DAILY ALMANAC
Today is Monday, Dec. 27, the 361st day of 2021. There are four days left in the year.
On this date in:
1831: Naturalist Charles Darwin set out on a round-the-world voyage aboard the HMS Beagle.
1932: New York City’s Radio City Music Hall first opened.
1949: Queen Juliana of the Netherlands signed an act recognizing Indonesia’s sovereignty after more than three centuries of Dutch rule.
1958: American physicist James Van Allen reported the discovery of a second radiation belt around Earth, in addition to one found earlier in the year.
1964: The Cleveland Browns defeated the Baltimore Colts 27-0 to win the NFL Championship Game played at Cleveland Municipal Stadium.
1968: Apollo 8 and its three astronauts made a safe, nighttime splashdown in the Pacific.
1979: Soviet forces seized control of Afghanistan. President Hafizullah Amin, who was overthrown and executed, was replaced by Babrak Karmal.
1985: Palestinian guerrillas opened fire inside the Rome and Vienna airports; 19 victims were killed, plus four attackers who were slain by police and security personnel. American naturalist Dian Fossey, 53, who had studied gorillas in the wild in Rwanda, was found hacked to death.
1995: Israeli jeeps sped out of the West Bank town of Ramallah, capping a seven-week pullout giving Yasser Arafat control over 90 percent of the West Bank’s 1 million Palestinian residents and one-third of its land.
1999: Space shuttle Discovery and its seven-member crew returned to Earth after fixing the Hubble Space Telescope.
2000: President Bill Clinton put the first Black judge on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals serving several Southern states. (The nomination of Roger Gregory had been stalled in the Senate, but Clinton used a recess appointment to put him on the bench.)
2001: Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld announced that Taliban and al-qaida prisoners would be held at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
2002: A defiant North Korea ordered U.N. nuclear inspectors to leave the country and said it would restart a laboratory capable of producing plutonium for nuclear weapons; the U.N. nuclear watchdog said its inspectors were “staying put” for the time being.
Actor John Amos (“The West Wing,” “Roots”) is 82. Guitarist Mick Jones of Foreigner is 77. Singer Tracy Nelson is 77. Actor Gerard Depardieu is 73. Jazz drummer T.S. Monk is 72. Singer Karla Bonoff is 70. Guitarist
David Knopfler of Dire Straits is 69. Actor Ian Gomez (“Felicity,” “The Drew Carey Show”) is 57. Actor Eva Larue (“CSI: Miami”) is 55. Actor Wilson Cruz (“Party of Five,” “My So-called Life”) is 48. Actor Masi Oka (“Hawaii Five-0,” “Heroes”) is 47. Actor Emilie de Ravin (“Once Upon A Time,” “Lost”) is 40. Actor Jay Ellis (“Insecure”) is 40. Guitarist
James Mead of Kutless is 39. Singer
Hayley Williams of Paramore is 33. Singer Shay Mooney of Dan and Shay is 30. Actor Timothee Chalamet is 26.