| 1997 | 1st time a Channukah candle is officially lit in Vatican City |
| 1994 | 4 Moslem fundamentalists capture Air France pilot in Algiers |
| 1992 | President Bush pardons Caspar Weinberger in Iran-contra affair |
| 1990 | Expos trade Tim Raines to White Sox for Ivan Calderon and Barry Jones |
| 1990 | Saddam says Israel will be Iraq's 1st target |
| 1989 | Charles Taylor enters Liberia to unseat President Samuel K Doe |
| 1989 | Panama's dictator, Manual Noriega seeks asylum at Vatican embassy |
| 1986 | French hostage Aurel Cornea, held in Lebanon for 9 months, released |
| 1986 | Iran offensive against Iraqi islands of Shatt al-Arab |
| 1984 | Palace coup in Mauritania |
| 1982 | Chaminade, with a student body of only 850 students, beats #1 ranked Virginia 77-72 in a Honolulu holiday basketball classic |
| 1981 | Guardian Angels Curtis Sliwa and Lisa Evers marry |
| 1981 | U.S.S.R. performs nuclear test at Semipalitinsk, Eastern Kazakhstan U.S.S.R. |
| 1980 | Americans remembered Iran hostages by shining lights for 417 seconds |
| 1979 | 1st Ariane-rocket launched |
| 1974 | Cardinals' Lou Brock is named Sportsman of the Year |
| 1973 | Ferryboat capsized off coast of Equador, drowning 200 |
| 1971 | Peruvian Airlines Electra crashes at headwaters of Amazon, killing all except Juliane Margaret Koepcke found 10 days later |
| 1970 | 9 Jews are convicted in Leningrad of hijacking a plane |
| 1970 | Walt Disney's "Aristocats" is released |
| 1968 | Apollo 8 astronauts read passages from Book of Genesis |
| 1968 | WATU (now WAGT) TV channel 26 in Augusta, Georgia (CBS) begins broadcasting |
| 1967 | China performs nuclear test at Lop Nor PRC |
| 1966 | "Joyful Noise" closes at Mark Hellinger Theater New York City after 12 performances |
| 1966 | Luna 13 lands on Moon |
| 1966 | USAF C144 military charter crashes near Binh Thai Vietnam kills 129 |
| 1964 | Shooting begins on "The Cage" the pilot for Star Trek |
| 1963 | Greek and Turks riot in Cyprus |
| 1962 | U.S.S.R. performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya U.S.S.R. |
| 1961 | Houston Oilers beat San Diego Chargers 10-3 in AFL championship game |
| 1960 | Dutch bishops question papacy values |
| 1956 | "I Love Lucy" Christmas show airs, never put in syndication |
| 1956 | Ferdinand de Lesseps statue blown up in Port Said Egypt |
| 1954 | Council for the Children Protection forms in Netherlands |
| 1954 | Laos gains its independence |
| 1953 | 2 fast express trains crash head-on killing 103 (Czechoslovakia) |
| 1953 | KHOL (now KHGI) TV channel 13 in Kearney, NB (ABC) begins broadcasting |
| 1953 | KOA (now KCNC) TV channel 4 in Denver, CO (NBC) begins broadcasting |
| 1953 | Rene Coty elected President of France |
| 1953 | Wellington-Auckland (New Zealand) express train swept away in flood kills 166 |
| 1951 | 1st televised opera (Amahl and Night Visitor) |
| 1951 | United Kingdom of Libya gains independence from Italy via United Nations |
| 1950 | Cleveland Browns win NFL championship, beat LA 30-28 |
| 1948 | 1st U.S. house completely sunheated is occupied (Dover Massachusetts) |
| 1948 | Greek government disbands due to state of war, press censorship |
| 1946 | 4th French republic established |
| 1946 | U.S. General MacNarney gives 800,000 "minor Nazi's" amnesty |
| 1943 | Franklin D. Roosevelt appoints General Eisenhower supreme commander of Allied forces |
| 1943 | Terence Rattigan's "While the Sun Shines," premieres in London |
| 1942 | 1st powered flight of V-1 buzz bomb, Peenemunde, Germany |
| 1942 | Red army occupies German airports at Tasjinskaja and Morozowsk |
| 1941 | 1st ships of Admiral Nagumo's Pearl Harbor fleet return to Japan |
| 1937 | Dutch government recognizes Italian king Emanuel III as emperor of Abyssinia |
| 1936 | 1st radioactive isotope medicine administered, Berkeley, California |
| 1935 | Bradman scores 233 in 191 minutes, SA vs. Queensland, 28 fours 1 six |
| 1934 | Grimmett takes 9-180 for SA as Queensland make 430 |
| 1933 | Paris express train derails and kills 160, injures 300 (France) |
| 1932 | Arturo Alessandri wins presidental election in Chile |
| 1930 | Bandung, Java: ir Sukarno 4 years jail sentenced |
| 1930 | F Garcia Lorca's "La Zapatera Prodigiosa," premieres in Madrid |
| 1928 | George Abbott Theater (Adelphi, 54 St) opens at 152 W 54th St. New York City |
| 1927 | Test Cricket debut of Walter Hammond, who scored 51 and took 5-36 vs. S Af |
| 1924 | 1st radio transmission of NCRV in Netherlands |
| 1924 | Albania becomes a republic (ex-premier Ahmed Zogoe's coup) |
| 1924 | Richard Rodgers Theater (46th St. Chanin's) opens at 226 W 46th New York City |
| 1924 | School in Babb's Switch, Oklahoma catches fire, 36 die |
| 1922 | BBC sends 1st British radio play "Truth about Father Christmas" |
| 1922 | London Coloseum opens |
| 1920 | Enrico Caruso gives his last public performance (New York City) |
| 1914 | German plane drops bombs on Dover England |
| 1912 | Irving Fisher patents archiving system with index cards |
| 1910 | Luisa Tetrazzini sings to 250,000 people at Lotta's Fountain |
| 1906 | Reginald A Fessenden became 1st to broadcast music over radio (Mass) |
| 1904 | German SW Africa abolishes slavery of young children |
| 1900 | Herman Heijermans' "Hope of Blessing" premieres in Amsterdam |
| 1898 | Herman Heijermans' "Ghetto," premieres in Amsterdam |
| 1894 | Scheveningse fishing boats destroyed by storm |
| 1894 | Soccer team Achilles '94 forms in Axes |
| 1893 | Henry Ford completes his 1st useful gas motor |
| 1889 | Daniel Stover and William Hance patent bicycle with back pedal brake |
| 1884 | Austria-Hungary admits King Leopold II's Congo Free State |
| 1874 | Pope Pius IX proclaims a jubilee for 1875 |
| 1871 | Giusseppi Verdi's "Aida" premieres in Cairo, at Suez canal opening |
| 1865 | Several Confederate veterans form Ku Klux Klan in Pulaski, Tn |
| 1864 | Battle of Gordonsville, Virginia |
| 1860 | Joseph Jefferson's "Rip Van Winkle," premieres in New York City |
| 1851 | Fire devastates Library of Congress in Wash, destroys 35,000 volumes |
| 1851 | U.S. Library of Congress catches fire; 35,000 books burn |
| 1832 | HMS Beagle anchors in Wigwam Bay at Cape Receiver |
| 1818 | "Silent Night" composed by Franz Joseph Gruber; 1st sung next day |
| 1818 | Franz Xaver Gruber composes "Silent Night" |
| 1814 | Treaty of Ghent (end of US-Britain's War of 1812) signed |
| 1799 | Jakobijns plot against Napoleon uncovered |
| 1798 | Russia and England sign Second anti-French Coalition |
| 1724 | Benjamin Franklin arrives in London |
| 1715 | Swedish troops occupy Norway |
| 1651 | John van Riebeeck departs to Cape of Good Hope |
| 1593 | Storm hits Texel: 40 ships hit, 500 killed |
| 1568 | Uprising of Morisco's in Granada |
| 1565 | Compromise of the Nobles closes against inquisition |
| 1515 | Thomas Wolsey appointed English Lord Chancellor |
| 1476 | 400 Burgundy soldiers freeze to death during siege of Nancy |
| 1294 | Cardinal Benedetto Gaetani chosen as Pope Boniface VIII |
| 1046 | Pope Clement II, Suitger, elected |
| 640 | John IV begins his reign as Catholic Pope |
