January 11 - Events

Events

• 630 – Muhammad leads an army of 10,000 to conquer Mecca.
• 1055 – Theodora is crowned Empress of the Byzantine Empire.
• 1158 – Vladislav II becomes King of Bohemia.
• 1569 – First recorded lottery in England.
• 1571 – Austrian nobility is granted freedom of religion.
• 1693 – Mount Etna erupts in Sicily, Italy. A powerful earthquake destroys parts of Sicily and Malta.
• 1759 – In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the first American life insurance company is incorporated.
• 1779 – Ching-Thang Khomba is crowned King of Manipur.
• 1787 – William Herschel discovers Titania and Oberon, two moons of Uranus.
• 1794 – Robert Forsythe, a U.S. Marshal is killed in Augusta, Georgia when trying to serve court papers, the first US marshal to die while carrying out his duties.
• 1805 – The Michigan Territory is created.
• 1815 – Sir John A. Macdonald, first Prime Minister of Canada is born.
• 1861 – Alabama secedes from the United States.
• 1863 – American Civil War: Battle of Arkansas Post – General John McClernand and Admiral David Dixon Porter capture the Arkansas River for the Union.
• 1863 – American Civil War: CSS Alabama encounters and sinks the USS Hatteras off Galveston Lighthouse in Texas.
• 1879 – The Anglo-Zulu War begins.
• 1908 – Grand Canyon National Monument is created.
• 1912 – Immigrant textile works in Lawrence, Massachusetts, go on strike when wages are reduced in response to a mandated shortening of the work week.
• 1917 – The Kingsland munitions factory explosion occurs as a result of sabotage.
• 1919 – Romania reincorporates Transylvania.
• 1922 – First use of insulin to treat diabetes in a human patient.
• 1923 – Occupation of the Ruhr: Troops from France and Belgium occupy the Ruhr area to force Germany to make its World War I reparation payments.
• 1927 – Louis B. Mayer, head of film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), announces the creation of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, at a banquet in Los Angeles, California.
• 1935 – Amelia Earhart becomes the first person to fly solo from Hawaii to California.
• 1942 – World War II: The Japanese capture Kuala Lumpur.
• 1943 – World War II: The United States and United Kingdom give up territorial rights in China.
• 1943 – Italian-American anarchist Carlo Tresca is assassinated in New York
• 1946 – Enver Hoxha, Secretary General of the Communist Party of Albania, declares the People's Republic of Albania with himself as head of state.
• 1949 – The first "networked" television broadcasts take place as KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania goes on the air connecting the east coast and mid-west programming.
• 1949 – First recorded case of snowfall in Los Angeles, California.
• 1957 – The African Convention is founded in Dakar, Senegal.
• 1960 – Henry Lee Lucas, once listed as America's most prolific serial killer, commits his first known murder.
• 1962 – Cold War. While tied to its pier in Polyarny, the Soviet submarine B-37 is destroyed when fire breaks out in its torpedo compartent.
• 1962 – An avalanche on Huascarán in Peru causes 4,000 deaths.
• 1964 – Surgeon General of the United States Dr. Luther Terry, M.D., publishes the landmark report Smoking and Health: Report of the Advisory Committee to the Surgeon General of the United States saying that smoking may be hazardous to health, sparking national and worldwide anti-smoking efforts.
• 1972 – East Pakistan renames itself Bangladesh.
• 1986 – The Gateway Bridge, Brisbane in Queensland, Australia is officially opened.
• 1994 – The Irish Government announces the end of a 15-year broadcasting ban on the IRA and its political arm Sinn Féin.
• 1996 – Space Shuttle program: STS-72 launches from the Kennedy Space Center marking the start of the 74th Space Shuttle mission and the 10th flight of Endeavour.
• 1998 – Sidi-Hamed massacre takes place in Algeria, over 100 people are killed.
• 2002 – The first twenty captives arrive at Camp X-Ray.
• 2003 – Illinois Governor George Ryan commutes the death sentences of 167 prisoners on Illinois' death row based on the Jon Burge scandal.