December 26
is the 360th day of the year in the
Gregorian Calendar, 361st in
leap years. There are 5 days remaining.
*
1481 -
Battle of Westbroek -
Holland defeats troops of
Utrecht.
*
1620 -
Elizabeth Báthory's crimes are uncovered.
* 1620 -
Pilgrim Fathers land at what becomes
New Plymouth in
Massachusetts.
*
1776 -
American Revolutionary War: The British are defeated in the
Battle of Trenton.
*
1790 -
Louis XVI of France gives his public assent to
Civil Constitution of the Clergy during the
French Revolution.
*
1792 - The final trial of
Louis XVI of France begins in
Paris.
*
1793 -
Battle of Geisberg:
French defeat
Austrians.
*
1793 - The wedding of Prince
Friedrich Ludwig of Prussia and
Frederica of Mecklenburg-Strelitz takes place.
*
1825 - Several
Imperial Russia army officers lead circa 3000
soldiers on the Senate Square in the failed
Decembrist uprising.
*
1825 - The
Erie Canal opens.
*
1848 - The
Phi Delta Theta fraternity is founded.
*
1860 - The first ever inter-club
football match takes place between
Hallam F.C. and
Sheffield F.C. at
Sandygate in
Sheffield,
England.
*
1861 -
American Civil War:
Confederate diplomatic envoys
James M. Mason and
John Slidell are freed by the
United States government, thus heading off a possible war between the United States and
Britain.
*
1862 -
American Civil War: The
Battle of Chickasaw Bayou begins.
* 1862 - The largest mass-hanging in US history took place in
Mankato, Minnesota, killing 39.
*
1870 - The 12.8-km long
Fréjus Rail Tunnel through the Alps is completed.
*
1898 -
Marie and
Pierre Curie announce the isolation of
radium.
*
1908 -
Jack Johnson becomes the first
African American heavyweight boxing champion by defeating
Tommy Burns in
Sydney,
Australia.
*
1916 -
Joseph Joffre is made
Marshal of France.
*
1925 - The
Communist Party of India is founded.
* 1925 -
Turkey adopts the
Gregorian Calendar.
*
1931 -
Phi Iota Alpha, the oldest existing
Latino fraternity is founded.
*
1933 - The
Nissan Motor Company is organized in
Tokyo,
Japan.
* 1933 -
FM radio is patented.
*
1943 -
World War II: The German warship
Scharnhorst sinks off the coast of North Cape in
Norway after being attacked by the
British Royal Navy late the previous evening.
*
1944 - The play
The Glass Menagerie by
Tennessee Williams is first publicly performed.
* 1944 -
World War II:
U.S. troops repulse
German forces at
Bastogne.
*
1945 -
CFP franc and
CFA franc are created.
*
1946 - The
Flamingo Hotel opens in
Las Vegas.
*
1947 - Twenty-six inches of
snow falls in 16 hours in
New York City.
*
1948 -
Cardinal Mindszenty is arrested in
Hungary and accused of treason and conspiracy.
*
1966 - The first
Kwanzaa is celebrated by
Maulana Karenga, the chair of
Black Studies at
California State University, Long Beach.
*
1973 -
Comet Kohoutek reaches
perihelion but is not such a display as expected.
* 1973 -
Soyuz 13 lands on
earth after a week in orbit.
*
1974 -
Salyut 4 is launched.
*
1975 - The
Tupolev Tu-144 goes into service in
Soviet Union.
*
1976 - The
Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist-Leninist) is founded.
*
1979 -
Soviet Special forces troops take over presidential palace in
Kabul,
Afghanistan.
* 1979 - Opening night of the
Concerts for the People of Kampuchea at the
Hammersmith Odeon; a benefit concert for the citizens of
Cambodia who were victims of dictator
Pol Pot*
1980 -
Aeroflot puts the
Ilyushin Il-86 into service.
*
1982 -
TIME magazine's Man of the Year was for the first time given to a non-human, the
personal computer.
*
1984 -
Princess Astrid of Belgium marries Archduke
Lorenz of Austria-Este.
*
1986 - The first long-running American television
soap opera,
Search for Tomorrow, airs its final episode after thirty-five years on the air.
*
1988 - The
Nanjing Anti-African protests in
Nanjing,
China begin.
*
1991 -
Supreme Soviet meets and formally dissolves the
USSR.
*
1991 -
Mount Pinatubo erupts.
*
1996 -
JonBenét Ramsey, a six-year-old
beauty queen, is found murdered in her family's basement in
Boulder, Colorado.
* 1996 - The
United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification goes into force.
*
1998 -
Iraq announced its intention to fire upon
U.S. and
British warplanes that patrol the northern and southern
no-fly zones.
* 1998 - Severe gales over
Ireland, northern
England, and southern
Scotland cause widespread disruption and widespread power outages in
Northern Ireland and southern
Scotland.
*
1999 - Severe weather in
France kills over 100 people and causes extensive damage to property and trees and the French national power grid (see
Lothar).
*
2002 - French
Raelian scientist Brigitte Boisselier says
Clonaid has delivered the first of a supposed five
clone babies through
cesarean section.
*
2003 - A major
earthquake devastates southeast
Iranian city of
Bam, killing tens of thousands and destroying the citadel of
Arg-é Bam.
*
2004 - An
earthquake measuring 9.3 on the
Richter magnitude scale creates a
tsunami causing devastation in
Sri Lanka,
India,
Indonesia,
Thailand,
Malaysia, The
Maldives and many other areas around the rim of the
Indian Ocean, killing more than 300,000.
*
1194 -
Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (d.
1250)
*
1532 -
Guilielmus Xylander, German classical scholar (d.
1576)
*
1536 -
Yi I, Korean Confucian scholar (d.
1584)
*
1646 -
Robert Bolling, English settler in Virginia (d.
1709)
*
1687 -
Johann Georg Pisendel, German musician (d.
1755)
*
1716 -
Thomas Gray, English writer (d.
1771)
* 1716 -
Jean François de Saint-Lambert, French poet (d.
1803)
*
1723 -
Friedrich Melchior, baron von Grimm, German writer (d.
1807)
*
1736 -
Antonio Caldara, Italian composer (b.
1670)
*
1737 -
Prince Josias of Coburg, Austrian general (d.
1815)
*
1751 -
Clement Hofbauer, Austrian missionary and saint (d.
1820)
*
1780 -
Mary Fairfax Somerville, British mathematician (d.
1872)
*
1782 -
Filaret Drozdov, Metropolitan of Moscow (d.
1867)
*
1791 -
Charles Babbage, English mathematician and inventor (d.
1871)
*
1819 -
E. D. E. N. Southworth, American novelist (d.
1899)
*
1822 -
Dion Boucicault, Irish actor and playwright (d.
1890)
*
1837 -
George Dewey, U. S. admiral (d.
1917)
*
1853 -
René Bazin, French novelist (d.
1932)
*
1859 -
William Stephens, U.S. political figure (d.
1944)
*
1872 -
Norman Angell, British politician, recipient of the
Nobel Peace Prize (d.
1967)
*
1873 -
Thomas Wass, English cricketer (d.
1953)
*
1890 -
Uncle Charlie Osborne, American fiddler (d.
1992)
*
1891 -
Henry Miller, American writer (d.
1980)
*
1893 -
Mao Zedong, Chinese military leader and politician (d.
1976)
*
1902 -
Anatoli Lvovich Kaplan, Russian painter (d.
1980)
*
1903 -
Elisha Cook Jr., American actor (d.
1995)
*
1904 -
Alejo Carpentier, Cuban writer (d.
1980)
*
1914 -
Richard Widmark, American actor
*
1921 -
Steve Allen, American actor, comedian, composer, and author (d.
2000)
*
1927 -
Alan King, American comedian and actor (d.
2004)
* 1927 -
Denis Quilley, British actor (d.
2003)
* 1927 -
Stu Miller, baseball player
*
1933 -
Ugly Dave Grey, Australian television personality
*
1935 -
Abdul "Duke" Fakir, American singer (
The Four Tops)
* 1935 -
Norm Ullman, Canadian
ice hockey player
*
1937 -
John Horton Conway, British mathematician
* 1937 -
Jay Heimowitz, American poker player
*
1938 -
Bahram Beyzayi, Iranian play writer and film director
*
1940 -
Edward C. Prescott, American economist,
Bank of Sweden Prize winner
* 1940 -
Phil Spector, American music producer
*
1942 -
Gray Davis, Governor of California, 1998-2003
*
1945 -
John Walsh, American talk show host
*
1947 -
Carlton Fisk, baseball player
*
1949 -
José Ramos Horta, Foreign Minister of East Timor, recipient of the
Nobel Peace Prize*
1954 -
Ozzie Smith, baseball player
* 1954 -
Steve Steen, English actor
*
1955 -
Evan Bayh, U.S. Senator from
Indiana*
1956 -
David Sedaris, American essayist
*
1959 -
Koji Morimoto, Japanese animated film director
*
1960 -
Temuera Morrison, New Zealand actor
*
1961 -
John Lynch, Northern Irish actor
*
1963 -
Lars Ulrich, Danish drummer (
Metallica)
*
1971 -
Jared Leto, American actor
* 1971 -
Jonathan M. Parisen, American film director
*
1975 -
Marcelo Ríos, Chilean tennis player
*
1976 -
Lea De Mae, Czech actress (d.
2004)
*
1978 -
Kaoru Sugayama, Japanese volleyball player
*
1979 -
Chris Daughtry,
American Idol contestant
*
268 -
Pope Dionysius*
418 -
Pope Zosimus*
1350 -
Jean de Marigny, French bishop
*
1458 -
Arthur III, Duke of Brittany (b.
1393)
*
1476 -
Galeazzo Maria Sforza, Duke of Milan (b.
1444)
*
1530 -
Babur, Emperor of the Mogul empire (b.
1483)
*
1574 -
Charles of Guise, French cardinal (b.
1524)
*
1624 -
Simon Marius, German astronomer (b.
1573)
*
1731 -
Antoine Houdar de la Motte, French writer (b.
1672)
*
1771 -
Claude Adrien Helvétius, French philosopher (b.
1715)
*
1780 -
John Fothergill, English physician (b.
1712)
*
1784 -
Seth Warner, American revolutionary leader (b.
1743)
*
1786 -
Gasparo Gozzi, Italian critic and dramatist (b.
1713)
*
1869 -
Jean Louis Marie Poiseuille, French physiologist (b.
1797)
*
1890 -
Heinrich Schliemann, German archaeologist (b.
1822)
*
1909 -
Frederic Remington, American artist (b.
1861)
*
1933 -
Anatoly Lunacharsky, Russian literary critic and politician (b.
1875)
*
1960 -
Watsuji Tetsuro, Japanese philosopher (b.
1889)
*
1963 -
George Wagner, American professional wrestler and television personality (b.
1915)
*
1972 -
Harry S. Truman, 33rd
President of the United States (b.
1884)
*
1973 -
Harold B. Lee, 11th president of
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (b.
1899)
*
1974 -
Jack Benny, American comedian (b.
1894)
*
1977 -
Howard Hawks, American film director and writer (b.
1896)
*
1981 -
Savithri, Telugu, Tamil Actress
*
1983 -
Violet Carson,
OBE, British actress
*
1985 -
Dian Fossey, American gorilla specialist (b.
1932)
*
1986 -
Elsa Lanchester, British-born actress (b.
1902)
*
1999 -
Curtis Mayfield, American musician (b.
1942)
* 1999 -
Shankar Dayal Sharma, President of India (b.
1918)
*
2000 -
Jason Robards, American actor (b.
1922)
*
2001 -
Nigel Hawthorne, English actor (b.
1929)
*
2002 -
Herb Ritts, American photographer (b.
1952)
* 2002 -
Armand Zildjian, American cymbal manufacturer (b.
1921)
*
2003 - Bomi Bulsara, father of
rock singer Freddie Mercury (b.
1908)
*
2003 - Sir
Alan Bates, British actor (b.
1934)
*
2004 -
Marianne Heiberg, Norwegian mediator (b.
1945)
* 2004 -
Troy Broadbridge, Australian football player (b.
1980)
* 2004 -
Aki Sirkesalo, Finnish musician (b.
1962)
* 2004 -
Reggie White, American football player (b.
1961)
*
2005 -
Kerry Packer, Australian businessman (b.
1937)
* 2005 -
Vincent Schiavelli, American actor (b.
1948)
* 2005 -
Erich Topp, World War Two U-Boat Ace (b.
1914)
December 26 is a public holiday in most Christian countries, a notable exception being the
United States (unless
Christmas Day falls on a
Sunday like it did in
2005 and will again in
2011, in which it is the observed federal holiday). In Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, and Scandinavia, Christmas Day and the following day are called First and Second Christmas Day.
*
R.C. Saints -
Saint Stephen*
St. Stephen's Day, a public holiday in
Catalonia,
Croatia,
Czech Republic, and the
Republic of Ireland.
* The first
day of Christmas in Western
Christianity.
*
Boxing Day in the
Commonwealth of Nations.
*
Wren day in Ireland and the
Isle of Man.
*
Australia -
Proclamation Day (South Australian
public holiday), for the foundation of the
Australian state of
South Australia on
December 28 1836 but commemorated on this day.
*
Slovenia -
Independence and Unity Day (
1990)
*
South Africa - Day of Goodwill, a public holiday
*First day of
Kwanzaa*
Mandala Pooja at
Sabarimala in
Kerala,
India*
Indonesia,
Thailand,
Malaysia - Tsunami Awareness Day/Tsunami Memorial (or Remembrance) Day
*Period of
Ursids meteor shower ends about this day
*
Wrenboys celebrate
Wren in Ireland
*First day of
Junkanoo street parade in the
Bahamas (the second day is on the
New Year's Day)
*
BBC: On This Day*
Today in History: December 26December 25 -
December 27 -
November 26 -
January 26 --
listing of all days
