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This Day in World History

March 6, 1869

Mendeleev’s Periodic Table presented in public

Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev. Source: NYPL.

In his early twenties, Mendeleev had intuited that the elements followed some kind of order, and he spent thirteen years trying to discover it. In developing his system, he drew on the data and ideas of scientists around the world. Two — Lothar Meyer and British chemist John Alexander Reina Newlands — had published ideas about the periodicity of elements. But Mendeleev’s addressed every known element, which theirs had not.

His system also surpassed the others because he accounted for gaps in the sequence of elements. Mendeleev said that an element would be discovered to fill each gap and even predicted the properties of those elements. The discovery of the one of these missing elements — gallium, in 1875 — helped spur wide acceptance of Mendeleev’s system.

Later work showed that Mendeleev’s reliance on atomic weight to determine periodicity is not completely correct. While atomic weight tends to increase as one moves from element to element, there are exceptions. Mendeleev also did not have the theoretical understanding to explain why the elements exhibited these periodic characteristics. Nevertheless, his achievement marked an important milestone in the understanding of the physical world.

Mendeleev did not personally present his breakthrough to the Chemical Society. Ill on the day of the meeting, he asked a colleague to deliver the report.

Interestingly, the date celebrated for this event reflects Russia’s use of the “Old Style” Julian calendar. According to the “New Style” Gregorian calendar — not adopted in Russia until after 1918 — Mendeleev’s periodic table was presented twelve days later, on March 18.

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This Day in World History

March 2, 1855

Alexander II Becomes Czar of Russia

Aleksandr II Imperator Vseross. Source: New York Public Library.

Two strong influences stamped Alexander’s character. One was the autocratic personality and rule of his father; the other was his education, tinged with the principles of liberalism and romanticism. He ascended to the throne with Russia in a crisis, fighting the Crimean War against the Ottoman Empire, which had the support of Britain and France. The fighting continued for nearly a year, but Alexander had to sign a treaty making concession.

Russia’s defeat convinced him that he had to modernize the nation and spurred a program of industrialization and liberal reform. New railway lines were built, universities and courts were reformed, and there was even some steps made to reduce censorship. The signal achievement of Alexander’s reign was the emancipation of the serfs, as tens of millions of peasants were released from centuries-old feudal bonds and even given land allotments. The reform failed to produce a viable class of small farmers, however.

Another liberalization, with Russia lightening its grip on Poland, led to nationalist revolts there and the growth of radicalism both there and in Russia. Alexander responded by strengthening the secret police, which produced more unrest, further suppression, and several assassination attempts against the emperor. In 1881, he leaned once more toward liberalization, signing a decree on March 1 that would create a new constitution. That very day, he was wounded fatally in a terrorist attack, dying one day short of the anniversary of the day he took the throne.

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This Day in World History

February 28, 1983

Final Episode of TV Series M*A*S*H Airs

On February 28, 1983, at the end of its eleventh season, M*A*S*H said goodbye to television. More than 105 million Americans in about 51 million homes watched the series finale, a two-and-a-half-hour-long movie directed by star Alan Alda, that featured the show’s characteristic blend of comedy and drama.

M*A*S*H debuted in 1972, two years after the release of the Robert Altman movie of the same name and four years after the publication of the Richard Hooker novel that was the original for both. Set in a mobile army surgical hospital during the Korean War, the show featured an ensemble cast that included three regulars — Alda as doctor “Hawkeye” Pierce, Loretta Swit as chief nurse Major Margaret Houlihan, and William Christopher as chaplain Father Mulcahy — who appeared in all eleven seasons.

In its first few seasons, the show’s Korean War setting made it a commentary of sorts on the Vietnam War. Even after Vietnam ended, the series examined the tragic personal cost of war and the extent to which people will go to try to maintain sanity in war. The last episode, set around the close of the Korean War, included storylines reinforcing those themes.

The show made several innovations, including use of multiple storylines in an episode, the mixture of comedy and drama, the way the camera was used to shoot scenes, and the fact that the characters developed over time.

M*A*S*H remains one of the most highly regarded of all television series. Though the records the final episode once held for number of households tuning in and total number of viewers have been surpassed by Super Bowl broadcasts, that last show remains the single most watched episode of a television series in US history. Its Neilsen rating of 60.2, which means that more than three-quarters of all televisions were tuned to it, makes it the highest-rated television show of any kind.

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This Day in World History

February 26, 1924

Adolf Hitler’s Treason Trial Begins in Munich

On February 26, 1924, Adolf Hitler and nine associates stood trial in a Munich courtroom. The charge was treason — they were accused of trying to overthrow the German republic. That day, Hitler turned the tables to accuse the German leaders who had surrendered in 1918, ending World War I, and created the republican government he so despised: “There is no such thing as high treason against the traitors of 1918,” he proclaimed.

Germany in the early 1920s was deeply divided. Right-wing nationalists like Hitler bitterly opposed both the republican government and the leftists and Communists who struggled with them for power. These nationalists were also inspired by the example of fascist Benito Mussolini, who had seized power in Italy. Perhaps, they thought, they too could gain power with forceful action.

Hitler’s hopes to launch a national revolt were buttressed by the apparent support of three Bavarian officials. Hoping to force them to join his cause, he staged a putsch, or coup, at a political meeting in a Munich beer garden. Declaring “The revolution has begun,” he had armed thugs from his National Socialist (Nazi) party use the threat of force to convince the three to join him. The next day, however, the three had police fire on a Nazi march, and had Hitler and others arrested.

The trial received coverage across Germany, which Hitler used to his advantage. He denounced the republican government. He denounced the three Bavarian leaders for cowardice. He remained defiant down to the guilty verdict. In his closing speech, Hitler offered a prophetic call: “The man who is born to be a dictator is not compelled: he wills it.”

Sympathetic judges gave Hitler a sentence of only five years. He served only eight months of it. He spent his time in prison writing the first half of Mein Kampf¸ his political manifesto, which detailed his anger at “the traitors of 1918” and set forth his extreme racial views. He also used his time in prison to plan a second — and more successful — takeover of Germany’s government.

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This Day in World History

February 16, 1958

Fidel Castro Becomes Prime Minister of Cuba

Fidel Castro arrives MATS Terminal, Washington, D.C. 15 April 1959.

In 1953, Castro had led an attack on a Cuban army barracks hoping to launch a revolt against the government of Fulgencio Batista. That attack failed and he was arrested and imprisoned, though later released in an amnesty of political prisoners. Castro and his brother Raúl formed a small rebel group and hid in Cuba’s eastern mountains as they gathered more supporters, trained them to fight, and connected with other anti-Batista groups. By late 1958, the rebel forces were advancing westward. On January 1, 1959, Batista fled the country and Castro entered Havana triumphant.

The initial provisional government included leaders from several rebel factions, not just Castro’s. At first, he refrained from taking any political power, although he was commander of the armed forces. In six weeks, though, the provisional prime minister—not a Castro ally—resigned, and he took the office.

During 1959, Castro supporters, including Raúl, filled more and more top-level positions. Meanwhile, hundreds of former Batista officials were tried and executed, and Castro began sending signals that he was a Communist. An exodus of thousands of Cubans began, some fearing for their lives because of links to Batista, others angered by Castro’s refusal to restore the 1940 constitution and hold promised elections. Cuban relations with the United States worsened when Castro seized the assets of several American companies and tilted toward the Soviet Union; they fractured when the U.S. government cancelled trade agreements and backed an invasion by anti-Castro Cubans, which failed miserably. By early 1962, Castro had announced that his revolution was socialist, and the United States had placed an embargo on trade with the island.

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This Day in World History

February 13, 1633

Galileo arrives in Rome for trial before Inquisition

Source: Library of Congress.

Nicolas Copernicus had published his heliocentric theory in 1543. His ideas were condemned by religious leaders — not only Catholic ones but also Protestants Martin Luther and John Calvin — because they contradicted the Bible. Slowly, though, astronomers began to accept the sun-centered universe.

Galileo’s own acceptance, forged in the 1590s, grew stronger in 1609, when he used a new invention, the telescope, to study the planets. Discovering that the Moon had craters, Jupiter was orbited by moons, and Venus had phases like the Moon, he rejected the accepted belief that the heavens were fixed, perfect, and revolving around Earth.

Church authorities, however, objected to a 1613 letter he wrote supporting the Copernican theory. At a hearing, he was told not to actively promote Copernican ideas. A document placed in the records of the proceeding went further, saying he was ordered never to discuss the theory in any way, but evidence suggests that Galileo’s understanding the document was planted after the meeting by enemies.

By the late 1620s, Galileo believed that Pope Urban would be more open to his ideas than earlier popes. He wrote the Dialogue as a conversation between a Copernican and an adherent of the Church’s geocentric theory, hoping to escape condemnation by presenting both views. The ploy failed, and he was summoned. The panel of cardinals decided to ban his book, force him to abjure Copernican ideas, and sentence him to imprisonment. A few months later, the old man was released to his home, where he lived until 1642.

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This Day in World History

February 11, 1889

Emperor Meiji Issues New Constitution of Japan

On February 11, 1889, Japan’s Emperor Meiji furthered his plan to modernize and westernize his nation by promulgating a new constitution. The new plan of government created a western-style two-house parliament, called the Diet, and a constitutional monarchy — though one with a Japanese character.

When Prince Mutsuhito became emperor and took the ruling name Meiji (“enlightened ruler”) in 1867, he was determined to break with his late father’s traditionalist policies and embrace western ways. He took several steps in this direction. Along with creating a public school system and enacting land reforms, the Meiji emperor created government ministries.

The crowning governmental reform was the new constitution, which embraced the idea of citizen participation — though no plebiscite was held to give the public a voice in the document either as a whole or in detail. The emperor declared that the new constitution arose from his desire “to promote the welfare of, and to give development to the moral and intellectual faculties of Our beloved subjects.”

The constitution was modeled chiefly on the Prussian constitution, a fairly conservative document that subjected parliamentary rule to the power of the monarchy. Thus, the Meiji constitution began by declaring the emperor to be sovereign and “sacred and inviolable.” The emperor was named commander of the armed forces and given the power to declare war or make peace without needing to consult with the Diet.

The constitution was chiefly written by Itō Hirobumi, one of the elder statesmen who effectively ran the Japanese government. Itō and his colleagues assumed that they would be chiefly responsible for running the government and making policy and the emperor would not become involved except occasionally.

The Meiji constitution remained in force in Japan until after World War II, when a new constitution creating a stronger parliamentary system was adopted.

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This Day in World History

February 8, 1904

Japanese Attack Port Arthur, Starting Russo-Japanese War

On February 8, 1904, just before midnight, Japanese destroyers entered the harbor of Port Arthur (now Lü-shun, China). Soon after, they unleashed torpedoes against Russian ships in a surprise attack that began the Russo-Japanese War.

The conflict grew over competition between Russia and Japan for territory in both Korea and Manchuria, in northern China. Japan had won Port Arthur, at the tip of the Liaotung Peninsula, from China in an 1894–1895 war. Russia joined with other European powers to force it to relinquish the port, however — and then three years later had compelled China to grant the city to it. These actions rankled Japan, as did Russia’s refusal to honor a promise to withdraw troops from Manchuria. Japan decided to go to war.

The attack on Port Arthur resumed in the late morning of February 9, when bigger Japanese ships began shelling the Russian fleet and nearby forts. The Russians put up more resistance than expected, however, and the Japanese ships withdrew.

The attack on Port Arthur was inconclusive, but the rest of the war went largely Japan’s way. The Japanese enjoyed several victories in 1904, seizing Korea in March, and defeating Russian forces twice in Manchuria during the summer. More success followed in 1905, with the surrender of Port Arthur in January, a victory over a large Russian army in Manchuria in March, and a decisive naval battle at Tsushima Strait in May that destroyed the Russian fleet. Russia’s government, facing unrest at home, was forced to seek peace.

The Russo-Japanese War marked the first victory of a non-European nation against a European one in modern times. It also contributed to unrest in Russia that would lead, more than a decade later, to the Russian Revolution.

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This Day in World History

February 2, 1536

Buenos Aires First Founded

On February 2, 1536, Spanish explorer Pedro de Mendoza founded the city he named Nuestra Señora Santa María del Buen Aire—Buenos Aires, Argentina. The new town was meant to spearhead the Spanish effort to colonize the interior of South America. It came less than two years after conquistadors had returned to Spain from Peru with treasures seized from the Inca empire.

Spain’s Charles I was spurred by the vast Inca wealth to seek further riches in South America. He also wanted to block any effort by Portugal to expand its foothold in Brazil. Accordingly, he commissioned Mendoza to mount an expedition to explore and settle the Río de la Plata, a vast estuary in southern South America that had been sighted back in 1516.

Mendoza set out in August 1535 in command of 800 to 1700 men (accounts vary) in around a dozen ships. The expedition — the largest sent from Spain to the Americas to date — was ill fated, however. A fierce storm blew the ships off course, and after regrouping Mendoza decided that one of his lieutenants was a rebel and had him executed. Troubles continued after the founding of Buenos Aires. At first the Spaniards received gifts of food from the indigenous locals but soon after fighting broke out between the two groups. That conflict cut off the chief source of food, and the Spaniards began to starve. Mendoza sent a lieutenant upriver in search of a friendlier site. He founded Asunción, now the capital of Paraguay.

Mendoza himself headed back to Spain in 1537. He was seriously ill — perhaps from syphilis — and died on the return trip. His settlement continued to struggle, and in 1541 the remaining colonists abandoned it, heading for Asunción. Not until 1580, when Juan de Garay returned to the scene, was a permanent Spanish presence established at Buenos Aires.

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This Day in World History

February 1, 2009

Iceland’s Siguroardottir Becomes the First Openly Gay World Leader

On February 1, 2009, Johanna Siguroardottir made double history: she became the first woman to serve as Iceland’s prime minister and she became the first openly gay person to become leader of any nation.

Siguroardottir’s rise to the premiership resulted from several factors. She had a long career in politics and was the longest-serving member of the Iceland’s parliament, the Althing, having first been elected in 1978. She also had experience in government positions, serving four times as Minister of Social Affairs, overseeing Iceland’s social welfare programs. Siguroardottir was a member of Iceland’s middle class, working as both a flight attendant and an office worker before entering politics. Her understanding of the basic concerns of ordinary people appealed to many Icelanders.

The other factor contributing to her achievement was Iceland’s economic mess. The island nation’s banking industry collapsed in 2008 and 2009. That crisis brought down the conservative government of Prime Minister Geir H. Haarde and caused Icelanders to favor the leftist views of the socialist Siguroardottir.

Two years after taking office, her government seems to have stabilized Iceland’s economy. Inflation had been surging above 18 percent a year at the end of 2008, just before she took office. By 2011, it had fallen under 4 percent. The growth rate of the nation’s gross domestic product, which had been negative in 2009 and 2010, in the wake of the economic collapse, was expected to reach 2.5 percent in 2011. The banking sector has been overhauled.

Success was not complete, however. Icelandic voters rejected a government-backed plan to reimburse British and Dutch depositors in Icelandic banks for lost deposits. Voters also seem not to favor Siguroardottir’s desire to enter the European Union.

Siguroardottir did enjoy a great personal moment from her premiership. When Iceland’s new law that allowed gay marriage took effect in June 2010, she married her longtime partner Jonina Leosdottir, a writer.

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This Day in World History

January 30, 1948

Mahatma Gandhi is Assassinated

The 78-year-old man was walking to a prayer meeting with the support of two grandnieces. A man stepped out of the crowd and greeted him. The old man returned the salutation when, suddenly, the other man pulled out a pistol and shot three times. Half an hour later, Mohandas Gandhi—the leading figure of India’s independentce movement and the leading exponent of nonviolent resistance—was dead.

Born in India, Mohandas Gandhi was trained as a lawyer and first began a movement for social change in South Africa, where he had lived and worked for a time. That campaign aimed at overturning laws that limited the rights of Indians living in South Africa. The effort, based on his belief in nonviolent resistance, won some concessions from the government in 1913.

He launched his first civil disobedience movement in India in 1919, protesting a British law that required military service of all Indian men. For most of the next three decades, Gandhi was the spiritual and political leader of India, pushing for reform, boycotting British goods, protesting violence between Hindus and Muslims, and eventually pressuring Britain to grant Indian independence.

That campaign finally succeeded in 1947, though Gandhi’s hope for a united India was dashed when Britain, bowing to pressure from the Muslim League, split the area into two states—the chiefly Hindu India and the mainly Muslim Pakistan.

Religious violence followed, as members of the two faiths attacked and killed each other. Gandhi pleaded for an end to the violence and for the Hindu majority to grant tolerance to Muslims. That plea led his assassin, a Hindu fanatic, to kill the Mahatma, or “Great Soul.” A reporter who had been Gandhi’s friend wrote, “Just an old man in a loincloth in distant India: yet when he died, humanity wept.”

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This Day in World History

January 26, 1500

Pinzón Becomes First European to Land in Brazil

On January 26, 1500, Spanish sailor Vincente Yáñez Pinzón spotted land. He named the cape the Cabo de Santa María de la Consolación. The site was near modern-day Recife, Brazil, making Pinzón the first European to explore Brazil.

Pinzón was an accomplished navigator who had taken part in the famous 1492 voyage of Christopher Columbus. Pinzón commanded the Niña while his brother Martín commanded the Pinta (a third brother, Francisco, was Martín’s chief officer on that ship). It was not until 1499, however, that Pinzón set out on a new expedition.

In November of that year, he sailed from Palos, Spain, reaching the South American coast by the next January. He spent several months exploring the coast, reaching as far north as the mouth of the Amazon River. Pinzón noticed that the color of the water had changed and, after sampling that differently color water, found it to be freshwater, and not saltwater. He named the body the Mar Dulce, or Sweetwater Sea, and using the strength of the outflowing current, he sailed for the West Indies before returning to Spain.

Records and maps from the Age of Exploration are not always clear or without controversy. Pinzón’s sighting of Brazil is subject to these uncertainties. Some historians think that he landed in Venezuela, not Brazil, and encountered the Orinoco River, not the Amazon. They believe that Portuguese explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral—who certainly reached Brazil in April of 1500—was the first European to land there. At any rate, Portugal, not Spain, gained possession of Brazil and made it the cornerstone of its American empire.

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This Day in World History

January 25, 1971

Idi Amin Takes Power in Uganda

Source: Library of Congress

Obote had led Uganda’s independence movement in 1962 and had served as its first prime minster. In 1966, though, he deposed Uganda’s king and had a new constitution written that created a republic with himself as president. Amin was an ally whom Obote named as head of the army and air force at that time.

Amin decided to move against Obote when he was under investigation for his leadership of a gang of thugs. His brutality emerged quickly. Prominent Ugandans — including the police official who had been investigating him — were killed, some by armed toughs and others in mysterious circumstances. Several thousand soldiers were killed on Amin’s orders, decimating the armed forces but putting it firmly under his control.

Amin formed four different security organizations, which he used to carry out his harsh rule. Estimates suggest that as many as 300,000 people were killed in his violent rule.

Amin’s leadership was also marked by actions based on fleeting moods. Late in 1972, he ordered all Asians expelled from Uganda. The departure of some 35,000 people, many of whom owned businesses, crippled Uganda’s economy. A Muslim, Amin was extreme in his condemnation of Israel and once praised Adolf Hitler’s execution of millions of Jews.

Fear drove several different assassination attempts between his coup and 1979. That year, Amin sent troops into neighboring Tanzania to harass some villagers. In response Tanzania’s leader, Julius Nyerere, ordered a counterattack that was joined by thousands of Ugandans. Within weeks, the rebels had seized power and Amin had fled to Libya. He died in Saudi Arabia in 2003.

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This Day in World History

January 23, 1849

Elizabeth Blackwell Becomes First Woman to Receive a Medical Degree

Source: National Library of Medicine

Blackwell was born to a wealthy and progressive-minded English family that moved to the United States in the 1830s, when she was around ten. She became a teacher, though that profession did not engage her. One day, a dying friend told her that she might have endured her disease better if she had been attended by a female physician. The conversation planted the idea of becoming a doctor in Blackwell’s mind.

She received some rudimentary training in medicine in the home of a local physician and began applying to medical school. Geneva accepted her, in part because the student body — to whom the question of her admission had been put — treated the idea of a female medical student as a joke. Blackwell faced the hostility of some teachers, students, and townspeople, though she eventually disarmed critics with her dedication and seriousness.

Prejudice made it difficult for Blackwell to establish a practice after her graduation. In 1853, she opened a clinic for women in New York City. She was eventually joined by her sister Emily and by Marie E. Zakrzewska, both of whom she had encouraged to earn medical degrees. The clinic grew and in 1857 was renamed the New York Infirmary for Women and Children. Eleven years later, Blackwell opened the Woman’s Medical College associated with the infirmary. In 1869, she returned to England, where she lived and worked for the rest of her life.

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This Day in World History

December 19, 1843

Dickens publishes A Christmas Carol

“Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it.” So begins a staple of Christmas celebrations, Charles Dickens’s novella A Christmas Carol.

Dickens’s book, of course, relates the conversion of the crabbed miser Ebenezer Scrooge to a warm-hearted man who embraces Christmas after a night of visits from the ghost of his old partner, Jacob Marley, and three time-traveling spirits, those of Christmas Past, Christmas Present, and Christmas Yet to Come. Dickens’s work became an instant classic. All 6,000 copies of the first printing were sold by Christmas, and the 2,000 copy second printing that quickly followed was also quickly sold out. Its lasting charm is evidenced by countless plays, radio dramatizations, television specials, and movie adaptations that have followed, a new one, seemingly, each generation.

While A Christmas Carol is probably Dickens’s most beloved work, it did little to alleviate the financial trouble in which he labored in 1843. At the time, Martin Chuzzlewhit was being serialized, but sales were slow. With his wife expecting the couple’s fifth child, Dickens penned the Christmas story in the hopes of a financial boost. Despite the brisk sales, his income did not rise as desired. The cost of producing the book—all resulting from Dickens’s own decisions, as he supervised the printing and hired the illustrator—was so high that the author saw few profits. Dickens lamented that “I shall be ruined past all mortal hope of redemption”—ironic, given that A Christmas Carol demonstrates that redemption has nothing to do with one’s financial condition.

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This Day in World History

December 12, 1531

Virgin of Guadalupe appears to Mexican peasant

According to the tradition accepted by the Roman Catholic Church, a fifty-five-year old Native American who had converted to Christianity was moving down Tepeyac Hill to a church in Mexico City to attend mass. Suddenly, he beheld a vision of the Virgin Mary, mother of Jesus Christ and an iconic figure in the Catholic Church. She instructed him to tell the local bishop to build a shrine to her on the spot. The Native American, Juan Diego, hurried to the bishop to relate the story. The bishop was intrigued but unconvinced; he needed proof, he said. Three days after the first encounter, on December 12, 1531, Diego saw the vision again. Asking for a sign, Mary told him to gather roses and carry them in his cloak to the bishop. When Diego opened his cloak and the roses fell out, the image of the Virgin Mary was embedded in the fabric of the inside of the cloak. A shrine was built on the site, and later a basilica.

The account is not universally accepted. The bishop identified in the story did not reach office until three years after the visitation was said to take place, and his papers say nothing of the event nor of Juan Diego. Indeed, documentary evidence about the visitation comes from more than a century later. Nevertheless, since the 1550s, the site has been home to a shrine—one of many dedicated to Our Lady of Guadalupe across Mexico. The Virgin of Guadalupe was named the patron saint of Mexico and recently was named the patroness of all the Americas. She has long been a national symbol for Mexicans. Today, the basilica in Tepeyac Hill contains a cloth said to be the original cloak—and is a much-visited pilgrimage destination.

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This Day in World History

December 10, 1896

Alfred Nobel dies

Stricken by a cerebral hemorrhage, wealthy industrialist Alfred Nobel died on December 10, 1896. That date is still commemorated as the day on which the famous prizes issued in his name—perhaps the most prestigious prizes in the world—are officially awarded each year.

In his thirties, Swedish chemist and engineer Alfred Nobel became interested in explosives and experimented with a chemical named nitroglycerin, but it was very volatile, and accidental explosions frequently occurred. When he accidentally discovered that the liquid was more stable if dried, he had a new invention, which he called dynamite, from which he built a huge fortune. Nobel lived a solitary life: he never married and had little social life, though he was intellectually active and committed to philanthropic causes. In 1895, at sixty-two, he began to develop chest pains. Late in that year, he wrote a will. When he died the following year, his family was shocked to learn that in this will he had left the bulk of his fortune to fund prizes to be given each year to individuals who had made the greatest achievements in chemistry, literature, physiology or medicine, physics, and who had made significant contributions to world peace.

Because his surviving family contested the will, the first Nobel Prizes were not issued until 1901. In 1968, the Bank of Sweden created a sixth award, in economics, named in Alfred Nobel’s honor. The winners of the six awards—called laureates—receive medals and a citation at an awards ceremony each December 10; they also receive a sum of money. All prizes but the peace prize are awarded in Stockholm; that ceremony occurs in Oslo, as a Norwegian committee confers that award. Each laureate gives a lecture in the days preceding the awards ceremony. Some years, more than one person receives a given award. In some years, a prize in a particular field may not be granted.

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This Day in World History

December 7, 374

Ambrose consecrated Bishop of Milan

On December 7, 374, after a quickly arranged baptism and eight days of instruction, Ambrose was consecrated as a bishop. No one, perhaps, was more surprised by this turn of events than the new bishop himself.

At the time Milan was in the midst of two decades of religious turmoil. For twenty years, Bishop Auxentius had ruled the see. Auxentius followed the Arian faith, a Christian doctrine that denied the divinity of Jesus and thus the Trinity, and the bishop made sure that much of the priesthood was Arian as well. Most people in the city followed the faith that developed into orthodox Roman Catholicism, however, and they chafed under Arian control. When Auxentius died late in 374, a succession crisis arose. Orthodox Catholic officials asked the emperor Valentinian to name his successor, but he insisted on leaving the decisions to the priests. A noisy meeting was being held in the city’s basilica, with the priesthood on one side and a crowd of citizens on the other. Ambrose, the Roman governor of the province of Milan, had the task of keeping order. According to tradition, after he finished a speech aimed at calming emotions, a voice shouted, “Ambrose, Bishop.” The suggestion was loudly acclaimed, and the selection approved by an official vote. The emperor confirmed the appointment, and Ambrose reluctantly accepted.

In his twenty-five years as bishop, Ambrose became one of the leading figures of the early church. He worked to remove Arian influence in Milan, promoted the incorporation of Greek learning into Catholic thought, introduced new music and wrote hymns, gained renown for his strict morality, and tried to assert the church’s moral authority by criticizing actions by different emperors that he thought reprehensible. He also was a principal figure in the conversion of Augustine of Hippo, who—like Ambrose himself—is considered one of the fathers of the church. It was quite a career for the accidental bishop.

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This Day in World History

December 6, 1877

Edison demonstrates the phonograph

While he cranked the handle on the device, inventor Thomas Edison watched the faces of the editors from the journal Scientific American. He was in the magazine’s offices to demonstrate one of his newest inventions. As he cranked, indentations made on a tinfoil cylinder sent signals to a diaphragm, and the editors heard the machine ask after their health. Astonished, they heard the device then say it was fine and bid them good night. “There can be no doubt,” editor Alfred Beach later wrote, “that the inflections are those of nothing else than the human voice.” The phonograph was born.

Edison had long been interested in recording information and playing it back later—his interest started back when he was working primarily on inventions related to telegraphy. By 1887, he had enjoyed enough success to create a laboratory dedicated to invention in Menlo Park, New Jersey. Edison had a large staff of scientists and technicians, one of whom—Swiss machinist John Kruesi—turned Edison’s sketches for the phonograph into a real device, reportedly in 30 hours. To test it, Edison had shouted a verse of the nursery rhyme “Mary had a little lamb” into the machine. As hoped, his recorded voice could be heard, as clearly as he had spoken.

Excited by the invention, Edison began to promote it vigorously, and the visit to Scientific American was part of his campaign. The journal published Beach’s glowing account of the demonstration on December 22. The inventor wrote an article for the North American Review speculating on the possible uses for the machine that was published the following spring, by which time he had already formed a company to manufacture phonographs. Whenever visitors came to the Menlo Park lab—and Edison encouraged them to come—he made sure to show them the phonograph, which he called his “baby.”

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This Day in World History

December 3, 1967

Barnard performs first heart transplant

For five hours, the thirty-person surgical team worked in an operating room in Cape Town, South Africa. The head surgeon, Dr. Christiaan Barnard, was leading the team into uncharted territory, transplanting the heart of a young woman killed in a car accident into the chest of 55-year-old Louis Washkansky.  As the operation neared to a close, Barnard used electrodes to stimulate the heart. It began pumping, and the team knew they had succeeded. The operation was not the first organ transplant—kidney transplants had been performed for more than ten years. In transplanting the heart, though, Barnard pushed medicine into a new phase.

“On Saturday,” Barnard remembered later, “I was a surgeon in South Africa, very little known. On Monday I was world-renowned.” The recipient, 55-year-old Louis Washkansky, lived only eighteen days after the surgery before dying of pneumonia. Nevertheless, Barnard had revolutionized cardiac care. The surgeon improved his heart transplant techniques over the years such that some patients lived for several years after surgery. He also experimented with new techniques, including using artificial heart valves and using hearts from monkeys as a stopgap measure for some patients.

Along with his medical breakthroughs, Barnard challenged social conventions. His second heart transplant roused controversy in his native land because the recipient was white and the donor was “coloured”—the term under South Africa’s apartheid system for a person of mixed white and black ancestry. Over the years, Barnard became more outspoken about the rights of black South Africans, putting his reputation behind the end of apartheid. He also became somewhat controversial for his obvious enjoyment of his celebrity status and for, late in life, trying to find ways to reverse aging.

Barnard will be most remembered, though, as a bold surgeon looking to expand the boundaries of medicine.

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This Day in World History

December 1, 1955

Rosa Parks refuses to change her seat

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks refused to move—and became the mother of the civil rights movement.

In 1955, strict segregation laws separated African Americans and whites in public settings across the South, including Parks’s home town, Montgomery, Alabama. That December evening, returning home from work, Parks sat with three other African Americans in a row just behind the fourteen whites in the front of the bus. Because the bus was full, a white man had to stand when he entered the bus. Under the South’s Jim Crow laws, whites sat and African Americans stood. The bus driver told Parks and the other three blacks to move to the back of the bus—the black section. The other three did, but Parks refused. The driver insisted, and she refused again.  Faced with continued refusal, he used his powers under a city ordinance to arrest her. The driver summoned the police, and Parks spent the night in jail.

The arrest galvanized Montgomery’s African Americans. The local chapter of the NAACP had long resented the segregated buses and the drivers’ treatment of blacks; now they had a chance to act. The next day, a women’s council called for a boycott of the city bus system. African Americans by the thousands complied.  By December 5, a new group—the Montgomery Improvement Association—was formed to coordinate the boycott. Inspired by young clergyman Martin Luther King, Jr., Montgomery’s African Americans kept up their boycott for more than a year, until the U.S. Supreme Court ruled segregation on buses unconstitutional. The Montgomery Bus Boycott was one of the early triumphs of the civil rights movement. Parks later admitted her surprise: “I had no idea when I refused to give up my seat on that Montgomery bus that my small action would help put an end to the segregation laws in the South.”

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November 29, 1803

Haitian leaders declare independence

On November 29, 1803, Haitian leaders Jean-Jacques Dessalines, Henri Christophe, and a General Clerveaux joined together to sign a preliminary proclamation of independence for St. Domingo, the former French colony that soon after took the name Haiti. The proclamation came just ten days after French forces under the Vicomte de Rochambeau had surrendered to the Haitian rebels.

The Haitian revolt had been launched in 1798 by Toussaint Louverture, a former slave whose original goal had not been independence. By 1802, though, the Haitian rebels had grander designs—fueled in part by concerns that the French would restore slavery and spurred further by the death of Toussaint under French arrest. On November 19, 1803, they won a decisive victory over French forces at the Battle of Vertieres. Ten days later, at their headquarters at Fort Dauphin, the rebel leaders issued their proclamation of independence, given “in the name of the black people, and men of color of St. Domingo.” The proclamation went on, “Restored to our primitive dignity, we have asserted our rights; we swear never to yield them to any power on earth.” The secretary who recorded the document sent a copy to a Philadelphia newspaper, and it was published widely in the United States..

The Haitian leaders issued a more formal document, the Act of Independence, on January 1, 1804. In this act, the signers pledged their support to independence, explained the significance of the act, and named Dessalines leader of the new nation. At this time, the rebels adopted the name Haiti, derived from Hispaniola’s indigenous Taino people, as the name of their nation. Haiti became just the second independent nation in the Americas—and the first nation formed by a successful slave revolt.

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November 22, 1935

China Clipper makes first trans-Pacific flight

Holding more than 110,000 pieces of mail, the mammoth plane that weighed more than 52,000 pounds and had a 130-foot wingspan lifted from the waters of San Francisco Bay. The plane, the China Clipper, was beginning the first flight across the Pacific Ocean on November 22, 1935—just eight years after Charles Lindbergh had flown alone across the Atlantic.

Built by the Glenn Martin Company, the China Clipper was a giant seaplane, a design well-suited to its use. The plane had to be massive to carry powerful enough engines and enough fuel to cover the vast expanse of the Pacific. The size and weight meant the plane would need a large runway, uncommon in the 1930s when aviation was just beginning. A seaplane, though, could easily land on water.

Flying across the Pacific was the brainchild of Juan Trippe, president of Pan American Airways, the leading U.S. airline at the time. Trippe knew that even the largest, most powerful plane would not be able to cross the entire Pacific in one flight. He planned to make stops at Honolulu, Midway, Guam, and Wake islands before reaching the plane’s original destination at Manila, in the Philippines. He was there—along with Postmaster General James A. Farley—to send the plane off on its initial flight. Trippe meant the name clipper to evoke the romance of the fastest merchant ships of the days of sail, the clipper ships that for decades had carried on the China trade.

Pan Am added two other planes to its trans-Pacific fleet, the Hawaii Clipper and the Philippine Clipper. Trans-Pacific passenger service was inaugurated in 1936, and that same year the first trip to China took place. Later, the Martin seaplanes were replaced by even more powerful Boeing aircraft.

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November 20, 1977

Egypt’s President Sadat addresses Israeli Knesset

On November 20, 1977, Egyptian President Anwar al-Sadat made an historic speech before Israel’s Knesset, or Parliament, becoming the first leader of an Arab nation to speak there. He was also the first of Israel’s Arab neighbors to publicly say anything like these words: “Today I tell you, and I declare it to the whole world, that we accept to live with you in permanent peace based on justice.”

By 1977, Israel and the nearby Arab states had fought four wars in less than 30 years. Sadat himself had been a principal architect of the most recent conflict, the Yom Kippur War of 1973. That conflict ended when Egypt, Syria, and Israel accepted a United Nations–imposed cease-fire. This time, though, the uneasy peace was not followed by yet another war. Sadat failed in peace talks to regain control of the Sinai Peninsula, which Israel had occupied in 1967. To break the deadlock, on November 9, 1977, he stunned the world by telling Egypt’s Parliament that he was willing to travel to Israel to negotiate peace. No Arab state had ever recognized Israel’s existence, let alone sent a leader to the Jewish state. Israel quickly accepted his offer, and arrangements for the historic visit were made.

Sadat’s bold move set in course discussions that resulted in the Camp David Accords the following September, and a peace treaty in early 1979—the first treaty signed by Israel and an Arab nation. Both Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin received Nobel Peace Prizes for their historic agreement. While Sadat was hailed across the world, he was less well received in the Arab world, however. The Arab League denounced Egypt in September of 1978, and Sadat was assassinated in his homeland by radical Islamists because of his overtures to Israel and the western world.

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November 17, 1558

Elizabeth I becomes England’s Queen

The twenty-five-year-old princess was seated beneath an oak tree on the lawn of her home, Hatfield House. Suddenly, several courtiers hurried across the lawn until they reached her location, stopped, and bowed. The queen has died, they told her. You are now queen of England. Young Elizabeth, it is said, fell to her knees and quoted a line from Psalm 118: “It is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.”

Elizabeth I, daughter of King Henry VIII by his second wife, Anne Boleyn, had reached the throne by a more circuitous path than most monarchs. Her father’s first wife, Catherine of Aragon, had born a daughter, Mary, but no son. Frustrated, Henry had broken with the Catholic Church and formed the Church of England so he could divorce Catherine and marry Anne Boleyn. After she bore Elizabeth and a stillborn son, Boleyn was beheaded for adultery—a trumped-up charge—when Elizabeth was but three. Henry then married Jane Seymour, who finally produced a male heir, the prince Edward.

Much of Elizabeth’s childhood and youth were difficult and spent away from court because her father rejected her. When he died and Edward came to the throne, she soon fell under suspicion of complicity in a plot to overthrow him. Her careful response to questions saved her. When Edward died, Mary came to the throne. She tried to restore the Catholic Church, leading to several Protestant rebellions, which led the queen to throw her half-sister into the Tower of London for a few months and eventually send her to Hatfield under house arrest.

Everything changed on that November day, however. Two months later, on January 15—a day chosen in part for its astrological promise—she had her official coronation at Westminster Abbey. Elizabeth I, called Gloriana—and Good Queen Bess—ruled for nearly 45 years and gave her name to an age.

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