On this day, Jan. 3
1777 Gen. George Washington’s army routed the British in the Battle of Princeton, N.J.
1861 More than two weeks before Georgia seceded from the Union, the state militia seized Fort Pulaski at the order of Gov. Joseph E. Brown. The Delaware House and Senate voted to oppose secession from the Union.
1868 The Meiji Restoration re-established the authority of Japan’s emperor and heralded the fall of the military rulers known as shoguns.
1959 Alaska became the 49th state as President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed a proclamation.
1961 President Dwight D. Eisenhower announced the United States was formally terminating diplomatic and consular relations with Cuba.
1967 Jack Ruby, the man who shot and killed Lee Harvey Oswald, the accused assassin of President John F. Kennedy, died in a Dallas hospital.
1977 Apple Computer was incorporated in Cupertino, Calif., by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Mike Markkula Jr.
2002 A judge in Alabama ruled that former Ku Klux Klansman Bobby Frank Cherry was mentally competent to stand trial on murder charges in the 1963 Birmingham church bombing that killed four Black girls. (Cherry was later convicted, and served a life sentence until his death in November 2004.)
2007 Gerald R. Ford was laid to rest on the grounds of his presidential museum in Grand Rapids, Mich., during a ceremony watched by thousands of onlookers.
2008 Illinois Sen. Barack Obama won Democratic caucuses in Iowa, while Mike Huckabee won the Republican caucuses.
2013 Students from Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., reconvened at a different building in the town of Monroe about three weeks after the massacre that had claimed the lives of 20 first graders and six educators.
2013 The new 113th Congress opened for business, with House Speaker John Boehner re-elected to his post despite a mini-revolt in Republican ranks.
2020 The United States killed Iran’s top general in an airstrike at Baghdad’s international airport; the Pentagon said Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s elite Quds force, had been “actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members” in Iraq and elsewhere. Iran warned of retaliation.
Today’s Birthdays: Actor Dabney Coleman, 91. Journalist-author Betty Rollin, 87. Hockey Hall of Famer Bobby Hull, 84. Singer-songwriter-producer Van Dyke Parks, 80. Musician Stephen Stills, 78. Rock musician John Paul Jones (Led Zeppelin), 77. Actor Victoria Principal, 73. Actor-director Mel Gibson, 67. Actor Shannon Sturges, 55. Actor John Ales, 54. Jazz musician James Carter, 54. Contemporary Christian singer Nichole Nordeman, 51. Musician Thomas Bangalter (Daft Punk), 48. Actor Jason Marsden, 48. Actor Danica McKellar, 48. Actor Nicholas Gonzalez, 47. Singer Kimberley Locke (TV: “American Idol”), 45. Actor Kate Levering, 44. Former NFL quarterback Eli Manning, 42. Actor Nicole Beharie, 38. Pop musician Mark Pontius, 38. R&B singer Lloyd, 37. Pop-rock musician Nash Overstreet (Hot Chelle Rae), 37. Actor Alex D. Linz, 34.