In 1848, US President James K. Polk sparks the 1849 Gold Rush by certifying a gold find in California.
People had previously made false claims that they had discovered gold, thus the Gold Rush did not begin until December 1848, when President James Polk backed up th...
Sikkim become an Indian protectorate in 1950.
In 1948, the Sikkim Darbar and the Government of India agreed a "Standstill Agreement" to alleviate the relationship, and a new treaty went into force. A...
Nelson Mandela, South African anti-apartheid campaigner, political prisoner, and South African President, died of a lung illness in 2013 at the age of 95.
Mandela died on 5 December 2013 at the age of 95, at about 20:50 local time, at his home in Houghton, accompanied by his family, after suffering from a lengthy res...
In 1992, 300,000 people demolished the Babri Mosque in India in order to uncover an ages-old temple devoted to Lord Ram; four people were killed in the process.
The mosque stood on the location where millions of Hindus believe Lord Ram, the hero of the epic Ramayan, was born, or "janmabhoomi." Over 1.5 lakh perso...
B.R. Ambedkar, an Indian politician, lawyer, and social reformer who inspired the Dalit Buddhist Movement, dies of diabetes at the age of 65 in 1956.
Ambedkar has been suffering with diabetes since 1948. Due to medicine side effects and bad eyesight, he remained bedridden from June to October 1954. During 1955, ...
Apollo 17, the final manned lunar landing mission, launched in 1972, with the crew taking the iconic "blue marble" shot of the whole Earth.
Apollo 17 commander Gene Cernan and his crewmates — Harrison Schmitt and Ronald Evans — oohed and ahhed over their home planet, poised in the blackness...
Mary, Queen of Scots, Queen of Scotland, was born at Linlithgow Palace, Scotland, in 1542.
Mary, Queen of Scots, commonly known as Mary Stuart or Mary I of Scotland, reigned as Queen of Scotland from 14 December 1542 until her forced resignation in 1567....
Rabindranath Tagore, a Bengali poet, is the first non-European to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 for his work "Gitanjali."
Rabindranath Tagore received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 "for his deeply sensitive, fresh, and beautiful poem, through which, with great ability, he...
In the year 1830, Emily Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts.
Emily Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, on December 10, 1830. She only stayed at Mount Holyoke Female Seminary in South Hadley for a year. Dickinson...
Alfred Nobel, the Swedish scientist who created dynamite and organised the Nobel Prize ceremony on this date, died at the age of 63 in 1896.
Alfred Bernhard Nobel was born on October 21, 1833, in Stockholm, Sweden. Alfred Nobel is well-known for the yearly prizes he bestows in research, literature, and ...
Dilip Kumar [Muhammad Yusuf Khan], the "Tragedy King" and one of the best performers in Indian film, was born in Peshawar, British India, in 1922.
Mohammed Yusuf Khan, well known by his stage name Dilip Kumar, was an Indian actor and film producer who worked in Hindi cinema from November 11, 1922 until July 7...
In 2019, India passed the Citizenship Amendment Bill, paving the path for immigrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan's minority populations to get citizenship.
On 9 December 2019, Minister of Home Affairs Amit Shah tabled the Bill in the 17th Lok Sabha, and it was approved on 10 December 2019 with 311 MPs voting in favour...
Delhi succeeds Calcutta as India's capital in 1911.
On February 13, 86 years ago, New Delhi became the power capital of undivided India, following a 20-year wait. On December 12, 1911, during the New Delhi durbar, K...
Mary Todd, the American wife of Abraham Lincoln and the first lady of the United States, was born in Lexington, Kentucky in 1818.
Mary Ann Todd Lincoln, the wife of President Abraham Lincoln, was the First Lady of the United States from 1861 until 1865. Mary Lincoln was a well-educated member...
Nostradamus, a French astrologer and prophet, was born in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France, in 1503.
Michel de Notredame, also known as Nostradamus, was born in the south of France in December 1503. His family was Jewish, but he converted to Catholicism at a time ...
In 1799, George Washington, an American Founding Father, military leader who commanded the Continental Army during the American Revolution, and the first President of the United States, died at the age of 66.
George Washington died between ten and eleven o'clock at night on December 14, 1799. His wife, who sat at the foot of the bed, his friends Dr. Craik and Tobias...
Vallabhbhai Patel, an Indian freedom warrior and politician, died in 1952 at the age of 75.
Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel was a leader of the Indian National Congress till his death. Many historians, like Ramchandra Guha, find it hilarious that Patel is being ...
1971 East Vijay Diwas After India's army takes Dacca and 93,000 West Pakistani forces surrender, Bangladesh's independence from Pakistan is acknowledged globally.
The 16th of December is an important day for India, as well as its neighbours Bangladesh and Pakistan. In 1971, India defeated Pakistan in a war that resulted in t...
Charlie Chaplin began his film career at Keystone in 1913, earning $150 per week.
Charles Spencer Chaplin was born on April 16th, 1889, in London, England. His father was a skilled vocalist and actor, and his mother, who went by the stage name L...
In 1971, In Kashmir, India and Pakistan have agreed to a cease-fire.
In Jammu and Kashmir, the line of control established by the December 17, 1971 cease-fire should be observed by all parties without regard to each side's ackno...
Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union's Dictator and General Secretary, was born in Gori, Tiflis Governorate, Russian Empire, in 1878.
On December 18, 1878, he was born in Gori, Georgia. Losif Jughashvili was his birth name. Stalin's parents were impoverished, and he had a difficult upbringing...
Emily Bronte, an English author, dies of TB at the age of 30 in 1848.
Emily Jane Bronte was an English author and poet best known for her one and only novel, Wuthering Heights, which is today regarded as a classic of English lit...
The Chinese invasion of Tibet in 1950 forces Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, to leave.
Following China's invasion of Tibet in 1950, His Holiness was called upon to take complete political control. He visited Beijing in 1954 and met with Mao Zedon...
In 1961, India liberates Goa and two other Portuguese colonies.
Unlike the Indian liberation war against the British, in which several heroes rose to oppose British rule, the Goan freedom movement was openly short and more of a...
In Menlo Park, California, Thomas Edison secretly tested incandescent light in 1879.
An incandescent light bulb, incandescent lamp, or incandescent light globe is a type of electric light that uses a wire filament that is heated until it lights. To...
Radium is discovered by scientists Pierre and Marie Curie in 1898.
Marie and Pierre Curie successfully extract radioactive radium salts from the mineral pitchblende in their Paris laboratory on December 20, 1902. In their pitchble...
After a dispute with fellow painter Paul Gauguin in 1888, Vincent van Gogh slices off his left ear with a razor and gives it to a prostitute for safekeeping.
For years, historians have been fascinated by Vincent van Gogh's ear, prompting them to devise a variety of ideas as to why the 19th century Dutch artist slice...
In 1912, Rash Behari Bose led the Indian revolutionary underground in Bengal and Punjab in an attempt to kill Viceroy of India Lord Hardinge by putting a handmade bomb into the Viceroy's Howdah during a ceremonial parade in Delhi.
On December 23, 1912, a bomb was hurled at Viceroy Lord Hardinge as his procession left Chandni Chowk. In the attempt, the Viceroy was injured, but his Mahavat was...
Isaac Newton, an English physicist, mathematician, and astronomer, was born in Woolsthorpe-by-Colsterworth, England, in 1642.
Sir Isaac Newton, born 25 December 1642, was an English mathematician, physicist, astronomer, theologian, and author (dubbed a "natural philosopher" at t...
Mao Zedong, the Chinese revolutionary and former Chairman of the Communist Party of China, was born in Shaoshan, Hunan, in 1893.
On December 26, 1893, the Mao family, rich farmers in Shaoshan, Hunan Province, China, welcomed a son. They gave the kid the name Mao Zedong. The father of modern ...
Benazir Bhutto, Pakistan's 12th Prime Minister and the first female leader of a Muslim country, was murdered by a suicide bomber in Rawalpindi in 2007.
Benazir Bhutto was the first Muslim woman to head a country. On December 27, 2007, a 15-year-old suicide bomber named Bilal assassinated Bhutto. She had barely com...
Subhash Chandra Bose waves the Indian independence flag in Port Blair in 1943.
Subhash Chandra Bose raised the Tricolour for the first time on free Indian soil on December 30, 1943, at the Cellular Jail in Port Blair during his visit to Andam...
Grigori Rasputin, a Russian monk and companion of Russian Tsar Nicholas II, was killed by reactionary Russian aristocracy in 1916 at the age of 47.
The assassination of Rasputin, Russia's iconic "Mad Monk," provides fuel for a wonderful historical storey that combines truth and mythology. However...
Saddam Hussein, the President of Iraq, was hung in Baghdad in 2006 at the age of 69.
Saddam Hussein was executed by hanging on the morning of Eid al-Adha, December 30, 2006, for crimes against humanity. It is a day that will live on in the minds of...
