965)

● 1887 - Srinivasa Ramanujan, Indian mathematician (d. 1920)

● 1888 - J. Arthur Rank, British film producer (d. 1972)

● 1898 - Vladimir Aleksandrovich Fock, Russian physicist (d. 1974)

● 1899 - Gustav Gründgens, German actor and director (d. 1963)

● 1901 - André Kostelanetz, American popular music orchestra leader and arranger (d. 1980)

● 1903 - Haldan Keffer Hartline, American physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1983)

● 1905 - Kenneth Rexroth, American poet (d. 1982)

● 1905 - Pierre Brasseur, French actor (d. 1972)

● 1907 - Dame Peggy Ashcroft, English actress (d. 1991)

● 1908 - Giacomo Manzu, Italian sculptor (d. 1991)

● 1909 - Patricia Hayes, actress on 'Carry On' series, Mama The Turk in "Superbitch"(1973) (d. 1998)

● 1912 - Lady Bird Johnson, First Lady of the United States

● 1915 - Barbara Billingsley, American actress

● 1917 - Gene Rayburn, American game show host (d. 1999)

● 1921 - Hawkshaw Hawkins, American country singer (d. 1963)

● 1922 - Jim Wright, Former House speaker

● 1922 - Jack Brooks, American politician

● 1922 - Ruth Roman, American actress (d. 1999)

● 1925 - Lewis Glucksman, American financier and philantrophist (d. 2006)

● 1934 - David Pearson, NASCAR Driver 1960-1986

● 1936 - Hector Elizondo, Actor

● 1936 - Wojciech Frykowski, Polish actor, writer, and Manson murder victim (d. 1969)

● 1937 - Eduard Uspensky, Russian writer

● 1938 - Red Steagall, Country singer

● 1938 - Matty Alou, Baseball player

● 1938 - Lucien Bouchard, Quebec politician, Premier of Quebec

● 1939 - James Gurley, American musician

● 1942 - Dick Parry, English musician (Pink Floyd)

● 1943 - Paul Wolfowitz, American politician, World Bank president, and Bush apologist

● 1944 - Steve Carlton, baseball player

● 1945 - Diane Sawyer, American journalist (''Good Morning America'')

● 1946 - Rick Nielsen, American musician (Cheap Trick)

● 1948 - Lynne Thigpen, American actress (d. 2003)

● 1948 - Noel Edmonds, UK game show host

● 1948 - Patricia Hewitt, Senior British Labour Politician

● 1948 - Steve Garvey, Major League Baseball player

● 1949 - Maurice Gibb, English musician (The Bee Gees) (d. 2003)

● 1949 - Robin Gibb, English musician (The Bee Gees)

● 1951 - Jan Stephenson, Golfer

● 1951 - Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor, Duke of Westminster

● 1953 - BernNadette Stanis, African American Actress and Author

● 1953 - Ian Turnbull, Canadian ice hockey player

● 1955 - Lonnie Smith, Major League Baseball player

● 1957 - Carole James, Canadian politician

● 1958 - Frank Gambale, Australian guitarist

● 1958 - Mikael Nordfors, Swedish physician and author

● 1959 - Bernd Schuster, German footballer

● 1960 - Luther Campbell, Rapper (2 Live Crew)

● 1960 - Chuck Mead, Country musician (BR549)

● 1960 - Jean-Michel Basquiat, American artist

● 1960 - Patrick Fitzgerald, US Attorney

● 1961 - Andrew Fastow, Enron CFO, convicted of fraud

● 1962 - Ralph Fiennes, English actor

● 1966 - Dmitry Bilozerchev, Soviet gymnast

● 1967 - Dan Petrescu, Romanian footballer

● 1967 - Richey James Edwards, Manic Street Preachers songwriter/guitarist, (missing since 1995)

● 1967 - Stéphane Gendron, Quebec politician and radio and television host

● 1969 - Lauralee Bell, Actress (''The Young and the Restless'')

● 1969 - Dina Meyer, Actress

● 1969 - Myriam Bédard, Canadian athlete

● 1972 - Big Tigger, African American T.V. Host

● 1972 - Vanessa Paradis, French singer and actress

● 1974 - Heather Donahue, American actress, famous for her role in The Blair Witch Project

● 1975 - Crissy Moran, American erotic actress

● 1975 - Stanislav Neckář, Czech ice hockey player

● 1977 - Steve Kariya, Canadian ice hockey player

● 1980 - Chris Carmack, Actor

● 1980 - Devin Anderson, American composer

● 1980 - Lee Eun-ju, South Korean actress (d. 2005)

● 1983 - Jennifer Hawkins, Miss Universe 2004

● 1984 - Jonas Altberg, Swedish musician (Basshunter)

● 1993 - Aliana Lohan, American singer, model and actress

DEATHS

● 1100 - Duke Bretislaus II of Bohemia

● 1603 - Mehmed III, Ottoman Emperor (b. 1566)

● 1646 - Peter Mogila, Orthodox Metropolitan of Kiev and Galicia (b. 1596)

● 1660 - André Tacquet, Belgian mathematician (b. 1612)

● 1681 - Richard Alleine, English Puritan clergyman (b. 1611)

● 1708 - Hedwig Sophia, duchess of Holstein-Gottorp, Swedish writer (b. 1681)

● 1738 - Constantia Jones, British prostitute (executed)

● 1767 - John Newbery, English publisher (b. 1713)

● 1788 - Percivall Pott, English physician and surgeon (b. 1714)

● 1806 - William Vernon, American merchant (b. 1719)

● 1867 - Jean-Victor Poncelet, French mathematician (b. 1788)

● 1870 - Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, Spanish poet and writer (b. 1836)

● 1828 - William Hyde Wollaston, English chemist (b. 1766)

● 1880 - George Eliot, English writer (b. 1819)

● 1899 - Dwight L. Moody, American evangelist (b. 1837)

● 1902 - Richard von Krafft-Ebing, German psychiatrist (b. 1840)

● 1917 - Mother Cabrini, first American citizen canonized by the Catholic Church (b. 1850)

● 1936 - Dragutin Gorjanovic-Kramberger, Croatian paleontologist (b. 1856)

● 1939 - Ma Rainey, American singer (b. 1886)

● 1940 - Nathanael West, American writer (b. 1903)

● 1942 - Franz Boas, German anthropologist (b. 1858)

● 1943 - Beatrix Potter, English writer (b. 1866)

● 1944 - Harry Langdon, American silent film actor (b. 1884)

● 1947 - Hans Aumeier, German Nazi official and concentration camp commandant (b. 1906)

● 1959 - Gilda Gray, Polish-born American dancer and actress (b. 1901)

● 1965 - Richard Dimbleby, English journalist and broadcaster (b. 1913)

● 1971 - Godfried Bomans, Dutch author and television personality (b. 1913)

● 1979 - Darryl F. Zanuck, American producer (b. 1902)

● 1980 - Karl Dönitz, German politician and U-boat commander (b. 1891)

● 1985 - D. Boon, American singer and guitarist (The Minutemen) (b. 1958)

● 1988 - Chico Mendes, Brazilian rubber tapper, unionist, and environmental activist (assassinated) (b. 1944)

● 1989 - Samuel Beckett, Irish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1906)

● 1993 - Don DeFore, American actor (b. 1913)

● 1995 - Butterfly McQueen, American actress (b. 1911)

● 1995 - James Meade, English economist, Bank of Sweden Prize winner (b. 1907)

● 1998 - Michelle Thomas, American actress (b. 1969)

● 2002 - Desmond Hoyte, President of Guyana (b. 1929)

● 2002 - Joe Strummer, British musician (The Clash) (b. 1952)

● 2003 - Dave Dudley, American singer (b. 1928)

● 2004 - Doug Ault, baseball player (b. 1950)

HOLIDAYS AND OBSERVANCES

● Roman Catholic:
● St. Frances Xavier Cabrini
● St. O Rex
● St. Amaswinthus
● St. Zeno
● St. Chaeromon
● St. Demetrius
● St. Flavian
● St. Hunger

● Russian Orthodox Christian Menaion Calendar for December 9 (Civil Date: December 22)
● Nativity Fast.
● The Conception by St. Anna of the Most
● Prophetess Anna (Hannah), mother of Prophet Samuel.
● St. Stephen the "New Light" of Constantinople.
● St. Sophronius, Archbishop of Cyprus.

● Greek Calendar:
● Martyr Sositheus.
● Martyr Narses of Persia.
● Martyr Isaac.
● Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos "Unexpected Joy".

● Japan - Tōji (winter solstice)

● In the Northern Hemisphere, the winter solstice (longest night and shortest day) occurs on or very close to this date. In the Southern Hemisphere, the summer solstice (longest day and shortest night) occurs around this time.

● Astrology: First day of sun sign Capricorn

● Spain: the main draw of Spanish National Lottery, where it is a Christmas tradition.

● Arab : Ashura

● México : Day of National Mourning (José Maria Morelos) (1815)

● World : International Arbor Day

● Wicca : Yule sabbat


Click on this LINK to see original Wikipedia list with many having links with details.

Additional facts taken from:

On this day in the New York Times

The BBC’s Take on the day

On This Day Website

Scope Systems Any Day Website

Geov Parrish's this Day in Radical History, things that happened on this day that you never had to memorize in school.

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