Today in History
Today’s highlight:
On Jan. 30, 1933, Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany.
On this date:
1649: England’s King Charles I was executed for high treason.
1931: The Charles Chaplin feature “City Lights” had its world premiere in Los Angeles.
1945: During World War II, a Soviet submarine torpedoed the German ship MV Wilhelm Gustloff in the Baltic Sea with the loss of more than 9,000 lives, most of them war refugees; roughly 1,000 people survived. Adolf Hitler marked the 12th anniversary of his appointment as Germany’s chancellor with his last public speech in which he called on Germans to keep resisting until victory.
1948: Indian political and spiritual leader Mohandas K. Gandhi, 78, was shot and killed in New Delhi by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu extremist. Godse and a co-conspirator were later executed.
1962: Two members of “The Flying Wallendas” high-wire act were killed when their seven-person pyramid collapsed during a performance at the State Fair Coliseum in Detroit.
1968: The Tet Offensive began during the Vietnam War as Communist forces launched surprise attacks against South Vietnamese towns and cities; although the Communists were beaten back, the offensive was seen as a major setback for the U.S. and its allies.
1969: The Beatles staged an impromptu concert atop Apple headquarters in London; it was the group’s last public performance.
1972: Thirteen Roman Catholic civil rights marchers were shot to death by British soldiers in Northern Ireland on what became known as “Bloody Sunday.”
1974: President Richard Nixon delivered what would be his last State of the Union address; Nixon pledged to rein in rising prices without the “harsh medicine of recession” and establish a national health care plan that every American could afford.
1981: An estimated 2 million New Yorkers turned out for a ticker-tape parade honoring the American hostages freed.
2005: Iraqis voted in their country’s first free election in a half-century; President George W. Bush called the balloting a resounding success.
Ten years ago: China suspended military exchange visits with the United States in protest over $6.4 billion in planned U.S. arms sales to Taiwan. Those exchanges were reinstated in Jan. 2011.
Five years ago: Mitt Romney announced that he had put “considerable thought into making another run for president,” but in the end, he decided to give other leaders in the Republican party a chance.
One year ago: President Donald Trump lashed out at his intelligence chiefs after they told Congress that North Korea was unlikely to dismantle its nuclear arsenal and that the Iran nuclear deal was working; Trump tweeted, “Perhaps Intelligence should go back to school!”