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This day in history

This day in history: 15 December

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 day171 · 85

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Key facts

309 historical events, births and deaths are listed for 15 December.
Entries come from Wikipedia’s day pages and are ordered by page views.
2017: A 6.5Mwearthquake strikes the Indonesian island of Java in the city of Tasikmalaya, resulting in four deaths.

Holidays and observances

Bill of Rights Day (United States) 2nd Amendment Day (South Carolina)

Christian feast day: December 15 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)

Christian feast day: Drina Martyrs

Christian feast day: Drostan (Aberdeen Breviary)

Christian feast day: John Horden and Robert McDonald (Episcopal Church (USA))

Christian feast day: Maria Crocifissa di Rosa

Christian feast day: Mesmin

Christian feast day: Valerian of Abbenza

Christian feast day: Virginia Centurione Bracelli

Homecoming Day (Alderney)

Kingdom Day (Netherlands), moves to December 16 if the 15th is on a Sunday

World Turkic Language Family Day (UNESCO)

Events

2017A 6.5Mwearthquake strikes the Indonesian island of Java in the city of Tasikmalaya, resulting in four deaths.

2014Gunman Man Haron Monis takes 18 hostages inside a café in Martin Place for 16 hours in Sydney. Monis and two hostages are killed when police raid the café the following morning.

2013The South Sudanese Civil War begins when opposition leaders Dr. Riek Machar, Pagan Amum and Rebecca Nyandeng vote to boycott the meeting of the National Liberation Council at Nyakuron.

2010A boat carrying 90 asylum seekers crashes into rocks off the coast of Christmas Island, Australia, killing 48 people.

2005Introduction of the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor into USAF active service.

2001The Leaning Tower of Pisa reopens after 11 years and $27,000,000 spent to stabilize it, without fixing its famous lean.

2000The third reactor at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant is shut down.

1997Tajikistan Airlines Flight 3183 crashes in the desert near Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, killing 85.

1993The Troubles: The Downing Street Declaration is issued by British Prime Minister John Major and Irish Taoiseach Albert Reynolds.

1989Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights relating the abolition of capital punishment is adopted.

1981A suicide car bombing targeting the Iraqi embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, levels the embassy and kills 61 people, including Iraq's ambassador to Lebanon. The attack is considered the first modern suicide bombing.

1978U.S. President Jimmy Carter announces that the United States will recognize the People's Republic of China and sever diplomatic relations with the Republic of China (Taiwan).

1973John Paul Getty III, grandson of American billionaire J. Paul Getty, is found alive near Naples, Italy, after being kidnapped by an Italian gang on July 10.

1973The American Psychiatric Association votes 13–0 to remove homosexuality from its official list of psychiatric disorders, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

1970Soviet spacecraft Venera 7 successfully lands on Venus. It is the first successful soft landing on another planet.

1967The Silver Bridge collapses, killing 46 people.

1965Project Gemini: Gemini 6A, crewed by Wally Schirra and Thomas Stafford, is launched from Cape Kennedy, Florida. Four orbits later, it achieves the first space rendezvous, with Gemini 7.

1961Eichmann trial: Adolf Eichmann is sentenced to death after being found guilty by an Israeli court of 15 criminal charges, including charges of crimes against humanity, crimes against the Jewish people, and membership of an outlawed organiza

1960King Mahendra of Nepal suspends the country's constitution, dissolves parliament, dismisses the cabinet, and imposes direct rule.

1960Richard Pavlick is arrested for plotting to assassinate U.S. President-Elect John F. Kennedy.

1945Occupation of Japan/Shinto Directive: General Douglas MacArthur orders that Shinto be abolished as the state religion of Japan.

1944World War II: a single-engine UC-64A Norseman aeroplane carrying United States Army Air Forces Major Glenn Miller is lost in a flight over the English Channel.

1943World War II: The Battle of Arawe begins during the New Britain campaign.

1942World War II: The Battle of Mount Austen, the Galloping Horse, and the Sea Horse begins during the Guadalcanal campaign.

1941The Holocaust in Ukraine: German troops murder over 15,000 Jews at Drobytsky Yar, a ravine southeast of the city of Kharkiv.

1939Gone with the Wind (highest inflation adjusted grossing film) receives its premiere at Loew's Grand Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia, United States.

1933Anarchist insurrection suppressed in Zaragoza, Spain.

1917World War I: An armistice between Russia and the Central Powers is signed.

1914A gas explosion at Mitsubishi Hōjō coal mine, in Kyushu, Japan, kills 687.

1914World War I: The Serbian Army recaptures Belgrade from the invading Austro-Hungarian Army.

1906The London Underground's Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway opens.

1905The Pushkin House is established in Saint Petersburg, Russia, to preserve the cultural heritage of Alexander Pushkin.

1903Italian American food cart vendor Italo Marchiony receives a U.S. patent for inventing a machine that makes ice cream cones.

1899British Army forces are defeated at the Battle of Colenso in Natal, South Africa, the third and final battle fought during the Black Week of the Second Boer War.

1893Symphony No. 9 ("From the New World" a.k.a. the "New World Symphony") by Antonín Dvořák premieres in a public afternoon rehearsal at Carnegie Hall in New York City, followed by a concert premiere on the evening of December 16.

1890Hunkpapa Lakota leader Sitting Bull is killed on Standing Rock Indian Reservation, leading to the Wounded Knee Massacre.

1871Sixteen-year-old telegraphist Ella Stewart keys and sends the first telegraphed message from Arizona Territory at the Deseret Telegraph Company office in Pipe Spring.

1869The short-lived Republic of Ezo is proclaimed in the Ezo area of Japan. It is the first attempt to establish a democracy in Japan.

1864American Civil War: The Battle of Nashville begins at Nashville, Tennessee, and ends the following day with the destruction of the Confederate Army of Tennessee under General John Bell Hood as a fighting force by the Union Army of the Cumbe

1862American Civil War: The Battle of Fredericksburg ends in a Union defeat as General Ambrose Burnside withdraws the Army of the Potomac across the Rappahannock River.

Born on this day

2000Kayvon Thibodeaux, American football player

1997Magdalena Fręch, Polish tennis player

1997Maude Apatow, American actress

1997Stefania LaVie Owen, New Zealand-American actress

1996Jenifer Brening, German singer

1996Oleksandr Zinchenko, Ukrainian footballer

1995Jahlil Okafor, American basketball player

1993Daniel Ochefu, American basketball player

1992Alex Telles, Brazilian footballer

1992Jesse Lingard, English footballer

1992Maximiliano Meza, Argentine footballer

1991Alana Haim, American musician and actress

1991Conor Daly, American race car driver

1991Yanni Gourde, Canadian ice hockey player

1988Erik Gustafsson, Swedish ice hockey player

1988Steven Nzonzi, French footballer

1986Keylor Navas, Costa Rican footballer

1986Kim Junsu, South Korean singer-songwriter and dancer

1986Snejana Onopka, Ukrainian model

1985Diogo Fernandes, Brazilian footballer

1984Martin Škrtel, Slovak footballer

1983Camilla Luddington, English actress

1983Delon Armitage, Trinidadian-English rugby player

1983René Duprée, Canadian professional wrestler

1983Ronnie Radke, American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer

1983Sophia Young, Vincentian-American basketball player

1982Borja García, Spanish racing driver

1982Charlie Cox, English actor

1982George O. Gore II, American actor and comedian

1982Tatiana Perebiynis, Ukrainian tennis player

1981Brendan Fletcher, Canadian actor and screenwriter

1981Michelle Dockery, English actress

1981Roman Pavlyuchenko, Russian footballer

1980Élodie Gossuin, French beauty pageant titleholder and model

1980Sergio Pizzorno, English singer-songwriter and guitarist

1979Adam Brody, American actor

1979Eric Young, Canadian-American wrestler

1978Mark Jansen, Dutch guitarist and songwriter

1977Geoff Stults, American actor and producer

1977Mehmet Aurélio, Brazilian-Turkish footballer and manager

Died on this day

2025William J. Bauer, senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago and previously a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ill

2024Zakir Hussain, Indian tabla player, musical producer, film actor and composer (born 1951)

2020Saufatu Sopoanga, Tuvaluan politician, 8th Prime Minister of Tuvalu (born 1952)

2018Eryue He, Chinese historical fiction writer (born 1945)

2018Girma Wolde-Giorgis, President of Ethiopia (born 1924)

2017Calestous Juma, academic (born 1953)

2017Heinz Wolff, scientist and TV presenter (born 1928)

2016Craig Sager, American sports journalist (born 1951)

2015Harry Zvi Tabor, English-Israeli physicist and engineer (born 1917)

2014Donald Metcalf, Australian physiologist and immunologist (born 1929)

2014Fausto Zapata, Mexican journalist, lawyer, and politician, Governor of San Luis Potosí (born 1940)

2013Dyron Nix, American basketball player (born 1967)

2013Harold Camping, American evangelist, author, radio host (born 1921)

2013Joan Fontaine, British-American actress (born 1917)

2012Olga Zubarry, Argentinian actress (born 1929)

2012Owoye Andrew Azazi, Nigerian general (born 1952)

2012Patrick Ibrahim Yakowa, Nigerian politician, 18th Governor of Kaduna State (born 1948)

2011Bob Brookmeyer, American trombone player and composer (born 1929)

2011Christopher Hitchens, English-American essayist, literary critic, and journalist (born 1949)

2010Blake Edwards, American director, producer, and screenwriter (born 1922)

2010Bob Feller, American baseball player and sportscaster (born 1918)

2010Eugene Victor Wolfenstein, American psychoanalyst and theorist (born 1940)

2009Eliza Atkins Gleason, American librarian (born 1909)

2009Oral Roberts, American evangelist, founded the Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association (born 1918)

2008León Febres Cordero, Ecuadorian engineer and politician, 46th President of Ecuador (born 1931)

2007Julia Carson, American lawyer and politician (born 1938)

2006Clay Regazzoni, Swiss racing driver (born 1939)

2006Mary Stolz, American journalist and author (born 1920)

2005Heinrich Gross, Austrian physician and psychiatrist (born 1914)

2005Stan Leonard, Canadian golfer (born 1915)

Quote of the day

“When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive, to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.”

Marcus Aurelius

Questions people ask

Where do the entries come from?

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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