Historical Events on January 1

Events 1 - 200 of 484

• 153 BC Roman consuls begin their year in office

• 1 Origin of the Christian Era
• 69 Roman garrison of Mainz uprising
• 89 Governor Lucius Antonius Saturninus of Germany becomes emperor of Rome

• 313 Start of Roman (Pontifical) Indiction
• 404 Last gladiator competition in Rome
• 456 Gallo-Roman scholar Sidonius Apollinaris recites a panegyric in verse in honor of the Emperor Avitus in Rome
• 468 Gallo-Roman scholar Sidonius Apollinaris recites a panegyric in verse in honor of the Emperor Anthemius, his third panegyric, in Rome
• 630 Prophet Muhammad sets out with an army 10,000 strong to conquer Mecca
• 722 Hofmeier Charles Martel flees from bishop Willibrord
• 990 Russia adopts Julian calendar
• 1259 Michael VIII Palaiologos is proclaimed co-emperor of the Empire of Nicaea with his ward John IV Laskaris
• 1430 Jews of Sicily are no longer required to attend conversionist services
• 1438 Albert II of Habsburg crowned King of Hungary after the death of his father-in-law King Sigismund
• 1494 Juw Dekama elected potentate of Frisia

• 1515 Jews are expelled from Laibach in Austria
• 1527 Croatian nobles elect Ferdinand I of Austria as king of Croatia in the Parliament on Cetin
• 1573 Geuzen sets fire to Woudrichem

• 1592 Korean naval commander Admiral Yi Sun-sin begins his famous war diary "Nanjung ilgi" (included in UNESCO's Memory of the World 2013) [1]
• 1600 Scotland begins its numbered year on January 1 instead of 25 March.
• 1622 Papal Chancery adopts Jan 1 as beginning of the year (was Mar 25)

• 1660 Academia de Bellas Artes is founded in Seville with painter Bartolomé Esteban Murillo its first president
• 1660 General Moncks army battles with the Tweed on way to London

• 1673 Regular mail delivery begins between NY & Boston
• 1675 Don Carlos de Gurrea becomes Spanish land guardian of Southern Netherlands
• 1700 Protestant Western Europe (except England) begins using the Gregorian calendar
• 1700 Russia begins using the Anno Domini era and no longer uses the Anno Mundi era of the Byzantine Empire
• 1707 John V succeeds his father Pedro II as King of Portugal
• 1710 Paris merchant Jean Marius obtains 5-year royal privilege for his invention of a folding umbrella - first in Europe

• 1739 French explorer Jean-Baptiste Charles Bouvet de Lozier discovers the uninhabited Bouvet Island, the world's most remote island, near Antarctica [1]
• 1743 French explorers Louis-Joseph and François de La Vérendrye are the first Europeans to reach the foot of the Rocky Mountains at the Yellow River, having crossed the Great Plains [1]

• 1770 Date of action in the opera "Madeleine"
• 1772 First traveler's cheques go on sale in London, can be used in 90 European cities

• 1785 John Walter publishes the 1st issue of his newspaper "The Daily Universal Register", renamed "The Times" of London in 1788
• 1788 London's Daily Universal Registrar becomes the Times
• 1788 Quakers in Pennsylvania emancipate their slaves
• 1797 Albany replaces New York City as capital of New York
• 1798 Russia appoints 1st Jewish censor to censor Hebrew books
• 1800 Dutch East Indies Company dissolves
• 1801 The dwarf planet Ceres is discovered by Italian monk Giuseppe Piazzi

• 1803 Emperor Gia Long orders all bronze wares of the Tây Sơn Dynasty to be collected and melted into nine cannons for the Royal Citadel in Huế, Vietnam.
• 1804 Haiti gains independence from France (National Day), making it the only state ever founded by former slaves and without slavery
• 1805 World's first iron bridge opens to the public, crossing the Severn River at Coalbrookdale, England. Regarded as the symbol of the Industrial Revolution. [1]

• 1807 Curacao is taken by English (until March, 1816)
• 1808 African Benevolent Society (education) forms
• 1808 Congress prohibits importation of slaves
• 1808 Sierra Leone becomes a British colony
• 1809 Holland Brigade under Brigadier-General David Hendrik Chassé reaches Madrid (Napoleonic Wars)
• 1814 Field marshal Blucher's troops cross the Rhine at Kaub

• 1818 Official reopening of the White House
• 1826 Godert van der Capellen resigns as governor of Dutch-Indies
• 1827 Dutch Trade Company NHM gets opium monopoly on Java
• 1831 Slave plantation owner Charles Farquharson begins his diary at Prospect Hill Plantation, Watlings Island (San Salvador). Only plantation diary to survive from the Bahamas (ends Dec 1832). [1]

• 1833 British government demands Falkland islands
• 1833 Curacao census: 2,602 whites, 6,531 free people, 5,894 slaves
• 1834 German Tolunie goes into effect
• 1838 1st official horse race in South Australia-Adelaide
• 1840 1st recorded bowling match in US, Knickerbocker Alleys, NYC
• 1842 1st illustrated weekly magazine in US publishes 1st issue, NYC
• 1844 1st edition of New Rotterdam's Daily (3x per week)
• 1845 The Cobble Hill Tunnel in Brooklyn is completed
• 1846 Yucatan declares independence from Mexico
• 1847 Michigan is 1st state to abolish capital punishment
• 1848 Britain takes Mosquito Coast from Nicaragua
• 1851 City of Glasgow steamer inaugurates Philadelphia-Liverpool line
• 1852 1st US public bath opens in New York City
• 1852 National debt of Britain & Ireland is 765,126,582 pounds
• 1852 Netherlands begins issuing postage stamps
• 1853 1st practical fire engine (horse-drawn) in US enters service
• 1854 Presbyterian minister John Miller Dickey and his wife, Sarah Emlen Cresson, found Ashmun Institute, a Black college (later Lincoln University),in Hinsonville, Pennsylvania
• 1858 Canada begins using decimal currency system
• 1860 Slavery abolished in the Dutch East Indies for areas under direct rule
• 1861 Porfirio Díaz conquers Mexico City
• 1862 1st US income tax (3% of incomes > $600, 5% of incomes > $10,000)
• 1863 1st homestead under the Homestead Act claimed, near Beatrice, Nebraska
• 1863 Battle of Galveston, Texas-Confederates recapture the city

• 1871 Belgium disbands salt tax
• 1872 Moerdijk railway bridge over Hollands Diep, South Holland opens - then longest bridge in Europe
• 1873 Origin of Japanese Era
• 1874 New York City annexes the Bronx
• 1875 Britain's Midlands Railway abolishes second class travel, ending the practice of carrying third class passengers in open air wagons [1]
• 1876 The Reichsbank, central bank of the German Empire, opens in Berlin

• 1880 Building of Panama Canal begins

• 1890 Eritrea is consolidated into a colony by the Italian government.
• 1890 The Rose Parade, then known as the Tournament of Roses, is first held in Pasadena, California
• 1891 French troops occupy Nioro, West-Sudan, 3000 killed
• 1892 Ellis Island opens as a US immigration inspection station - it would go on to be the gateway to the US for more than 12 million people
• 1893 1st US college extension courses for credit, University of Chicago
• 1893 Japan adopts the Gregorian calendar
• 1893 The railway line from Germiston to Pretoria, South Africa, is opened to traffic
• 1894 Denmark adopts Mid-European time
• 1894 Manchester Ship Canal in England opens to traffic
• 1894 South African Amateur Athletic Union is founded in Johannesburg
• 1895 Norway adopts Mid-European time

• 1897 1st football game between black colleges-Atlanta U 10, Tuskegee 0
• 1898 Brooklyn merges with NY to form present City of NY

• 1898 Lightship replaces whistling buoy at mouth of San Francisco Bay
• 1899 Cuba liberated from Spanish rule by the US, American occupation continues till 1902

• 1900 British protectorates of Northern and Southern Nigeria are established
• 1900 Compulsory education in Netherlands goes into effect
• 1901 The Commonwealth of Australia is formed when the British (Imperial) Parliament Act, the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900, comes into effect
• 1902 1st Rose Bowl, Tournament Park, Pasadena, California: Michigan beats Stanford, 49-0; MVP: Neil Snow, Michigan, FB
• 1902 Nathan Stubblefield makes 1st public demonstration of radio, Pennsylvania

• 1904 Dutch East Indies government takes control of opium distribution
• 1906 Dutch law makes driver's license mandatory
• 1906 First permanent movie theater in Canada, The Ouimetoscope, is opened by Léo Ouimet in Montreal, Quebec
• 1906 The poll tax of £1 per head on all adult male inhabitants of Natal, South Africa, except indentured Indians and married Blacks, imposed by the Natal parliament in 1905, becomes payable.
• 1907 Joe Gans lands a devastating right to the head of Canadian challenger Kid Herman to retain his world lightweight boxing title with an 8th round knockout in Tonopah, Nevada
• 1907 US President Theodore Roosevelt shakes a record 8,513 hands in 1 day

• 1909 American Robert Fowler runs then world record marathon (2:52:45.4) at Yonkers, NY
• 1909 Drilling begins on the Lakeview Gusher
• 1909 In Great Britain, the Old Age Pension Law is finally instituted, providing pensions for every British subject over 70 with low income

• 1910 England cricket underhand bowler George Simpson-Hayward takes 6-43 on debut with underarm lobs in 1st Test against South Africa in Johannesburg; SA wins by 19 runs
• 1911 Belgian Mining law introduces 9½ hour work day
• 1911 South Australia transfers Northern Territory to federal government
• 1912 1st running of San Francisco's famed "Bay to Breakers" footrace (7.63 miles/12.3 km); first winner Robert Vlught 44:10

• 1913 US Post office begins parcel post deliveries
• 1914 1st scheduled airline flight, St Petersburg-Tampa (Tony Jannus pilot)
• 1914 Klaas ter Laan becomes The Netherlands 1st socialist mayor (Zaandam)
• 1914 Northern & Southern Nigeria united in British colony of Nigeria
• 1914 The St. Petersburg–Tampa Airboat Line becomes the world's first scheduled airline, covering the 18 mile distance 23 minutes. Service ceased after three months.
• 1915 DW Griffith shows "Clansman" at a sneak preview
• 1915 Jews of Laibach Austria expelled
• 1916 1st first blood transfusion using stored and cooled blood is performed
• 1916 1st issue of "Journal of Negro History" published

• 1918 Last day of the Julian calendar in Finland
• 1919 Battle of Jutland British naval commander David Beatty is promoted to full admiral
• 1919 Belorussian SSR established

• 1920 The Belorussian Communist Organisation is founded as a separate party.
• 1922 Coal miners in the Transvaal, South Africa, embark on a strike in response to a wage cut, which quickly escalated into a large-scale revolt against the government, known as the Rand Rebellion.
• 1922 Vancouver, British Columbia starts driving on the right side of road
• 1923 Britain's Railways are grouped into the Big Four: LNER, GWR, SR, and LMSR.
• 1923 Union of Socialist Soviet Republics established
• 1924 Grossdeutsche Volksgemeinschaft/Volkische Block replaces NSDAP

• 1925 Norway's capital Christiania changes name to Oslo
• 1926 Flood in Rhine strikes Cologne
• 1927 Brooklyn announces release of future Baseball Hall of Fame outfielder Zack Wheat after 18 consecutive seasons with Robins; Wheat hits .324 in final season with Philadelphia A's
• 1927 Communist uprising in West Java
• 1927 Turkey adopts the Gregorian calendar: December 18, 1926 (Julian), is immediately followed by January 1, 1927 (Gregorian).
• 1928 1st US air-conditioned office building opens, San Antonio
• 1928 Algemeene Vereeniging Radio Omroep (AVRO) begins broadcasting in the Netherlands
• 1930 Claus von Stauffenberg promoted to 2nd lieutenant
• 1930 Jurgens & Van den Berg merge with Lever Brothers to form Unilever
• 1932 Jacob Cocey Sr chosen as Mayor of Massillon, Ohio

• 1932 The United States Post Office Department issues a set of 12 stamps commemorating the 200th anniversary of George Washington's birth.
• 1934 Alcatraz officially becomes a federal prison
• 1934 Federal Deposit Insurance Corp (US bank guarantor) effective
• 1934 International Telecommunication Union established
• 1934 Nazi Germany passes the "Law for the Prevention of Genetically Diseased Offspring".
• 1935 1st Orange Bowl: Bucknell beats Miami (FL), 26-0
• 1935 Associated Press inaugurates Wirephoto
• 1935 Eastern Airlines hires Eddie Rickenbacker as GM
• 1935 President Mustapha Kemal Pasha names himself "Ataturk: Father of Turkey"
• 1936 1st newspaper to microfilm its current issues, NY Herald Tribune
• 1937 Anastasio Somoza García becomes President of Nicaragua
• 1937 German officer Claus von Stauffenberg promoted to captain
• 1937 Safety glass in vehicle windscreens becomes mandatory in Great Britain.
• 1937 US Army Air Corps physiological research laboratory completed, Ohio

• 1939 Sydney, Australia, swelters in 45 ˚C (113 ˚F) heat, a record for the city.
• 1941 Netherlands begins taxing wages

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