NOW & THEN
DECEMBER 27
537: The Hagia Sophia in Istanbul was inaugurated by emperor Justinian.
1831: Admiralty survey ship HMS Beagle set out from Plymouth, with Charles Darwin on board, on the famous scientific round-the-world voyage that was to last five years.
1871: The world’s first cat show was held at Crystal Palace in London.
1887: Chewing gum patented. 1904: Premiere of JM Barrie’s play, Peter Pan, at the Duke of York Theatre, London.
1927: Leon Trotsky expelled from Communist Party as Josef Stalin’s faction won at All-union Congress.
1932: Radio City Music Hall opened in New York.
1945: International Monetary Fund was formally established, by 29 member countries, with headquarters in Washington.
1945: Foreign ministers of Britain, United States and Soviet Union, meeting in Moscow, called for provisional democratic government in Korea.
1949: The Netherlands’ Queen Juliana signed document granting Indonesia sovereignty after more than three centuries of Dutch rule.
1956: United Nations fleet began clearing the Suez Canal after the Suez War.
1965: Huge waves capsized BP oilrig Sea Gem off the mouth of the Humber in North Sea. Thirteen died, but many men were away on Christmas leave.
1975: Sex Discrimination and Equal Pay Acts came into force.
1978: Spain became a democracy after 40 years of dictatorship.
1979: Russian armed forces invaded territory of neighbouring Afghanistan after coup d’etat, which overthrew president Hafizullah Amin of Afghanistan.
1985: Terrorists struck at holiday travellers in simultaneous attacks on Israel’s El Al airline at Rome and Vienna airports, killing 16 people and wounding more than 100.
1989: US soldiers blasted rock music and news bulletins about Panama at the Vatican embassy in Panama City in an effort to drive General Manuel Noriega from his refuge there.
1995: As bitterly cold weather continued to hold much of Britain in its grip, Glasgow recorded its lowest ever temperature of -18ºc. Braemar was the coldest place in Britain, at -20.1ºc.
2002: The firm Clonaid announced it had successfully cloned a human being, although it never presented verifiable evidence.
2002: The movie Chicago, based on the musical and starring Renee Zellweger, Richard Gere and Catherine Zeta Jones, was released. It won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2003.
2007: Benazir Bhutto, the former prime minister of Pakistan, was shot dead as she left a political rally in Rawalpindi.
BIRTHDAYS
MIKE HERON Edinburgh-born singer songwriter and multiinstrumentalist, 77
Janet Street-porter CBE, journalist and broadcaster, 73; Irene Adams, Baroness Adams of Craigielea, MP 1990-2005, 72; William Waldorf Astor III, 4th Viscount Astor, 68; Christopher Benjamin, actor, 85; Maryam d’abo, actress, 59; Gérard Depardieu, actor, 71; Duncan Ferguson, Scottish footballer, 48; Simon King OBE, natural history film director and presenter, 57; Polly Toynbee, journalist and broadcaster, 73; John Amos, actor, 80; Shelly-ann Fraser-pryce, Jamaican sprinter, 33; Milos Raonic, tennis player, 29; José Cuevas, world welterweight boxing champion, 62; Lily Cole, British model and actress, 32.
ANNIVERSARIES
Births: 1571 Johannes Kepler, German astronomer; 1748 William Marshall, composer of Scottish fiddle music; 1761 Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly, member of Scottish clan Barclay and Russian Minister of War; 1822 Louis Pasteur, French scientist. Deaths: 1800 Hugh Blair, Edinburgh-born church minister and author; 1834 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, poet; 1923 Gustave Eiffel, builder of the Paris tower; 1924 William Archer, Scottish journalist and drama critic; 1981 Hoagy Carmichael, composer, singer, pianist and bandleader; 2003 Sir Alan Bates, actor; 2007 Benazir Bhutto, prime minister of Pakistan 1988-1990 and 1993-1996; 2012 Norman Schwarzkopf, US army general who led the coalition forces in the Gulf War; 2015 Meadowlark Lemon, basketball player (Harlem Globetrotters); 2016 Carrie Fisher, actress, novelist, screenwriter.