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This day in history

This day in history: 16 January

Events, births and deaths on this date, ordered by how many people look them up.

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Born on this day · Died on this day226 · 119

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Key facts

401 historical events, births and deaths are listed for 16 January.
Entries come from Wikipedia’s day pages and are ordered by page views.
2020: The first impeachment of Donald Trump formally moves into its trial phase in the United States Senate.

Holidays and observances

Christian feast day: Berard of Carbio

Christian feast day: Blaise (Armenian Apostolic)

Christian feast day: Eve of Saint Anthony observed with ritual bonfires in San Bartolomé de Pinares

Christian feast day: Fursey

Christian feast day: Honoratus of Arles

Christian feast day: January 16 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)

Christian feast day: Joseph Vaz

Christian feast day: Pope Benjamin (Coptic)

Christian feast day: Pope Marcellus I

Christian feast day: Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God (Coptic Church)

Christian feast day: Titian of Oderzo

National Religious Freedom Day (United States)

Events

2020The first impeachment of Donald Trump formally moves into its trial phase in the United States Senate.

2020The United States Senate ratifies the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement as a replacement for NAFTA.

2018Myanmar police open fire on a group of ethnic Rakhine protesters, killing seven and wounding twelve.

2017Turkish Airlines Flight 6491 crashes into a residential area near Manas International Airport in Kyrgyzstan, killing 39 people.

2016Thirty-three out of 126 freed hostages are injured and 23 killed in terrorist attacks in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso on a hotel and a nearby restaurant.

2012The Mali War begins when Tuareg militias start fighting the Malian government for independence.

2011Syrian civil war: The Movement for a Democratic Society (TEV-DEM) is established with the stated goal of re-organizing Syria along the lines of democratic confederalism.

2006Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is sworn in as Liberia's new president. She becomes Africa's first female elected head of state.

2003The Space Shuttle Columbia takes off for mission STS-107 which would be its final one. Columbia disintegrated 16 days later on re-entry.

2002War in Afghanistan: The UN Security Council unanimously establishes an arms embargo and the freezing of assets of Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and the remaining members of the Taliban.

2001Second Congo War: Congolese President Laurent-Désiré Kabila is assassinated by one of his own bodyguards in Kinshasa.

2001US President Bill Clinton awards former President Theodore Roosevelt a posthumous Medal of Honor for his service in the Spanish–American War.

1998In Santa Lucía Cotzumalguapa, Guatemala, thirteen American students on a school trip are attacked and robbed at gunpoint; five were raped.

1995An avalanche hits the Icelandic village Súðavík, destroying 25 homes and burying 26 people, 14 of whom died.

1992El Salvador officials and rebel leaders sign the Chapultepec Peace Accords in Mexico City, Mexico ending the 12-year Salvadoran Civil War that claimed at least 75,000 lives.

1991Coalition Forces go to war with Iraq, beginning the Gulf War.

1984A radiation detector at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, United States, detects radioactivity after a truck carrying rebar accidentally passed through the laboratory's area, revealing a contamination incident that occurred in C

1983Turkish Airlines Flight 158 crashes at Ankara Esenboğa Airport in Ankara, Turkey, killing 47 and injuring 20.

1979Iranian Revolution: The last Iranian Shah flees Iran with his family for good and relocates to Egypt.

1969Czech student Jan Palach commits suicide by self-immolation in Prague, Czechoslovakia, in protest against the Soviets' crushing of the Prague Spring the year before.

1969Space Race: Soviet spacecraft Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 perform the first-ever docking of crewed spacecraft in orbit, the first-ever transfer of crew from one space vehicle to another, and the only time such a transfer was accomplished with a spa

1959Austral Líneas Aéreas Flight 205 crashes into the Atlantic Ocean near Astor Piazzolla International Airport in Mar del Plata, Argentina, killing 51.

1945World War II: Adolf Hitler moves into his underground bunker, the so-called Führerbunker.

1942Crash of TWA Flight 3, killing all 22 aboard, including film star Carole Lombard.

1942The Holocaust: Nazi Germany begins deporting Jews from the Łódź Ghetto to Chełmno extermination camp.

1921The Marxist Left in Slovakia and the Transcarpathian Ukraine holds its founding congress in Ľubochňa.

1920The League of Nations holds its first council meeting in Paris, France.

1919Nebraska becomes the 36th state to approve the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. With the necessary three-quarters of the states approving the amendment, Prohibition is constitutionally mandated in the United States on

1913Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan writes his first letter to G. H. Hardy at Cambridge, stating without proof various formulae involving integrals, infinite series, and continued fractions, beginning a long correspondence between the

1909Ernest Shackleton's expedition finds the magnetic South Pole.

1900The United States Senate accepts the Anglo-German treaty of 1899 in which the United Kingdom renounces its claims to the Samoan islands.

1883The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, establishing the United States Civil Service, is enacted by Congress.

1878Russo-Turkish War (1877–78): Battle of Philippopolis: Captain Aleksandr Burago with a squadron of Russian Imperial army dragoons liberates Plovdiv from Ottoman rule.

1862Hartley Colliery disaster: Two hundred and four men and boys killed in a mining disaster, prompting a change in UK law which henceforth required all collieries to have at least two independent means of escape.

1847Westward expansion of the United States: John C. Frémont is appointed Governor of the new California Territory.

1809Peninsular War: The British defeat the French at the Battle of La Coruña.

1786Virginia enacts the Statute for Religious Freedom authored by Thomas Jefferson.

1780American Revolutionary War: Battle of Cape St. Vincent.

1757Forces of the Maratha Empire are defeated by the Durrani Empire in the Battle of Narela.

1716King Philip V of Spain promulgates the Nueva Planta decree of the Principality of Catalonia, abolishing the Catalan institutions and its legal system, being replaced by those of Castile, thus putting an end to Catalonia as separate state an

Born on this day

2000Andrew Nembhard, Canadian basketball player

1998Boo Seung-kwan, South Korean singer

1996Jennie, South Korean singer

1996Zhou Qi, Chinese basketball player

1995Jonathan Allen, American football player

1995Mikaela Turik, Australian-Canadian cricketer

1995Tre'Davious White, American football player

1994Mikko Lehtonen, Finnish ice hockey player

1993Amandine Hesse, French tennis player

1993Hannes Anier, Estonian footballer

1993Sungjin, South Korean musician

1992Jason Zucker, American ice hockey player

1991Matt Duchene, Canadian ice hockey player

1990Dennis Kelly, American football player

1988FKA Twigs, English singer-songwriter and actress

1988Jorge Torres Nilo, Mexican footballer

1988Nicklas Bendtner, Danish footballer

1987Charlotte Henshaw, English swimmer

1987Greivis Vásquez, Venezuelan basketball player

1987Jake Epstein, Canadian actor

1986Johannes Rahn, German footballer

1986Mark Trumbo, American baseball player

1986Reto Ziegler, Swiss footballer

1985Gintaras Januševičius, Russian-Lithuanian pianist

1985Jayde Herrick, Australian cricketer

1985Joe Flacco, American football player

1985Jonathan Richter, Danish-Gambian footballer

1985Renée Felice Smith, American actress

1985Sidharth Malhotra, Indian actor

1985Simon Richter, Danish-Gambian footballer

1984Miroslav Radović, Serbian footballer

1984Stephan Lichtsteiner, Swiss footballer

1983Andriy Rusol, Ukrainian footballer

1983Emanuel Pogatetz, Austrian footballer

1982Birgitte Hjort Sørensen, Danish actress

1982Preston, English singer-songwriter

1982Tuncay, Turkish footballer

1981Bobby Zamora, English footballer

1981Jamie Lundmark, Canadian ice hockey player

1981Nick Valensi, American musician and songwriter

Died on this day

2025Bob Uecker, American professional baseball catcher and sportscaster (born 1934)

2025Dame Joan Plowright, English actress (born 1929)

2025David Lynch, American filmmaker and actor (born 1946)

2022Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, Former Malian President (born 1945)

2021Chris Cramer, British journalist (born 1948)

2021Pedro Trebbau, German-born Venezuelan zoologist (born 1929)

2021Phil Spector, American record producer, songwriter (born 1939)

2020Christopher Tolkien, British academic and editor (born 1924)

2019Chris Wilson, Australian musician (born 1956)

2019John C. Bogle, American businessman, investor, and philanthropist (born 1929)

2019Lorna Doom, American musician (born 1958)

2018Ed Doolan, British radio presenter (born 1941)

2018Oliver Ivanović, Kosovo Serb politician (born 1953)

2017Eugene Cernan, American captain, pilot, and astronaut (born 1934)

2016Joannis Avramidis, Greek sculptor (born 1922)

2016Ted Marchibroda, American football player and coach (born 1931)

2015Miriam Akavia, Polish-Israeli author and translator (born 1927)

2015Yao Beina, Chinese singer (born 1981)

2014Dave Madden, Canadian-American actor (born 1931)

2014Gary Arlington, American author and illustrator (born 1938)

2014Hiroo Onoda, Japanese lieutenant (born 1922)

2014Ruth Duccini, American actress (born 1918)

2013André Cassagnes, French technician and toy maker, created the Etch A Sketch (born 1926)

2013Glen P. Robinson, American businessman, founded Scientific Atlanta (born 1923)

2013Gussie Moran, American tennis player and sportscaster (born 1923)

2013Pauline Phillips, American journalist and radio host, created Dear Abby (born 1918)

2013Wayne D. Anderson, American baseball player and coach (born 1930)

2012Gustav Leonhardt, Dutch pianist, conductor, and musicologist (born 1928)

2012Jimmy Castor, American singer-songwriter and saxophonist (born 1940)

2012Joe Bygraves, Jamaican-English boxer (born 1931)

Quote of the day

“Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.”

Zen proverb

Questions people ask

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From Wikipedia’s on-this-day pages for this language, updated once a day and ordered by how often each article is read.

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