January 8

2023 Calendar

January 8 is the eight day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 357 days remaining until the end of the year (358 in leap years).

Events Edit

Up to 1900 Edit

307 - Jin Huidi, Chinese Emperor of the Jin Dynasty, is poisoned, and succeeded by his son, Jin Huaidi.
871 – Battle of Ashdown – Ethelred of Wessex defeats Danish invasion army.
1198 – Innocent III becomes Pope.
1297 - François Grimaldi, disguised as a monk, leads his men to capture the Rock of Monaco; from then on, his family rules the Principality of Monaco.
1499 - King Louis XII of France marries Anne of Brittany.
1697 - Thomas Aikenhead of Edinburgh becomes the last person in Scotland, and in the present-day United Kingdom, to be executed for blasphemy.
1734 – Premiere of George Frideric Handel's Ariodante at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.
1746 – Bonnie Prince Charlie occupies Stirling.
1781 - An earthquake hits Tabriz, Persia, killing over 50,000 people.
1790 - In New York City, George Washington makes the US' first State of the Union Address.
1806 – Cape Colony becomes a British colony.
1815 – War of 1812: In the Battle of New Orleans, Andrew Jackson leads American forces in victory over the British.
1835 - US national debt is at zero, for the only time in US history.
1838 – Alfred Vail demonstrates a telegraph using dots and dashes (this is the forerunner of Morse code).
1856 – Borax is discovered (John Veatch).
1863 - American Civil War: Second Battle of Springfield.
1867 – African American men granted the right to vote in the District of Columbia.
1877 – In Montana, Crazy Horse and his warriors fight their last battle with the United States Cavalry.
1889 – Herman Hollerith receives a patent for his electric tabulating machine.
1893 - Captain Thomas Robertson discovers Dundee Island in the Weddell Sea off Antarctica.
1894 – A fire at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago causes a good deal of damage.
1900 – United States President William McKinley places Alaska under military rule.

1901 – 1950 Edit

1906 – A landslide in Haverstraw, New York kills 20 due to the excavation of clay along the Hudson River.
1908 – A train collision occurs in the Park Avenue Tunnel in New York City killing 17, injuring 38 and leading to increased demand for electric trains.
1912 - The African National Congress is founded.
1916 – World War I: Allied forces withdraw from Gallipoli.
1918 – President Woodrow Wilson announces his "Fourteen Points" for the aftermath of World War I.
1926 – Abdul-Aziz ibn Saud becomes the King of Hejaz and renames it Saudi Arabia.
1935 – A.C. Hardy patents the spectrophotometer.
1942 - World War II: To stop Japanese advances in the Pacific Ocean, the Allies create the commando ABDACOM.

1951 – 2000 Edit

1953 – René Mayer becomes Prime Minister of France.
1958 – 14 year old Bobby Fischer wins the United States Chess Championship.
1959 – Michel Debré becomes Prime Minister of France, while Charles de Gaulle becomes the first President of France's Fifth Republic.
1961 - In a referendum, a majority of French voters supports Charles de Gaulle's policies on Algeria, which would lead towards the country's independence from France.
1963 – Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is exhibited in the United States for the first time (National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC).
1964 – President Lyndon B. Johnson declares a "War on Poverty" in the United States.
1971 - Bowing to international pressure, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto releases Bengali leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
1973 – Watergate scandal: The trial begins for seven men accused of placing bugs in United States Democratic Party headquarters at the Watergate Hotel.
1973 - The Soviet Luna 21 space mission is launched.
1975 – Ella Grasso becomes Governor of Connecticut, becoming the first woman to serve as a Governor in the United States who did not succeed her husband.
1977 - Three bombs explode in Moscow, within 37 minutes, killing 7 people. These attacks are suspected to have been carried out by an Armenian Separatist group.
1982 – AT&T agrees to divest itself of twenty-two subdivisions.
1989 – Kegworth Air Disaster: British Midland Flight 92 crashes onto the M1 motorway, killing 47 people out of the 127 on board.
1992 – President of the United States George H. W. Bush becomes ill on a visit in Japan and vomits on the Japanese Prime Minister.
1994 – Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov on Soyuz TM-18 leaves for Mir. He will stay on the space station till March 22, 1995 for a record 437 days in space.
1996 – An Antonov 32 cargo jet crashes into the central market in Kinshasa, Zaire killing more than 350 people
1998 – Ramzi Yousef is sentenced to life in prison for planning the World Trade Center bombing and for planning Project Bojinka.
1999 – Cosmologists announce that the expansion rate of the universe is increasing.

From 2001 Edit

2003 - In Kosciuszko National Park in Australia, following several lightning strikes during the dry season, bush fires break out.
2003 – US Airways flight 5481 crashes at Charlotte-Douglas International Airport in Charlotte, North Carolina killing all 21 people aboard.
2004 – Queen Elizabeth names the Queen Mary II cruise liner, the largest passenger ship ever built.
2010 – The Togo national football team is targeted in an attack in Cabinda, Angola, and therefore withdraws from the African Cup of Nations.
2011 – 2011 Tucson shooting: Six people are killed in a shooting in Tucson, Arizona, and several are injured, including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Jared Lee Loughner is arrested for the shooting.
2015 - Maithripala Sirisena is elected President of Sri Lanka, defeating Mahinda Rajapaksa, and takes office the next day.

Births Edit

Deaths Edit

Up to 1900 Edit

307 - Jin Huidi, Emperor of China (b. 259)
482 - Severinus of Noricum, Italian saint (b. 410)
1107 – Edgar of Scotland (b. 1074)
1198 - Pope Celestine III (b. 1106)
1324 – Marco Polo, Italian trader and explorer (b. 1254)
1337 - Giotto, Italian painter and architect (b. 1266)
1598 - John George, Elector of Brandenburg (b. 1525)
1642 – Galileo Galilei, Italian astronomer (b. 1564)
1697 – Thomas Aikenhead, Scottish student, executed under Blasphemy law (b. 1676)
1713 - Arcangelo Corelli, Italian composer (b. 1653)
1775 - John Baskerville, English printer (b. 1706)
1794 - Justus Möser, German statesman (b. 1729)
1815 – Edward Pakenham, British general (b. 1778)
1818 - Robert Bowie, Governor of Maryland (b. 1750)
1825 – Eli Whitney, American inventor (b. 1765)
1878 – Nikolay Nekrasov, Russian poet (b. 1821)
1880 – Emperor Norton, self-proclaimed Emperor of the United States (b. 1819)
1896 - William Rainey Marshall, Governor of Minnesota (b. 1825)
1896 - Paul Verlaine, French poet (b. 1844)

1901 – 2000 Edit

1918 - Ellis H. Roberts, American politician (b. 1827)
1919 - Peter Altenberg, Austrian writer (b. 1859)
1925 - Fernand Sanz, French cyclist (b. 1881)
1934 - Andrei Bely, Russian poet (b. 1880)
1941 – Robert Baden-Powell, English founder of Scouting (b. 1857)
1943 - Richard Hillary, American pilot and author (b. 1919)
1948 - Richard Tauber, Austrian tenor (b. 1891)
1948 - Kurt Schwitters, German painter (b. 1887)
1950 – Joseph Schumpeter, Austrian economist (b. 1883)
1952 - Antonia Maury, American astronomer (b. 1866)
1953 - Hugh Binney, British naval commander and Governor of Tasmania (b. 1883)
1958 - Paul Pilgrim, American runner (b. 1883)
1964 - Julius Raab, Chancellor of Austria (b. 1891)
1969 – Albert Hill, British athlete (b. 1889)
1976 – Zhou Enlai, Premier of the People's Republic of China (b. 1898)
1983 - Tom McCall, Governor of Oregon (b. 1913)
1990 - Jaime Gil de Biedma, Spanish poet (b. 1929)
1991 – Steve Clark, British guitarist (b. 1960)
1996 - Metin Göktepe, Turkish photographer and journalist (b. 1968)
1996 – François Mitterrand, President of France (b. 1916)
1997 – Melvin Calvin, American chemist (b. 1911)
1998 - Michael Tippett, English composer (b. 1905)

From 2001 Edit

2002 – Alexander Prokhorov, Russian physicist (b. 1916)
2002 – Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy's fast food chain (b. 1932)
2003 - Ron Goodwin, British composer and conductor (b. 1925)
2005 – Michel Thomas, Polish-American linguist (b. 1914)
2006 – Tony Banks, British politician (b. 1943)
2007 – Yvonne De Carlo, Canadian actress (b. 1922)
2007 – Iwao Takamoto, American animator (b. 1925)
2010 – Art Clokey, American animator (b. 1921)
2011 - Jiri Dienstbier, Czech journalist and politician (b. 1937)
2011 – John Roll, American judge (b. 1947)
2012 - Alexis Weissenberg, Bulgarian pianist (b. 1929)
2013 - Kenojuak Ashevak, Canadian Inuit artist (b. 1927)
2015 - Kep Enderby, Australian politician and judge (b. 1926)
2015 - Ray McFall, British nightclub owner (b. 1926)
2015 - Andraé Crouch, American gospel singer (b. 1942)
2015 - Hubert Markl, German biologist (b. 1938)
2015 - Leif Rantala, Finnish linguist (b. 1947)
2016 - German Moreno, Filipino television host (b. 1933)
2016 - André Courrèges, French fashion designer (b. 1923)
2016 - Red Simpson, American singer-songwriter (b. 1934)
2016 - Otis Clay, American singer (b. 1942)
2016 - Oscar Fritschi, Swiss politician (b. 1939)
2016 - Royal Parker, American television personality (b. 1929)
2016 - Piet Steenkamp, Dutch footballer (b. 1925)
2017 - James Mancham, 1st President of the Seychelles (b. 1939)
2017 - Ruth Perry, Liberian politician (b. 1939)
2017 - Hashemi Rafsanjani, 4th President of Iran (b. 1934)
2017 - Peter Sarstedt, English singer-songwriter (b. 1941)
2017 - Buddy Bregman, American arranger, producer and composer (b. 1930)
2017 - Klaib Al-Fawwaz, Jordanian diplomat and politician (b. 1950)
2017 - Miriam Goldberg, American newspaper publisher (b. 1916)
2017 - Roy Innis, American civil rights activist and politician (b. 1934)
2017 - Abdulkadir Kure, Nigerian politician (b. 1956)
2017 - Eli Zelkha, Iranian-American entrepreneur (b. 1950)
2017 - Nigel Spearing, British politician (b. 1930)
2018 - George Maxwell Richards, President of Trinidad and Tobago (b. 1931)
2018 - Kato Ottio, Papua New Guinean rugby league player (b. 1994)
2018 - Denise LaSalle, American singer-songwriter (b. 1939)

Observances Edit

Commonwealth Day (Northern Mariana Islands)
Celebration of Elvis Presley's Birthday at Graceland, Memphis, Tennessee
Kim Jong-un's Birthday (North Korea)

January 8

Events Edit

Up to 1900 Edit

1901 – 1950 Edit

1951 – 2000 Edit

From 2001 Edit

Births Edit

Up to 1850 Edit

1851 – 1900 Edit

1901 – 1950 Edit

1951 – 1975 Edit

From 1976 Edit

Deaths Edit

Up to 1900 Edit

1901 – 2000 Edit

From 2001 Edit

Observances Edit