TODAY IN HISTORY
Today is
Jan. 4. Wednesday, Today’s highlight:
On Jan. 4, 2007, Nancy Pelosi was elected the first female speaker of the House as Democrats took control of Congress.
On this date:
In 1821, the first native- born American saint, Elizabeth Ann Seton, died in Emmitsburg, Maryland.
In 1935, President Frank- lin D. Roosevelt, in his State of the Union address, called for legislation to provide assistance for the jobless, elderly, impoverished children and the disabled.
In 1948, Burma ( now called Myanmar) became independent of British rule.
In 1964, Pope Paul VI began a visit to the Holy Land, the first papal pilgrimage of its kind
In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson delivered his State of he Union address in which he outlined the goals of his “Great Society.”
In 1974, President Richard Nixon refused to hand over tape recordings and documents subpoenaed by the Senate Watergate Committee.
In 1987, 16 people were killed when an Amtrak train bound from Washington, D.C., to Boston collided with Conrail locomotives that had crossed into its path from a side track in Chase, Maryland.
In 1990, Charles Stuart, who’d claimed that he’d been wounded and his preg- nant wife fatally shot by a robber, leapt to his death off a Boston bridge after he himself became a suspect.
In 1999, former profes- sional wrestler Jesse Ven
ttura took the oath of office as Minnesota’s governor.
In 2002, Sgt. 1st Class Nathan Ross Chapman, a U.S. Army Special Forces soldier, was killed by smallarms fire during an ambush in eastern Afghanistan; he was the first American military death from enemy fire in the war against terrorism.
In 2006, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon suffered a significant stroke; his official powers were transferred to his deputy, Ehud Olmert. (Sharon remained in a coma until his death in January 2014.)
In 2015, Pope Francis named 156 new cardinals, selecting them from 14 countries, including farflung corners of the world, to reflect the diversity of the Roman Catholic church and its growth in places like Asia and Africa.
Ten years ago: The government reported that the nation’s jobless rate hit 5 percent in December 2007, a two-year high, fanning recession fears. Britney Spears lost custody of her two sons to ex-husband Kevin Federline a day after police and paramedics were called to her home.
Five years ago: The new Congress passed a $9.7 billion bill to help pay flood insurance claims to homeowners, renters and businesses damaged by Superstorm Sandy.
One year ago: Nearly a year after the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, a poll by The Associated Press and the NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that only about 4 in 10 Republicans recalled the attack by supporters of Donald Trump as violent or extremely violent.