The Mars Exploration Rover “Spirit” safely lands on the Red Planet

On January 3, 1521, Pope Leo X issues the papal bull Decet Romanum Pontificem, which excommunicates Martin Luther from the Catholic Church. Martin Luther, the chief catalyst of Protestantism, was a professor of biblical interpretation at the University of Wittenberg in Germany when he drew up his 95 theses condemning the Catholic Church for its […]

Escalating the tensions that would lead to rebellion and war, the Mexican government imprisons the Texas colonizer Stephen Austin in Mexico City. Stephen Fuller Austin was a reluctant revolutionary. His father, Moses Austin, won permission from the Mexican government in 1821 to settle 300 Anglo-American families in Texas. When Moses died before realizing his plans, […]

On January 3, 1861, just two weeks after South Carolina became the first state to secede from the Union, the state of Delaware rejects a similar proposal. There had been little doubt that Delaware would remain with the North. Delaware was technically a state where slavery was legal, but the institution was not widespread. In […]

Two years after British archaeologist Howard Carter and his workmen discovered the tomb of the Pharaoh Tutankhamen near Luxor, Egypt, they uncover the greatest treasure of the tomb—a stone sarcophagus containing a solid gold coffin that holds the mummy of Tutankhamen. When Carter first arrived in Egypt in 1891, most of the ancient Egyptian tombs […]

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, an adult victim of polio, founds the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, which he later renamed the March of Dimes Foundation, on January 3, 1938. A predominantly childhood disease in the early 20th century, polio wreaked havoc among American children every summer. The virus, which affects the central nervous system, flourished in […]

On January 3, 1959, President Eisenhower signs a special proclamation admitting the territory of Alaska into the Union as the 49th and largest state. Indigenous peoples inhabited the region that would become Alaska for centuries. The European discovery of Alaska came in 1741, when a Russian expedition led by Danish navigator Vitus Bering sighted the […]

In the climax of deteriorating relations between the United States and Fidel Castro’s government in Cuba, President Dwight D. Eisenhower closes the American embassy in Havana and severs diplomatic relations. The action signaled that the United States was prepared to take extreme measures to oppose Castro’s regime, which U.S. officials worried was a beachhead of […]

On January 3, 1973, James Abourezk, a Congressperson representing South Dakota’s 2nd District, takes office in his newly elected role in the U.S. Senate, once again representing his home state. Abourezk, who is of Lebanese descent, was the first Arab American to ever serve in the U.S. Senate. During his time as a national representative, […]

On January 3, 1987, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame admits its first woman: Aretha Franklin. Fewer than 100 female performers—less than 10 percent—have been added since the Hall began its induction ceremonies. In 1986, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame announced its first group of inductees: Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Fats […]

Matthew Stuart meets with Boston prosecutors and tells them that his brother, Charles, was actually the person responsible for murdering Charles’s wife, Carol. The killing of Carol Stuart, who was pregnant at the time, on October 23, 1989, had touched off a national outrage when Charles Stuart told authorities that the couple had been robbed […]