NOW & THEN
26 JANUARY
1340: English King Edward III was proclaimed king of France.
1348: Black Death began in England.
1531: Lisbon was struck by an earthquake, leading to around 30,000 deaths.
1736: Stanislaw I of Poland abdicated his throne.
1788: The first consignment of convicts from England arrived in Australia, at Sydney Cove.
1790: Mozart’s opera Cosi Fan Tutte premiered in Vienna.
1828: Duke of Wellington became Conservative prime minister.
1841: British sovereignty was proclaimed over Hong Kong.
1871: The Rugby Football Union was founded in London.
1875: Electric dental drill was patented by George F Green.
1905: The Cullinan diamond, the largest in the world, weighing more than 1lb 4oz, was found at the Premier Mine in Pretoria, South Africa.
1908: The 1st Glasgow Boy Scout troop was registered, the first to be formed.
1926: The BBC broadcast the first shipping forecasts.
1931: Mahatma Gandhi was released from prison in India for discussions with the government.
1934: Germany signed a tenyear non-aggression pact with Poland.
1939: Filming began on the epic movie Gone with the Wind.
1942: First US expeditionary force arrived in Europe, with troops put ashore in Northern Ireland.
1950: India was proclaimed a republic within the Commonwealth.
1968: The National Provincial and Westminster Banks merged, under the name National Westminster Bank.
1982: Unemployment in Britain rose above three million for the first time since the 1930s.
1991: Seven Iraqi warplanes flew to Iran and the Pentagon said at least two dozen had landed there in recent days.
1993: Chancellor Norman Lamont cut interest rates to 6 per cent, the lowest level for more than 15 years.
1998: American President Bill Clinton went on television to deny that he had had an affair with Monica Lewinsky, a member of the White House staff.
2001: An earthquake hit Gujarat, India, killing more than 20,000 people.
2004: President Hamid Karzai signed the new constitution of Afghanistan.
2009: Steelmaker Corus confirmed that it was to cut 3,500 jobs worldwide, including around 2,500 in the UK.
2009: Iceland’s coalition government collapsed under the strain of the economic crisis in the country and around the world, with the whole cabinet resigning.
2011: Former Scottish Socialist Party MSP Tommy Sheridan was jailed for three years for committing perjury.
2015: Libby Lane was ordained the first female bishop of the Church of England.
2020: American basketball legend Kobe Bryant and his 13-year-old daughter Gianna were among nine people who perished in a helicopter crash in California.
BIRTHDAYS
José Mourinho, Portuguese football manager, 59; Jazzie B (Trevor Beresford Romeo OBE), rapper (Soul II Soul), 59; Anita Baker, soul singer, 64; John Brown, Scottish footballer and manager, 60; Sir Timothy Clifford, director-general, National Galleries of Scotland 1984-2006, 76; Ellen Degeneres, talk show presenter, 64; Kim Hughes, Australian cricketer, 68; Wayne Gretzky, ice hockey player and coach, 61; Tyger Drew-honey, actor, 26; Brendan Rodgers, football manager, 49; Heather Stanning OBE, Lossiemouthborn double Olympic and double World rowing champion, 37
ANNIVERSARIES
Births: 1908 Stephane Grappelli, jazz violinist; 1922 Michael Bentine, comedian; 1925 Paul Newman, actor; 1928 Roger Vadim, film director; 1945 Jacqueline du Pré, cellist. Deaths: 1823 Edward Jenner, vaccination pioneer; 1878 Kirkpatrick Macmillan, Dumfriesshire inventor of the bicycle; 2003 Viscount Younger of Leckie, politician; 2012 Alex Eadie, Labour MP 1966-92; 2017 Sir Thomas Dalyell of the Binns, MP 1962-2005; Michel Legrand, French film composer; 2020 Kobe Bryant, basketball player.