Today in History for Jan. 4:
In 1493, Columbus sailed for Spain from the New World on his ship, the "Nina.'
In 1581, James Ussher, archbishop of Armagh, was born in Dublin, Ireland. He published a chronology which dated creation from 4004 小蓝视频.
In 1785, German folklorist Jacob Grimm was born.
In 1790, U.S. president George Washington delivered his first annual presidential message.
In 1809, Louis Braille, inventor of the braille system of reading for the blind, was born in Paris.
In 1813, Sir Isaac Pitman, who invented a standardized form of shorthand writing, was born.
In 1817, stage-coach service between Kingston, Ont., and York (now Toronto) began. The fare was $18.
In 1821, the first native-born American saint, Elizabeth Ann Seton, died in Emmitsburg, Md.
In 1830, Upper Canada College was opened at York (Toronto).
In 1885, Dr. William Grant of Davenport, Iowa, performed what is believed to have been the first appendectomy. The patient was 22-year-old Mary Gartside.
In 1896, Prime Minister Mackenzie Bowell saw seven members of his cabinet resign over the Manitoba Schools Question.
In 1896, Utah was admitted as the 45th state.
In 1902, the Carnegie Institute was founded in Washington to promote research in the humanities and sciences.
In 1908, Canadian rowing champion Edward (Ned) Hanlan died. Born in Toronto in 1855, Hanlan was Ontario's best sculler by 1873 and four years later, he won the Dominion championship. The next year, he won the American title, and held the world title for five years until 1884. Hanlan was Canada's first world sports champion. Hanlan's Point on the Toronto Islands is named after him.
In 1912, the Moon made its closest approach to Earth in the 20th century, 348,249 kilometres.
In 1932, the National Congress in India was declared illegal and Mahatma Gandhi was arrested.
In 1948, Burma (now Myanmar) became independent from Britain.
In 1951, North Korean and Communist Chinese forces captured Seoul, the capital of South Korea.
In 1953, Stanley Thompson, considered Canada's greatest golf course architect, died at age 59.
In 1960, Albert Camus, author of "The Outsider," died in a car crash outside Paris. He was 46.
In 1961, the world's longest labour strike ended after 33 years. It concerned employment of barbers' assistants in Copenhagen.
In 1964, Pope Paul VI began a visit to the Holy Land -- becoming the first pontiff to travel by airplane.
In 1965, Montreal newspaper "La Presse" was published for the first time after a seven-month strike by typographers in a dispute that included the issue of automation in the composing room.
In 1965, T.S. Eliot, one of the most influential English writers in the 20th century, died at age 76. He was a devout Christian who wove his religious convictions into his work. Among his most famous works are the poems 鈥淭he Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock鈥� and 鈥淭he Waste Land.鈥�
In 1966, following a kidney ailment, 17-year-old June Clark of Miami began a sneezing attack that lasted 155 days. Electric treatment finally stopped the sneezing.
In 1970, Canada withdrew from international hockey competition to protest a ban on Canadian pros. The decision caused the Canadian national team to disband, and the cancellation of that year's world championship tourney in Winnipeg and Montreal. Apart from various special series, Canada did not return to international play until 1976.
In 1974, U.S. President Richard M. Nixon refused to hand over tape recordings and documents subpoenaed by the Senate Watergate Committee.
In 1983, a new Criminal Code law came into effect, replacing rape with three categories of sexual assault. The new law gave equal protection to men and women, and allowed husbands and wives to charge each other with sexual assault.
In 1986, Wayne Gretzky of the Edmonton Oilers became the first NHL player to score 100 or more points in seven consecutive seasons.
In 1987, 16 people were killed when an Amtrak train bound from Washington, D.C. to Boston collided with Conrail locomotives that had crossed into its path from a side track in Chase, Md.
In 1990, a passenger train switched to the wrong tracks and crashed into a stationary freight train near Sukkur, Pakistan, killing at least 307 people.
In 1995, Denis Lortie was released on parole after serving 10 years in prison for killing three people at the Quebec legislature in 1984.
In 1999, former professional wrestler Jesse Ventura took the oath of office as Minnesota's governor. He served until Jan. 6, 2003, without seeking a second term.
In 2004, Mikhail Saaskashvili, who led a peaceful protest campaign to oust Eduard Shevardnadze, won in a landslide in Georgia's presidential election.
In 2004, NASA's Mars rover, "Spirit," touched down on Mars.
In 2007, the Anglican Church of Canada introduced Mark MacDonald as its first indigenous bishop.
In 2008, five-time Grand Slam winner Martina Hingis was banned by the International Tennis Federation for two years for testing positive for cocaine.
In 2010, Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest skyscraper, formally opened in Dubai. It is more than 160 storeys high, rising 828 metres into the sky -- about 250 metres higher than Toronto鈥檚 CN Tower.
In 2012, disgraced Roman Catholic Bishop Raymond Lahey was sentenced in Ottawa to 15 months in jail and two years probation for importing child pornography. He was released from custody after receiving credit for pre-sentencing time served.
In 2013, 15-year-old Malala Yousufzai of Pakistan left a Birmingham, England, hospital three months after she was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman for daring to say girls should be able to get an education. She became a symbol of the struggle for women's rights in Pakistan as her case won worldwide attention and she shared the Noble Peace prize in 2014.
In 2018, Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer booted Sen. Lynn Beyak out of the party's caucus after she refused to remove offensive content in letters she posted to her Senate website expressing support for her controversial comments last year defending aspects of the residential school system.
In 2018, the Dow Jones Industrial Average traded and closed above 25,000 for the first time.
In 2020, an outbreak of a mysterious infectious disease in a mainland China city revived memories of the SARS epidemic. At least 44 people were infected in the city of Wuhan, and five possible cases of the viral pneumonia had been reported in Hong Kong, prompting authorities there to activate a newly created "serious response" level. The city's health department added an additional thermal imaging system at the airport to check the body temperature of arriving passengers. It was the early stages of what would soon become known as the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2020, Canada's defence minister said a Canadian-led NATO training mission in Iraq had been temporarily suspended in the wake of the killing of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani. Harjit Sajjan confirmed a statement released by NATO earlier in the day, which said the security of personnel must be a top priority.
In 2021, the U-K became the first country in the world to start using the COVID-19 vaccine developed by Oxford University and drugmaker AstraZeneca. A dialysis patient named Brian Pinker was the first to get the shot. Pinker said he was very pleased to get the vaccine, adding that he can now look forward to celebrating his 48th wedding anniversary with his wife Shirley later in the year.
In 2022, an Ontario court awarded $107 million to the families of six of the victims of the downing of a Ukraine International Airlines flight two years prior. More than 100 of the 176 people killed when the Iranian military fired a missile at the plane had ties to Canada, including 55 Canadian citizens. In the damages decision, Ontario Superior Court Justice Edward Belobaba found the missiles that brought down the passenger plane were fired deliberately at a time when there was no armed conflict in the area -- constituting an act of terrorism.
In 2022, Ottawa officially announced it had reached an agreement in principle with First Nations partners to compensate children harmed by its underfunding of child welfare. The federal Liberal government said that of the $40 billion earmarked to resolve the matter, $20 billion would be designated for compensation and the rest would be spent on reforming the system over five years.
In 2023, Canada marked the first National Ribbon Skirt Day, after a bill to recognize the event every Jan. 4 passed in Parliament late the previous year. It was inspired by a 10-year-old girl who wore a ribbon skirt to her rural Saskatchewan school in December 2020. Isabella Kulak wore the colourful garment as part of a formal day, but her family said at the time that a staff member told her the outfit wasn't formal enough. The school division later apologized.
In 2024, a 小蓝视频 conservation group bought the hunting rights in part of a provincial rainforest in an effort to protect the wildlife there. The Raincoast Conservation Foundation said it took two years to raise $1.92 million to buy a quarter of the Great Bear Rainforest on the province's north and central coast. The group has been buying hunting rights in 小蓝视频 since 2005, four years after a moratorium on grizzly bear hunting was overturned.
In 2024, Canada's safety watchdog took part in a probe of a fatal Japan Airlines crash that happened on Jan. 2. The Transportation Safety Board of Canada said a representative, along with technical advisers from Transport Canada, De Havilland Canada and Pratt and Whitney Canada would information to Japanese authorities about the destroyed Dash 8 aircraft and its engines. The Dash 8 regional planes were manufactured by De Havilland Canada.
In 2024, Vancouver police said dozens of police officers would now be recording their interactions on body-worn cameras as part of a pilot project launched in an effort to improve public trust in the force.
In 2024, two New Brunswick men were exonerated for a 1983 murder after their convictions were overturned. Chief justice Tracey DeWare of the Court of King's Bench said Robert Mailman and Walter Gillespie are innocent in the eyes of the law of the killing of George Gilman Leeman. The two men were convicted of second-degree murder and spent years behind bars before both were paroled.
In 2024, the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for two suicide bombings at a ceremony honouring an Iranian general killed in a 2020 U.S. drone strike in Iraq.
In 2024, about 50 automotive journalists from Canada and the U.S. name thed Kia EV-9 large electric SUV the 2024 North American Utility of the Year. The Automotive Press Association chose the Toyota Prius hybrid as the Car of the Year and Ford's Super Duty pickup as Truck of the Year. Electric vehicles made up more than half of the finalists.
In 2024, the largest male specimen of the world's most venomous spider was found in Australia. The deadly Sydney funnel-web spider, who has been named "Hercules," was found by chance by a civilian on the Central Coast 50 kilometres north of Sydney. The 7.9-centimetre long arachnid is much bigger than the average size of one to five centimetres for Sydney funnel-webs. "Hercules" will live at the Australian Reptile Park, contributing to its antivenom program.
In 2024, the Canadian Press identified 17 green charities whose top executives drew annual compensation in the $200,000 to $250,000 range or higher, in 2022 and 2023. The news agency reviewed Canada Revenue Agency filings for charities in the environment, conservation and animal protection sectors. The charity with the highest-paid executives was Manitoba-based Ducks Unlimited Canada. But the review found most of the 864 registered charities in the two sectors rely on volunteers or a modestly paid workforce.
In 2024, thirteen-year-old Willis Gibson was identified as the first player to officially defeat the original Tetris Nintendo version of the game. The previous month, Gibson -- who has the streaming handle "blue scuti" -- made it to what gamers call a "kill screen," where the Tetris code glitches, crashing the game. It's a highly coveted achievement in the world of video games, especially in Tetris, which doesn't actually have a scripted ending.
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The Canadian Press
