January 10, 1981 (Saturday)
- Salvadoran Civil War: The FMLN launched a guerilla war against the government of El Salvador which would last for eleven years. At 6:30 pm, after radio stations in San Salvador were seized and FMLN leader Cayetano Carpio announced "The hour... for the taking of power by the people... has arrived." and attacks were launched at multiple locations. One estimate is that 80,000 people, almost 2% of El Salvador's population of 4.5 million, were killed in the course of attacks and reprisals.
- Died: Richard Boone, 63, American TV actor; Paladin on Have Gun, Will Travel; and Fawn M. Brodie, 65, American historian
Read more about this topic: January 1981
Famous quotes containing the word january:
“and you undid the reins
and I undid the buttons,
the bones, the confusions,
The New England postcards,
the January ten o’clock night,
and we rose up like wheat....”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)