TODAY in HISTORY

Today is Thursday, January 25, the 25th day of 2018. There are 340 days left in the year.

1494 Alfonso II becomes king of Naples.

1515 Coronation of Francis I of France. 1533 Henry VIII of England secretly marries his second wife Anne Boleyn.

1554 Founding of São Paulo city, Brazil.

1573 Battle of Mikatagahara: In Japan, Takeda Shingen defeats Tokugawa Ieyasu.

1755 Moscow University is established on Tatiana Day.

1791 The British Parliament passes the Constitutional Act of 1791 and splits the old Province of Quebec into Upper Canada and Lower Canada. 1881 Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell form the Oriental Telephone Company.

1915 Alexander Graham Bell inaugurates U. S. transcontinental telephone service, speaking from New York to Thomas Watson in San Francisco.

1918 The Ukrainian People’s Republic declares independence from Bolshevik Russia.

1941 Pope Pius XII elevates the Apostolic Vicariate of the Hawaiian Islands to the dignity of a diocese. It becomes the Roman Catholic Diocese of Honolulu.

1961 In Washington, D. C., President John F. Kennedy delivers the first live presidential television news conference.

1971 Charles Manson and three female “Family” members are found guilty of the 1969 Tate– LaBianca murders.

1971 Idi Amin leads a coup deposing Milton Obote and becomes Uganda’s president. 1980 Mother Teresa is honored with India’s highest civilian award, the Bharat Ratna

1995 – The Norwegian rocket incident: Russia almost launches a nuclear attack after it mistakes Black Brant XII, a Norwegian research rocket, for a US Trident missile.

1996 – Billy Bailey becomes the last person to be hanged in the USA.

1998 During a historic visit to Cuba, Pope John Paul II demands political reforms and the release of political prisoners while condemning US attempts to isolate the country.

1999 A 6.0 Richter Scale earthquake hits western Colombia killing at least 1,000.

2003 Invasion of Iraq: A group of people leave London, England, for Baghdad, Iraq, to serve as human shields, intending to prevent the US- led coalition troops from bombing certain locations.

2005 A stampede at the Mandhradevi temple in Maharashtra, India kills at least 258.

2011 The first wave of the Egyptian revolution begins throughout the country, marked by street demonstrations, rallies, acts of civil disobedience, riots, and labour strikes.