29 Dec 1845     Texas became the 28^th US state.
29 Dec 1860     The first British seagoing iron-clad warship, HMS Warrior was launched.
29 Dec 1997     Hong Kong began slaughtering all its chickens to prevent bird flu.
29 Dec 2013     Seven-time F1 champion Michael Schumacher suffered a massive head injury while skiing in the French Alps.
29 Dec 2022     Pele died.

30 Dec 1924     Astronomer Edwin Hubble formally announced the existence of other galactic systems at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society.
30 Dec 1968     Frank Sinatra recorded ‘My Way’, the lyrics written by Paul Anka and based on the French song ‘Comme d’habitude’.
30 Dec 1970     Boxer Sonny Liston died.

31 Dec 1759     Arthur Guinness signed a 9,000-year lease at £45 per annum and started brewing Guinness.
31 Dec 1857     Queen Victoria chose Ottawa, then a small logging town, as the capital of the Province of Canada.
31 Dec 1904     The first New Year’s Eve celebration was held in Times Square, New York City.
31 Dec 1923     The BBC began using Big Ben chimes.
31 Dec 1964     Donald Campbell broke the world water speed record, the only man to break both land and water speed records in the same year.
31 Dec 2019     The World Health Organisation was informed of cases of pneumonia with an unknown cause, detected in Wuhan, China, that turned out to be COVID-19.
31 Dec 2020     The World Health Organisation issued its first emergency use validation for a COVID-19 vaccine.
31 Dec 2022     Pope Benedict XVI died.

1 Jan 45BC       The Julian calendar takes effect as the civil calendar of the Roman Empire.
1 Jan 1600        Scotland recognises 1^st January as the start of the year, instead of March 25.
1 Jan 1651        Charles II is crowned King of Scotland at Scone Palace.
1 Jan 1772        The first Traveller’s Cheques, accepted in 90 European cities, were issued by the London Credit Exchange Company.
1 Jan 1788        The first edition of The Times of London, previously The Daily Universal Register, was published.
1 Jan 1808        The United States bans the importation of slaves.
1 Jan 1860        The first Polish stamp was issued, replacing the Russian stamps previously used.
1 Jan 1877        Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom was proclaimed Empress of India.
1 Jan 1885        Twenty-five nations adopt Sandford Fleming’s proposal for standard time zones.
1 Jan 1892        Ellis Island began processing immigrants into the United States.
1 Jan 1899        Spanish rule ended in Cuba.
1 Jan 1901        Edmund Barton was appointed the first Prime Minister of Australia.
1 Jan 1910        Captain David Beatty was promoted to Rear admiral, and became the Royal Navy’s youngest admiral (except for Royal family members) since Horatio Nelson.
1 Jan 1912        The Republic of China was established.
1 Jan 1914        The SPT Airboat Line became the world’s first scheduled airline to use a winged aircraft.
1 Jan 1923        Britain’s Railways were grouped into the Big Four: LNER, GWR, SR, and LMS.
1 Jan 1932        The United States Post Office issued a set of 12 stamps commemorating the 200th anniversary of the birth of George Washington.
1 Jan 1934        Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay became a United States federal prison.
1 Jan 1948        The British railway network was nationalized to form British Railways.
1 Jan 1958        The European Economic Community was established.
1 Jan 1959        Cuban Revolution. Fulgencio Batista, dictator of Cuba, was overthrown by Fidel Castro’s forces.
1 Jan 1960        Cameroon achieved independence from France and the United Kingdom.
1 Jan 1965        The People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan was founded in Kabul, Afghanistan.
1 Jan 1970        The defined beginning of Unix time, at 00:00:00.
1 Jan 1971        Cigarette advertisements were banned on US television.
1 Jan 1973        Denmark, Ireland and the United Kingdom are admitted into the European Economic Community.
1 Jan 1981        Greece was admitted into the European Community.
1 Jan 1983        The ARPANET officially changes to using TCP/IP, the Internet Protocol, effectively creating the Internet.
1 Jan 1985        The first British mobile phone call was made by Michael Harrison to his father Sir Ernest Harrison, the chairman of Vodafone.
1 Jan 1989        The Montreal Protocol came into force, stopping the use of chemicals contributing to ozone depletion.
1 Jan 1995        Austria, Finland and Sweden joined the EU.
1 Jan 1995        Serial killer Fred West was found dead in his prison cell after committing suicide.
1 Jan 1999        Euro currency was introduced in 11 member nations of the European Union (with the exception of the UK, Denmark, Greece and Sweden).
1 Jan 2000        Billions welcomed the New Millennium with some of the most spectacular celebrations ever seen.
1 Jan 2001        Greece adopts the Euro.
1 Jan 2007        Bulgaria and Romania join the EU.
1 Jan 2011        Estonia officially adopts the Euro currency and becomes the 17th Eurozone country.
1 Jan 2023        Croatia officially adopts the Euro and becomes the 20th Eurozone country.

2 Jan 1533        Mercurius became Pope John II, the first pope to adopt a new name on becoming The Pope.
2 Jan 1818        The British Institution of Civil Engineers was founded by a group of six engineers. Thomas Telford became its first president.
2 Jan 1959        Luna 1, the first spacecraft to reach the vicinity of the Moon and to orbit the Sun, was launched by the Soviet Union.
2 Jan 1967        Ronald Reagan, Former actor and future US President, was sworn in as Governor of California.
2 Jan 1969        Rupert Murdoch, beat off a rival bid to win control of the News of the World newspaper group. His first Fleet Street newspaper.
2 Jan 1971        The second Ibrox disaster kills 66 fans at a Rangers-Celtic football match.
2 Jan 1974        President Richard Nixon signed a bill lowering the maximum speed limit in the USA to 55 mph in order to conserve gasoline during an OPEC embargo.
2 Jan 1980        Steel workers stage their first national strike for more than fifty years.
2 Jan 1981        South Yorkshire Police arrested serial killer Peter Sutcliffe following one of the largest investigations ever.

3 Jan 1777        American General George Washington defeated British General Lord Cornwallis at the Battle of Princeton.
3 Jan 1870        Construction work began on the Brooklyn Bridge in New York.
3 Jan 1956        A fire damaged the top part of the Eiffel Tower.
3 Jan 1957        The Hamilton Watch Company introduced the first electric watch.
3 Jan 1959        Alaska was admitted as the 49th US state.
3 Jan 1977        Apple Computer was incorporated.
3 Jan 1977        Former Home Secretary Roy Jenkins announced he is leaving Westminster politics to become  Britain’s first President of the European Commission.
3 Jan 1993        George HW Bush and Boris Yeltsin sign the second Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in Moscow.
3 Jan 1999        The Mars Polar Lander is launched by NASA.
3 Jan 2019        Chang’e 4 made the first soft landing on the far side of the Moon, deploying the Yutu-2 lunar rover.

4 Jan 1642        King Charles I, accompanied by 400 soldiers, attempted to arrest five members of Parliament for treason, only to discover the men had been tipped off and had fled.
4 Jan 1717        The Netherlands, Great Britain, and France sign the Triple Alliance.
4 Jan 1853        Solomon Northup regained his freedom. His memoirs ‘Twelve Years a Slave’ later becomes a global bestseller.
4 Jan 1896        Utah is admitted as the 45th US state.
4 Jan 1912        The Scout Association was incorporated throughout the British Empire by royal charter.
4 Jan 1951        Korean War. Chinese and North Korean forces captured Seoul for the second time.
4 Jan 1958        Sputnik 1, the first artificial Earth satellite, launched by the Soviet Union in 1957, falls from the Earth’s orbit.
4 Jan 1958        Sir Edmund Hillary became the first to reach the South Pole since Captain Scott in 1912.
4 Jan 1959        Luna 1 became the first spacecraft to reach the vicinity of the Moon.
4 Jan 1967        Donald Campbell died attempting to break his own water speed record in his jet-powered boat, Bluebird K7.
4 Jan 1972        Rose Heilbron became the first female judge to sit at London’s Old Bailey.
4 Jan 1986        Former Thin Lizzy star, Phil Lynott died following a drink and drug binge.
4 Jan 1999        Former professional wrestler Jesse Ventura was sworn in as governor of Minnesota in the US.
4 Jan 2000        The first British women to walk across Antarctica to the South Pole arrived safely, more than two months after starting their record-breaking journey.
4 Jan 2004        Spirit, a NASA Mars rover, landed successfully on Mars.
4 Jan 2010        The Burj Khalifa in Dubai became the world’s tallest building.