January 5


January 5 is the 5th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. There are
360 days remaining (361 in leap years).

Events

   * 1463 - Poet Francois Villon is banned from Paris
   * 1500 - Duke Ludovico Sforza conquers Milan
   * 1781 - American Revolutionary War: Richmond, Virginia is burned by
     British naval forces led by Benedict Arnold.
   * 1846 - The United States House of Representatives votes to stop sharing
     the Oregon Territory with the United Kingdom
   * 1895 - Dreyfus Affair: French officer Alfred Dreyfus is stripped of his
     rank and sentenced to life imprisonment on Devil's Island
   * 1896 - An Austrian newspaper reports that Wilhelm Roentgen discovered a
     type of radiation later known as X-rays.
   * 1900 - Irish leader John Edward Redmond calls for a revolt against
     British rule.
   * 1909 - Colombia recognizes the independence of Panama
   * 1914 - Ford Motor Company announces an eight-hour workday and a minimum
     wage of $5 for a day's labor.
   * 1925 - Nellie Tayloe Ross becomes the first female governor in the
     United States.
   * 1933 - Construction of the Golden Gate Bridge begins in San Francisco
     Bay.
   * 1940 - FM radio is demonstrated to the FCC for the first time.
   * 1944 - The London Daily Mail becomes the first transoceanic newspaper.
   * 1945 - The Soviet Union recognizes the new pro-Soviet government of
     Poland
   * 1948 - Warner Brothers shows the first color newsreel (Tournament of
     Roses Parade and the Rose Bowl).
   * 1957 - Major league baseballer Jackie Robinson retires.
   * 1961 - Television: Mr. Ed debuts.
   * 1968 - "Prague Spring" begins in Czechoslovakia
   * 1970 - Soap opera: All My Children premieres.
   * 1972 - President of the United States Richard Nixon orders the
     development of a space shuttle program.
   * 1980 - Hewlett-Packard announces release of its first personal computer
   * 1987 - President of the United States Ronald Reagan undergoes prostate
     surgery causing worries about his health.
   * 1993 - The oil tanker MV Braer runs aground on the coast of the
     Shetland Islands spilling 84,700 tonnes of oil.
   * 1993 - Washington state executes Westley Allan Dodd by hanging (the
     first legal hanging in America since 1965).
   * 1996 - Hamas operative Yahya Ayyash is killed by an Israeli-planted
     booby-trapped cell phone.
   * 2002 - Charles Bishop, a 15-year-old student pilot, crashes a light
     aircraft into a Tampa, Florida building, evoking fear of a copycat 9/11
     terrorist attack.

Births

   * 1717 - William Wildman Shute Barrington, British statesman (+ 1793)
   * 1779 - Stephen Decatur, American naval officer
   * 1855 - King Camp Gillette, inventor (+ 1932)
   * 1876 - Konrad Adenauer, German chancellor 1949-1963 (+ 1967)
   * 1893 - Paramahansa Yogananda, Indian guru
   * 1904 - Jeane Dixon, astrologer (+ 1997)
   * 1909 - Stephen Kleene, mathematician
   * 1913 - Jean-Pierre Aumont, actor
   * 1914 - George Reeves, actor (+ 1959)
   * 1921 - Friedrich DŸrrenmatt, writer (+ 1990)
   * 1923 - Sam Phillips, country music producer (+ 2003)
   * 1926 - Maria Schell, actress
   * 1928 - Walter Mondale, U.S. Senator, Democratic presidential nominee in
     1984
   * 1928 - Ali Bhutto, President and Prime Minister of Pakistan (+ 1979)
   * 1931 - Alvin Ailey, choreographer (+ 1989)
   * 1931 - Alfred Brendel, pianist
   * 1931 - Robert Duvall, actor and director
   * 1932 - Umberto Eco, philologist and writer
   * 1932 - Raisa Gorbachev, political consort, (+ 1999)
   * 1938 - King Juan Carlos of Spain
   * 1941 - Miyazaki Hayao, film maker
   * 1941 - Grady Thomas, singer (P-Funk)
   * 1942 - Charlie Rose, talk show host
   * 1946 - Diane Keaton, actress
   * 1953 - George Tenet, Director of the CIA
   * 1961 - Suzy Amis, actress
   * 1969 - Marilyn Manson, singer

Deaths

   * 1589 - Catherine de Medici, Queen of France
   * 1891 - Emma Abbott, american opera singer
   * 1922 - Ernest Shackleton, explorer
   * 1929 - Nikolai Nikolaevich Romanov, Grand Duke of Russia
   * 1933 - Calvin Coolidge, President of the United States
   * 1941 - Amy Johnson, aviator
   * 1943 - George Washington Carver, educator, activist, botanist
   * 1956 - Mistinguett (Jeanne Bourgeois), French singer
   * 1963 - Rogers Hornsby, Baseball Hall of Famer
   * 1970 - Max Born, physicist and recipient of the Nobel Prize in physics
     1954
        o Jock Yablonski, president of the United Mine Workers, is
          discovered dead with his family
   * 1971 - Douglas Shearer, pioneer motion-picture sound engineer
   * 1979 - Charles Mingus, musician
   * 1988 - Pete Maravich, basketball star
   * 1994 - Thomas P. 'Tip' O'Neill, Speaker of the House
   * 1996 - Yahya Ayyash, terrorist
   * 1998 - Sonny Bono, singer, actor, United States Representative
   * 2002 - Igor Cassini, gossip columnist ("Cholly Knickerbocker")
   * 2003 - Roy Jenkins, British politician

Holidays and observances

   * Catholicism - Feast day of St. John Neumann.