December 13
1642 - New Zealand was discovered by Dutch navigator Abel Tasman.
1769 - Dartmouth College in New Hampshire received its charter.
1862 - Confederate forces dealt Union troops a major defeat at the Battle of Fredericksburg in Virginia.
1918 - President Woodrow Wilson arrived in France, becoming the first U.S. president to visit Europe while in office.
1937 - The Chinese city of Nanjing fell to Japanese forces during the Sino-Japanese War; what followed was a massacre of war prisoners, soldiers and citizens. (China maintains that up to 300,000 people were killed; Japanese nationalists say the death toll was far lower, and some maintain that the massacre never happened.)
1978 - The U.S. Mint began stamping the Susan B. Anthony dollar, the first U.S. coin honoring a woman.
1981 - The Polish government imposed martial law in an attempt to crush the Solidarity movement.
1988 - PLO chairman Yasser Arafat addressed the U.N. General Assembly in Geneva, where it had reconvened after the United States refused to grant Arafat a visa to visit New York.
1989 - South African President F. W. de Klerk met with African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela for the first time.
1993 - The space shuttle Endeavour returned from its mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope.
1996 - Kofi Annan of Ghana was chosen to become U.N. secretary-general.
2000 - George W. Bush accepted the presidency 36 days after the election; Al Gore conceded and delivered a call for national unity.
2001 - The Pentagon released a captured videotape of Osama bin Laden in which the al-Qaida leader said the deaths and destruction achieved by the Sept. 11 attacks exceeded his "most optimistic" expectations.
2001 - President George W. Bush served formal notice that the United States was pulling out of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with Russia.
2002 - Cardinal Bernard Law resigned as Boston archbishop because of the priest sex abuse scandal.
2003 - American forces found and captured Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein who was hiding in a hole near his hometown of Tikrit.
2007 - Shareholders of Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal, approved a takeover by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.
2011 - 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.)
2014 - Thousands of protesters marched in New York, Washington and other U.S. cities to call attention to the killing of unarmed Black men by white police officers who faced no criminal charges.
2019 - The House Judiciary Committee approved two articles of impeachment accusing President Donald Trump of abuse of power in his dealings with Ukraine and obstruction of Congress in the investigation that followed.
2020 - The first vials of the Pfizer vaccine against COVID-19 began making their way to distribution sites across the United States. President Donald Trump said he was reversing an administration directive to vaccinate top government officials against COVID-19 while public distribution of the shot was limited to health care workers and people in nursing homes and long-term care facilities; hours earlier, the administration had confirmed that senior U.S. officials would be offered vaccines in the days ahead.
Birthdays
32 - Taylor Swift (singer)
33 - Marcel Spears (actor)
34 - Michael Socha (actor)
40 - Amy Lee (singer)
40 - Chelsea Hertford (actress)
42 - Kimee Balmilero (actress)
46 - James Kyson Lee (actor)
47 - Debbie Matenopoulos (TV host)
50 - Jeffrey Pierce (actor)
51 - Bart Johnson (actor)
54 - Lusia Strus (actress)
54 - Jamie Foxx (actor/comedian)
55 - NeNe Leakes (actress/reality star)
62 - Johnny Whitaker (actor)
64 - Steve Buscemi (actor)
67 - John Anderson (singer)
71 - Wendie Malick (actress)
72 - Randy Owen (singer)
72 - Robert Lindsay (actor)
73 - Ted Nugent (singer)
76 - Kathy Garver (actress)
80 - John Davidson (singer)
91 - Buck White (singer)
96 - Dick Van Dyke (actor/comedian)
=============================================
Today in Sports History - December 13
1936 - The Green Bay Packers defeated the Boston Redskins 21-6 to win the NFL Championship Game; the Redskins relocated to Washington, D.C. the following season.
1942 - The Washington Redskins defeat the Chicago Bears 14-6 in the NFL Championship Game.
1949 - The American League rejected a revival of the spitball, which had been banned since 1920.
1956 - Jackie Robinson (Los Angeles Dodgers) was traded to the Giants for pitcher Dick Littlefield and $35,000. Robinson retired instead of accepting the trade.
1966 - The broadcast rights to the first Super Bowl were sold to CBS and NBC for a total of $9.5 million.
1977 - A plane crash kills 14 members of the University of Evansville men's basketball team.
1983 - The Detroit Pistons defeated the Denver Nuggets 186-184 in triple overtime, the highest-scoring game in NBA history.
1995 - Paul Coffey (Detroit Red Wings) became the first NHL defenseman to reach 1,000 career points.
1997 - Michigan cornerback Charles Woodson wins the Heisman Trophy, becoming the first defensive player to win the award.
1998 - Gary Anderson (Minnesota Vikings) kicked six field goals against Baltimore. In the game Anderson set an NFL record for 34 straight field goals without a miss.
1998 - Marshall Faulk set a new Colts record for total yards from scrimmage in a season with 2,090. The record had been held by Eric Dickerson with 2,036.
1999 - Wisconsin running back Ron Dayne wins the Heisman Trophy.
2003 - Oklahoma quarterback Jason White wins the Heisman Trophy.
2007 - The Mitchell Report on performance-enhancing drugs in baseball was released, implicating seven MVPs and 31 All-Stars.
2010 - The New York Giants and Minnesota Vikings played at Detroit's Ford Field. The game was moved due to the collapse of the inflatable roof at Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, Mall of America Stadium the previous day.
2010 - Auburn quarterback Cam Newton wins the Heisman Trophy.
2014 - Oregon quarterback Marcus Mariota wins the Heisman Trophy.
2015 - Alabama running back Derrick Henry wins the Heisman Trophy.
2018 - Dirk Nowitzki takes the court for his 21st season with the Dallas Mavericks, surpassing Kobe Bryant's 20 seasons played with the Los Angeles Lakers.
1642 - New Zealand was discovered by Dutch navigator Abel Tasman.
1769 - Dartmouth College in New Hampshire received its charter.
1862 - Confederate forces dealt Union troops a major defeat at the Battle of Fredericksburg in Virginia.
1918 - President Woodrow Wilson arrived in France, becoming the first U.S. president to visit Europe while in office.
1937 - The Chinese city of Nanjing fell to Japanese forces during the Sino-Japanese War; what followed was a massacre of war prisoners, soldiers and citizens. (China maintains that up to 300,000 people were killed; Japanese nationalists say the death toll was far lower, and some maintain that the massacre never happened.)
1978 - The U.S. Mint began stamping the Susan B. Anthony dollar, the first U.S. coin honoring a woman.
1981 - The Polish government imposed martial law in an attempt to crush the Solidarity movement.
1988 - PLO chairman Yasser Arafat addressed the U.N. General Assembly in Geneva, where it had reconvened after the United States refused to grant Arafat a visa to visit New York.
1989 - South African President F. W. de Klerk met with African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela for the first time.
1993 - The space shuttle Endeavour returned from its mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope.
1996 - Kofi Annan of Ghana was chosen to become U.N. secretary-general.
2000 - George W. Bush accepted the presidency 36 days after the election; Al Gore conceded and delivered a call for national unity.
2001 - The Pentagon released a captured videotape of Osama bin Laden in which the al-Qaida leader said the deaths and destruction achieved by the Sept. 11 attacks exceeded his "most optimistic" expectations.
2001 - President George W. Bush served formal notice that the United States was pulling out of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with Russia.
2002 - Cardinal Bernard Law resigned as Boston archbishop because of the priest sex abuse scandal.
2003 - American forces found and captured Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein who was hiding in a hole near his hometown of Tikrit.
2007 - Shareholders of Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal, approved a takeover by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.
2011 - 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.)
2014 - Thousands of protesters marched in New York, Washington and other U.S. cities to call attention to the killing of unarmed Black men by white police officers who faced no criminal charges.
2019 - The House Judiciary Committee approved two articles of impeachment accusing President Donald Trump of abuse of power in his dealings with Ukraine and obstruction of Congress in the investigation that followed.
2020 - The first vials of the Pfizer vaccine against COVID-19 began making their way to distribution sites across the United States. President Donald Trump said he was reversing an administration directive to vaccinate top government officials against COVID-19 while public distribution of the shot was limited to health care workers and people in nursing homes and long-term care facilities; hours earlier, the administration had confirmed that senior U.S. officials would be offered vaccines in the days ahead.
Birthdays
32 - Taylor Swift (singer)
33 - Marcel Spears (actor)
34 - Michael Socha (actor)
40 - Amy Lee (singer)
40 - Chelsea Hertford (actress)
42 - Kimee Balmilero (actress)
46 - James Kyson Lee (actor)
47 - Debbie Matenopoulos (TV host)
50 - Jeffrey Pierce (actor)
51 - Bart Johnson (actor)
54 - Lusia Strus (actress)
54 - Jamie Foxx (actor/comedian)
55 - NeNe Leakes (actress/reality star)
62 - Johnny Whitaker (actor)
64 - Steve Buscemi (actor)
67 - John Anderson (singer)
71 - Wendie Malick (actress)
72 - Randy Owen (singer)
72 - Robert Lindsay (actor)
73 - Ted Nugent (singer)
76 - Kathy Garver (actress)
80 - John Davidson (singer)
91 - Buck White (singer)
96 - Dick Van Dyke (actor/comedian)
=============================================
Today in Sports History - December 13
1936 - The Green Bay Packers defeated the Boston Redskins 21-6 to win the NFL Championship Game; the Redskins relocated to Washington, D.C. the following season.
1942 - The Washington Redskins defeat the Chicago Bears 14-6 in the NFL Championship Game.
1949 - The American League rejected a revival of the spitball, which had been banned since 1920.
1956 - Jackie Robinson (Los Angeles Dodgers) was traded to the Giants for pitcher Dick Littlefield and $35,000. Robinson retired instead of accepting the trade.
1966 - The broadcast rights to the first Super Bowl were sold to CBS and NBC for a total of $9.5 million.
1977 - A plane crash kills 14 members of the University of Evansville men's basketball team.
1983 - The Detroit Pistons defeated the Denver Nuggets 186-184 in triple overtime, the highest-scoring game in NBA history.
1995 - Paul Coffey (Detroit Red Wings) became the first NHL defenseman to reach 1,000 career points.
1997 - Michigan cornerback Charles Woodson wins the Heisman Trophy, becoming the first defensive player to win the award.
1998 - Gary Anderson (Minnesota Vikings) kicked six field goals against Baltimore. In the game Anderson set an NFL record for 34 straight field goals without a miss.
1998 - Marshall Faulk set a new Colts record for total yards from scrimmage in a season with 2,090. The record had been held by Eric Dickerson with 2,036.
1999 - Wisconsin running back Ron Dayne wins the Heisman Trophy.
2003 - Oklahoma quarterback Jason White wins the Heisman Trophy.
2007 - The Mitchell Report on performance-enhancing drugs in baseball was released, implicating seven MVPs and 31 All-Stars.
2010 - The New York Giants and Minnesota Vikings played at Detroit's Ford Field. The game was moved due to the collapse of the inflatable roof at Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, Mall of America Stadium the previous day.
2010 - Auburn quarterback Cam Newton wins the Heisman Trophy.
2014 - Oregon quarterback Marcus Mariota wins the Heisman Trophy.
2015 - Alabama running back Derrick Henry wins the Heisman Trophy.
2018 - Dirk Nowitzki takes the court for his 21st season with the Dallas Mavericks, surpassing Kobe Bryant's 20 seasons played with the Los Angeles Lakers.
