This Week in History
JANUARY 23
Pete Acquavella was born.
Kerry O’Grady was born.
1556 – The deadliest earthquake on record killed 830,000 in Shansi, China.
1973 – President Nixon announced that an accord had been reached to end the
Vietnam War.
JANUARY 24
Kim Green was born.
Danny McFadden was born.
Kristin Papadopoulos was born.
2003 – The Department of Homeland Security, under Tom Ridge, became a cabinet department.
1848 – Gold was first discovered in California, in Sutter’s mill. When President Polk announced the news in December, the gold rush began.
JANUARY 25
Mara Brady was born.
Kevin Boyle was born.
Janet McDonnell was born.
Ed Mills was born.
Fran Reddon was born.
1890 – Nellie Bly bested Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days by completing her circumnavigation in 72 days.
JANUARY 26
Diana Cinicola was born.
1979 – Former Vice President Nelson Rockefeller died in New York at age 70.
1988 – Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera opened on Broadway. It would go on to become the longest-running Broadway show.
JANUARY 27
Chris Cori was born.
Ruth Graves was born.
1945 – The Russians liberated Auschwitz concentration camp, where the Nazis had killed over 1.5 million people, including over 1 million Jews.
1951 – The U.S. Air Force started atomic testing in the Nevada desert.
JANUARY 28
Esther Grillo was born.
1915 – Congress passed legislation creating the U.S. Coast Guard.
1986 – U.S. shuttle Challenger exploded 72 seconds after lift-off, killing all seven crew members aboard.
JANUARY 29
Sunshine Hastings was born.
John “Doc” Dougherty was born.
1886 – Karl Benz received a patent for the first successful gasoline-driven car.
1936 – Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson, and Walter Johnson were the first players elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.