January 18 is the 18th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 347 days remaining until the end of the year (348 in leap years).
Holidays
- Christian feast day:
- Confession of Peter (Eastern Orthodox, Anglican and Lutheran Churches)
- Revolution Day (Tunisia)
- Royal Thai Armed Forces Day (Thailand)
- The beginning of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Christianity)
History
In 52 BC, Publius Clodius Pulcher, Roman politician (b. 93 BC) dies. He was a Roman politician known for his popularist tactics. As tribune, he pushed through an ambitious legislative program, including a grain dole, but is chiefly remembered for his feud with Cicero and Milo, whose supporters murdered him in the street. A Roman nobilis of the patrician gens Claudia, and a senator of eccentric, mercurial and arrogant character, Clodius became a major, if disruptive, force in Roman politics during the rise of the First Triumvirate of Pompey, Crassus and Caesar (60–53 BC). He passed numerous laws in the tradition of the populares (the Leges Clodiae), and has been called “one of the most innovative urban politicians in Western history.”
In 350, General Magnentius deposes Roman Emperor Constans and proclaims himself Emperor.
In 474, Seven-year-old Leo II succeeds his maternal grandfather Leo I as Byzantine emperor. He dies ten months later.
In 532, Nika riots in Constantinople fail.
In 1126, Emperor Huizong abdicates the Chinese throne in favour of his son Emperor Qinzong.
In 1486, King Henry VII of England marries Elizabeth of York, daughter of Edward IV.
In 1535, Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro founds Lima, the capital of Peru.
In 1562, Pope Pius IV reopens the Council of Trent for its third and final session.
In 1591, King Naresuan of Siam kills Crown Prince Minchit Sra of Burma in single combat, for which this date is now observed as Royal Thai Armed Forces day.
In 1670, Henry Morgan captures Panama.
In 1701, Frederick I crowns himself King of Prussia in Königsberg.
In 1778, James Cook is the first known European to discover the Hawaiian Islands, which he names the “Sandwich Islands”.
In 1788, The first elements of the First Fleet carrying 736 convicts from England to Australia arrive at Botany Bay.
In 1862, John Tyler, American politician, 10th President of the United States (b. 1790) dies most likely due to a stroke. Tyler’s death was the only one in presidential history not to be officially recognized in Washington, because of his allegiance to the Confederacy. He had requested a simple burial, but Confederate President Jefferson Davis devised a grand, politically pointed funeral, painting Tyler as a hero to the new nation. Accordingly, at his funeral, the coffin of the tenth president of the United States was draped with a Confederate flag.
He was the tenth President of the United States (1841–1845). He was elected vice president on the 1840 Whig ticket with William Henry Harrison, and became president after his running mate‘s death in April 1841. Tyler was known as a supporter of states’ rights, which endeared him to his fellow Virginians, yet his acts as president showed that he was willing to support nationalist policies as long as they did not infringe on the rights of the states. Still, the circumstances of his unexpected rise to the presidency and his possible threat to the ambitions of other potential presidential candidates left him estranged from both major parties in Washington. A firm believer in manifest destiny, President Tyler sought to strengthen and preserve the Union through territorial expansion, most notably the annexation of the independent Republic of Texas in his last days in office.
Tyler, born to an aristocratic Virginia family, came to national prominence at a time of political upheaval. In the 1820s the nation’s only political party, the Democratic-Republicans, split into factions. Though initially a Democrat, his opposition to Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren led him to ally with the Whig Party. Tyler served as a Virginia state legislator, governor, U.S. representative, and U.S. senator before his election as vice president in the United States presidential election of 1840. He was put on the ticket to attract states’ rights Southerners to what was then a Whig coalition to defeat Van Buren’s re-election bid.
Harrison’s death made Tyler the first vice president to succeed to the presidency without being elected to the office. To forestall constitutional uncertainty, Tyler immediately moved into the White House, took the oath of office, and assumed full presidential powers, a precedent that would govern future successions and eventually become codified in the Twenty-fifth Amendment. A strict constructionist, Tyler found much of the Whig platform unconstitutional, and vetoed several of his party’s bills. Believing that the president should set policy instead of deferring to Congress, he attempted to bypass the Whig establishment, most notably Kentucky Senator Henry Clay. Most of Tyler’s Cabinet resigned soon into his term, and the Whigs, dubbing him His Accidency, expelled him from the party. Although he faced a stalemate on domestic policy, he had several foreign-policy achievements, including the Webster–Ashburton Treaty with Britain and the Treaty of Wanghia with Qing China.
President Tyler dedicated his last two years in office to the annexation of Texas. He initially sought election to a full term, but had lost the support of both Whigs and Democrats, and he withdrew. In the last days of his term, Congress passed the resolution authorizing the Texas annexation, which was carried out by Tyler’s successor, James K. Polk. When the American Civil War began in 1861, Tyler sided with the Confederate government, and won election to the Confederate House of Representatives shortly before his death. Although some have praised Tyler’s political resolve, his presidency is generally held in low esteem by historians; today he is considered an obscure president, with little presence in the American cultural memory
In 1866, Wesley College, Melbourne is established.
In 1871, Wilhelm I of Germany is proclaimed the first German Emperor in the Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles (France) towards the end of the Franco-Prussian War. The empire is known as the Second Reich to Germans.
In 1884, Dr. William Price attempts to cremate the body of his infant son, Jesus Christ Price, setting a legal precedent for cremation in the United Kingdom.
In 1886, Modern hockey is born with the formation of The Hockey Association in England.
In 1896, An X-ray generating machine is exhibited for the first time by H. L. Smith.
In 1903, United States President Theodore Roosevelt sends a radio message to King Edward VII: the first transatlantic radio transmission originating in the United States.[citation needed]
In 1911, Eugene B. Ely lands on the deck of the USS Pennsylvania stationed in San Francisco Bay, the first time an aircraft landed on a ship.
In 1913, First Balkan War: A Greek flotilla defeats the Ottoman Navy in the Naval Battle of Lemnos, securing the islands of the Northern Aegean Sea for Greece.
In 1915, Japan issues the “Twenty-One Demands” to the Republic of China in a bid to increase its power in East Asia.
In 1916, A 611-gram chondrite type meteorite strikes a house near the village of Baxter in Stone County, Missouri.
In 1919, World War I: The Paris Peace Conference opens in Versailles, France.
In 1919, Ignacy Jan Paderewski becomes Prime Minister of the newly independent Poland.
In 1919, Bentley Motors Limited is founded.
In 1923, Wallace Reid, American actor (b. 1891) died in a sanitarium while attempting recovery from a heroin drug addiction. Morphine was prescribed for pain relief after he was injured in a train wreck and on film location in Oregon, filming The Valley of the Giants (1919), in order to keep on filming. He was an American actor in silent film referred to as “the screen’s most perfect lover”.
In 1936, Rudyard Kipling, English author and poet, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1865) died at the age of 70 of a perforated duodenal ulcer. He was an English short-story writer, poet, and novelist. He wrote tales and poems of British soldiers in India and stories for children. He was born in Bombay, in the Bombay Presidency of British India, and was taken by his family to England when he was five years old. Kipling’s works of fiction include The Jungle Book (1894), Kim (1901), and many short stories, including “The Man Who Would Be King” (1888). His poems include “Mandalay” (1890), “Gunga Din” (1890), “The Gods of the Copybook Headings” (1919), “The White Man’s Burden” (1899), and “If—” (1910). He is regarded as a major innovator in the art of the short story; his children’s books are enduring classics of children’s literature; and one critic described his work as exhibiting “a versatile and luminous narrative gift”.
Kipling was one of the most popular writers in England, in both prose and verse, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Henry James said: “Kipling strikes me personally as the most complete man of genius (as distinct from fine intelligence) that I have ever known.” In 1907, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, making him the first English-language writer to receive the prize, and its youngest recipient to date. Among other honours, he was sounded out for the British Poet Laureateship and on several occasions for a knighthood, all of which he declined.
Kipling’s subsequent reputation has changed according to the political and social climate of the age and the resulting contrasting views about him continued for much of the 20th century. George Orwell called him a “prophet of British imperialism“. Literary critic Douglas Kerr wrote: “He [Kipling] is still an author who can inspire passionate disagreement and his place in literary and cultural history is far from settled. But as the age of the European empires recedes, he is recognised as an incomparable, if controversial, interpreter of how empire was experienced. That, and an increasing recognition of his extraordinary narrative gifts, make him a force to be reckoned with.”
In 1941, World War II: British troops launch a general counter-offensive against Italian East Africa.
In 1943, Warsaw Ghetto Uprising: The first uprising of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.
In 1944, The Metropolitan Opera House in New York City hosts a jazz concert for the first time. The performers are Louis Armstrong, Benny Goodman, Lionel Hampton, Artie Shaw, Roy Eldridge and Jack Teagarden.
In 1944, World War II: Soviet forces liberate Leningrad, effectively ending a three-year Nazi siege, known as the Siege of Leningrad.
In 1945, World War II: Liberation of the Budapest Ghetto by the Red Army.
In 1945, World War II: Liberation of Kraków, Poland by the Red Army.
In 1952, Jerome Lester Horwitz (October 22, 1903 – January 18, 1952), better known by his stage name Curly Howard, dies at 48 years old. He was an American comedian and vaudevillian actor. He was best known as the most outrageous member of the American farce comedy team The Three Stooges, which also featured his older brothers Moe Howard and Shemp Howard and actor Larry Fine. Curly was generally considered the most popular and recognizable of the Stooges. He was well known for his high-pitched voice and vocal expressions (“nyuk-nyuk-nyuk!”, “woob-woob-woob!”, “soitenly!” and barking like a dog) as well as his physical comedy, improvisations, and athleticism. An untrained actor, Curly borrowed (and significantly exaggerated) the “woob woob” from “nervous” and soft-spoken comedian Hugh Herbert. Curly’s unique version of “woob-woob-woob” was firmly established by the time of the Stooges’ second film, Punch Drunks, in 1934.
In 1954, Sydney Greenstreet, English actor (b. 1879) died in 1954 due to complications from diabetes. He was a versatile English actor who did not work in films till the age of 62, but enjoyed a run of notable hits in a Hollywood career lasting just eight years. He is best remembered for his Warner Bros. films with Humphrey Bogart and Peter Lorre, which include The Maltese Falcon (1941) and Casablanca (1942).
In 1941, Greenstreet began working for Warner Bros. His debut film role was as Kasper Gutman (“The Fat Man”) co-starring with Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon. The film also featured Peter Lorre, as the twitchy Joel Cairo, a pairing that would prove durable. The two men appeared in some nine films altogether, including Casablanca (1942) as crooked club owner Signor Ferrari (for which he received a salary of $3,750 per week for seven weeks), as well as Background to Danger (1943, with George Raft), Passage to Marseille (1944), reteaming him with Casablanca stars Humphrey Bogart and Claude Rains, The Mask of Dimitrios (1944, receiving top billing), The Conspirators (1944, with Hedy Lamarr and Paul Henreid), Hollywood Canteen (1944), Three Strangers (1946, receiving top billing) and The Verdict (1946, with top billing). The actor played roles in both dramatic films, such as William Makepeace Thackeray in Devotion and witty performances in screwball comedies, for instance Alexander Yardley in Christmas in Connecticut. In 1949, Greenstreet played opposite Joan Crawford in Flamingo Road. After a mere eight years, in 1949, Greenstreet’s film career ended with Malaya, in which he was billed third, after Spencer Tracy and James Stewart.
In 1955, – Chinese Civil War: Battle of Yijiangshan Islands is fought.
In 1958, Willie O’Ree, the first African Canadian National Hockey League player, makes his NHL debut with the Boston Bruins.
In 1960, Capital Airlines Flight 20 crashes into a farm in Charles City County, Virginia, killing all 50 aboard, the third fatal Capital Airlines crash in as many years.
In 1967, Albert DeSalvo, the “Boston Strangler“, is convicted of numerous crimes and is sentenced to life imprisonment.
In 1969, United Airlines Flight 266 crashes into Santa Monica Bay killing all 32 passengers and six crew members.
In 1974, A Disengagement of Forces agreement is signed between the Israeli and Egyptian governments, ending conflict on the Egyptian front of the Yom Kippur War.
In 1976, Lebanese Christian militias overrun Karantina, Beirut, killing at least 1,000.
In 1977, Scientists identify a previously unknown bacterium as the cause of the mysterious Legionnaires’ disease.
In 1977, Australia’s worst rail disaster occurs at Granville, Sydney killing 83.
In 1977, SFR Yugoslavia’s Prime minister, Džemal Bijedić, his wife and six others are killed in a plane crash in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In 1978, The European Court of Human Rights finds the United Kingdom government guilty of mistreating prisoners in Northern Ireland, but not guilty of torture.
In 1978, The roof structure of the Hartford Civic Center collapses after a significant snowfall.
In 1981, Phil Smith and Phil Mayfield parachute off a Houston skyscraper, becoming the first two people to BASE jump from objects in all four categories: buildings, antennae, spans (bridges), and earth (cliffs).
In 1983, The International Olympic Committee restores Jim Thorpe‘s Olympic medals to his family.
In 1990, Washington, D.C. Mayor Marion Barry is arrested for drug possession in an FBI sting.
In 1993, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is officially observed for the first time in all 50 states.
In 1994, The Cando event, a possible bolide impact in Cando, Spain. Witnesses claim to have seen a fireball in the sky lasting for almost one minute.
In 1997, In northwest Rwanda, Hutu militia members kill three Spanish aid workers, three soldiers and seriously wound one other.
In 1997, Børge Ousland of Norway becomes the first person to cross Antarctica alone and unaided.
In 2000, The Tagish Lake meteorite impacts the Earth.
In 2002, Sierra Leone Civil War is declared over.
In 2003, A bushfire kills four people and destroys more than 500 homes in Canberra, Australia.
In 2005, The Airbus A380, the world’s largest commercial jet, is unveiled at a ceremony in Toulouse, France
In 2007, The strongest storm in the United Kingdom in 17 years kills 14 people and Germany sees the worst storm since 1999 with 13 deaths. Hurricane Kyrill causes at least 44 deaths across 20 countries in Western Europe.
In 2009, Gaza War: Hamas announces they will accept Israel Defense Forces‘s offer of a ceasefire, ending the assault.
In 2011, Sargent Shriver, American politician and diplomat, 21st United States Ambassador to France (b. 1915) died on January 18, 2011, in Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland, at age 95. He was an American statesman and activist. As the husband of Eunice Kennedy Shriver, he was part of the Kennedy family, serving in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. Shriver was the driving force behind the creation of the Peace Corps, founded the Job Corps, Head Start and other programs as the “architect” of Johnson’s “War on Poverty” and served as the United States Ambassador to France. During the 1972 U.S. presidential election, he was George McGovern‘s running mate as the Democratic Party‘s nominee for U.S. Vice President, replacing Thomas Eagleton, who had resigned from the ticket.
In 2012, A series of coordinated actions take place in protest against Stop Online Piracy Act and PROTECT IP Act.
In 2016, Governor Bill Haslam was on the March Again…. Displaying a distasteful attack on conservatives. The Jobs4TN PAC had been linked to the notorious AdvanceTN PAC that Haslam and Mark Cate tried to secretly fund through their allies to attack conservative Republicans in the 2014 GOP primaries. The attempt by a Republican governor to defeat members of his own party was unprecedented in Tennessee history. At the time, the pair appeared to be stockpiling money to once again take out and/or distract conservatives who dare oppose Haslam’s agenda (Common Core, Gas Tax, Insure TN, etc.) or the business interests of Haslam’s cronies.
In 2018, A bus catches fire on the Samara–Shymkent road in Yrgyz District, Aktobe, Kazakhstan. The fire kills 52 passengers, with three passengers and two drivers escaping.
