Today in History

1492 – Fall of Granada, the last stronghold of the Moors in Spain. 1839 – French photographer Louis

Daguerre, right, takes the first photograph of the Moon.

1933 – Anarchist and Syndicalist uprising starts in Barcelona, Spain.

1938 – The first official New Zealand airmail to the United States leaves Auckland for San Francisco on a flying boat. The mail arrives in the US on January 6.

1942 – Philippines capital Manila is captured by Japanese.

1960 – Senator John F Kennedy of Massachusetts announces his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination.

1971 – Sixty-six people die when a crowd barrier gives way at a football match in Glasgow, Scotland.

1981 – Serial killer Peter Sutcliffe, known as the Yorkshire Ripper, is arrested. He was later jailed for life for the murders of 13 women.

2004 – The US Stardust spacecraft downloads images and collects samples of space dust after surviving inside the tail of the Wild 2 comet about 390 million kilometres from Earth.

2005 – After the devastation wreaked by the Boxing Day tsunami, a deluge triggers flash floods in Sri Lanka.

2006 – The roof of an ice rink in Germany collapses after a heavy snowfall, killing 15 people.

2008 – A mob torches a church where hundreds had sought refuge in Eldoret, Kenya. Witnesses say dozens of people – including children – are burned alive or hacked to death in ethnic violence after disputed election.

Birthdays

Michael Tippett, English musician (1905-98); Roger Miller, US country singer (1936-92); David Bailey, UK photographer (1938-); John Hood, NZ-born Oxford University vicechancellor (1952-); Cuba Gooding Jr, US actor (1968-); Christy Turlington, US model (1969-); Kate Bosworth, US actress (1983-).