On this day, Dec. 7
1787 Delaware became the first state to ratify the U.S. Constitution. 1796 Electors chose John Adams to be the second president of the United States.
1917 During World War I, the United States declared war on Austria-Hungary.
1941 The Empire of Japan launched an air raid on the U.S. Navy base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii as well as targets in Malaya, Hong Kong, Guam, the Philippines and Wake Island; the United States declared war against Japan the next day.
1963 During the Army-Navy game, videotaped instant replay was used for the first time in a live sports telecast.
1972 America’s last moon mission to date was launched as Apollo 17 blasted off from Cape Canaveral.
1982 Convicted murderer Charlie Brooks Jr. became the first U.S. prisoner to be executed by injection, at a prison in Huntsville, Texas.
1988 A major earthquake in the Soviet Union devastated northern Armenia; official estimates put the death toll at 25,000.
2001 Taliban forces abandoned their last bastion in Afghanistan, fleeing the southern city of Kandahar.
2004 Hamid Karzai (HAH’-mihd KAHR’zeye) was sworn in as Afghanistan’s first popularly elected president.
2017 Democratic Sen. Al Franken said he would resign after a series of sexual harassment allegations.
2018 James Alex Fields Jr., who drove his car into counter-protesters at a 2017 white nationalist rally in Virginia, was convicted of first-degree murder.
2020 Retired Air Force Brig. Gen. Charles “Chuck” Yeager, the World War II fighter pilot ace and quintessential test pilot who in 1947 became the first person to fly faster than sound, died at 97.
2022 Aaron Judge signed a nine-year, $360 million contract – baseball’s biggest free agent deal in history to that point – to remain with the New York Yankees.
Today’s birthdays: Linguist and political philosopher Noam Chomsky, 95. Bluegrass singer Bobby Osborne, 92. Actor Ellen Burstyn, 91. Broadcast journalist Carole Simpson, 83. Baseball Hall of Famer Johnny Bench, 76. Actor-directorproducer James Keach, 76. Country singer Gary Morris, 75. Singer-songwriter Tom Waits, 74. Sen. Susan M. Collins, RMaine,, 71. Basketball Hall of Famer Larry Bird, 67. Actor Priscilla Barnes, 66. Former “Tonight Show” announcer Edd Hall, 65. Rock musician Tim Butler (The Psychedelic Furs), 65. Actor Patrick Fabian, 59. Actor Jeffrey Wright, 58. Actor C. Thomas Howell, 57. Actor Kimberly Hébert Gregory (TV: “Kevin (Probably) Saves the World”), 51. Former NFL player Terrell Owens, 50.