Events
December 29
1170
– Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, is
assassinated inside Canterbury Cathedral by followers
of King Henry II; he subsequently becomes a saint
and martyr in the Anglican Church and the Catholic
Church.
1778 – American Revolutionary War: 3,000 British
soldiers under the command of Lieutenant Colonel
Archibald Campbell capture Savannah, Georgia.
1786 – French Revolution: The Assembly of Notables
is convened.
1812 – The USS Constitution under the command
of Captain William Bainbridge, captures the HMS
Java off the coast of Brazil after a three hour
battle.
1813 – British soldiers burn Buffalo, New York
during the War of 1812.
1835 – The Treaty of New Echota is signed, ceding
all the lands of the Cherokee east of the Mississippi
River to the United States.
1845 – In accordance with International Boundary
delimitation, United States annexes the Mexican
state of Texas, following the Manifest Destiny
doctrine. The Republic of Texas, which had been
independent since the Texas Revolution of 1836,
is thereupon admitted as the 28th U.S. state.
1851 – The first American YMCA opens in Boston,
Massachusetts.
1860 – The first British seagoing iron-clad warship,
HMS Warrior is launched.
1876 – The Ashtabula River Railroad bridge disaster
occurs, leaving 64 injured and 92 dead at Ashtabula,
Ohio.
1890 – United States soldiers kill more than 200
Oglala Lakota people with four Hotchkiss guns
in the Wounded Knee Massacre.
1911 – Sun Yat-sen becomes the provisional President
of the Republic of China; he formally takes office
on January 1, 1912.
1911 – Mongolia gains independence from the Qing
dynasty.
1914 – A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,
the first novel by James Joyce, is serialised
in The Egoist.
1930 – Sir Muhammad Iqbal's presidential address
in Allahabad introduces the Two-Nation Theory
and outlines a vision for the creation of Pakistan.
1934 – Japan renounces the Washington Naval Treaty
of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930.
1937 – The Irish Free State is replaced by a new
state called Ireland with the adoption of a new
constitution.
1939 – First flight of the Consolidated B-24 Liberator.
1940 – World War II: In The Second Great Fire
of London, the Luftwaffe fire-bombs London, killing
almost 200 civilians.
1949 – KC2XAK of Bridgeport, Connecticut becomes
the first Ultra high frequency (UHF) television
station to operate a daily schedule.
1959 – Physicist Richard Feynman gives a speech
entitled "There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom",
which is regarded as the birth of nanotechnology.
1959 – The Lisbon Metro begins operation.
1972 – An Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 (a Lockheed
Tristar) crashes on approach to Miami International
Airport, Florida, killing 101.
1975 – A bomb explodes at LaGuardia Airport in
New York, New York, killing 11 people and injuring
74.
1989 – Riots break-out after Hong Kong decides
to forcibly repatriate Vietnamese refugees.
1992 – Fernando Collor de Mello, president of
Brazil, tries to resign amidst corruption charges,
but is then impeached.
1996 – Guatemala and leaders of Guatemalan National
Revolutionary Union sign a peace accord ending
a 36-year civil war.
1997 – Hong Kong begins to kill all the nation's
1.25 million chickens to stop the spread of a
potentially deadly influenza strain.
1998 – Leaders of the Khmer Rouge apologize for
the 1970s genocide in Cambodia that claimed over
1 million lives.
2001 – A fire at the Mesa Redonda shopping center
in Lima, Peru, kills at least 291.
2003 – The last known speaker of Akkala Sami dies,
rendering the language extinct.
Holidays
and observances
Christian
Feast Day:
Thomas Becket
Trophimus of Arles
Constitution Day (Ireland)
Independence Day (Mongolia)
The fifth day of Christmas (Western Christianity)
For details, contact Datacentre
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