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Events, deaths, births, of JAN 21
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On a January 21:
2001 Nahum Korman, 37, Israeli, is sentenced by the Jerusalem District Court to six months community service for the killing of Palestinian Hilmi Shawasheh, 11. Karman is also ordered to pay 70'000 shekels to the victim's family.
     A six and half year prison sentence is imposed by an Israeli court on Su'ad Hilmi Ghazal, Palestinian girl from Sebastia village near Nablus, who in December 1998 at the age of 15 and whilst suffering psychological problems, injured an Israeli enclave settler by stabbing him. After her arrest she was held incommunicado without access to either a lawyer or her family for 27 days, for 17 of which she was held in solitary confinement. Since then, Su'ad Hilmi Ghazal, her mental health deteriorating, has been held for two years in the women's section of Neve Terze prison in Ramle.
     On 24 January 2001, Amnesty International would comment on the contrast between the two cases.
2001 Pope John Paul II names 37 new cardinals
     This is an unusually high number, putting a heavy stamp on the body that will elect his successor. With the new nominations, the 80-year-old pontiff has personally appointed all but 10 of the cardinals eligible to vote in a secret conclave to choose a pope. The total number of voting cardinal traditionally has been 120, but the pope announced that he was breaking that custom, bringing the number to 128.
      The new cardinals come from five continents. They include three from the United States: Monsignor Theodore E. McCarrick, archbishop of Washington; Monsignor Edward Egan, archbishop of New York; and a Jesuit theologian, Avery Dulles, a professor at New York's Fordham University who at 82 years of age is too old to vote in an conclave. Dulles is the son of John Foster Dulles, who was US secretary of state during the Cold War years.
      Other prominent names include a Vietnamese, Monsignor Francois Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan; the archbishop of Buenos Aires, Argentina, Jorge Mario Bergoglio; the archbishop of Westminster, England, Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, and the archbishop of Caracas, Venezuela, Ignacio Antonio Velasco Garcia. Others are the archbishop of Lima, Peru, Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne; and the archbishop of Lyon, France, Louis-Marie Bille. Also named is the archbishop of Dublin, Ireland, Desmond Connell.
      Among the Italians is a close aide to the pope, Monsignor Giovanni Battista Re, who the Italian media say is a possible papal successor. From Germany, John Paul named Monsignor Walter Kasper, head of a pontifical council. The archbishop of Bombay, India, Ivan Dias was also nominated. Other Latin American nominations go to the archbishop of Quito, Ecuador, Antonio Jose Gonzalez Zumarraga; the archbishop of Sao Salvador da Bahia, in Brazil, Geraldo Majella Agnelo; and the archbishop of Bogota, Colombia, Pedro Rubiano Saenz. Other Latin American nominations include Brazil's Claudio Hummes, Sao Paulo's archbishop; Chile's Monsignor Francisco Javier Errazuriz Ossa, archbishop of Santiago; Honduras' Oscar Andres Rodriguez Maradiaga, archbishop of Tegucigalpa, and Lima, Peru Archbishop Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne. Africa's Ivory Coast is represented with Abidjan's archbishop, Bernard Agre.
      From Europe, the pope nominated Monsignor Jose Da Cruz Policarpo, patriach of Lisbon, Portugal; and from Spain, Toledo's archbishop, Francisco Alvarez Martinez. From the former Soviet Union, the archbishop of Vilnius, Lithuania, Audrys Juozas Backis, was named to be a cardinal. Many of the other nominations came from the Vatican's hierarchy, from countries ranging from Italy to Syria. Most of those men head Vatican congregations or other offices. Some of the pope's choices clearly reflected his gratitude for work well done close to him. A Vatican Radio official, Monsignor Roberto Tucci, who traveled around the world preparing papal pilgrimages for two decades, was among those named to be a cardinal. Turning 80 in April, he won't be eligible to vote in the conclave for very long. Since becoming pontiff in 1978, John Paul, with Sunday's list, has named a total of 154 cardinals, some of whom have since died.
      Ci sono sette italiani tra i 37 nuovi cardinali dei quali oggi il Papa ha annunciato la nomina.
Essi sono: Giovanni Battista Re, prefetto della Congregazione per i vescovi; Agostino Cacciavillan, presidente dell'Amministrazione del patrimonio della Sede apostolica; Sergio Sebastiani, presidente della Prefettura degli affari economici; Crescenzio Sepe, segretario generale del Comitato centrale per il Giubileo; Francesco Pompedda, prefetto del tribunale della Segnatura apostolica; Severino Poletto, arcivescovo di Torino.
Elian's granmas 000121 2000 El presidente de Ecuador Jamil Mahuad, huye del palacio presidencial de Quito, acorralado por el asalto al poder protagonizado por un grupo de militares y miles de indígenas.
2000 The grandmothers of Elian González, 6, travel to the United States to plead for the boy's return to Cuba. Photo: Raquel Rodriguez, left, and Mariela Quintana, the maternal and paternal grandmothers of six-year-old Cuban boy Elian Gonzalez, stand together at a news conference after their arrival at New York's Kennedy International Airport . The women said they came to press for Elian's return to Cuba, saying they wanted to "finish this tragedy." The National Council of Churches is assisting them. Why didn't Elian's father come? Why did they wait for two months before coming? Why did they go to New York? One can understand why they would be reluctant to go to Miami, where the boy is, but where the Cuban exiles have demonstrated in the streets to keep him in the US But why New York rather than Washington?
1999 (Thursday) Clinton impeachment trial: Defense last day (Congressional Record)
(1) On the final day of its defense case, President Bill Clinton's legal team offers the Senate two contrasting lines of reasoning why it should not remove the president from office -- one based on the "facts", the other on "common sense". Presidential attorney David Kendall spends much of his nearly three-hour presentation rebutting the House prosecutors' allegations that Clinton tried to influence Lewinsky's testimony in the Paula Jones sexual harassment case by asking her to lie and trying to get her a job to ensure her silence. Kendall specifically refutes the managers' assertion that in a late-night phone call on December 17, 1997, the president, knowing Lewinsky was on the witness list in the Paula Jones case, discussed cover stories with the former White House intern. Citing Lewinsky's February 1998 hand-written offer to testify, a July 1998 interview with the FBI and her August 1998 grand jury testimony, Kendall shows the Senate how Lewinsky repeatedly said she did not discuss cover stories with the president in regards to the Jones case. "Cover stories are an almost inevitable part of every improper relationship between two human beings," Kendall admits. "Now to say that is not to excuse it or to exonerate it or justify it, but rather to emphasize the testimony about 'visiting Betty' or 'bringing me letters' is in the record, but it is not linked in any way to the December 17 phone call or to any testimony or affidavit with regards to the Jones case."
      The House managers' contention, Kendall says, boils down "to the inferences to be drawn from the uncontested fact that ... before this December 17th phone call, the president and Ms. Lewinsky had had discussions about what she should say if asked about her visits to the Oval Office." Using charts and timelines, Kendall argues that testimony, attorney billing records and phone records prove there was not a quid pro quo, job-for-silence conspiracy involving Clinton, Lewinsky and presidential friend Vernon Jordan. "Mr. Jordan testified unequivocally that he never at any time felt any particular pressure to get Ms. Lewinsky a job. This is plain and powerful and unrebutted testimony," Kendall tells senators.
      Kendall also seeks to refute the allegation that Clinton obstructed justice by giving false accounts of his affair to his aides. Noting that Clinton made the same denials to his aides that he did in a nationally televised news conference, Kendall comments, "Having made this denial to the entire country, it's simply absurd to regard it any differently when made to four aides in the White House directly and person to person, rather than through the medium of television." In concluding his remarks, Kendall, whose aggressive and contentious manner has been often been criticized, praises the Senate's conduct. "I think that the bipartisan manner, however, you've conducted this impeachment trial is a welcome change from the For the last year," Kendall says. "We ask only that you give this case, and give this country, the constitutional stability and the political sanity which this country deserves."
      After Kendall finishes, former Arkansas Sen. Dale Bumpers takes to the well of the Senate for a folksy speech, arguing that history and common sense should prevent his former colleagues from convicting Clinton. Bumpers, known as a gifted public speaker, is a longtime Clinton ally who has urged the president to forcefully fight the charges against him. Both Bumpers and Clinton are former governors of Arkansas. After six days of lawyerly arguments, Bumpers' folksy approach during the defense team's summation elicits some laughter from the senators who have been forced into silence during the trial. But his mostly serious appeal passionately argues for the Senate to show Clinton the human compassion the American people seem to have already extended the president. "We are none of us perfect," Bumpers says. "Sure, you say, he should have thought of all that beforehand. And indeed he should. Just as Adam and Eve should have." Noting that the founding fathers intended impeachment as a protection for the people, Bumpers pleads, "The people are saying, please don't protect us from this man; 76 percent of us think he's doing a fine job." And while he avoids suggesting the Senate vote "for or against the polls," Bumpers quotes from advice he said former President Harry Truman once gave him: "Put your faith in the people." "The American people are now and for some time have been asking to be allowed a good night's sleep. They're asking for an end to this nightmare. It is a legitimate request," Bumpers says. "So don't, for God's sakes, heighten people's alienation that is at an all-time high toward their government."

(2) Outside the Senate chamber, Rep. Asa Hutchinson (R-Arkansas), says he and other House prosecutors presented much more direct evidence than Kendall's statement indicated. Hutchinson laments that they were to be given no time to rebut the Clinton defense and reiterates his hope that witnesses would be allowed to testify. Hutchinson also tells reporters that one reason witnesses would be helpful was that the president was the last witness to testify in the investigation, so that the key witnesses had told their stories before Clinton's version was on the record.

(3) After six days of prosecution and defense opening statements, Democrats are declaring the Senate impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton all but over, while Republicans are still talking about calling witnesses. It would take 67 votes to remove Clinton from office, which would mean 12 Democrats and all 55 Republicans in the Senate would have to vote for conviction. Democrats maintain there is no way the president will be convicted and removed from office, and say members on both sides of the aisle are anxious to see the trial end. Dying to make a rebuttal Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Mississippi) dismisses reports that some Republicans are scrambling in search of a quick exit strategy as "spin from the Democrats." Lott does not close the door on the possibility of the Senate calling witnesses to give closed-door depositions to resolve any outstanding questions. "Clearly, there are conflicts in what has been said by the House managers and the White House," Lott says. "There appear to be conflicts between what the witnesses have said."

(4) Lead House prosecutor Henry Hyde writes Kenneth Starr today seeking his help with getting Monica Lewinsky to talk with the Senate trial managers. Lewinsky, though her lawyers, rejects being interviewed by the House team.

1999 The US Coast Guard intercepts a ship headed for Houston, TX, with over four tons of cocaine aboard, one of the largest drug seizures in US history.
1998 Pope John Paul II visits Cuba. — En su visita a Cuba, Juan Pablo II reprueba la política de Estados Unidos y pide respeto a los derechos humanos al tiempo que condena las revoluciones marxistas.
1998 President Clinton angrily denies reports that he had an affair with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky and had tried to get her to lie about it.
1998 Prodigy subcontracts Web content
      Prodigy announced it would no longer create its own Web content but instead would turn to Excite to provide content. The move marked another step toward Prodigy's transformation from online service to pure Internet service provider. The company, founded by Sears, IBM, and CBS in 1984, had been an early success in the online industry but found itself unable to compete with the Internet. In 1996, Sears and IBM sold the company to its management, and in late 1996, the company began offering Web access. While Prodigy still had 600'000 members in its proprietary online service, it hoped to wean them to the Internet in order to complete the switch to ISP.
1997 US House of Representatives Speaker Newt Gingrich (R) was reprimanded and fined as the House voted for first time in history to discipline its leader for ethical misconduct.
1977 US President Jimmy Carter pardons almost all Vietnam War draft evaders.
1976 The supersonic Concorde jet was put into service by Britain and France.
1994 Lorena Bobbitt found temporarily insane for chopping off spouse's penis
1994 Dow Jones passes 3900 (record 3914.20)
1993 Aviones estadounidenses disparan contra un radar en el norte de Irak, primer acto de este tipo dentro de la nueva Administración Clinton.
1991 During the Gulf War, Iraq announced it had scattered prisoners of war at targeted areas; President Bush denounced Iraq's treatment of POWs, and said Iraqi President Saddam Hussein would be held responsible. CBS News correspondent Bob Simon, CBS News London bureau chief Peter Bluff, a cameraman and soundman were captured by Iraqi forces; they were released almost six weeks later.
1991 El nuevo rey de Noruega, Harald V, jura la Constitución ante el Parlamento.
1988 US accept immigration of 30'000 US-Vietnamese children
1987 Anglican Archbishop's peacemaking envoy Terry Waite disappears in Lebanon
1985 Bomb attack on Borobudur temple in Java
1985 Don DeLillo's novel White Noise wins award.
      Don DeLillo wins the American Book Award for his breakthrough novel, White Noise. Although DeLillo had been publishing novels since 1971, his books had received little attention. White Noise, a semi-satire about a professor of Hitler Studies exposed to an "airborne toxic event," established DeLillo as a leading post-modern novelist, concerned with the dread, paranoia, and malaise lying beneath American popular culture. He published Libra, a fictional portrait of Lee Harvey Oswald, in 1988 and Mao II, about a reclusive writer dragged into international politics and terrorism, in 1991.
      In 1997, DeLillo published what some considered his masterwork, the 827-page Underworld, a sprawling exploration of America during the Cold War that touches on baseball, Vietnam, serial killings, nuclear weapons, visual art, and more.
      DeLillo was born in New York to Italian immigrants in 1936. He grew up in working-class New York and attended Fordham University. He worked as a copywriter for an advertising agency before he became a novelist in his mid-30s. He lived for many years with his wife, a banker, in Toronto before returning to New York, where they now live.
1983 Reagan certifies El Salvador human-rights abuses have decreased making country eligible for US military aid.
1982 Gerardo Fernández Albor jura su cargo como presidente de la Xunta de Galicia.
1981 Bernhard Goetz is assaulted for first time on a New York subway train.
1980 Jorge Luis Borges y Gerardo Diego Cendoya, son galardonados ex aequo con el Premio Cervantes.
1979 Price of gold increases to record $875 troy ounce
1980 Gold hits record $850 an ounce.
1979 Neptune becomes outermost planet (Pluto moves closer).
1977 President Jimmy Carter pardons almost all Vietnam War draft evaders
1977 Italy legalizes abortion.
1976 Supersonic Concorde's first commercial flights.
      From London's Heathrow Airport and Orly Airport outside Paris, the first Concordes with commercial passengers simultaneously take flight on January 21, 1976. The London flight was headed to Bahrain in the Persian Gulf, and the Paris to Rio de Janeiro via Senegal in West Africa. At their cruising speeds, the innovative Concordes flew well over the sound barrier at 1,350 miles an hour, cutting air travel time by more than half.
      The flights were the culmination of a 12-year effort that pitted English and French engineers against their counterparts in the USSR. In 1962, 15 years after US pilot Chuck Yeager first broke the sound barrier, Britain and France signed a treaty to develop the world's first supersonic passenger airline. The next year, President John F. Kennedy proposed a similar US project. Meanwhile, in the USSR, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev ordered his top aviation engineers to beat the West to the achievement.
      There were immense technical challenges in building a supersonic airliner. Engines would need to be twice as powerful as those built for normal jets, and the aircraft's frame would have to withstand immense pressure from shock waves and endure high temperatures caused by air friction. In the United States, Boeing tackled the supersonic project but soon ran into trouble with its swing-wing design. In England and France, however, early results were much more promising, and Khrushchev ordered Soviet intelligence to find out as much as possible about the Anglo-French prototypes.
      In 1965, the French arrested Sergei Pavlov, head of the Paris office of the Soviet airliner Aeroflot, for illegally obtaining classified information about France's supersonic project. Another high-level Soviet spy remained unknown, however, and continued to feed the Soviets information about the Concorde until his arrest in 1977. On 31 December 1968, just three months before the first scheduled flight of the Concorde prototype, the fruits of Soviet industrial espionage were revealed when the Soviet's TU-144 became the world's first supersonic airliner to fly. The aircraft looked so much like the Concorde that the Western press dubbed it "Konkordski."
      In 1969, the Concorde began its test flights. Two years later, the United States abandoned its supersonic program, citing budget and environmental concerns. It was now up to Western Europe to make supersonic airline service viable before the Soviets. Tests continued, and in 1973 the TU-144 came to the West to appear alongside the Concorde at the Paris Air Show at Le Bourget airport. On 03 June, in front of 200'000 spectators, the Concorde flew a flawless demonstration. Then it was the TU-144's turn. The aircraft made a successful 360-degree turn and then began a steep ascent. Abruptly, it leveled off and began a sharp descent. Some 500 meters above the ground, it broke up from overstress and came crashing into the ground, killing all six Soviet crew members and eight French civilians.
      Soviet and French investigators ruled that pilot error was the cause of the accident. However, in recent years, several of the Russian investigators have disclosed that a French Mirage intelligence aircraft was photographing the TU-144 from above during the flight. A French investigator confirmed that the Soviet pilot was not told that the Mirage was there, a breach of air regulations. After beginning his ascent, the pilot may have abruptly leveled off the TU-144 for fear of crashing into this aircraft. In the sudden evasive maneuver, the thrust probably failed, and the pilot then tried to restart the engines by entering a dive. He was too close to the ground, however, and tried to pull up too soon, thus overstressing the aircraft.
      In exchange for Soviet cooperation in the cover-up, the French investigators agreed not to criticize the TU-144's design or engineering. Nevertheless, further problems with the TU-144, which was designed hastily in its bid to beat the Concorde into the air, delayed the beginning of Soviet commercial service. Concorde passenger service began with much fanfare in January 1976. Western Europe had won its supersonic race with the Soviets, who eventually allowed just 100 domestic flights with the TU-144 before discontinuing the airliner.
      The Concorde was not a great commercial success, however, and people complained bitterly about the noise pollution caused by its sonic booms and loud engines. Most airlines declined to purchase the aircraft, and just 16 Concordes were built for British Airways and Air France. Service was eventually limited between London and New York and Paris and New York, and luxury travelers appreciated the less than four-hour journey across the Atlantic.
      On 25 July 2000, an Air France Concorde crashed 60 seconds after taking off from Paris en route to New York. All 109 people aboard and four on the ground were killed. The accident was caused by a metal debris from another plane bursting one of the Concorde's tires, which ruptured a fuel tank, creating a fire that led to engine failure. The fatal accident--the first and only in Concorde's history — led to a one year inturruption in the use the aircraft until it is modified to make it resistant to similar hazards. The US is working on a larger and more efficient supersonic airliner. NASA and the US companies involved are being aided in their efforts by the Russians, who have provided a TU-144 for experimental flights.
1975 La Organización de Estados Americanos acusa a Estados Unidos de discriminación comercial.
1974 In London, gold hits a record $161.31 an ounce, silver a record $3.97 an ounce.
1974 The US Supreme Court rules that pregnant teachers can no longer be forced to take long leaves of absence.
1972 Belgium government of Eyskens-Cools forms
1972 Assam's North East Frontier Agency becomes Arunachal Pradesh territory
1972 Manipur, Meghalaya and Tripura become separate states of Indian union
1972 Mizoram, formerly part of Assam, is made an Indian union territory.
1970 El papa Pablo VI rechaza todo tipo de compromiso en el asunto del celibato del clero.
1968 Tet offensive in Vietnam begins with battle for Khe Sanh
      One of the most publicized and controversial battles of the Vietnam war begins at Khe Sanh, 23 km south of the DMZ and 10 km from the Laotian border. Seized and activated by the US Marines a year earlier, the base, which had been an old French outpost, was used as a staging area for forward patrols and was a potential launch point for contemplated future operations to cut the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos. The battle began on this date with a brisk firefight involving the 3rd Battalion, 26th Marines and a North Vietnamese battalion entrenched between two hills northwest of the base. The next day North Vietnamese forces overran the village of Khe Sanh and North Vietnamese long-range artillery opened fire on the base itself, hitting its main ammunition dump and detonating 1500 tons of explosives. An incessant barrage kept Khe Sanh's Marine defenders pinned down in their trenches and bunkers. Because the base had to be resupplied by air, the American high command was reluctant to put in any more troops and drafted a battle plan calling for massive artillery and air strikes. During the 66-day siege, US planes, dropping 5000 bombs daily, exploded the equivalent of five Hiroshima-sized atomic bombs in the area. The relief of Khe Sanh, called Operation Pegasus, began in early April as the 1st Cavalry (Airmobile) and a South Vietnamese battalion approached the base from the east and south, while the Marines pushed westward to re-open Route 9. The siege was finally lifted on April 6 when the cavalrymen linked up with the 9th Marines south of the Khe Sanh airstrip. In a final clash a week later, the 3rd Battalion, 26th Marines drove enemy forces from Hill 881 North. Gen. William Westmoreland, commander of US Military Assistance Command Vietnam, contended that Khe Sanh played a vital blocking role at the western end of the DMZ, and asserted that if the base had fallen, North Vietnamese forces could have outflanked Marine defenses along the buffer zone. Various statements in the North Vietnamese Communist Party newspaper suggested that Hanoi saw the battle as an opportunity to re-enact its famous victory at Dien Bien Phu, when the communists had defeated the French in a climactic decisive battle that effectively ended the war between France and the Viet Minh. There has been much controversy over the battle at Khe Sanh, as both sides claimed victory. The North Vietnamese, although they failed to take the base, claimed that they had tied down a lot of US combat assets that could have been used elsewhere in South Vietnam. This is true, but the North Vietnamese failed to achieve the decisive victory at Khe Sanh that they had won against the French. For their part, the Americans claimed victory because they had held the base against the North Vietnamese onslaught. It was a costly battle for both sides. The official casualty count for the Battle of Khe Sanh was 205 Marines killed in action and over 1600 wounded (this figure did not include the American and South Vietnamese soldiers killed in other battles in the region). The US military headquarters in Saigon estimated that the North Vietnamese lost between 10'000 and 15'000 men in the fighting at Khe Sanh.
1967 España adquiere 166 millones de dólares del Fondo Monetario Internacional.
1965 Persian premier Ali Mansoer injured
1962 Snow falls in San Francisco
1961 Portuguese rebels seize cruise ship Santa Maria
1957 The previous day, being 20 January, Eisenhower was sworn in as US President, for his 2nd term, privately in the East Room at the White House because it was a Sunday. This day he repeats the oath of office on the East Portico of the Capitol and gives his inaugural address.
1953 John Foster Dulles appointed as Secretary of State
1952 Jawaharlal Nehru's Congress party wins general election in India
1950 McCarthyism in action:
      Former State Department official Alger Hiss, accused of being part of a Communist spy ring, is found guilty in New York of lying to a grand jury. Hiss, who always maintained his innocence, was sentenced to five years in prison; he served less than four
1950 Alger Hiss convicted of perjury In the conclusion to one of the most spectacular trials in US history, former State Department official Alger Hiss is convicted of perjury. He was convicted of having perjured himself in regards to testimony about his alleged involvement in a Soviet spy ring before and during World War II. Hiss served nearly four years in jail, but steadfastly protested his innocence during and after his incarceration.
      The case against Hiss began in 1948, when Whittaker Chambers, an admitted ex-communist and an editor with Time magazine, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee and charged that Hiss was a communist in the 1930s and 1940s. Chambers also declared that Hiss, during his work in the Department of State during the 1930s, had passed him top secret reports.
      Hiss appeared before HUAC and vehemently denied the charges, stating that he did not even know Chambers. Later, after confronting Chambers face to face, Hiss admitted that he knew him, but that Chambers had been using another name at the time. In short order, Chambers produced the famous "Pumpkin Papers"-copies of the documents he said Hiss passed him during the 1930s. They were dubbed the "Pumpkin Papers" because Chambers kept them hidden in a pumpkin in his pumpkin patch.
      Charges and countercharges about the spy accusations soon filled the air. Defenders of Hiss, such as Secretary of State Dean Acheson, declared that President Truman's opponents were making a sacrificial lamb out of Hiss. Truman himself declared that HUAC was using "red herrings" to defame Hiss. Critics fired back that Truman and Acheson were "coddling" communists, and that Hiss was only the tip of the iceberg-they claimed that communists had penetrated the highest levels of the American government.
      Eventually, Hiss was brought to trial. Because the statute of limitations had run out, he was not tried for treason. Instead, he was charged with two counts of perjury--for lying about passing government documents to Chambers and for denying that he had seen Chambers since 1937. In 1949, the first trial for perjury ended in a deadlocked jury. The second trial ended in January 1950 with a guilty verdict on both counts.
      The battle over the Hiss case continued long after the guilty verdict was handed down. Though many believed that Hiss was a much-maligned official who became a victim of the anticommunist hysteria of the late-1940s, others felt strongly that he was a lying communist agent. Hiss himself never deviated from his claim of innocence.
1950 The December 1949 discovery of berkelium, the eighth member of the actinide transition series, by Thompson, Ghiorso, and Seaborg, is announced. Each atom of americium-241 in a target of a few milligrams was struck with 4 helium-ions shot by a cyclotron at Berkeley, California, producing one atom of berkelium-243 and 2 neutrons. It is the fifth transuranium element synthesized. One of the first visible amounts of a pure berkelium compound, berkelium chloride BkCl3, was produced in 1962. It weighed 3 billionth of a gram [visible? with an electronic super-microscope?]. Other compounds constructed since then are berkelium oxychloride BkOCl, berkelium fluoride BkF3, berkelium dioxide BkO2 and berkelium trioxide BkO3. Berkelium is expected to be a silvery metal, easily soluble in dilute mineral acids, and readily oxidized by air or oxygen at elevated temperatures to form the oxide. X-ray diffraction methods have been used to identify various compounds. As with other actinide elements, berkelium tends to accumulate in the skeletal system. The maximum permissible body burden of 249Bk in the human skeleton is about 0.0004 microgram (about 6 cents' worth). Because of its rarity, berkelium (Atomic Number 97, Atomic Weight: 247, Electron Configuration: 2-8-18-32-26-9-2 [-27-8-2]) presently has no commercial or technological [or military, I hope] use. When chemists perform chemical experiments on berkelium, the isotope Berkelium-249 is used. It can be produced in weighable amounts that are isotopically pure. Berkelium has a melting point of 1259ºK, a boiling point of 3730ºK, a density of 14.78 g/cm^3. The half-lives of the known isotopes are: 242 Bk 7.0 m — 243 Bk 4.5 h — 244 Bk 4.4 h— 245 Bk 4.9 d — 246 Bk 1.8 d — 247 Bk 1400 y — 248 Bk 23.7 h — 249 Bk 320 d (to californium 249) — 250 Bk 3.22 h — 251 Bk 57 m. Berkelium-249 is [or was] available, as sloid nitrate or chloride, from Oak Ridge National Laboratory at a cost of $160'000'000/g plus packing charges, but it will only be produced if sufficient cash advances have been made to cover the cost of a production batch. You don't have to buy a whole gram, $160's worth will do. However keep in mind that half of it will become californium (less valuable?) in 320 days. [The best thing about berkelium is that no one is going to make a berkelium bomb in the foreseeable future, but do keep it out of your skeleton].
1948 Québec adopte le drapeau à fleurs-de-lis.
     Le Fleurdelisé devient le drapeau officiel du Québec à l'initiative de l'Assemblée Législative de la province (l'actuelle Assemblée Nationale du Québec). Évocateur de la monarchie capétienne, le drapeau aux quatre fleurs de lys est adopté le jour anniversaire de la mort de Louis XVI. C'est à partir de Louis VII, époux malheureux d'Aliénor d'Aquitaine, que les fleurs de lys ornent la bannière d'azur brandie par l'écuyer du roi lors des batailles. Le drapeau à croix blanche sur fond bleu apparaît, lui, sur les navires français au temps de Jacques Cartier et de François 1er. Combinant ces souvenirs, un curé conçoit la bannière fleurdelisée en 1902. En 1977, les Québécois se sont aussi donnés une fête officielle. C'est la journée de la Saint-Jean. Elle donne lieu chaque année, le 24 Jun, à de grandes réjouissances: barbecues en plein air, danses, musique et bien sûr feux d'artifice. La province du Québec remonte à la création de la Confédération canadienne, en 1867, suite aux revendications des autonomistes francophones. L'ancienne colonie française de la Nouvelle-France, annexée par l'Angleterre en 1763, avait auparavant été constituée en colonie du Bas-Canada par l'Acte constitutionnel du 10 Jun 1791....
1945 British troops land on Ramree, near coast of Burma.
1944 447 German bombers attack London.
1944 649 British bombers attack Magdeburg.
1943 Soviet forces reconquer Gumrak airport near Stalingrad.
1943 Soviet forces reconquer Worosjilowsk.
1942 Japanese air raid on Rabaul New Britain.
1942 Tito's partisans occupy Foca
1942 Rommel begins counter-offensive in North Africa
      During World War II, German Field Marshall Erwin Rommel starts a counter-offensive against the Allies in Libya near the Gulf of Sidra, capturing the British First Armored Division by surprise. Rommel first arrived to the North African desert in February of 1941, sent by Nazi leader Adolf Hitler to strengthen the Italian tank divisions that had suffered grave defeats against British Commander Archibald Wavell's desert forces. By the end of May, Rommel's Africa Korps had won back much of the territory lost by the Italians, and Rommel earned the nickname "Desert Fox" for his skill in fashioning elegant deceptions to confuse his enemy. Subsequently, Wavell was replaced by British General Claude Auchinleck, who in November launched Operation Crusader, a campaign which forced Rommel back into eastern Libya. On January 21 of the next year, Rommel launched an offensive in Cyrenaica, decisively defeating the comparatively inexperienced British First Armored Division. By July, the Africa Korps had pushed as far east as El Alamein, Egypt, less than fifty miles from Alexandria, and Rommel's forces paused to rest. Three months later, British General Bernard Montgomery launched a massive counter-offensive, and the tide turned for the last time in the battle for North Africa.
1941 First commercial extraction of magnesium from seawater, Freeport TX.
1941 First anti-Jewish measures in Bulgaria
1941 Australia and Britain attack Tobruk Libya.
1941 En Rumanía, el general Ion Antonescu recurre al Ejército para aplastar la insurrección de la ultranacionalista "Guardia de hierro".
1941 British communist newspaper Daily Worker banned.
1939 El general Rojo, jefe del estado mayor del ejército republicano español, comunica a Juan Negrín López que ya no hay frente.
1932 USSR and Finland stop non-attack treaty.
1930 La dimisión del ministro de Hacienda, José Calvo Sotelo, causa la crisis del Gobierno español del general Primo de Rivera.
1930 El emperador Hirohito disuelve el Parlamento japonés.
1930 George V inaugura en Londres la conferencia naval.
1925 Albanian parliament announces itself a republic; Ahmed Zogoe President
1919 Sinn Fein proclaims parliament of Free Ireland.
1913 Aristide Briand forms French government. — Aristide Briand forma su tercer gabinete en Francia.
1910 British-Russian military intervention in Persia.
1908 New York City's Board of Aldermen passes an ordinance that effectively prohibits women from smoking in public. The measure would be vetoed by Mayor George B. McClellan Jr.
1907 Comienzan las elecciones en Rusia para la Duma.
1903 Harry Houdini escapes police station Halvemaansteeg in Amsterdam.
1903 Wizard of Oz premieres in New York City NY
1899 Opel converts from appliances to cars
      The five Opel brothers begin converting the sewing-machine and appliance factory of Adam Opel into an automobile works in Russelheim, Germany. On this day in 1899, they acquired the rights to the Lutzmann automobile, and began production. The Opel-Lutzmann was soon abandoned, and in 1902 Opel introduced its first original car, a 2-cylinder runabout. In the decades that followed, Opel became one of the premier forces in the European automobile industry, modernizing its factories relentlessly and adopting the continuous-motion assembly line before its European competitors. Today, Opel is a wholly owned subsidiary of General Motors. It produces about a quarter of all German cars, and exports heavily to South America and Africa.
1895 Sherman Anti-Trust Act blocked
      In 1895, the Supreme Court handed down a judgement in the case of United States v. E.C. Knight that effectively neutered the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. Passed in 1890, the Sherman Act was designed to weed out oversized businesses that blocked the "natural" flow of competition. Though the act was invoked that same year to force the break-up of Standard Oil, it was generally regarded as a limp piece of legislation that did little to stem the rise of trusts. However, that didn't stop big business from mounting charges to severely limit the scope of the Sherman Act. And, in the E.C. Knight case, the Supreme Court sided with the argument that the anti-trust legislation should distinguish between commercial and manufacturing enterprises and thus only apply to companies engaged in interstate trade. In turn, a company such as the sugar trust at the heart of the case, which "restricted" its business to manufacturing within a single state, was deemed legal, despite squashing any semblance of competition in the sugar refining industry. Whatever the legal merits of this decision, it derailed any efforts to put a lid on monopolies, until the passage of the Clayton Act in 1916. Incidentally, on July 15,1994, the US government filed a complaint charging the Microsoft Corporation, the world’s largest software developer, with violating Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act.
1863 First Battle of Sabine Pass
      Two Confederate ships drive away two Union ships as the Rebels recapture Sabine Pass, Texas, and open an important port for the Confederacy. Sabine Pass lay at the mouth of the Sabine River along the gulf coast of Texas. The Confederates constructed a major fort there in 1861. In September 1862, a Union force captured the fort and, shortly after, the port of Galveston to the southwest. The Yankees now controlled much of the Texas coast. In November, General John Bankhead Magruder arrived to change Southern fortunes in the area. Magruder was an early Confederate hero in Virginia, and now he was assigned the difficult task of expelling the Federals from Sabine Pass and Galveston.
      Magruder's efforts paid quick dividends. He recaptured Galveston and then turned his attention to Sabine Pass. The decks of two ships, the Bell and the Uncle Ben, were stacked with cotton bales. Sharpshooters were placed behind the bales and the ships steamed towards two Union ships, the Morning Light and the Velocity. Some of the sharpshooters became seasick and had to be removed, but the expedition continued. The Confederates chased the Yankee ships into open water, and the sharpshooters injured many Union gunners. After a one-hour battle, both Union ships surrendered. Magruder's victory reopened the Texas coast for Confederate shipping. The Union tried to recapture Sabine Pass later in the year, but the effort was thwarted when less than 50 Confederates inside the fort at Sabine Pass held off a much larger Union force.
1861 The future president of the Confederacy, Jefferson Davis of Mississippi, and four other Southerners resigned from the US Senate.
1830 Portsmouth (Ohio) blacks forcibly deported
1824 Ashantees defeat British at Accra, West Africa.
1812 Las Cortes de Cádiz crean el Consejo de Estado.
1803 Première messe annuelle pour Louis XVI, fondée par son bourreau
      Depuis 1803, tous les ans, jusqu'il y a peu, une messe populaire avait lieu à Paris. Aucune organisation royaliste, aucune pompe particulière. Il s'agit d'une messe fondée par … le bourreau de Louis XVI. Ce bourreau s'appelait Sanson. Il tenta d'abord d'échapper à la responsabilité écrasante liée à sa fonction. Mais toutes les échappatoires furent vaines. Le bourreau officiel, le seul d'ailleurs, légalement, à pouvoir monter les " bois de Justice ", les montants de la Veuve Noire (de la guillotine) et à pouvoir officier, dut exécuter la sentence. Frappé par la dignité du Roi, par sa bonté, il en perdit d'abord la parole, puis peu à peu la raison. Trois mois plus tard, il mourut de chagrin. Non sans avoir laissé une somme importante pour fonder une messe anniversaire annuelle à la mémoire du Roi, qui lui avait confié cet emploi.
1799 Edward Jenner's smallpox vaccination is introduced. Already on 14 May 1796 he had inoculated an eight-year-old boy, James Phipps, who promptly developed a slight fever and a low-grade lesion but acquired immunity. In 1797 Jenner had sent to the Royal Society a description of his results, but the paper was refused. Then in 1798, having added further cases, he published privately a slender book entitled “An Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of the Variolae Vaccinae, a Disease Known by the Name of Cow Pox.”
1795 El ejército francés, al mando del general Charles Pichegru, entra en Amsterdam.
1793 Prussia and Russia sign treaty to partition Poland (the Second Partition).
      Taking advantage of the political turmoil of a struggle for reform within Poland, Austria, Russia, and Prussia had seized large portions of Polish territory in 1772 (First Partition). Then what was left of Poland prospered and political reform reached the point where Stanislaw II August Poniatowski, the last king of Poland (1764-95), approved 17910503 the first modern written constitution in Europe, a revolutionary document that created a constitutional parliamentary monarchy. It was, however, unacceptable to Russia and Prussia, fearful lest a strong Poland reclaim its lost lands. Russia invaded Poland in 1792 and fought the outnumbered Polish troops under Prince Józef Poniatowski and General Tadeusz Koshciuszko, a hero of the American War of Independence. Intimidated, the Polish king and government capitulated; the May constitution was abolished; leading patriots emigrated and the Second Partition followed.
1732 Russia and Persia sign Treaty of Riascha
1604 Tsar Ivan IV defeats the False Dmitri, who claims to be the true tsar
1522 Head inquisitor Adrian Florisz Boeyens elected pope
1276 Pierre de Tarantaise elected Pope Innocent V
1189 Philip II, Henry II and Richard Lion-Hearted initiate 3rd Crusade.
1077 German King Heinrich IV petitions Pope Gregory VII for forgiveness
0912 Le roi de Lotharingie venant de mourir sans héritier, Charles le Simple en revendique cette couronne. Il l'obtient et reprend le titre de rex francorum (roi des Francs).
TO THE TOP
Deaths which occurred on a January 21:
2002 Some 50 looters at a Goma, Congo-Kinshasa, gasoline service station as it explodes into flames when some spilled gasoline reaches the hot lava still flowing from the volcano Nyiragongo' eruption which started on 17 January 2002. The eruption itself has killed about 45 persons.
2002 Twelve Muslims: eight children aged 6 months to 12 years, two men, and two women, by assailants who enter homes in the village Salva-Bherah, Poonch district, Kashmir, India, about 230 km northwest of Jammu.The attackers enter the village at about midnight and shot dead Zakir Hussain, his son and daughter, both aged below two years, and his wife, nine months' pregnant with twins.. The gunmen then attack the house of Mohammad Zaman, a soldier in Jammu and Kashmir Light Infantry (JKLI) and kill his wife Khatima Bi, 35, and their four children -- daughter Gulnaz and sons Mohammad Issac, Mohammad Mehfoz and Mohammad Yasir -- all in the age group of two to twelve years. The gunmen also attack the family of Mohammad Akram killing his three-year-old daughter Rubina and six-month-old son, Islaq. The gunmen also kill Maqsood Ahmed, a resident of Uttar Pradesh, and kidnap one Special Police Officer (SPO), Mohammad Nazir. Three persons are wounded
2001 Byron De La Beckwith, 80, while serving a life sentence in prison, for the murder of civil rights leader Medgar Evers, 37, on 12 June 1963. Two all-white juries deadlocked in trials in 1964 and Beckwith's sentence was imposed only after a third trial in 1994. The Mississippi Supreme Court upheld it in 1997.
2001 Half Zantop and Susanne Zantop, from multiple stab wounds believed to have been inflicted by James Parker, 16, and Robert Tulloch, 17, who later fled the region. They would be captured in Indiana on 19 February 2001. Half Zantop, 62, taught earth sciences at Dartmouth College. Susanne Zantop, 55, was chairwoman of the German Studies Department. Both were German-born naturalized US citizens.
2000 El teniente coronel Pedro Antonio Blanco, asesinado por la banda terrorista ETA (Euzkadi Ta Askatasuna) tras la ruptura de la tregua.
1986: 27 killed in bomb attack in East-Beirut.
1974 Lewis L Strauss, 78, head US Atomic Energy Commission (1953-58)
1974 Denjoy, mathematician.
1971 Richard B Russell,73, (Senator-D-GA)
1964 Luis Martín Santos, escritor español.
1959 Cecil B. De Mille, 77, director, producer, and screenwriter, in Hollywood.
     He was one of the most influential filmmakers of his day. Among his many accomplishments: He helped found Paramount studios and served as the creative force behind the company's films.
      De Mille was born on 12 August 1881 in Ashfield, Massachusetts, into a family with a strong background in theater. After studying drama at the Pennsylvania Military College and New York's Academy of Dramatic Arts, De Mille acted in and later became general manager of a theatrical company founded by his mother. He also collaborated with his brother William, an established playwright, to write for the theater. In 1913, he co-founded the Jesse L. Lasky Feature Play Company with Jesse Lasky and glove salesman Samuel Goldfish (who later changed his last name to Goldwyn).
      The company's first film, The Squaw Man, in 1914, became a critical and financial success. The first feature film made in the tiny town of Hollywood, The Squaw Man tells the story of an English aristocrat who comes to America and marries a Native American. The company, which later became filmmaking giant Paramount Pictures, made several distinctive silent films, including Joan the Woman and The Whispering Chorus.
      De Mille liked to focus on social comedies portraying sexual liberation while still endorsing traditional values. In 1921, he formed his own company, Cecil B. De Mille Productions Inc., and started making Bible-based films in his quest to defuse the public perception that Hollywood prided itself on promoting immorality. His silent versions of The Ten Commandments in 1923 and The King of Kings, chronicling the life of Jesus Christ, in 1927 were immediately successful.
      De Mille left Paramount in 1925 and formed the Cinema Corporation of America. Three years later, he and his staff joined the crew at MGM but headed back to Paramount in 1931. His comeback film, which he made in 1932, was The Sign of the Cross, an account of Christians seeking religious freedom under the Roman Emperor Nero. His expensive, extravagant, flamboyant films also included Cleopatra, The Crusades, and a massive remake of The Ten Commandments. De Mille directed and produced all 70 of his films, and he hosted a radio show from 1936 to 1945. He won a special Academy Award for showmanship in 1949, and in 1952 The Greatest Show on Earth — featuring big-top entertainment and a circus clown with a mysterious past — won an Academy Award for Best Picture. De Mille also won the Irving Thalberg Award.
1959 Carl Switzer, “Alfalfa” from the “Our Gang” comedies. Switzer, who became a hunting guide and bartender in Northern California after his acting career fizzled, is shot after an argument over a $50 debt. Authorities ruled the shooting "justifiable homicide."
1958 Ataúlfo Argenta, director de orquesta español nacido en 1913, fallece en extrañas circunstancias.
1950 George Orwell, author of 1984 and Animal Farm, in London.
1946 Bateman, mathematician
1945 The last of the dead of the Battle of the Bulge as it ends
       During World War II, the Allies succeed in forcing the German army back to its original line in Belgium's Ardennes Forest, ending the Battle of the Bulge, last major counter-offensive of Hitler's Reich. On 16 December 1944, with the Anglo-Americans closing in on Nazi Germany from the west and the Russians from the east, Nazi leader Adolf Hitler ordered an attack against the Western Allied front by three German armies. The German counterattack out of the densely wooded Ardennes region took the Allies entirely by surprise, and the experienced German troops wrought havoc on the American line, creating a triangular "bulge" sixty miles deep and fifty miles wide along the Allied front. Conditions of fog and mist prevented the unleashing of Allied air superiority, and for several days, Hitler's desperate gamble seemed to be paying off. However, unlike the French in 1940, the embattled Americans kept up a fierce resistance even after their lines of communication had been broken, buying time for a three-point counter-offensive led by British Field Marshall Sir Bernard Montgomery and US generals Omar Bradley and George S. Patton. On 23 December, the skies finally cleared over the Battle of the Bulge and the Allied air force inflicted heavy damage on German tanks and transport, which were jammed solidly along the main roads. By 21 January, the Germans had been pushed back to their original line. Germany's last major offensive of the war had cost them 120'000 men, 1600 planes, and 700 tanks. The Allies suffered 81'000 killed, wounded, or missing in action with all but 4000 of these casualties being of the US. It was the heaviest single battle toll in US history.
1940 Day 53 of Winter War: USSR aggression against Finland.
More deaths due to Stalin's desire to grab Finnish territory.
Finns outnumbered more than three to one
      Ladoga Karelia: Soviet troops attempt a breakthrough at Kollaa and on the River Aittojoki. A similar attempt is made in Ilomantsi.
      Enemy artillery begins heavy shelling on the River Kollaanjoki at 08:50. The enemy attack is supported by approximately 20 tanks. The Finnish troops are outnumbered more than three to one. The enemy loses six tanks and 450 men.
      The Russian 8th Army launches a general offensive in Ladoga Karelia.
      In the morning the Russian 1st Army Corps launches a broad offensive on Group Talvela's defensive positions on the River Aittojoki. The 155th Division launches a related assault at Kallioniemi and Oinaansalmi in Ilomantsi.
      Northern Finland: Siilasvuo's 9th Division is redeployed from Suomussalmi to Kuhmo.
      Eastern Isthmus: Finnish troops on the River Taipaleenjoki shoot down a captive balloon being used to direct the Soviet artillery fire. In Ladoga Karelia, Finnish Blenheim bombers and dive-bombers cripple the air base built by the enemy at Karkunlampi in Salmi.
      Stockholm: Hella Wuolijoki holds talks in the Swedish capital with Soviet emissaries Boris Yartsev and Grauer. Foreign Minister Tanner prepares an unofficial memorandum for Wuolijoki with an eye to possible peace talks.
      Abroad: participants at a major international skating event in Norway remember the Finnish world champion Birger Wasenius, who was killed at the front at the beginning of January.
Suomalaisia vastassa on yli kolminkertainen ylivoima Talvisodan 53. päivä, 21.tammikuuta.1940
      Neuvostojoukot yrittävät läpimurtoa Kollaalla, Aittojoella ja Ilomantsissa.
      Kollaanjoella alkaa voimakas vihollisen tykistötuli klo 8.50. Vihollinen hyökkää parinkymmenen panssarivaunun tukemana. Suomalaisia vastassa on yli kolminkertainen ylivoima. Vihollinen menettää kuusi panssarivaunua ja 450 miestä.
      Laatokan-Karjalassa alkaa venäläisen 8. Armeijan yleishyökkäys.
      Aamulla venäläinen I Armeijakunta aloittaa laajan hyökkäyksen Ryhmä Talvelan puolustusasemaa vastaan Aittojoella. Tähän liittyen 155. Divisioona hyökkää Ilomantsin Kallioniemessä ja Oinaansalmella.
      Siilasvuon 9. Divisioona siirretään Suomussalmelta Kuhmoon.
      Taipaleenjoella ammutaan alas neuvostotykistön tulenjohtoa palveleva kiintopallo. Suomalaiset Blenheim-pommi-koneet ja syöksypomittajat hiljentävät vihollisen Salmin Karkunlammelle rakentaman lentotukikohdan.
      Hella Wuolijoki keskustelee Tukholmassa Neuvostoliiton edustajien Boris Jartsevin ja Grauerin kanssa. Ulkoministeri Tanner laatii Wuolijoelle epävirallisen muistion mahdollisia rauhanneuvotteluja silmällä pitäen.
      Ulkomailta: Suurissa kansainvälisissä luistelukilpailuissa Norjassa muistetaan tammikuun alussa rintamalla kaatunutta suomalaista maailmanmestaria Birger Waseniusta.
Finland stöter på ett över trefaldigt motstånd Vinterkrigets 53 dag, den 21 januari 1940
      De ryska trupperna försöker bryta in vid Kollaa, Aittojoki och Ilomants.
      Vid Kollaanjoki öppnar fienden en häftig artillerield kl. 8.50. Fienden anfaller understödd av ett tjugotal pansarvagnar. Finnarna stöter på ett över trefaldigt motstånd. Fienden förlorar 6 pansarvagnar och 450 man.
      I Ladoga-Karelen inleder den ryska 8. Armén en allmän offensiv.
      På morgonen inleder den ryska I Armékåren en storoffensiv mot Grupp Talvelas försvarsställningar vid Aittojoki. I samband med det här anfaller den 155. Divisionen vid Kallioniemi i Ilomants och vid Oinaansalmi.
      Siilasvuos 9. Division förflyttas från Suomussalmi till Kuhmo.
      Vid Taipaleenjoki skjuter finnarna ner en förankrad ballong som betjänat det ryska artilleriets eldledning. Finska Blenheim-bombplan och störtbombplan tystar ner fiendens flygbas vid Karkunlampi i Salmis.
      Hella Wuolijoki diskuterar med Sovjetunionens representanter Boris Jartsev och Grauer i Stockholm. Utrikesminister Tanner gör upp ett inofficiellt memorandum åt Wuolijoki med tanke på eventuella fredsförhandlingar.
      Utrikes: Vid de stora skridskotävlingarna i Norge minns man världsmästaren Birger Wasenius, som i början av januari stupade vid fronten.
1931 Burali-Forti, mathematician
1924 Vladimir Ilitch Oulianov, dit Lénine
      Il meurt dans sa maison de Gorki le 21 janvier 1924. Il a 53 ans. Le maître d'oeuvre de la révolution bolchévik était paralysé depuis un an et demi et avait dû renoncer peu à peu à l'exercice du pouvoir. Mais il avait eu le temps d'installer la dictature de son parti après le coup d'Etat d'Octobre 1917. Pendant la maladie de leur chef, les hiérarques communistes se disputent la succession. C'est finalement l'opportuniste Staline qui l'emporte grâce à sa position clé au secrétariat général du parti. Il se rallie à la NEP (Nouvelle Politique économique) et autorise une libéralisation de l'économie et de l'expression politique et artistique. Son principal opposant, le rigide Trotski, prône la poursuite de la terreur révolutionnaire. Il est mis sur la touche et bientôt obligé de fuir.
Un révolutionnaire de l'exil
      Fils d'un fonctionnaire anobli par le tsar, avec des ascendances mongole, allemande, suédoise,... Lénine est issu de la nouvelle bourgeoisie russe de la fin du tsarisme. La mort prématurée de son père et l'exécution de son frère aîné en font un intellectuel déclassé. Avec sa compagne, il découvre les mouvements révolutionnaires et la doctrine marxiste. Son activisme lui vaut alors d'être condamné par la justice du tsar.
      Pendant son exil au bord de la Léna (d'où son surnom), il se marie religieusement. Toute sa vie, au gré de ses pérégrinations et de ses fuites, en Suisse, en France ou encore en Finlande, il sera servi avec diligence par sa femme. Les désespoirs nés de la Grande Guerre et les faiblesses de la démocratie russe issue de la Révolution de Février lui permettront de réaliser l'ambition de sa vie: prendre le pouvoir en Russie. Révolutionnaire monomaniaque et brutal, Lénine n'a aucun scrupule à faire mourir les opposants à son régime, militants ou simples paysans. Mais il n'a lui-même aucun goût pour le martyre et n'hésite pas à abandonner ses partisans et à s'enfuir dans la difficulté. Il cultive pour les besoins de la propagande l'image d'un homme bon et déférent envers les humbles. On peut se recueillir devant la momie du grand homme, dans le mausolée de la place Rouge, à Moscou.
Vladimir Ilyich “Nicolai Lenin”, 54, the architect of the Bolshevik Revolution and the first leader of the Soviet Union, dies at 18:50 of a brain hemorrhage. In the early 1890s, Lenin abandoned his law career to devote himself to Marxist study and the provocation of revolutionary activity among Russian workers. Arrested and exiled to Siberia in 1897, he later traveled to Western Europe, where in 1903, he established the Bolshevik faction of the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party. The Bolsheviks were a militant party of professional revolutionaries who sought to overthrow the czarist government and set up a Marxist government in its place. In 1905, workers rebelled across Russia, but it was not until 1917, and Russia's disastrous involvement in World War I, that Lenin realized that the opportunity for Communist revolution had come. In March of 1917, the Russian army garrison at Petrograd defected to the Bolshevik cause and on 15 March 1917, Czar Nicholas II was forced to abdicate. Lenin immediately left Switzerland and crossed German enemy lines to arrive at Petrograd on 16 April 1917. Six months later, under Lenin's leadership, the Bolsheviks seized power in Russia, and Lenin became virtual dictator of the country. However, civil war and foreign intervention delayed complete Bolshevik control of Russian until 1920. Lenin's government nationalized industry and distributed land, and on 30 December 1922, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USS.R.) was established. Upon Lenin's death, his body was embalmed and placed in a mausoleum near the Moscow Kremlin, and Petrograd was renamed Leningrad in his honor. Fellow revolutionary Joseph Stalin, distrusted by Lenin, outmaneuvered his rivals to succeed him as dictator of the Soviet Union.
1901 Elisha Gray, inventor.
      A manufacturer of telegraph equipment in the late 1800s, he disputed Alexander Graham Bell's patent to the telephone but lost the long legal battle before the US Supreme Court. Gray, who held over sixty patents, started a company that became Western Electric Company. Ironically, the Bell Telephone Company purchased Western Electric in 1881. The United States sued to separate the two companies in 1949 under the Sherman Antitrust Act. Although the US won other concessions, it failed to separate the two companies.
1892 John Couch Adams, mathematician.
1883 José de Salamanca y Mayol, banquero y político.
1881 Manuel Orozco y Berra, historiador mexicano.
1837 Franz Krüger (or Pferde-Krüger), German artist born on 10 September 1797.
1801 Pierre Mercier-“la Vendée”, chouan, royaliste, opposant féroce de Bonaparte
      Né en 1774, fils d'un aubergiste du "Lion d'Angers", installé à Château-Gontier à l'enseigne de La Boule d'or , Pierre Mercier abandonne ses études de droit pour rejoindre Bonchamps à la "Grande Armée catholique et royale", où il devient chef d'escadron. Doté d'un rare prestige physique, et déguisant, sous une courtoisie de gentilhomme, une implacable volonté, il impose, en 1794, ses conceptions tactiques aux chouans du Morbihan, organise les tailles de Saint-Billy, modèle de camp retranché. Élu chef d'état-major de l'armée du Morbihan le 16Aug 1795, après l'aventure de l'"Armée rouge" qu'il contribue à dégager de l'emprise de Hoche, il obtient la confiance du comte d'Artois, alors à l'île d'Yeu. Puis il se tourne contre Puisaye, qu'il arrête avant de se réconcilier avec lui.
      Virtuose de la guérilla, on le nomme Mercier-La-Vendée, car il la connaît mieux que quiconque. Organisateur des enlèvements de fonds publics, des actions de représailles et de la chouannerie des officiers (1798), "superviseur" de la petite marine de chasse-marée commandée par Hermely, il ne rêve que de grandes batailles, discipline les paysans, les "militarise", contribue à l'ordonnance de Georges Cadoudal interdisant le mariage aux hommes de moins de quarante ans. Maréchal de camp et adjudant général depuis 1797, il habille et arme toute la Basse-Bretagne, tout en dirigeant personnellement les Côtes-du-Nord. Aux conférences de Pouancé (sept. 1799), il se prononce fortement pour la généralisation des hostilités.
      Adoptant la tactique de la guerre des chefs-lieux, il enlève Saint-Brieuc en compagnie de Saint-Régeant. Il couvre le débarquement de Penlan par le combat indécis de Kerléau-Elven, puis, le premier, lors des réunions de Candé, s'oppose à Bonaparte, bien vu des Vendéo-Angevins : " Il faut combattre le nouveau Cromwell."
      Georges Cadoudal passé en Angleterre, il cache les émigrés, les armes et le matériel, puis déclenche les opérations contre les prêtres "soumissionnistes" (réfractaires à la Constitution civile du clergé mais acceptant l'autorité du Directoire), co-dirige la chouannerie à volonté, organise le ravitaillement de la rive gauche et, pour l'exemple, fait tuer l'évêque constitutionnel Audrein.
      Au début de 1801, s'étant secrètement assuré le concours des garnisons de Brest et de Belle-Isle, il veut passer en Angleterre pour obtenir un soutien du comte d'Artois. Dans la nuit du 21 janvier, il est surpris par les gendarmes, dans la maison où se reposait son escorte, à La Fontaine-aux-Anges. Il tente de s'esquiver pour soustraire ses compagnons à la police républicaine, mais — cible facile, car il est en corps de chemise — il est tué par le gendarme Charlopin.
1793 Louis Capet, ex-king Louis XVI, 39, guillotined.
      The day after being convicted of conspiracy with foreign powers and sentenced to death by the French National Convention, King Louis XVI is executed by guillotine in the Place de la Revolution in Paris. Louis ascended to the French throne in 1774, and from the start was unsuited to deal with the severe financial problems that he had inherited from his grandfather, King Louis XV. In 1789, in a last-ditch attempt to resolve his country's financial crisis, Louis assembled the States-General, a national assembly that represented the three "estates" of the French people--the nobles, the clergy, and the commons. The States-General had not been assembled since 1614, and the third estate--the commons--used the opportunity to declare itself the National Assembly, igniting the French Revolution. On July 14, 1789, violence erupted when Parisians stormed the Bastille--a state prison where they believed ammunition was stored. Although outwardly accepting the revolution, Louis resisted the advice of constitutional monarchists who sought to reform the monarchy in order to save it, and also permitted the reactionary plotting of his unpopular queen, Marie Antoinette. In October of 1789, a mob marched on Versailles and forced the royal couple to move to Tuileries, and in June of 1791, opposition to the royal pair had become so fierce that the two were forced to flee. During their attempted flight to Austria, Marie and Louis were apprehended at Varennes, France, and carried back to Paris. There, Louis was forced to accept the constitution of 1791, which reduced him to a mere figurehead. On August 10, 1792, the royal couple were arrested by the sans-cullottes and imprisoned in the Temple, and in September, the monarchy was abolished by the National Convention (which had replaced the National Assembly). The next January, Louis was convicted of treason and condemned to death by a bare majority of one vote. On January 21, 1793, Louis walked steadfastly to the guillotine in the Place de la Revolution in Paris and was executed. Nine months later, Marie Antoinette was convicted of treason by a tribunal, and on October 16, she followed her husband to the guillotine.
Né en 1754, petit-fils de Louis XV, fils du Dauphin et de Marie-Josèphe de Saxe, Louis Auguste devient dauphin lui-même à douze ans par la mort de son père (il sera orphelin de mère à treize ans). De son père, qu'il n'a guère connu et qui ne s'est guère intéressé à lui, il gardera toujours le culte ; il en héritera la piété, la générosité, l'aversion contre les idées nouvelles et la méfiance envers tous ceux qui, hommes d'État, écrivains ou penseurs, ont touché de près à cette coterie des philosophes protégés par Mme de Pompadour et tenue pour responsable des mœurs relâchées de Louis XV.
      Il est élevé par son gouverneur, le duc de La Vauguyon, et par son précepteur, Mgr de Coestloquet. L'instruction, à la fois livresque et pratique, est bonne, mais la formation médiocre ; il entendra le latin, parlera l'italien, rédigera dans un français clair et nuancé, excellera dans les mathématiques, la géographie et les sciences physiques, s'intéressera de très près au droit et à l'histoire. En revanche, il ignorera tout de l'art militaire et méconnaîtra le soldat. Il manque de manières, fait preuve de brusquerie et de bizarrerie. Chasseur infatigable, cavalier d'une rare adresse, doué pour les travaux artisanaux (on connaît assez son goût pour la serrurerie), il semble peu porté sur l'amour. Peut-être est-il encore vierge lorsque, à quinze ans, il épouse Marie-Antoinette. Une légère malformation retardera la réalité de l'union consacrée par la naissance de Mme Royale (1778).
      Devenu roi à vingt ans par la mort de son grand-père, Louis XVI se sépare des ministres du défunt roi, interrompt la révolution royale commencée en 1771, ouvre son Conseil à Maurepas, à Vergennes et à Turgot. La roideur dogmatique de ce dernier amène le souverain à s'en séparer dès 1776, non sans que le ministre ait réalisé d'utiles réformes. Louis XVI refusera de même de soutenir longtemps Necker quelques années plus tard. Il n'est pas un monarque doué pour agir fermement, ni même pour conserver sa confiance à ceux qui pourraient agir en son nom.
      Contre les parlements rétablis qui multiplient les entraves à l'administration royale, le roi se refuse à sévir tant il croit nécessaire d'appuyer son gouvernement sur sa propre popularité. Celle-ci ne souffrira longtemps que des inconséquences de la reine. Louis XVI, passionné pour la renaissance navale de la France, enflammé par l'idée de revanche sur l'Angleterre, intervient victorieusement en Amérique (avec Rochambeau), aux Indes (avec Suffren) et rend au royaume une position d'arbitre européen inconnue depuis le temps de Fontenoy. Mais ces campagnes ont, de concert avec les dépenses de la cour et des privilégiés, épuisé les finances publiques.
      Un État pauvre dans une France riche assure de plus en plus malaisément ses fonctions, cependant que les récoltes médiocres engendrent sporadiquement des disettes. Louis XVI voudrait revenir aux combats de son grand-père pour la gratuité de la justice et l'égalité devant l'impôt mais ne veut pas se heurter aux privilégiés. Par l'octroi aux nobles des bénéfices ecclésiastiques et le monopole à leur profit des grades d'officiers, la soutane et l'épée, promotions traditionnelles dans l'ancienne France et ouvrant au troisième ordre les portes des deux premiers, sont désormais confisquées. En 1787, Louis XVI tente l'assainissement fiscal et financier en réunissant, à l'instigation du contrôleur général Calonne, une Assemblée des notables. Devant l'échec, il renvoie Calonne et fait appel à son adversaire, Loménie de Brienne. Celui-ci connaît les mêmes difficultés et revient, trop tard pour la monarchie, à la politique de Louis XV ; il exile les parlements. Une nouvelle fois Louis XVI, si constant en politique extérieure mais répugnant aux mesures violentes, même nécessaires, dans le domaine intérieur, se sépare de Loménie et renonce à sa tentative de despotisme éclairé.
      Comme l'Assemblée des notables n'a pas engendré de désordres, le roi, sur le conseil de Necker, croit pouvoir sans risque faire appel aux États généraux et autorise le doublement du tiers. À cette date, sa popularité, attestée par tous, est immense, à la mesure des espoirs que sa décision fait naître. Contrairement aux prévisions du monarque, les députés exigent de se constituer en Assemblée nationale. Louis XVI atermoie, puis leur ordonne de se disperser, enfin cède à leur résistance. Toujours à contretemps, il se décide pour la répression, renvoie Necker, concentre des troupes, provoque ainsi la journée parisienne du 14 Jul, dont il limite les effets en affrontant avec crânerie Paris insurgé. De même, agissant à contretemps, il refuse de sanctionner les décrets du 04 Aug et la Déclaration des droits de l'homme avant de se voir forcé d'y adhérer par l'émeute de la faim des 05 et 06 octobre, et obligé de venir résider à Paris. Il s'assure alors la complicité de Mirabeau, mais n'ose suivre ses conseils ; celui-ci préconisait le départ du souverain et de l'Assemblée pour une ville éloignée de la capitale. Restant prisonnier du peuple de Paris, Louis XVI se condamne à ne pouvoir prendre aucune des initiatives susceptibles de briser le cours de la Révolution ou, du moins, de lui opposer une alternative réalisable. Il accable la Constituante de déclarations où il proteste de son dévouement total à l'œuvre de régénération de la patrie et il intrigue en cachette avec les cours hostiles à la Révolution. En son âme et conscience, tel qu'il a été façonné par les principes de son éducation, il est convaincu d'agir ainsi selon son devoir ; son caractère indécis et souvent dissimulé par timidité s'accommode aisément de ses louvoiements et de ce qu'il faut bien appeler ses mensonges ; mais, à mesure qu'elle est pressentie puis avérée, sa duplicité lui aliène les sympathies et même les estimes. La fuite à Varennes (juin 1791) mettra fin à toute possibilité pour lui d'être le roi le plus populaire et peut-être le plus réellement puissant de sa dynastie en prenant la tête d'une nation rénovée.
      Torturé dans sa conscience de chrétien par l'application de la Constitution civile du clergé, qu'il avait pourtant ratifiée en décembre 1790, indigné par une émeute l'empêchant de se rendre à Saint-Cloud pour faire ses Pâques sans le secours d'un prêtre assermenté, Louis XVI tente avec sa famille de gagner la place fidèle de Montmédy, se fait arrêter à Varennes avant d'avoir pu rejoindre les troupes envoyées par Bouillé ; reconduit à Paris, il est suspendu par l'Assemblée.
      Rétabli dans ses prérogatives un mois plus tard, il a la chance, la dernière de son règne, de voir venir à lui les Feuillants (ancienne aile droite des Jacobins : les Lameth, Duport et Barnave); comme ceux de Mirabeau naguère, il écoute leurs conseils mais, par défiance, ne les suit pas. Face à la Législative, passablement soupçonneuse à son égard, le roi paraît se cantonner dans ses devoirs constitutionnels, mais ne renonce pas à reconquérir ses pouvoirs. Quand Brissot fait campagne en faveur de la guerre contre l'Empire, Louis XVI pense en tirer avantage ; si la guerre est gagnée, l'unité se cimentera dans la victoire ; si elle est perdue, comme il l'espère, le roi pourra seul négocier utilement avec le vainqueur, et partant recouvrer son autorité.
      Toutefois, entre les émigrés, résolus à supplanter le monarque, et les Jacobins, déterminés à confisquer ses derniers pouvoirs, la marge de manœuvre est d'autant plus étroite que Louis inquiète les révolutionnaires par ses tractations mal dissimulées avec les chancelleries étrangères. En opposant son veto suspensif aux mesures d'exception proposées par les ministres girondins, il s'attire la colère des faubourgs et subit, le 20 juin 1792, l'invasion de son palais. Sa fermeté et sa dignité dans cette circonstance lui valent un relatif retour de popularité, mais le manifeste de Brunswick, menaçant de raser Paris si la famille royale n'est pas respectée, provoque l'indignation populaire et l'insurrection du 10 août. Louis XVI, voyant les Tuileries investies, croit habile d'en appeler à la légalité ; il se rend à l'Assemblée, ordonne aux gardes suisses de cesser leur défense contre les sections parisiennes et les fédérés. Suspendu pour la seconde fois, livré par les députés à la Commune, il est conduit à la prison du Temple.
      Après la proclamation de la République (21 septembre 1792), la Convention, soucieuse de légitimer l'insurrection du 10 Aug, se prononce pour le procès de "Louis Capet". Celui-ci, craignant des représailles contre sa famille, se laisse conduire devant l'Assemblée, paraissant du même coup la reconnaître.
      Embarrassé par la découverte de papiers compromettants dans l'armoire de fer des Tuileries, l'inculpé oppose à toutes les accusations des dénégations systématiques et maladroites mais impressionne les députés par sa dignité. Le manque d'unanimité des Girondins et la pression des tribunes provoquent néanmoins la condamnation à mort (théorique par 387 voix contre 344, effective par 361 voix contre 360). Un vote ultime en faveur du sursis ayant été rejeté par 380 voix contre 310,
Louis Capet devant la Convention
      Louis Capet, anciennement Louis XVI, comparaît devant la Convention le 11 decembre 1792. L'assemblée révolutionnaire s'est constituée en tribunal. Elle siège dans la salle du Manège, aux Tuileries. Le roi Louis XVI a été déposé après la journée révolutionnaire du 10 Aug 1792. Celle-ci a marqué un tournant dans la Révolution, jusque là modérée et libérale, et préfiguré la terrible dictature de la gauche jacobine et montagnarde. Trois jours plus tard, le roi déchu a été emprisonné au Temple avec sa famille.
      Il est accusé de haute trahison pour avoir joué double jeu face aux assemblées nées de la Révolution et avoir tenté de s'enfuir à l'étranger en juin 1791. Sa mise en accusation se fonde aussi sur la découverte opportune d'une "armoire de fer" (un coffre-fort) dans les appartements royaux des Tuileries, le 20 novembre 1792. L'armoire dévoile la correspondance secrète entre le roi et le défunt Mirabeau. Elle confirme que le roi complotait avec le duc de Brunswick contre le gouvernement de la Législative. Le 03 decembre, devant la Convention, Maximilien de Robespierre donne le ton du futur procès dans l'un de ses plus célèbres discours.
Robespierre contre Capet
      Au nom des députés montagnards, résolus à poursuivre la Révolution, Robespierre fait valoir la nécessité de condamner le roi pour légitimer la Révolution: "Il n'y a point ici de procès à faire... Vous n'avez point une sentence à rendre pour ou contre un homme, mais une mesure de salut public à prendre... Proposer de faire le procès de Louis XVI, de quelque manière que ce puisse être, c'est rétrograder vers le despotisme royal et constitutionnel; c'est une idée contre-révolutionnaire, car c'est mettre la Révolution elle-même en litige. Si Louis est innocent, tous les défenseurs de la liberté deviennent des calomniateurs, les rebelles étaient les amis de la vérité et les défenseurs de l'innocence opprimée... Pour moi, j'abhorre la peine de mort prodiguée par vos lois; et je n'ai pour Louis ni amour, ni haine; je ne hais que ses forfaits... Je prononce à regret cette fatale vérité... mais Louis doit mourir parce qu'il faut que la patrie vive... Je demande que la Convention nationale le déclare dès ce moment traître à la nation française, criminel envers l'humanité (!)..." Mais à l'opposé de Robespierre, les députés girondins (ou brissotins) craignent des désordres et de nouvelles dissensions si le roi est exécuté. Ils voudraient en finir avec la Révolution maintenant que la démocratie est installée et l'ennemi repoussé.
Le verdict
      Quand s'ouvre son procès, Louis XVI ne se fait plus guère d'illusions malgré le dévouement de ses défenseurs, Malesherbes, Desèze et Tronchet. Le procès va durer jusqu'aux votes du 15 au 19 janvier 1793. Le 15 janvier, 707 députés sur 718 présents jugent le roi coupable de conspiration. A 423 voix contre 281, ils rejettent ensuite l'idée des députés modérés de la Gironde de faire ratifier le jugement par le peuple. Enfin, par un vote nominal qui dure 36 heures, ils se prononcent à la majorité pour la peine de mort. La majorité requise étant de 361 voix, 387 députés demandent la peine de mort... mais 26 avec une possibilité de sursis. Il s'en faut d'une voix que Louis XVI échappe à la guillotine.
      Parmi les Montagnards qui votent la mort, figure Philippe-Egalité, ci-devant duc d'Orléans et cousin du prévenu. C'est à son cousin que Louis XVI doit donc de ne pas bénéficier du sursis...
Philippe d'Orléans sera lui-même guillotiné avec les Montagnards mais son fils règnera plus tard sous le nom de Louis-Philippe 1er.
      Louis XVI (39 ans) est exécuté le 21 janvier 1793 sur la place de la Révolution (aujourd'hui, place de la Concorde). Il meurt, dit-on, en homme digne et courageux, effaçant quelque peu le souvenir des faiblesses, des bontés, des erreurs et des faux-semblant qui ont jalonné son règne et entraîné l'Ancien Régime à sa perte. Le condamné, montrant au matin de son exécution la majesté vraiment royale qui lui avait fait défaut durant son règne. C'est vers 9 heures du matin que le roi quitte la prison du Temple et est conduit place de la Révolution (place de la Concorde) dans la voiture du maire avec son confesseur. En dépit des roulements de tambours qui couvrent sa voix, on l'entend dire, ferme et digne: " Je pardonne à mes ennemis... Je meurs innocent et je prie Dieu que mon sang ne retombe pas sur mon peuple. " Le couperet tombe à 10 h 10 sur le cou d'un roi qui a trente-huit ans.
      Du rappel des Parlements à la déclaration de guerre à l'Autriche, en passant par le renvoi de Turgot et le sabotage de la tentative de monarchie constitutionnelle sous la Législative, nombreux sont les actes du feu roi qui attestent de l'inconvénient qu'il peut y avoir à porter un soliveau sur le trône.
1774 Mustapha III, 56, sultan of Turkey (1957-74).
1748 Joseph Frans Nollekens, Flemish artist born on 06 June 1702.
1729 Marco Ricci, Italian painter and etcher specialized in Landscapes born in 1676 or 1679.— MORE ON RICCI AT ART “4” JANUARY — LINKS — Landscape with Figures — Landscape with horses — Landscape with River and Figures (detail) — Landscape with Washerwomen
1746 Nicolaas Verkolye, Dutch artist born on 11 April 1673.
1672 Adriaen van de Velde, Dutch painter born on 30 November 1636. — MORE ON VAN DE VELDE AT ART “4” JANUARY — LINKS — Portrait of a Couple with Two Children and a Nursemaid in a Landscape — The Hut — Amusement on the Ice — The Beach at Scheveningen — The Farm
1668 Jan Adrienszoon van Staveren, Dutch painter born in 1625. — Boy with birdcage
1665 Pierre de Fermat, 63. French mathematician (Fermat theorem)
1659 Jochem-Govertszoon Camphuysen, Dutch artist born in 1602.
1609 Joseph Justus Scaliger , 68, French inventor of "Julian Period"
1547 fra Sebastiano Luciani (or Lucianis) del Piombo, Italian painter born in 1485. — MORE ON DEL PIOMBO AT ART “4” JANUARY — LINKS — Christ Carrying the Cross — Saint John Chrysostome and Saints — Deposition _ detail — Portrait of a Man — Resurrection of Lazarus
1527 Juan de Grijalba, militar español.
0118 Paschalis II [Raniero], pope (1099-1118)
Births which occurred on a January 21:
Nautilus, first atomic powered submarine, is launched (Groton CT)
1954 Le Nautilus, premier sous-marin atomique du monde, est lancé à Groton (Connecticut), États Unis
      Pendant plus d'un demi-siècle, bien qu'ayant acquis une redoutable efficacité, le sous-marin voyait ses possibilités limités par une double nécessité : celle de son ravitaillement en combustible d'une part, et la nécessité absolue de faire surface pour renouveler l'air que respirait l'équipage une fois en plongée et de recharger les accumulateurs. Le "snorkel", un système imaginé par les allemands durant la deuxième guerre mondiale avait bien atténué la rigueur de cette contrainte, ce long tube servant à amener de l'air frais dans la coque, tandis que le sous-marin évoluait entre 15 et 20 mètres sous la surface des vagues. Mais les impératifs du ravitaillement en mazout subsistait. Or, grâce à sa chaudière atomique, le Nautilus allait définitivement échapper aux nécessités du ravitaillement. Quelques kilogrammes d'uranium allait lui permettre de parcourir des milliers de kilomètres sous l'eau sans avoir à se ravitailler, peut-être même vingt mille lieues sous les mers.
1933 William Wrigley III chewing gum mogul (Wrigleys)
1929 Rudolf Ludwig Mossbauer, científico alemán.
1928 Reynaldo Benito Antonio Bignone, político argentino.
1925 Josep Pintat Solans, político andorrano.
1918 Eurogio Marcelino Camacho Abad, sindicalista español.
1918 Elisa Mújica, escritora colombiana.
1915 Linnik, mathematician.
1914 Rafael Santos Torroella, poeta español y profesor de Historia del Arte.
1905 Christian Dior Normandy France, fashion designer (long-skirted look). He would die on 24 October 1957.
1897 Weinstein, mathematician.
1895 Umberto Nobile, ingeniero aeronáutico italiano.
1891 Franz Sedlacek, Austrian artist who died in 1944.
1884 Roger Nash Baldwin founder (American Civil Liberties Union)
1879 Eduardo Marquina, poeta dramático español.
1877 Gustave de Smet, Belgian artist who died in 1943.
1874 Baire, mathematician.
1867 Maxime Weygand French General/Governor-General (Algeria)
1867 French general Maxime Weygand, in Belgium.
      He was one of the commanders who accepted the German surrender at the close of World War I only to advise the French government to surrender to the Germans early in World War II. Although born in Belgium (his actual ancestry is uncertain), Weygand was educated in France and graduated from the Saint-Cyr training school for officers in 1888 with honors. He taught at a cavalry school where, in 1914, he won the respect of Gen. Ferdinand Foch, who made Weygand his chief of staff during the World War I. Weygand held a variety of positions between the wars, including a post as adviser to the Polish army in 1920, and a stint as inspector general of the French army. He retired from active service in 1935, at age 68.
      When the Germans invaded France in May 1940, Weygand was recalled into service to take command of the Allied troops in France-after the Germans were already overrunning much of the country. As the British Expeditionary Force was pushed to the Channel by the Germans and then finally pushed out of France, things looked increasingly desperate for the French. Britain attempted to keep hope alive — Prime Minister Winston Churchill ordered more British troops into France and British bombers continued to attack German lines of communication. But despite the British reinforcements and encouragement, Weygand ordered the French military governor of Paris to ensure that the French capital remained an open city-in other words, there was to be no armed resistance to the Germans. Orders to this effect meant that Weygand was pushing for an armistice, a capitulation--the enemy would be allowed to pass through unchallenged. Weygand addressed his cabinet with his assessment of the situation: "A cessation of hostilities is compulsory." France capitulated. Weygand served in the new German-loyal Vichy government as minister of defense, delegate general to French Africa, and governor-general of Algeria. He was dismissed in December 1941 and sent to Cannes to retire on a pension. He tried to get back into the fray in 1942 by flying to Algiers when the Allies invaded North Africa, but he was caught by the Germans and transported to Austria, where he sat imprisoned in an Austrian castle. Upon the surrender of Germany, he was released by US troops of liberation but then rearrested on orders of General Charles de Gaulle and charged with enemy collaboration. Weygand was "rehabilitated" within three years and pardoned for his concession to the Germans. De Gaulle was forced to admit that by the time Weygand took command of the army in France, "It was too late, without any doubt, to win the battle of France." Weygand died on 28 January 1965.
1855 John Moses Browning, gun designer, sometimes referred to as the "father of modern firearms," in Ogden, Utah. Many of the guns manufactured by companies whose names evoke the history of the American West-Winchester, Colt, Remington, and Savage-were actually based on John Browning's designs.
      The son of a talented gunsmith, John Browning began experimenting with his own gun designs as a young man. When he was 24 years old, he received his first patent, for a rifle that Winchester manufactured as its Single Shot Model 1885. Impressed by the young man's inventiveness, Winchester asked Browning if he could design a lever-action-repeating shotgun. Browning could and did, but his efforts convinced him that a pump-action mechanism would work better, and he patented his first pump model shotgun in 1888.
      Fundamentally, all of Browning's manually-operated repeating rifle and shotgun designs were aimed at improving one thing: the speed and reliability with which gun users could fire multiple rounds-whether shooting at game birds or other people. Lever and pump actions allowed the operator to fire a round, operate the lever or pump to quickly eject the spent shell, insert a new cartridge, and then fire again in seconds.
      By the late 1880s, Browning had perfected the manual repeating weapon; to make guns that fired any faster, he would somehow have to eliminate the need for slow human beings to actually work the mechanisms. But what force could replace that of the operator moving a lever or pump? Browning discovered the answer during a local shooting competition when he noticed that reeds between a man firing and his target were violently blown aside by gases escaping from the gun muzzle. He decided to try using the force of that escaping gas to automatically work the repeating mechanism.
      Browning began experimenting with his idea in 1889. Three years later, he received a patent for the first crude fully automatic weapon that captured the gases at the muzzle and used them to power a mechanism that automatically reloaded the next bullet. In subsequent years, Browning refined his automatic weapon design. When US soldiers went to Europe during WWI, many of them carried Browning Automatic Rifles, as well as Browning's deadly machine guns.
      During a career spanning more than five decades, Browning's guns went from being the classic weapons of the American West to deadly tools of world war carnage. Amazingly, since Browning's death in 1926, there have been no further fundamental changes in the modern firearm industry. Browning died on 26 November 1926.
1846 Schoute, mathematician.
1829 Oscar II Frederik King of Sweden (1872-1907)/Norway (-1905)/poet
1824 Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson, one of Robert E. Lee's most outstanding generals in the Army of Northern Virginia, is born in Clarksburg, Virginia (now West Virginia). He died on 10 May 1863.
1821 John Cabell Breckinridge (D) 14th US Vice Pressident (1857-61)/Major-General (Confederacy)
1813 John Fremont, US mapmaker and explorer who died on 13 July 1890.
1793 Olivier, mathematician
1789 The Power of Sympathy or the Triumph of Nature, Founded in Truth, first US novel published, in Boston, Massachusetts.
      This is the first novel by a US writer to be published in the US. The first editions of the book do not have the author's name, but a later printing would carry the name of Sarah Wentworth Apthorp Morton. It is a thinly veiled epistolary account about the incestuous seduction and suicide of a young woman in Morton's family. It follows the sentimental style developed by Samuel Richardson and its popularity would stimulate a flood of sentimental novels.
      However, some scholars attribute the book's authorship to William Hill Brown, born in November 1765 in Boston, who died on 02 September 1793 in Murfreesboro, N.C. The son of the Boston clockmaker who made the timepiece in Old South Church, Boston, Brown wrote the romantic tale Harriot, or the Domestic Reconciliation (1789), which was published in the first issue of Massachusetts Magazine, and the play West Point Preserved (1797), a tragedy about the death of a Revolutionary spy. He also wrote a series of verse fables, a comedy in West Indies style (Penelope), essays, and a short other novel about incest and seduction, Ira and Isabella (published posthumously, 1807). Brown went south to study law and died shortly thereafter.
1784 Peter de Wint, British painter who died on 30 June 1849. — LINKS — Boats on a Beach at Hastings
1756 Jean-Antoine Constantin, French artist who died on 09 January 1844.
1746 Johann H Pestalozzi Zurich Switzerland, educator (Leonard and Gertrude).
1743 John Fitch, US steamboat builder who died on 02 July 1798.
1738 Ethan Allen, US soldier and frontiersman who died on 12 February 1789.
1725 Louis-Jean-François Lagrenée, French painter who died on 19 June 1805. — MORE ON LAGRENÉE AT ART “4” JANUARY — LINKS — Horatius after Striking his Sister — Mars & Venus, an Allegory of Peace
1659 Adriaan van der Werff, Dutch painter of religious and mythological scenes and portraits, who died on 12 November 1722. — MORE ON VAN DER WERFF AT ART “4” JANUARY — LINKS — Children Playing before a Hercules Group — Johann Wilhelm, Elector Palatine of Pfalz — Maria Anna Loisia de'Medici — Sarah Presenting Hagar to Abraham
1613 George Gillespie, Scottish minister and polemical writer who died on 17 December 1648.
1533 La ciudad de Cartagena de Indias es fundada por Pedro de Heredia tras conseguir la gobernación del nuevo territorio.
1338 Charles V (the Wise) king of France (1364-80).
Holidays    Dominican Republic : Nuestra Senora de Altagracia Day
Religious Observances:   Baha'i : World Religion Day (Sultan 3) / Christian : Feast of St Meinrad    /   Roman Catholic, Anglican : St Agnes, virgin/martyr at Rome / Santa Inés; santos Epifanio, Meinrado, Patrocio y Publio. / Sainte Agnès, jeune convertie, fut selon la légende enfermée nue dans un lupanar. Mais, par une intervention divine, sa chevelure s'allongea et put protéger sa pudeur! Finalement exécutée, cette martyre romaine du IVe siècle devint pour les chrétiens le symbole de la pureté et de la virginité.
TRUISM OF THE DAY: Islamic charities cannot claim to be non-prophet organizations.
Thoughts for today: “You are here to please me. Nothing else on earth matters.” — Cecil B. DeMille to his staff.
“Creation is a drug I can't do without.” — Cecil B. DeMille
“Most of us serve our ideals by fits and starts. The person who makes a success of living is one who sees his goal steadily and aims for it unswervingly. That's dedication.” — Cecil B. DeMille
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