This Day in History

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January 14

Today is Ratification Day in the United States, celebrating the anniversary of the ratification of the 1783 Treaty of Paris.


Events

1539 – Spain annexes Cuba.

1639 – The "Fundamental Orders", the first written constitution that created a government, is adopted in Connecticut.

1784 – American Revolutionary War: Ratification Day, United States - Congress ratifies the Treaty of Paris with Great Britain.

1911 – Roald Amundsen's South Pole expedition makes landfall on the eastern edge of the Ross Ice Shelf.

1943 – World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill begin the Casablanca Conference to discuss strategy and study the next phase of the war.

1943 – World War II: Franklin D. Roosevelt becomes the first President of the United States to travel by airplane while in office when he travels from Miami to Morocco, to meet with Winston Churchill, where they discuss strategy and study the next phase of the war.

1950 – The first prototype of the MiG-17 makes its maiden flight.

1952 – NBC's long-running morning news program Today debuts, with host Dave Garroway.

1954 – The Hudson Motor Car Company merges with Nash-Kelvinator Corporation forming the American Motors Corporation.

1960 – The Reserve Bank of Australia, the country's central bank and banknote issuing authority, is established.

1967 – Counterculture of the 1960s: The Human Be-In takes place in San Francisco, California's Golden Gate Park, launching the Summer of Love.

1969 – An accidental explosion aboard the USS Enterprise near Hawaii kills 27 people.

1973 – Elvis Presley's concert Aloha from Hawaii is broadcast live via satellite, and sets the record as the most watched broadcast by an individual entertainer in television history.

2004 – The national flag of the Republic of Georgia, the so-called "five cross flag", is restored to official use after a hiatus of some 500 years.

2011 – Former president of Tunisia, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali flees his country to Saudi Arabia after a series of street demonstrations against his regime and corrupt policies, asking for freedom, rights and democracy, considered as the anniversary of the Tunisian Revolution and the birth of the Arab Spring.

2015 – Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson completed the first-ever free climb of the Dawn Wall of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park.

Births

83 BC– Mark Antony; 1741 – Benedict Arnold; 1875 – Albert Schweitzer; 1886 – Hugh Lofting (created Doctor Dolittle); 1892 – Hal Roach; 1896 – John Dos Passos; 1906 – William Bendix; 1915 – Mark Goodson (created Family Feud and The Price Is Right); 1919 – Andy Rooney; 1926 – Tom Tryon; 1932 – Big Daddy Don Garlits; 1936 – Clarence Carter♪ ♫("Clarence Carter!, Clarence Carter!, Clarence Carter!, Clarence Carter!, oooohh shit!, Clarence Carter!"); 1938 – Allen Toussaint; 1941 – Faye Dunaway; 1943 – Shannon Lucid (astronaut); 1948 – T Bone Burnett; 1948 – Carl Weathers; 1949 – Lawrence Kasdan; 1952 – Sydney Biddle Barrows; 1963 – Steven Soderbergh; 1964 – Shepard Smith; 1967 - Zakk Wylde(Ozzy, Black Label Society); 1969 – Jason Bateman (Hancock); 1969 – Dave Grohl(Nirvana, Foo Fighters); 1982 - Caleb Followill♪ ♫(Kings of Leon)

Deaths

1742 – Edmond Halley; 1898 – Lewis Carroll (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland); 1920 – John Francis Dodge (co-founded the Dodge Automobile Company); 1957 – Humphrey Bogart; 1961 – Barry Fitzgerald; 1965 – Jeanette MacDonald; 1977 – Peter Finch (He was mad as hell and he wasn't going to take it anymore.); 1977 – Anaïs Nin; 1984 – Ray Kroc; 1986 – Donna Reed; 1987 – Douglas Sirk; 2004 – Uta Hagen; 2004 – Ron O'Neal (Superfly); 2006 – Shelley Winters; 2009 – Ricardo Montalbán; 2012 – Dan Evins (founded Cracker Barrel Old Country Store); 2013 – Conrad Bain; 2016 – Alan Rickman