Also on this day
Lead Story
1620
On December 18, 1620, the British ship Mayflower docked at modern-day Plymouth, Massachusetts, and its passengers prepared to begin their new settlement, Plymouth Colony.
The famous Mayflower story began in 1606, when a group of reform-minded Puritans in Nottinghamshire, England, founded their own church, separate from the state-sanctioned Church of England....
American Revolution
1777
The new United States celebrates its first national day of thanksgiving on Thursday, December 18, 1777, commemorating the American victory at the Battle of Saratoga after the surrender of General John Burgoyne and 5,000 British troops in October 1777.
In proclaiming the first national day of thanksgiving, Congress...
Automotive
1968
On this day in 1968, the musical film “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” opens in New York City. The movie featured Dick Van Dyke, who had made a splash four years before in the Disney musical “Mary Poppins” and whose eponymous TV show had been a hit since 1961. Its real...
Civil War
1862
On this day in 1862, Confederate cavalry leader General Nathan Bedford Forrest routs a Union force under the command of Colonel Robert Ingersoll on a raid into western Tennessee, an area held by the Union.
With the main Union army in the region occupying northern Mississippi, Confederate General Braxton Bragg ordered...
Cold War
1972
Following the breakdown of peace talks with North Vietnam just a few days earlier, President Richard Nixon announces the beginning of a massive bombing campaign to break the stalemate. For nearly two weeks, American bombers pounded North Vietnam.On December 13, peace talks between the United States and North Vietnam...
Crime
1878
John Kehoe, the last of the Molly Maguires, is executed in Pennsylvania. The Molly Maguires, an Irish secret society that had allegedly been responsible for some incidences of vigilante justice in the coalfields of eastern Pennsylvania, defended their actions as attempts to protect exploited Irish-American workers. In fact, they are...
Disaster
1982
A power plant fire begins in Venezuela on this day in 1982. By the time it ended, the fire killed 128 people and injured hundreds more. Half the capital city of Caracas lost electrical power and 40,000 people had to be evacuated.
The large Tacoa power plant on the outskirts of...
General Interest
1865
Following its ratification by the requisite three-quarters of the states earlier in the month, the 13th Amendment is formally adopted into the U.S. Constitution, ensuring that “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude… shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”Before the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln...
1912
After three years of digging in the Piltdown gravel pit in Sussex, England, amateur archaeologist Charles Dawson announces the discovery of two skulls that appear to belong to a primitive hominid and ancestor of man, along with a canine tooth, a tool carved from an elephant’s tusk, and fossil teeth...
Hollywood
1946
On this day in 1946, Steven Spielberg, who will become one of the most successful directors in modern movie history with such blockbusters as Jaws, E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan, is born in Cincinnati, Ohio.
After studying film at California State University,...
Literary
1870
On this day, H.H. Munro, better known as short story writer Saki, is born in Burma.
The son of a Burma police officer, Munro was sent to live with his tyrannical aunts in England when he was 2. When he grew up, he joined the Burma police department but left because...
Old West
1888
While searching for stray cattle in the isolated canyons of southwest Colorado, Richard Wetherill and his brother-in-law stumble upon the magnificent ancient Indians ruins of Mesa Verde.
The Wetherill family started ranching in the rugged southwest lands of Colorado in 1881, and Richard and his brothers often explored the canyons and...
Presidential
1915
On this day in 1915, President Woodrow Wilson marries Edith Galt in Washington, D.C. The bride was 43 and the groom was 59. It was the second marriage for Wilson, whose first wife died the year before from a kidney ailment. Edith, who claimed to be directly descended from Pocahantas,...
Sports
1886
On this day in 1886, the often controversial baseball legend Ty Cobb is born in Narrows, Georgia. From the beginning of his career, a shadow seemed to hover over the hard-drinking, hard-living Cobb, whose dark personality would often overshadow his undeniable athletic talent. In August 1905, just before Cobb joined...
Vietnam War
1972
The Nixon administration announces that the bombing and mining of North Vietnam will resume and continue until a “settlement” is reached.
On December 13, North Vietnamese negotiators walked out of secret talks with National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger. President Richard Nixon issued an ultimatum to Hanoi to send its representatives back...
World War I
1916
The Battle of Verdun, the longest engagement of World War I, ends on this day after ten months and close to a million total casualties suffered by German and French troops. The battle had begun on February 21, after the Germans—led by Chief of Staff Erich von Falkenhayn—developed...
World War II
1941
On this day, Japanese troops land in Hong Kong and a slaughter ensues.
A week of air raids over Hong Kong, a British crown colony, was followed up on December 17 with a visit paid by Japanese envoys to Sir Mark Young, the British governor of Hong Kong. The envoys’ message...