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Today is Thursday, Dec. 13, the 348th day of 2012. There are 18 days left in the year.
Highlight in History
On Dec. 13, 1862, Union forces led by Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside launched futile attacks against entrenched Confederate soldiers during the Civil War Battle of Fredericksburg; the soundly defeated Northern troops withdrew two days later. (It was during this battle that Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee is said to have remarked: “It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it.”)
On this date
In 1642, Dutch navigator Abel Tasman sighted present-day New Zealand.
In 1769, Dartmouth College in New Hampshire received its charter.
In 1918, President Woodrow Wilson arrived in France, becoming the first chief executive to visit Europe while in office.
In 1928, George Gershwin’s “An American in Paris” had its premiere at Carnegie Hall in New York.
In 1937, the Chinese city of Nanjing fell to Japanese forces; what followed was a massacre of war prisoners, soldiers and citizens. (China maintains as many as 300,000 people died; Japan says the toll was far less.)
In 1944, during World War II, the U.S. cruiser Nashville was badly damaged in a Japanese kamikaze attack that claimed more than 130 lives.
In 1962, the United States launched Relay 1, a communications satellite which retransmitted television, telephone and digital signals.
In 1978, the Philadelphia Mint began stamping the Susan B. Anthony dollar, which went into circulation in July 1979.
In 1981, authorities in Poland imposed martial law in a crackdown on the Solidarity labor movement. (Martial law formally ended in 1983.)
In 1994, an American Eagle commuter plane crashed short of Raleigh-Durham International Airport in North Carolina, killing 15 of the 20 people on board.
In 2000, Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore conceded to Republican George W. Bush, a day after the U.S. Supreme Court shut down further recounts in Florida.
In 2003, Saddam Hussein was captured by U.S. forces while hiding in a hole under a farmhouse in Adwar, Iraq, near his hometown of Tikrit.
Ten years ago
Cardinal Bernard Law resigned as Boston archbishop because of the priest sex abuse scandal. President George W. Bush announced he would take the smallpox vaccine along with U.S. military forces, but was not recommending the potentially risky inoculation for most Americans. The U.N. Security Council condemned “acts of terror” against Israel in Kenya and deplored the claims of responsibility by the al-Qaida terror network. Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger stepped down as chairman of a panel investigating the Sept. 11 attacks, citing controversy over potential conflicts of interest with his private-sector clients.
Five years ago
Democratic presidential hopefuls meeting in Johnston, Iowa, called for higher taxes on the highest-paid Americans and on big corporations in an unusually cordial debate. Shareholders of Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal, approved a takeover by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. Major League Baseball’s Mitchell Report was released, identifying 85 names to differing degrees in connection with the alleged use of performance-enhancing drugs.
One year ago
Early sound recordings by Alexander Graham Bell that were packed away at the Smithsonian Institution for more than a century were played publicly for the first time using new technology that read the sound with light and a 3D camera. (In one recording, a man recites part of Hamlet’s Soliloquy; on another, a voice recites the numbers 1 through 6.) In the Penn State child sex abuse scandal, ex-assistant coach Jerry Sandusky waived a preliminary hearing on the charges, which he denied. (Sandusky was later convicted of abusing several boys, some on campus.) In Liege, Belgium, six people were killed when a 33-year-old man threw grenades and fired on a crowd of people in the city’s main square before committing suicide.
Top News
Today in History for Thursday, December 13, 2012
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Southern Baptists prepare to send help to Oklahoma
Members of the Southern Baptist Convention’s disaster relief organization are making plans at their suburban Atlanta offices to send help to the Oklahoma City area after Monday’s tornado.
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Wave of attacks kills at least 95 in Iraq
A wave of attacks killed at least 95 people in Shiite and Sunni areas of Iraq on Monday, officials said, pushing the death toll over the past week to more than 240 and extending one of the most sustained bouts of sectarian violence the country has seen in years.
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Arias attorneys will put one witness on: Arias
Complaining that Jodi Arias’ sensational murder case has become a modern-day “witch trial,” her lawyers tried to quit in the middle of the death-penalty phase Monday, then said they will call only one witness: Arias.
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Oklahoma twister tracked path of 1999 tornado
Monday’s powerful tornado in suburban Oklahoma City loosely followed the path of a killer twister that slammed the region in May 1999.
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Dozens killed as tornado ravages Oklahoma City area
A powerful late-afternoon tornado leveled much of this Oklahoma community Monday, killing at least 51 people. Reporters on helicopters flying above the scene described the scene as “devastating.”
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Today in History for Tuesday, May 21, 2013
Today is Tuesday, May 21, the 141st day of 2013. There are 224 days left in the year.
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Several Republicans weigh challenge to Barrow
Now that Rep. John Barrow has turned down a campaign for the U.S. Senate, the challenge ahead for the Deep South’s last white Democratic congressman will be to defy the odds a second time by winning re-election in an eastern Georgia district that was drawn to ensure his defeat.
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‘Trek’ does $70.6M but falls short of studio hopes
“Star Trek: Into Darkness” has warped its way to a $70.6 million domestic launch from Friday to Sunday, though it’s not setting any light-speed records with a debut that’s lower than the studio’s expectations.
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Syrian troops push into strategic rebel-held town
Syrian troops pushed into a rebel-held town near the Lebanese border on Sunday, fighting house-to-house and bombing from the air as President Bashar Assad tried to strengthen his grip on a strategic strip of land running from the capital to the Mediterranean coast.
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Taylor Swift wins 8 trophies at Billboard Awards
Another day, another domination for Taylor Swift: She was the red hot winner at the Billboard Music Awards.
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